The past few years have presented many economic challenges for the fire service and our resiliency has been tested on many levels. Now, more than ever, we’re all striving for efficiency in everything we do, but what does that really mean? As the now very familiar saying goes, it means “doing more with less,” and it is the expectation of government administrators across the country. As a result, we must continually demonstrate our value within the communities we serve to garner the funds and resources we need to operate.
Although the fire service has always demonstrated a unique agility during tough times, today we find ourselves having to reinvent the ways we accomplish our job, and that, in effect, is changing our culture. But as we all know, cultural changes in the fire service are rarely well received. It is an administrative challenge to keep the workforce motivated in the face of diminishing job security, wage and benefit cuts, and the expectation to work even harder to prove our value to the community–which can pose an even greater challenge when it comes to recruiting new candidates into the industry. Ongoing attacks on pension and benefits packages have forced us to develop new strategies for recruiting and retaining a broad range of viable candidates.
Because this is a multifaceted problem, the solution must be as well. All tiers of the organization must take responsibility for maintaining a productive, positive workplace, even in the face of adversity.
Several factors contribute to fostering a productive work environment. Your compensation philosophy, the overall work environment, and the people you choose to hire are all critical when it comes to enticing, hiring and retaining firefighters and your future leadership in today’s market.
Compensation
Although we’re living in an economically challenging time, a complete compensation package must be a factor as we rethink how to compete for quality employees. The public sector will always struggle to compete with the earning potential of the private sector; however, most people don’t take public servant jobs to get rich. We typically take them for job satisfaction, the schedule and the idea that we’re getting paid to constantly contribute to the good of our community. But with pensions–the holy grail of public safety–under direct attack these days, there’s got to be more to the job satisfaction equation. The very nature of our business will continue to draw interest, but the romance of emergency services doesn’t feed the family.
It’s critical to consider two things when developing a wage and compensation package: 1) making reasonable comparisons between demographically similar agencies in your region and 2) low-cost benefits that can add to job quality and satisfaction. If you’re in an area that has several different fire departments in a close geographical area, you may want to take comparative surveys within that group while also looking at comparable municipalities in neighboring states. A good rule of thumb is stay within 5% of the market to remain competitive. The last thing you want to do is spend thousands of dollars training an employee so they can seek employment with a neighboring jurisdiction due to better compensation.
Low-cost benefits are often overlooked by organizations. They can be offered job-wide or in the form of an incentive program. Job-wide enticements are useful if you’re unable to meet or beat the comparable wage compensation of agencies within your market. One example would be to offer additional vacation or personal days. Sometimes this can also be used as a stopgap measure if pay raises aren’t readily available; however, care must be taken to minimize negative impact on staffing levels and avoid generating overtime expenses. This can typically be accomplished by setting parameters for when the additional time off can be used.
Incentives & Recognition
Incentive and recognition programs are another way to keep employees engaged and to create a favorable work environment. The key to a successful incentive program: Have a clear idea of the performance and/or behaviors you want to reward, and offer a reward that’s desired by your workforce. Rewards not only provide a sense of accomplishment for the employee, but they also reinforce the desired outcome for your entire staff or crew.
People like to know that their efforts are being noticed, and they’ll work harder if they know that they’re not being taken for granted. Recognition can be as subtle as stopping by their office or fire station and telling them how much you value their contribution, or it could involve rewarding a crew or individual with time off or some type of retreat. The bottom line: You have the opportunity to hold up the employee as an example of what your department values.
But this isn’t just a tool to be used when needed. It should be a prevailing attitude throughout your department, and it should include more than just a simple “thank you.” Leaders who do this take the focus off of themselves and make the success of the department, shift or crew about the individuals who made it happen.
Although recognition should be given to the team when they’re successful, the responsibility to recognize and appreciate others really belongs to everyone. Some would argue that recognition starts with the chief. But if you’ve got a crappy chief who rarely shows their appreciation for their people, why let them ruin how you interact with your crew, department and/or other people in your circle of influence? Yes, the chief can make bad decisions that will make your job more challenging, but you can still decide how you will work and behave within that environment.
Remember: People are emotional sponges; we tend to absorb and emulate the emotions around us. Everyone within an organization has the power to lead simply through their behavior and attitude.
We’ve all seen the power of influence at work, good and bad. Place that gung-ho probie in a station full of malcontents and what do you get when it’s time for them to rotate out? Another malcontent. But what happens if you take that same individual and put them with one of your highly motivated crews? Chances are they’ll turn out a very different person. Those first few months on the job can set the tone for a person’s entire career. Positive influence is everything when it comes to genuine cultural changes in your organization.
