Officer Development Program: Where to Start and Lessons Learned

By Brad McCutcheon

The American fire service is finally embracing the need for robust training and development for the company officer. Where does a department with no existing program start?

• Bridging the Firefighter-to-Officer Gap: The Acting Company Officer Program
• The Company Officer: Being Present
• Succession Planning: Retaining Our Greatest Assets
• The Job of a Fire Officer: What the Books Don’t Teach About Managing and Leading

Plano (TX) Fire-Rescue’s Officer Development Program (ODP), now in its fifth iteration, began like countless fire department initiatives around the world—at the kitchen table. The disparity between the importance of the company officer and the training provided on promotion in Plano, as in most departments, was glaring. At a 2018 departmentwide strategic planning session, officer development emerged as a top priority. Departments that engage in strategic planning have a much better chance of quantifying departmental support for ODPs and other initiatives that members desire to see rise to the top of the chief’s priority list.

Every department is different—budgets, hazards, cultures, personalities, equipment, and so on. In building a successful officer development program, the steps must be adaptable and tailored to the department’s needs.

Step 1. Assemble a Team

Every program needs a champion, and a successful program champion needs a dependable and passionate team. The credibility and respect that each team member brings to the table are vitally important to an ODP design team. Plano’s team included officers and chiefs—lieutenants, captains, and battalion chiefs. The assistant chief of operations served as an absentee team member and a conduit to the department chief’s office.

Step 2. What to Teach

Training topics for a successful ODP should come from one place—the field. Plano’s design team brainstormed as many potential company officer training topics as possible. They broke them into four categories: strategy and tactics, administrative responsibilities, firefighter health and wellness, and leadership development. The team compiled the topics into an online survey and the assistant chief sent it to the department; nearly half the department completed it. “It’s hard to get that many firefighters to read, much less respond, to e-mails,” remarked then-Assistant Chief Chris Biggerstaff. “We knew we needed this program, but the survey showed us how badly our people think we need it, too.”

Step 3. Program Design

With the department’s officer development training topic wish list in hand, Plano’s team got to work building the program and found an expert and resources for every topic. If the resources didn’t exist, they created them. If an internal instructor was not an option, they leveraged relationships and brought in teachers from outside the organization. They determined that 10 class members was the maximum, with breaks every hour. There would be a classroom session in the morning with hands-on scenarios in the afternoon—no sitting in the classroom after lunch.

The class itself had to be different and raise the bar to a level commensurate with the importance of the company officer himself.

Brian Ingram, a truck captain and team member, said that Plano’s ODP was designed to be different from the start. “The class starts with physical training at sunrise. It’s not easy. But the entire instructor cadre, all the way up to the assistant chief of operations, is right there doing the same workout with the class. That’s different than standing in front of a class and telling them that physical fitness is important” (photo 1).

“That’s just one example of how we set a different tone,” Ingram continued. “We bring in breakfast and lunch. The chief of the department visits each potential class member in person and invites them to be in the class. We create a professional environment that’s different from most fire department training classes.”

According to the team, one of the most valuable tools they use is the class survey. At the end of every class day, the students receive an online survey addressing every topic covered that day and rate each on a scale of one to five; they also can provide additional feedback. Even the meals are surveyed. The anonymous survey has been invaluable in improving the program from one class to the next.

“The first thing we do when we start planning the next class is pull out the surveys,” Lieutenant Jared Barker said. “That’s where we start. If something doesn’t survey well, we take a hard look at taking it out.”

One thing that stood out in the initial survey was leadership development. As a result, core values, ownership, optimizing communication styles, and having students identify their own strengths and weaknesses are part of the leadership classes’ foundation. The fall 2021 and spring 2022 classes featured Moore (OK) Fire Department Battalion Chief Corley Moore delivering his “Nine Ls of Leadership,” a four-hour class designed to sharpen fire service leadership skills.

With every opportunity for company officers to be leaders, the department provides them with a management responsibility. Proficiency in administrative roles such as incident reporting and addressing firefighter injuries is the minimum expectation for all company officers. At the station, an officer must be the expert in those categories.

A popular administrative topic is discipline, taught by Plano’s Chief of Department Chris Biggerstaff. He enlists “actors” from the Training Division to act as employees in disciplinary role-playing scenarios. “We don’t have to make up the scenarios,” Chief Biggerstaff said. “Thirty years working with firefighters has provided far more interesting scenarios than we could ever make up on our own.”

