How do you control a seriously speed-happy engineer?
Click here to read the solutions to the May Personnel Problem of the Month: Electronic Hang-Ups
Problem to Ponder
You're a newly promoted captain and have just been assigned to an engine company in a busy part of town. You know everyone assigned to your new truck, but you've never worked with them before. It's your first shift at the station, and 10 minutes after getting there, you get an alarm for a house fire in your first-due area; leaving the station, you see a column of smoke about a mile away. As you approach the first intersection en route, the light is red, and your engineer is not slowing down (you keep saying to yourself, "I know he'll stop"). As you get to the intersection, your engineer does not stop, but very skillfully manipulates the truck through the intersection and continues at Mach speed toward the fire. You turn around to look at your firefighters' expressions, thinking they'll be just as dismayed as you are, and they're unbelted, turning out and acting like this is business as usual. How would you bring this uncontrolled situation back under control?
Please e-mail your responses to FireRescue@FireRescue1.com, or e-mail your solution to frm.editor@elsevier.com. Please include your name, rank, department name and contact information. Although we will not print identifiable information without your consent, we must confirm your identity. We'll post reader responses here, as well as in the April issue of FireRescue.
Solutions to May's Personnel Problem of the Month: Electronic Hang-Ups
Hang Up & Get to Work
Cell phones have no place on emergency calls
Last month's problem had you pondering a roving (or floating) firefighter, "Scott," who answered his cell phone while working an EMS call involving a heart attack victim (see "Electronic Hang-Ups," May issue, p. 86). Let's take a look at the four responses I received for this problem.
The Reponses
1) "First, check to see if your ‘rover' has an emergency of his own. If he does, see if he needs immediate relief. This will determine if you need to call another unit so adequate care can be provided to the patient; otherwise you may need to step up and get busy with your patient. If Scott does not have an emergency of his own, advise him to continue to provide care for the patient, without answering additional calls. When you return to the station, determine the facts surrounding the phone call, and review the department's cell phone policy with Scott. I have a huge pet peeve about cell phones on calls, especially if they go off during a call. But we are away from our homes for long periods of time, and there may be a family medical emergency that needs our attention."
2) "Our department experienced this very issue. This happened on a BLS call for the engine. While the crew was taking the patient's vitals, the firefighter's cell phone rang. He actually got into an argument with his wife over a purchase she had made that day. The officers counseled him about appearances and their duty to the public, and the issue was brought up at the next staff meeting, prompting a discussion on the development of a cell phone policy.
"We proposed banning all communication devices; this raised all sorts of hues and cries, especially from those employees who were expecting the birth of a child. So labor/management developed a compromise that allows firefighters to carry alpha pagers while on duty. This allows for emergency contact in case of childbirth or issues with elderly parents or children in daycare. Firefighters can only carry cell phones during off-productive hours, and not out in public. We based our decision on public perception, safety (using the phone while driving or otherwise engaged in activities, including training), crew productivity and safeguarding patients' rights to privacy (cell phone cameras). Are phones completely gone from training sessions and emergency scenes? Probably not, as some officers are more interested in being liked than respected. However, it is a rare problem in our department nowadays."
3) "Obviously it's always best to address a problem before it manifests, but who would believe that we have come to a point in our society and our fire-service culture when cell phones could take precedence over an emergency response? I doubt the call would have changed the outcome of the incident, but that is not the point. Our customers need and deserve our undivided attention when we respond, and we have a duty to act when we are called.
"I would immediately and very directly inform the young man that he must end the call and focus on his patient. Upon returning from the incident, I would further express that taking or placing personal calls while conducting fire-related business is not acceptable, for the aforementioned reasons. If the young man's disposition was one of remorse and he appeared sufficiently contrite, I would take the issue no further. However, if he wanted to defend his position and make this a bigger deal, I would gladly take him to task and move the issue up the chain of command, with full confidence that my position would be supported."
