Welcome back to The Flipside of the Firehouse. This is where we talk about the things that don't always make it into reports, policies, or training manuals. The real conversations, the tension, the leadership moments that happen in the bay and around the kitchen table. The things that actually shape a crew, for better or worse.

When I first got to my newest duty station at Aviation Rescue Swimmer School in Pensacola, FL, way back in 2010, there was a lesson I was about to learn that only the maturity and experience of a great mentor could teach me. It was one that, up until that point, I didn’t even realize could be a hindrance to my job scope, especially one in the emergency response world. That lesson was about underreacting to situations.

It was in my first weeks of being on the job when I was learning my job as the lead SAR Corpsman and quasi-medical director of swimmer school. I was taking over for a “legend” of sorts in our job field, and one day while we were working over some logistics things I’d need to be responsible for, the pool deck emergency alarm rang out. It was my first one, and I was eager to show the rescue swimmers that their new lead medical guy was just as capable as the “legend” he was replacing.

It was for a shallow-water blackout. It happened from time to time when aspiring rescue swimmer candidates did not listen to the instructors and tried to hyperventilate themselves before an underwater swim they had to complete. This poor guy’s reflex didn’t kick in, and our guys had to pull him out.

Our swimmers are at a first-responder level, quite capable of handling the initial response, and knew exactly what to do. Nonetheless, I dashed out of the office, across the pool deck. I just happened to look back, and my mentor was casually walking across the pool deck. My first thought was, “It’s an emergency, why is he walking?”, but I figured he knew I was capable and was letting me strut my stuff. I was wrong.

When I got to the candidate, our swimmers had already brought him back, and he was starting to come to and coughing up some water. They did exactly as they had been trained, and I casually took over to do a deeper assessment and assumed care of the patient. He ended up being fine, a little embarrassed, and got a stern talking-to by his instructor cadre for not following the rules.

We got him off to the hospital for aftercare, and I thought that was the end of it. But later in the day, my mentor asked me why I ran across the pool deck. I thought it was a question my parents would have asked or scolded me for when I was young, running around the pool. But I answered and said what I thought was the obvious: “It’s an emergency; I wanted to get there ASAP.”, I said.

A hard-learned lesson in leadership

Now what I thought he was going to mention was something that these rescue swimmers are trained more than the fleet guys specifically for this, or as scary as shallow water blackouts were, they are somewhat common here because of the high-risk environment we train in, all of which were true. But what he said, I was not even thinking about, and it was a lesson in leadership I’d never forget and is the hardest to master.

He said, “When we heighten our emotions and react in ways that change the dynamics of the people around us, we bring unnecessary emotion and anxiety into the mix when we don’t need to, and that causes others to worry and question themselves when they don’t need to.”

That floored me at the time, but he was 100 percent right, especially in the EMS field.  Our rescue swimmer instructors were fully capable of working on the oxygen-starved candidate. By me running and overreacting, I had unnecessarily added a sense of urgency and a “holy crap” moment that didn’t need to be there. They could have questioned themselves, be doubting their skills at the moment, and even been thinking something like, “If Doc (our nickname at the school) is worried, should I be?” or “What does he see that I don’t?” All things they didn’t need to be worried about.

In the end, they did awesome; the kid survived just fine and eventually graduated from the school.

That lesson, though, has stayed with me because it exposed something most leaders do not recognize until much later in their careers: our reactions carry more weight than we think. We may believe we are responding to a problem, correcting a mistake, or showing urgency, but the people around us are often responding less to the situation and more to us. They are watching our faces, listening to our tone, and measuring the speed and intensity of our response. Before we ever give an order, ask a question, or make a decision, we have already communicated whether the moment is manageable or whether everything is about to come apart.

Leaders set the emotional temperature of the room. That happens on the fireground, in the apparatus bay, during training, and around the kitchen table. It happens when a new firefighter makes a mistake, when a senior member pushes back, when a task gets missed, or when information reaches us before we have the full story. Our people look to us for more than direction. They look to us for a signal. They want to know how serious the situation is, whether they should be concerned, and what kind of response is expected. When we overreact, even unintentionally, we send the message that the situation is bigger, worse, or more threatening than it may actually be.

