Bruce Martin

Fire Nuggets Current Issue ®

Generations in the Firehouse

Part 3 — What Do I Do?

In the last two articles, we looked at the fire service mission, values and job, then the characteristics of the various generations in the firehouse, particularly the newer generations, X and Y. You have probably recognized some similarities among your crew – yourself, the older folks and the newer folks. So now what? What can we expect, and what do we do?

First off, repetitive, high-input training is becoming the norm. People don't quickly grasp the "new" set of skills we're presenting because they don't bring the background with them. This new skill set includes those things we mentioned before – building construction basic principles of mechanics (lefty loosy, righty tighty), problem solving, and more. Comprehensive training for new firefighters is also spreading out to other life skills that aren't consistently learned at school or at home: finances, physical fitness, nutrition, mental health and wellness, retirement planning.

Be explicit about your expectations. Remember that the assumptions you make about the assignments you give (and the level of accomplishment) are based on your values and experience, not your employees'. Many of our new firefighters have not had a significant job before and have to be shown how to produce quality work, from PPE use to apparatus maintenance to providing medical aid and firefighting. What criteria are you using to define quality at the line level? Speed? Courtesy? At-scene time? Save rate? Percent damage after arrival? Define quality and train to it.

Set specific standards and hold them, in all areas of your firefighters' duties. Where a verbal approach may work with older firefighters, you may find yourself writing more with your newer employees. Use the performance appraisal more seriously than you ever have before. The latest generations are used to written contracts from schools and parents, and they react well to them.

Above all, don't lower your standards and don't have differing standards for employees. You have a reason for requiring a SCBA donned within 60 seconds, and that reason doesn't change with your work force. Identify the important skills your firefighters need and use them as your base.

Be careful about allowing senior firefighters slack in job requirements. Aside from possible legal difficulties in that practice, being able to perform and provide service to your citizens remains a need at all levels of the organization, and at all stages of a career.

Set your standards, publish them and make them part of the fabric of your department. Use NFPA or state standards or standards that are specific to your agency, equipment and procedures. Just make sure they're pertinent and job-related. Explicit expectations provide a set of benchmarks for you, and they provide a target for employees. When employees don't know what's required of them, morale issues begin as people push attention away from themselves in an effort to define their own standards.

Consider formalizing the mentoring process. Many of us may recall a senior firefighter who provided informal leadership and guidance outside the chain of command. By acting as role models and counselors, these people are critical in developing new firefighters. It's in your best interest to choose the role models you want, and provide them with some training and direction.

This group of new firefighters prefers a somewhat contradictory supervision style: Be hands off, but be there. In other words, provide assignments, stand back a ways, and be ready to answer questions; but try not to hover or micromanage. Be ready to talk, talk, talk. Tell them what you're going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them.

Ironically, the organizational style most of us use is a legacy of one of the “Ghost” generations (the Silent Generation – WW II era). They had a strong work ethic, grew up in the midst of world conflict, local shortages and rationing, and patriotic sacrifice felt by most every family in the country. Their para-military style of supervision and training translates well into the fire service, but hits problems when the receiving generations (read X & Y) are exposed to it, because they don’t have the same set of experiences, and don’t have Silent generation folks as parents or even grandparents some times. To Generation Y, Vietnam is just a story. The Ghost Generation has left the workforce, but their presence is still felt in policies, procedures, values, cultures and habits in the firehouse.

With many employees, including Xers, directions seem to be accepted more readily if you exert authority from reason, rather than an expectation of blind obedience. In other words, tell them WHY we are loading the hose this way. People can internalize a task if they know how it relates to the organization's mission. Plus, the school system of the last 20 years has advocated telling students why they were learning their various subjects; most of your new firefighters come to you trained top ask “why.”

The newer firefighters' need for feedback requires that you provide support and assistance, perhaps more than you used to. Praise freely when it's deserved, and coach or counsel as needed and as soon as possible to enable the employee to make changes immediately and more effectively. Be sensitive to each individual's values, experience and abilities; nothing beats knowing your employees for successful supervision. Focus on behavior, not attitude, and be objective about the issues needing improvement. Define what's not acceptable (e.g. discourtesy towards the public) and what change you must see (e.g., please and thank you).

Rewards are difficult in the public sector, but use what you have. Medals, citations and letters of recognition are meaningful to people, as long as they're sincere. When it comes to rewards, people want to know that what they're doing makes a difference.

Learn to move faster in making change. Consider the speed of the world in which this generation was raised. The bureaucratic model is slow enough relative to the private sector, but changes within your discretion can be sped up if worthwhile.

Your instructors' methods may have to change as well. Students coming out of the current school system received information through a variety of media. If you haven't begun using every tool that's available to you, you need to start. These new technologies, especially online or computer training, aren't a panacea, but they are familiar to your new recruits. If your organization is embracing this technology, your instructors and supervisors have to demonstrate competence in order to send the message that it's part of your workplace.

Regarding station life, this generation of firefighters doesn't initially have a grasp of seniority. If "paying your dues" is part of your organizational culture, and you value it, you'll have to explain it and make sure it's fair and unbiased. Formalize what was informal.

Orient your company officers and training officers to this information. Their assumptions must change. The experience, skills and knowledge of incoming firefighters is different from what we've designed our training systems for. The technical literacy of new firefighters is lower, their interpersonal experiences are different, and they were surrounded by different social and historical events.

The fire service's blue-collar and paramilitary traditions were largely imported by our work force. Twenty to 30 years ago, a large segment of our candidates came from the trades or the military. Sociologists have observed that the blue-collar background of our personnel brought with it a variety of social behaviors designed to test character and maintain group solidarity. (See Real Heat: Gender and Race in the Urban Fire Service, by Carol Chetkovich [Rutgers University Press].)

Behaviors such as ritual insults and practical jokes that can be common and expected with one generation are foreign to a newer one. Our new work force will be bringing in their own traditions and expectations, forcing us to analyze what we're doing and deciding if it's valid. Are you doing something because it provides the best to your citizens, or because you've always done it that way?

How do we handle this new generation as a department?

Identify new needs for recruit training. Ask your company officers where the deficits are in their new personnel.
Identify and address changes in staffing, and deal with the gender, culture and generational differences using all the tools that are out there.
Identify important organizational values, and be able to explain why you do something when recruits ask (and they will!).

Overall, figure out how to convey this information in your organization and be ready to make an investment of time and attention in your agency's biggest investment — its people.

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