Dealing with the Dark Cloud
Of course, not everyone has a positive attitude or outlook, and corrective actions may need to be taken from time to time. Dealing with the chronic “dark cloud” employee is no one’s favorite job, but it’s the manager’s nightmare only if they allow it to be. Hoping that the problem will just go away on its own is a typical approach and yet the least effective. Addressing bad attitudes, poor performance and insubordination early definitively sends the right message to the individual and the rest of the department.
Remember: When taking corrective action, it should be in the spirit of educating and assisting that individual to better understand the mission and vision of the department and how their actions are incongruent with one or both. And the severity of the corrective action must match the severity of the infraction, with the objective being to change the behavior. Sometimes this takes only a gentle correction, while other times, you may need to show the individual that what they’ve chosen to do cannot and will not work in your agency, and maybe firefighting isn’t the best career choice for them.
This is not to say that you should make some happy by making another suffer. To the individual who does the right thing and for the right reasons, however, it can be confusing and frustrating to see someone continually break the rules without consequence.
Selecting the “People Person”
To continually foster a desirable work environment, it’s critical to replenish your workforce with personalities that will perpetuate a positive attitude. The employee selection process is critical, and today’s candidates are very different from the past: We have the tech-savvy youngster, the midlife career-changer and those with a great deal of military experience, to name a few. We also attract lawyers, bankers, military commanders and other well-educated people in a wide range of age groups. But where do you start when it comes time to hiring?
Most entry-level tests try to measure basic aptitude and physical ability, which are critical components of candidate selection. Something a bit more elusive, however, is how to identify the person who has strong interpersonal skills, the service-driven individual who understands that it’s not so much what you do, but how you do it.
Training someone to be a “people person” per se is considerably more difficult than training them to pull hose. Hiring an individual with an affinity for value-driven service will position your organization to meet the demands that are being put on the fire service, all other aptitudes presenting equally.
The crux of our mission in the fire service is fairly straightforward. We educate and mitigate. But how we do that is where we stand to make big gains when it comes time to lobby for funds or resources. It’s what sets us apart from other service providers and is the key to how the public and our elected officials perceive us.
The service-oriented “people person” is going to get you significantly more mileage in how your department connects with the public and the administrative body in charge of allocating funds each year. Grounding your business in the business of connecting with people will make managing your workforce easier and give you an edge when competing for funds within your municipality.
Opportunities, Not Obstacles
To some, the seemingly vast differences between the younger generation of firefighter and the seasoned veteran are a convenient excuse to disengage. The truth is, there have been generational gaps for as long as there have been generations. Another truth: People are people, and our needs and desires are not as different as outward appearances may lead you to believe.
We all want to feel valued. If you look at Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, belongingness, esteem and self-actualization are on the top three tiers. Basic human needs vary little from generation to generation. Recognizing that, it’s best to view the differences between us as opportunities instead of obstacles.
Connecting with Everyone
So how do you connect with such a diverse group? The young recruit has grown up in a high-tech, computer-based era. Today’s 21-year-old was born between 1990 and 1991. What were you doing in 1990? Trying to figure out how to send an e-mail or listen to a CD? Most kids today can do this by the time they’re five years old. These are the norms for the youth of today.
Bridging the gap between your senior members and the new, younger-generation employee can be as simple as 1) recognizing each for the value that they bring to the organization and 2) facilitating opportunities for each to teach and share their knowledge and perspectives. Begin incorporating the skills and technology the younger generation is comfortable with into your training program. Let them bring the suggestions to the table on progressive training techniques and marry them into some of the more traditional programs.
Tip: Getting people to talk to each other rather than about each other will almost always have a more favorable outcome. Draw on what your people are good at, because that will give them a sense of value within the organization.
Conclusion
Remember: There are things we can control and things we can’t. No matter how bad it gets, you can stay grounded in valuing your workforce and providing the best environment possible to do business. Working through these political and economic times is challenging, but we always have two choices: We can come at it full of blame and contempt, or we can take what we have and use it as a starting point. By focusing on the positive and what needs to be done now and in the future, you’ll help everyone around you weather the storm.
The alarms are going to continue to go off, and people are going to continue to need us. Cultivate the positive attitudes that will see you into the next operational period. This is the best job in the world. Don’t lose sight of that.