Underreacting helps in leadership

That is why I believe underreacting is one of the most valuable and underdeveloped leadership skills in the fire service.

Underreacting does not mean ignoring a problem. It does not mean lowering standards, excusing poor performance, or avoiding difficult conversations. It does not mean sitting back when action is required. Intentional underreaction means controlling your initial response long enough to understand what is actually happening and then choosing the level of energy the situation truly deserves. It is the difference between reacting emotionally and responding deliberately.

There is a misconception that strong leadership has to be loud, immediate, and forceful. Some leaders feel they have to make their presence known whenever something goes wrong. They raise their voice, take over the conversation, and start issuing directions before anyone has had a chance to explain what happened. They may believe they are showing confidence, but often they are showing that they have lost control of themselves. The problem with that kind of leadership is not only the immediate tension it creates. The bigger problem is what it teaches people to do the next time something goes wrong.

If every mistake is met with an explosion, people stop admitting mistakes. If every piece of bad news elicits anger, people delay delivering it. If every disagreement becomes a confrontation, people stop offering honest opinions. The leader may think the crew has become more disciplined, when in reality the crew has become more careful about what they say in front of that leader.

That is not accountability. That is self-protection.

Real accountability requires people to tell the truth. They have to be willing to say, “I missed it,” “I made the wrong call,” or “I need help.” That level of honesty only exists when people believe they will be treated fairly. They may still be corrected. There may still be consequences. Standards still matter. But people need to trust that the leader will listen before deciding and responding to the facts rather than reacting to the emotion of the moment.

This is where underreacting becomes practical. A controlled response creates space for information. It allows people to explain what happened without immediately becoming defensive. It gives the leader time to separate facts from assumptions and intent from outcome. It also helps determine whether the situation is an isolated mistake, a training issue, a communication failure, a performance problem, or something more serious.

Not every mistake deserves the same response. A firefighter forgetting a piece of equipment during station duties is not the same as intentionally ignoring a safety procedure. A new member struggling with a task is not the same as a senior member refusing to meet the standard. A poor decision made with good intent is not always the same as carelessness. When leaders react to every issue with the same level of intensity, they remove their ability to distinguish between what is frustrating and what is truly unacceptable.

Eventually, the crew stops knowing what matters most. Everything feels urgent because the leader treats everything as urgent. When every problem becomes a crisis, the word crisis loses its meaning. People either become anxious about every small issue, or they begin tuning the leader out completely. Neither outcome helps the organization.

The fire service already asks people to operate in high-stress environments. Our members respond to situations where uncertainty, pressure, and risk are part of the job. The station should not become another place where people are constantly trying to predict a leader’s mood. Crews perform better when expectations are clear, and leadership is consistent. They should know that when the situation is truly serious, the leader will act with urgency. They should also know that everyday problems will be handled with perspective.

Calm leadership should never be confused with weak leadership. In fact, staying composed often requires more discipline than losing your temper. Anyone can react. It takes control to pause, ask questions, and decide what the situation actually needs. That pause may last only a few seconds, but those seconds can prevent a leader from saying something that damages trust or from making a decision that later has to be undone.

This is especially important for officers who were promoted because they were decisive firefighters. The habits that made someone effective during an emergency do not always transfer directly to leading people in the station. On the fireground, hesitation can be dangerous. In personnel situations, immediate action without context can be just as damaging. Leaders have to know which environment they are in and adjust accordingly.

The fireground often demands fast decisions. The firehouse usually demands thoughtful ones.

That distinction matters because leadership is not only about solving the problem in front of you. It is also about considering what your response teaches everyone watching. Does it teach them to communicate early or wait until the last minute? Does it teach them to own mistakes or hide them? Does it teach them that questions are welcome or that disagreement is dangerous? Every reaction becomes part of the culture, whether we intend it to or not.