While the engine and truck company lectures focus on specific functions like fire attack, ventilation, and vehicle extrication, the hands-on tactical scenarios are designed to simulate low-frequency/high-risk decision making for the early-arriving company officers at structure fires.

“This is a great example of a class that should be tailored specifically to a department’s standard operating procedures (SOPs),” said Plano Assistant Chief Jaime Reyes, who was instrumental in designing the scenarios. “Our first-arriving engine officer’s job is challenging. They’re expected to give a size-up, pack out, get a 360, give a situation report to the incoming battalion chief, and make decisions that will impact how the fire is going to go. We need to train on that repeatedly to set them up for success—not in a classroom but in a fire engine, wearing gear, with an elevated heart rate.”

Plano’s team used simulation software, three laptops, two big-screen TVs on rolling stands, portable radios, and two reserve engines to create a makeshift simulation lab (photos 2-3).

According to Plano Special Operations Battalion Chief Ryan Clark, a scenario facilitator, “Giving a size-up from the cab and then transitioning to the portable and walking their 360 helps reinforce those steps and identify opportunities to make their approach more efficient, like not missing critical radio traffic during that transition,” he said. “The reps build confidence and we’ve seen stronger leadership on the fireground because of that.”

Step 4. Funding

Dallas Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones famously said, “There are five keys to being a good salesman. Ask for the money … and I’ve forgotten the other four.” A legitimate ODP will eventually need a budget. Plano’s team began with the end in mind and designed the program accordingly. Most of the funds needed were for overtime for the instructors and the students. Other budget items included meals for the class and fees for outside instructors and guest speakers.

As with all the steps in the process, this will be different for every department. In Plano, we knew we had get on the fire chief’s calendar at the beginning of the annual budget process. The team put together a presentation encompassing the need for the program, the initial design, and the cost of it all. The chief seemed lukewarm on the idea but agreed to take the program through the budget process to city management. As with so many other first-year requests, it was not funded, but it wasn’t dead. The team reconfigured the design and the schedule to eliminate nearly all of the overtime and delivered the first class on a shift-based schedule. The ship was underway, but the schedule was unsustainable. The program would need funding.

The next year, the team and department leadership were optimistic. Then a global virus and unprecedented sales tax revenue uncertainty derailed the funding once again. It wasn’t until the third budget request that the program was approved as part of the department’s annual budget and it finally took its current shape.

This is one of the most important lessons learned for other departments building their own ODPs. It took nearly four years from the first strategic planning session until the class was finally delivered.

Step 5. Sustainability

Once the program is off the ground, it is time to plan for the future. The Plano team identifies class members who take an extra interest in the program and invites them to join the instructor cadre. New instructors may want to start by facilitating the scenarios or playing a support role, but they may also have a topic they are passionate about or new ideas for the class that will take it to the next level. Any ODP will grow and last far longer into the future if it is continuously fed new energy.

Lessons Learned

Although the goals and needs of every ODP will differ, the lessons Plano’s design team learned over the past four years can benefit departments starting their own programs.

• Departments with successful ODPs are eager to share their experience. Every officer and chief across the country that the Plano design team contacted was enthusiastic in discussing their programs and sent all the materials they had.
• Passion is essential to building a program. The team members must be passionate about officer development because, as with any new department initiative, it is easy to get discouraged. Delivering the program is equally grueling. Scheduling the instructor cadre and ensuring enough instructors are present at all times while avoiding burnout are imperative.
• Leverage your relationships. Creating a winning program depends on leveraging relationships. We relied on several departments for assistance: technology services, fleet services, logistics, dispatch, the training division, and the department’s administrative professionals. Having those relationships in place was invaluable.
• Bring in outside speakers. Nobody is an expert in their hometown. Engaging someone from another department who believes what you believe can strengthen the message to your department’s officers and lend credibility to your program. The fire service has some incredible speakers, and most of them may not be as expensive or hard to find as you think.

Hoping that a decent captain mentored a newly promoted company officer is a losing strategy. Building your department’s ODP based on its individual needs is shaping the culture and the future of your organization. The steps Plano’s ODP design team took to turn their department’s demand for officer development into a sustainable program are repeatable and customizable for any department.

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Brad McCutcheon is a 17-year veteran of the fire service and a captain with Plano (TX) Fire-Rescue, where he serves as the director of the Officer Development Program. He is a certified master firefighter and instructor with the Texas Commission on Fire Protection, has a bachelor’s degree from Texas A&M University, and is the president of the Plano Firefighters Association IAFF Local 2149.