“&%$!” screamed the salty veteran. “I just got transferred to staff!”
If that sentiment runs through your department, you probably have a problem. Many fire service organizations have policies that impose periodic rotations on officers and supervisors. These rotations likely involve a stint in a staff position. The traditional view is that forced rotations are good for an individual’s career development and benefit the organization, and staff assignments create better qualified officers by exposing them to administrative tasks and giving them experience that may come in handy as they seek or attain higher rank. Thus, the experience gained in a staff position somehow makes the officer better, going forward.
I’ve yet to see any concrete, measurable evidence that validates this practice. If a staff assignment is of limited duration, usually about two years, then it’s probably a waste of time. I suspect this line of thinking is a carryover from a previous era and derived from the military practice of ticket-punching, where certain prerequisites need to be met before an officer can advance to the next higher rank. It often involves taking a position or attending a school for no other reason than it being a requirement for promotion. In many cases, these assignments are endured, not embraced.
Military comparisons
The emergency services closely parallels the military, especially when it comes to organization. Both are “line and staff” hierarchical-type services because that system is best for accomplishing the very serious nature of their respective missions. Both missions require their people to place their personal safety in direct jeopardy, thus the need for a rigid system.
Not everything the military does, however, is good for the emergency services. For example, forcibly rotating officers into staff positions for the sole purpose of punching a ticket on the path of career advancement is bad policy, poor personnel management and can have negative effects on an emergency services organization.
The careers of military officers differ from typical fire department officers in many ways. Their commands are vastly larger, often numbering in the thousands of people. Their assets and systems are much more diverse, intricate and complex. As they progress to higher rank, their commands expand exponentially, in personnel, material and geography, many times that of their civilian fire officer counterparts. For example, an Army infantry colonel in command of a Brigade Combat Team (BCT) may direct 4,500 soldiers and their associated tanks, personnel carriers, helicopters and support vehicles. Few but the largest fire departments can be compared to organizations of this scale. For the Army, it’s desirable for officers to move through the organization and gain the multi-disciplinary experience necessary to complete the mission—destruction of enemy forces. It’s a sound strategy … for them.
Choose wisely
Typically, civilian fire departments are much smaller than their military counterparts, thus requiring much smaller administrative staffs. There’s no doubt having well-rounded officers is a plus. I believe you can never have too much experience or too much education. But is forcing officers into staff assignments they may not aspire to or be qualified for, simply because they’re “next in line” for a staff job, the best way to maximize productivity? Considering the ever-present budget constraints most fire departments deal with, personnel management and staffing are always critical issues. Getting the maximum performance out of every position on your organization chart is absolutely critical.
Let’s say you need to fill a position in your departments Fire Code Unit. It’s a difficult task since officers aren’t exactly flooding your inbox with requests to transfer there. Past practices dictate you simply take the next captain on the promotion list or the least-senior captain and assign them there. According to theory, the captain and the department will benefit greatly from this two- to three-year assignment—an assignment the captain may neither want nor have the particular aptitude for. The captain may struggle through it, do the minimum and hold out hope for a transfer to greener pastures. Little of substance is accomplished during their tenure other than maintaining the status quo. In this case, no one benefits from this all-too-common scenario. The captain may have actually stagnated and the department realizes no gain from a fairly critical position.
A better idea would be to canvass your department for members with particular skill sets and desires to fill staff positions or lead staff units. If you need to fill the position of apparatus officer, why not look for an officer with known automotive or mechanical skills who is willing to make a five-year commitment? How about a facilities manager? Why not look for an officer with contracting experience who can actually put together a multi-year station upgrade plan that makes use of their project management and logistic skills? Why not advertise the vacancy and ask for résumés? It’s amazing what we can learn about our people if we just ask. Firefighters are known for having multiple and diverse skill sets. Why not tap into them? If you’re having trouble filling certain staff positions, why not be creative and incentivize them? Flexible scheduling is a great way to get people to step up. The department gets a happy, productive employee dedicated to making the best out of an otherwise undesirable assignment.
Better options
The fire service does a good job of producing amazing officers who can confront the most unbelievable disasters and incidents with cool, level-headed decision making skills. But those skills take years to develop and are finely honed. Is it realistic to suddenly take a field officer with 20 years of experience out of the position you have trained them for and put them behind a desk and expect great things? To what end? It’s worth mentioning that we rarely give new staff officers the training commensurate with their new position. Often there’s a large amount of on-the-job training and “learning the ropes” that go with a new assignment. This takes time. Does it make sense spending six months getting an officer up to speed for a job they may only hold for two years? This further degrades the effectiveness of the position, especially in jobs with high turnover rates.
If rotations are such a great idea, then why don’t we rotate the administrative staff? Wouldn’t this logic apply across the board? Getting some of the administrators out into the field for six months should by all accounts make them better at their jobs since they would have a better understanding of the people and mission they are supporting. Food for thought.
If rotating field officers into staff positions is a must for your organization, a much better idea would be to design a system where newly promoted officers, like our captain from the previous scenario, are put through a series of assignments much like an internship over the same two-year time frame. In this “internship,” officers are rotated through various staff units where they assist the permanent head of the unit for a shorter time period of four to six months. This allows the new officer to learn from the permanent unit head, to gain exposure to the unit’s mission, policies and procedures without the pressure and responsibility of command. Rotating through a designated series of four to six staff units—like fire code, fire prevention, technical support, facilities, apparatus and safety—could be done in a two-year time frame. This scenario allows exposure to many more aspects of the inner workings of the administrative side of the job than if an officer is assigned to one unit under the old “one-and-done” mentality.
Some officers like staff work and are highly effective at it. There’s nothing wrong with that as we all have different talents and skill sets. Many find the sense of being able to work on programs or initiatives, or accomplishing other tasks behind the scenes a source of great personal pride and satisfaction. Organizations should seek out these officers and work with them. Offering officers who wish to stabilize in staff positions the opportunity to do so can produce excellent results, especially if they have an aptitude for the position. This approach offers a distinct upside to both line and staff officers and the department.
Again, let’s bring back our newly promoted captain: The captain has been assigned as the department’s apparatus officer for a two-year stint. Unfortunately, the department’s budget for new apparatus is projected to be zero for the next three years. The good captain now spends the next two years lording over oil changes and tire-pressure checks. After two years, the captain rotates back to a field spot and puts the whole staff nightmare behind them. Their replacement, however, is in a bind. With the new budget approved the department is looking to replace three pumpers and two medic units over the course of the next three years. The replacement has about a year to learn the procurement system, the inner workings of the apparatus unit, the bid process, the budgeting aspect, how to spec out the vehicles, what the maintenance shops requirements are, who the key players in the process are (to develop professional, working relationships) and so on, before they have to commit to spend millions of taxpayer dollars. Having a permanent, seasoned, experienced, and trained officer to guide the replacement captain through this process is critical to the success of the mission.
Finally, another alternative is to send your officers to an administrative course at some designated point or intervals during their career progression. The Army uses a succession of leadership schools called Non-Commissioned Officer Education System (NCOES) to train non-commissioned officers at various intervals while allowing them to stay in their primary Military Occupational Specialty (MOS). Anyone who ever went through these advanced training courses knows how effective they are.
In sum
In football, both sides of the ball (offense and defense) are critical for success. The fire service must also recognize that both sides of the ball (in line and staff organizations) are critical for success. They must also realize that not everyone has the capacity or desire to play offense and defense. Wide receivers rarely make good linemen. But knowledge of everyone’s job or responsibility helps the entire team play together effectively. Excellence, proficiency and desire are all factors that should be taken into consideration when putting together a top-notch administrative staff as well as field commands.