Crews watch patterns. They know which officers can handle bad news and which ones cannot. They know who listens and who interrupts. They know who corrects people privately and who embarrasses them in front of the room. They also know which leaders calm a situation and which leaders make it worse. A leader may forget the interaction by the end of the shift, but the person on the receiving end may remember it for years.

That does not mean leaders should become emotionless. People need to see that we care. They should know when something is important and when a line has been crossed. The goal is not to remove emotion from leadership. The goal is to keep emotion from taking control of leadership.

There are times when a strong response is necessary. Safety violations, dishonesty, harassment, and repeated failures to meet established standards cannot be handled casually. Underreacting is not a blanket response to every situation. It is the discipline to avoid giving a small problem a large reaction and the judgment to recognize when a large problem truly requires one.

The key is intentionality

An intentional leader asks, “What outcome am I trying to create?” before deciding how to respond. If the goal is improvement, the response should help the person understand the issue and correct it. If the goal is accountability, the expectations and consequences should be clear. If the goal is to gather information, then the leader has to listen. Too often, leaders say they want improvement but respond in ways that produce embarrassment, defensiveness, or silence.

Underreacting also protects the leader’s credibility. When a leader is known for staying composed, people pay attention when that leader becomes serious. The change in tone means something because it is not used every day. Leaders who are constantly angry have nowhere else to go. Their strongest reaction becomes normal, and eventually it loses its effect.

There is also a personal cost to constant overreaction. Leaders who treat every issue like an emergency carry unnecessary stress through every shift. They replay conversations, stay angry longer than the situation deserves, and bring that tension home. Intentional underreaction does not only benefit the crew. It helps leaders preserve their own energy and focus it on the situations that matter most.

The truth is that most of us will not recognize our overreactions in the moment. We will justify them. We will say we care about standards, that people need to toughen up, or that the crew should already know better. Sometimes those statements may even be true. But the more important question is whether our response improved the situation. Did it improve performance? Did it increase understanding? Did it build trust? Or did it only allow us to release our frustration?

Leadership is not measured by how strongly we feel in the moment. It is measured by what happens after we respond.

The art of underreacting is not about becoming passive. It is about becoming deliberate. It is about understanding that the leader’s reaction can either organize the room or disrupt it. It can invite honesty or create hesitation. It can build confidence or spread anxiety. The situation may not always be within our control, but our response usually is.

Like any leadership skill, this one has to be practiced intentionally. It will not develop simply because we understand the idea. The real test comes when we are tired, frustrated, embarrassed, or surprised. Those are the moments when our first reaction is most likely to take over. The goal is not perfection. The goal is to become more aware, more consistent, and more disciplined over time.

What can you do?

Before your next shift and your next interaction on that shift, try this;

1. Create space before you respond - When someone brings you a problem, gives you bad news, or admits a mistake, take a breath before answering. You do not need to stare at them silently or turn the moment into a dramatic pause. Just give yourself enough time to move past the first emotional response. Ask yourself whether you have the full story and whether the issue requires action right now. A few seconds of control can prevent hours of damage.
2. Ask questions before making conclusions - Start with, “Walk me through what happened,” or, “What am I missing?” Those questions do not remove accountability. They improve it. They help the leader understand the conditions, decisions, and intentions that led to the outcome. They also signal that the conversation will be based on facts rather than assumptions. Once the information is clear, the leader can address the issue directly and fairly.
3. Match your response to the actual problem - Before deciding how much energy to bring into the situation, determine what kind of problem you are dealing with. Is it a mistake, a pattern, a training gap, a communication failure, or a character issue? Each one requires a different response. Do not give a first-time mistake the same reaction as repeated misconduct. Do not treat frustration like an emergency. Bring the level of urgency, correction, and consequence the situation deserves, and no more.

Underreacting is not doing less. It is leading with control, perspective, and purpose.

Sometimes the strongest response is the one you choose not to have.

That’s leadership.

As always…if something in this column makes you pause…

If it creates an ah-ha moment…

If it causes you to see something differently…

Or if it is something you dismiss now but remember later when you need it…

Then it is doing its job.

That is why I am here.

That is the flipside.

Until next month.