A tension is emerging in today’s fire service that most are afraid to discuss. It isn’t about tactics. It isn’t about staffing models. It isn’t about generation gaps. It’s about responsibility without authority. Throughout the United States, fire officers find themselves accountable for more than they can control: safety and performance, morale, training standards, compliance and public trust. The authority to shape the conditions that lead to those outcomes often lies elsewhere. The tension that results from this doesn’t come across in policy manuals, standard operating procedures or standard operating guidelines. It comes across in hushed conversations and sleepless nights. Difficult decisions are made in the office long after the chatter in the apparatus bays stopped. If we don’t talk openly about it, the tension will destroy the culture that we try to build.
Expanding administrative environment
Local government accountability is nothing new. Answering to the city council and mayor is proper and the norm. Expectations that public entities should be transparent and operate with integrity are appropriate. However, the fire service today functions in an environment of additional risk-management layers, legal oversight, budget pressures and performance evaluations. Decisions that are made on the fireground are affected by forces that are many layers removed.
Fire officers are asked to provide better training outcomes with limited staff, to prevent injuries while reducing overtime, to meet compliance requirements with no budget increase and to maintain morale during organizational change. Individually, these aren’t unrealistic demands. Collectively, they add pressure. When the power to shift resources doesn’t equal the responsibility for outcomes, leadership is challenged.
Emotional cost that no one acknowledges
We talk a lot about physical bravery in the fire service. We don’t talk enough about emotional stress. Being a leader in a small box can be lonely. Leaders might silently battle to answer the question of how they can advocate for their crew without being contentious? How can they stand up for their people and still follow the chain of command? When is fighting harder the right thing to do—and when is it just ego?
When leaders find themselves in these situations, the easy thing to do is to either say nothing or to build resentment. Saying nothing protects one’s position but weakens that person’s influence. Building resentment protects one’s ego but weakens department culture. Neither is good for the organization.
Character test of leadership
Leadership is simple when it’s known who’s in charge and that person has the resources lined up. Leadership is difficult when authority narrows but accountability doesn’t. This is when true character is revealed: standing up for what one believes in professionally; disagreeing without being disagreeable; thinking of the organization before oneself; and knowing that not every battle is worth fighting. Character also means knowing that sometimes leadership means taking hits instead of punching down. Fire officers can’t take out their frustrations on their crews. Culture erodes fast when leaders blow off steam sideways.
Leading up without burning down
One of the most poorly developed skill sets in the fire service is upward leadership. We study and train endlessly on aspects of command presence and tactical-level leadership. We rarely, if ever, train on leading up through bureaucracy.
Leading up requires fact-based advocacy rather than an emotionally charged reaction, timed response over knee-jerk reactions, clear definition of risk and patience. Leading up also requires humility. Not every decision that’s made against one’s wishes is made with ill intent. Some decisions are made because of budgetary constraints, politics that might not be understood or legal advice to which one isn’t privy. Being a professional means understanding nuance, not abandoning principle.
Danger of cynicism
Consistently giving officers responsibility without authority breeds cynicism. Cynicism is corrosive because it happens subtly. It affects inflection. It alters how leaders talk about management. It permeates roll calls, shift talks and coaching sessions. Crews are observers. If they hear leaders preach frustration instead of professionalism, they write off outward frustration as acceptable behavior. The downfall won’t be operational in nature; it will be cultural.
A call to fire service leaders
This article isn’t an indictment of municipal government. It isn’t a criticism of chiefs or cities. This is an acknowledgement of a profession that’s under growing pressures.
The fire service must train leaders for more than just command on the fireground. They must be trained to lead through organizational stress, how to be politically aware without being political, how to be advocates without adversaries, how to be strong-willed yet able to deal with restrictions, how to be leaders with emotional intelligence.
Leading without power always will be a part of modern municipalities. That horse has left the barn. How we react is what we can control.
When leadership is tested
A soft humility takes hold when leaders realize that they might not have all of the levers to pull but they still pull the lever that is leadership. Leadership isn’t tested when one has a lot of authority over others. Leadership is tested when responsibilities are constant but authority is variable. It’s in those times that rank takes a backseat to character, and frankly, the future health of organizations will be determined less by how much authority that leaders have and more by how they lead when they don’t have it all.