4) "Fortunately, we have not yet had to develop a standard operating guideline (SOG) specifically addressing this type of issue — although guidelines pertaining to ‘conduct unbecoming' or ‘dereliction of duty' are darn close fits. Scott needs to be reprimanded in private and held responsible for purchasing a pie for each of the companies in this battalion/shift. If this behavior continues, Scott will not have enough money left after pie purchases to pay his cell phone bill, and therefore the problem will be resolved without further intervention."
Feedback
I'd like to start out with an issue that is becoming a big topic in the fire service these days, because it relates to this problem. Lots of people are talking about how screwed up the new generation of firefighters is, and asking how to effectively supervise them. I'm sure this is the same thing the old-timers said about my generation when we first got hired, and I'd bet in another 20 years, the generation we're currently hiring will say the same thing about the next bunch of kids.
I was recently at the Fire Department Instructors Conference (FDIC), where I attended a two-hour class called "How to Manage the New Generation of Firefighters." It was a very good class, describing in detail all the events and trends that have occurred in our society since 1980 that have produced the generation of firefighters we're currently hiring. Obviously, the most significant development during this timeframe is technology.
The instructor compared the difference between being raised 40 years ago and being raised 20 years ago and, basically, it came down to one thing: My generation was raised with a shovel and hammer in our hands, and the current generation was raised with a mouse in their hands. The instructor stated that this new generation is smarter than previous generations, is generally a little less mature at the same entry-level age than we were and will do basically anything that a supervisor asks. They just need a little bit more direction than we did, and they also want to know all the reasons behind our actions (I guess "because I said so" just doesn't cut it anymore).
Shortly after taking this class, I walked into my 13-year-old daughter's room and witnessed her watching MTV while simultaneously text messaging someone with her cell phone. The particular band she was watching was singing (if you want to call it that) some sort of rap song, and you couldn't tell if they were male or female performers. I immediately turned off her TV set, took her phone away, told her never to watch that channel again and gave her the book "Oliver Twist" to keep her mind occupied.
As I walked down the hallway right after this event, I realized that my parents had done and said the same exact things to me 30 years before, when they discovered me listening to a vinyl Led Zeppelin album on my overpowered stereo while playing a video game.
Once I recalled this, I turned around, went back into my daughter's room, took her book away, turned on her TV, gave her cell phone back and quit bothering her. After this event, it seemed to me that there really isn't that big of a generation gap; history just repeats itself (like a broken Led Zeppelin record).
Back to reality and the problem at hand. I would bet that at least 99 percent of the people reading this article own and operate a cell phone. I would also bet that we all have answered our phone at one time or another when it was inappropriate. That said, most firefighters probably wouldn't answer or even carry a cell phone while on a call. It's stupid, it's rude and you can't do your job while you're talking on the phone. The biggest candidates for this type of behavior would come from the younger generation, early on in their careers. They were raised in a society where half the people you see are talking on a cell phone and it's just OK to do that.
Front-end management prevents many problems from happening; if you just supervise, you can prevent most inappropriate or bad behavior. But this problem is similar to the problem discussed last month ("Put Some Clothes On!" p. 86), in which a firefighter's inappropriately dressed girlfriend showed up at the station for a ride along. You just don't address such problems until they actually happen to you. I wouldn't review the rider policy with someone when they asked to have a rider come down, and I wouldn't review the cell phone policy with a new member of my crew. Most people know that you shouldn't answer a cell phone while operating at an emergency scene, or allow a rider to come to the station wearing just a bathing suit — these are no-brainers.
But in this case, it did happen and you're going to have to address it. I would ask Scott at the beginning of his cell call if everything was all right at home (response No. 1), and I would do this loud enough for the patient's family to hear. If he gave the "yes" nod — everything is OK — I would tell him to hang up and do his job. While wrapping up the incident, I would apologize to the family about the interruption and explain to them that I would deal with this after I got back to the station.
Back at the firehouse, I would simply tell Scott to never let that happen again — short and sweet. This would probably do the job. Sometimes you don't need rules, regulations or SOGs; you just need to supervise.
