Get Out of Your Comfort Zone: More Advice for the New Fire Officer

Comfort zones are a wonderful thing.  Avoid yours.  One of the most important, and difficult, things to do is get avoid simple acceptance of the status quo.  “We’ve always done it that way” are some of the most dangerous words out there.  On the flip side of the coin, change simply for its own sake, can be just as problematic.  The newest, latest, greatest, hottest change in tactics, tools, or techniques, isn’t always.   

Always what?  Well it’s not always great, or in some cases, actually new.  Recycling old ideas or techniques with new names and calling it progress has been part of the culture for a long time. 

So what is a new fire officer (or any fire officer for that matter) to do?  How about this for a radical idea—think.   

Think for yourself.  Don’t blindly accept either the status quo or the latest greatest.  Examine both with a high degree of rigor.  I’m not suggesting blatant disregard of standard operating procedures, whether existing or new, but there’s nothing wrong with looking at them critically.   

Challenge yourself.  Specifically select articles, blogs, and authors to read with whom you inherently disagree, and then try to read them with an open mind.  Evaluate their arguments dispassionately.   Look behind the data.  How was it developed?  Was the methodology valid or do you perceive flaws?  

 

They may not change your mind, but you will better understand the arguments others are making on a particular topic.  Reading in this way also opens you up to the possibility that in some cases, you might need to acknowledge your own pre-conceived notions may not be correct. 

Try to find a few fellow officers, peers and superiors, with whom you can have a wide ranging, non-judgmental dialogue on fire service issues.  A few adult beverages (the operative word being few) can sometimes help lubricate these discussions.  The response “that’s #($*& stupid and so are you,” is not the type of conversation you are shooting for.  An open and respectful debate can sharpen thought processes, expose unanticipated flaws in policies and procedures, and overall, be valuable for all participants.   

I would be remiss if I didn’t point out; all of this is easier said than done.  Comfort zones are called that for a reason.  They’re nice enjoyable places to stay where you don’t have to think.  Critical thinking in this manner is one of the most important tools of the fire officer and leader.  Get out of your comfort zone and try it. 

Tradtionalists Take Note

There are a lot of good things one can say about being considered a traditionalist.  Stability, solid values, and steadiness are among them.  Not all the traits ascribed to this term, however, are considered positive.   Skeptics, intellectuals, and those who think outside the box, are commonly at odds with traditionalists.  The challenge is to combine the best of these worlds. 

In the current environment when many of our communities have decided that they can and will pay only X amount for fire protection; we can do one of two things.  We can take the traditional route and rationalize that our citizens don’t care or understand our needs (it’s all about us, right?) and complain that we can’t provide adequate service and will be endangering firefighter and civilian lives.  Or, we can understand the fiscal realities and explore alternatives in delivery of service, methodologies, staffing, multi-community alliances, on down to tactical changes.  Thinking outside the conventional system to allow us to provide the best and safest services possible within the inherent financial limits imposed by our citizens may result in some positive surprises. 

We need to be open to some “unpleasant” and mind challenging alternatives.  One area is the research and testing completed and still to be conducted on the many hard fast rules of strategic and tactical operations (attack modes, ventilation priorities and methods, etc.) may upset many traditionalists.  We learned these methods through historic experience and development and “know” the correctness of them.  Examining the validity of these “known” truths using scientific and engineering principles won’t change anything; after all, we’ve been successful for years this way.  Some folks may not like these results. 

Care in evaluating the validity of the test protocols and methodology used is vitally important.  After all, a test can be designed to prove almost anything.  But when care is taken to design testing to be as free of bias as possible, we need to give attention to the results, even if they were not what we expected (or hoped) to see. 

Reading a great book about the culture of U.S. Army leadership since World War II (The Generals by Thomas Ricks) got me thinking about much of this, especially after coming across a great quote.  Colonel Paul Yingling, who unfortunately retired after battles with Army traditionalists, noted that “Intellectuals are most valued when the dominant paradigm begins to break down.  In this moment of crisis, the heretics become heroes, as they have already constructed alternative paradigms that others haven’t considered.”  He closed with “…the challenge is to keep the skeptics from becoming extinct.” 

I don’t believe the fire service has reached that point, and hopefully never will.  Abandoning our past and traditions simply for the sake of change is a bad idea, but we all could take a lesson from this and try to remain open and intellectually curious.   Our fellow firefighters and the citizens we protect deserve nothing less.