One of the most critical roles in any fire department is that of the training officer (TO) or training chief (TC). Their responsibilities are varied and include the design, development, scheduling, and delivery of the department’s training program; record keeping and data management; interacting with other chief and company officers, outside training agencies, and other fire departments; and keeping current on changes in fire research and modern firefighting and rescue tactics. Although all these functions are critical in maintaining an effective training program, one task not mentioned above will guide the program’s direction: the development of the department’s training priorities.
Although functioning as the department’s TO/TC in a department of any size can be a challenge, performing this role in smaller combination or all-volunteer departments can be especially difficult. In many of these departments, the TO/TC will likely function as a “one-man band” without the benefit of a dedicated training cadre or administrative/support staff. In some cases, the TO/TC may be managing the department’s training program while also functioning as a deputy or assistant chief or a company-level officer assigned to a 24- or 48-hour shift. He may also be juggling additional responsibilities such as company-level supervisory functions, managing department daily operations, personnel, safety, fire prevention, or other critical functions. For this reason, developing clear and concise training priorities is especially important, as he will target your training efforts and reduce the likelihood of applying a time-consuming and generally ineffective “shotgun” training approach.
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As a 30-plus-year fire service department-level and regional instructor, former fire district training coordinator, and TO in two rural all-volunteer districts in southern Webster Parish, Louisiana, I have learned this lesson the hard way—through personal experience. Attempting to develop a training plan without an established set of priorities is much like watching a dog chase its tail; although amusing, at the end of the day, the dog has done nothing but tire himself out. Without those priorities in place as a guide, it is quite likely that you will find yourself chasing your own tail, wasting significant time and effort on the planning and delivery sides of the program.
So, where exactly do you start in developing your department’s training priorities? Obviously, the more services your department offers and the more diverse the district is in terms of building construction, building contents, and occupancy types, the more challenging this process will be. The one common enemy for any department will be that of time—the limited time available to you to deliver training programs, Especially in volunteer departments, the time available for training will likely be even more compressed when compared to having full-time or paid members on duty. As members are often on-duty for a 24- or 48-hour period, a training block can generally be scheduled into every shift either in the station or at the department’s training facilities. As such, the focus of this article will be on developing training priorities in combination departments using volunteers and all-volunteer agencies.
Managing Specialized Training
So, what services does your department provide beyond fire suppression responsibilities? Do you deliver emergency medical services (EMS) first response, operations-level hazardous materials, and basic vehicle extrication—all part of most combination and many volunteer departments’ service package? How about technical rescue operations such as rope/high-angle, water, ice, dive, confined space, trench, and wilderness rescue; technician-level hazardous materials response; or other highly specialized services? If so, how are they delivered within your department? If the expectation is that every department member will be able to perform all these specialized services at an advanced level, your training challenge has just become far more difficult because of the time required to develop and maintain these highly specific skills.
Developing specialized teams, either as a single-department unit or operating as part of a multiagency or regional response team responding together, will limit the number of members who require this time-consuming training. Certainly, another training option would be for state training agencies or private companies to deliver this specialized training. However, these services generally come at a considerable cost, which may challenge a combination or volunteer department’s limited training budget and may pose a time challenge to the volunteer members.
Certainly, there will be members of your department who may argue that training a limited number of personnel to perform, for example, high-angle rope rescue or relying on mutual-aid or multiagency team-based resources to complete this function may delay the ability to actually perform the rescue or operation—and they may have very valid points. However, it is critical to look at how often these skills are performed as compared to the training time required. More often than not, these will be low-frequency/high-risk events that may only occur once or twice a year.1 Although it would certainly be a solid practice to train all members at the “awareness” level (in the case of hazardous materials, the “operations” level) for these specialized skills should one of these events occur in your district, the time required to develop advanced skills departmentwide may simply not be worth the investment, especially given the trade-off in terms of limiting the time available for training on the more common and basic skills required for fire suppression, EMS, and vehicle extrication operations.
One final point on the more specialized fire department skills: Especially if the specialized team concept is implemented, you can schedule advanced training for these functions beyond the normal weekly or bi-weekly training times. This will not only sort out those who truly want to perform these functions from those who really don’t, but it will also strengthen the team concept. Obviously, if a multiagency or regional approach is being used, much of this training should occur with all team members attending. You can deliver basic awareness and operational support training to the full membership during scheduled drill nights.
Training Schedules
Now that we have discussed specialized skill sets and how to deliver that specialized training, let’s talk about training the members to perform the most common basic fire department functions: fire suppression; awareness- and operations-level hazardous materials response; basic vehicle extrication; and, in some agencies, EMS first response. For most smaller combination and all-volunteer departments that train as an agency even once per week, developing and maintaining these skills will be challenging enough.
One of the most basic structural guidelines for any TO/TC will be the training requirements as outlined by their state’s rating agency. These will designate the number of hours required for categories such as multicompany drills, company training, hazardous materials training, driver training, and officer training. Using these requirements as a framework for the training program will provide a solid structure for the training schedule. The specific topics identified by the department as priorities can then be plugged into this framework. It will also provide a tracking system that ensures the department meets the rating training requirements, which is a critical function for the member responsible for managing the training program.
Another consideration when developing priorities for your training program is the training meeting schedule for your department. Obviously, the more often your department meets for training, the more time you will have to deliver a wider variety of training; as a result, the number of priorities that can be addressed will increase. Given that, a weekly training night will be the best option for just about every combination or volunteer department. This will typically provide 50 to 52 training nights per year when holidays are considered.
Although not ideal, a bi-weekly schedule can also be adopted. However, at best, this will likely only give your agency 26 training nights per year, less holidays. Given all the topics that need to be covered, that schedule will provide very little margin for error; it’s likely that at least one to two trainings each year will have to be canceled because of bad weather or a fire/rescue incident.
In addition to the scheduled training nights, additional voluntary training can be scheduled for off-nights or Saturdays. Although there will be members who will not attend additional training, there will be those who will, especially if the drills are hands-on or deal with topics including the use of live-fire evolutions. You can use these additional drills as makeup sessions for members who have missed weekly training, or they can be factored in as “Members who go above and beyond” when considering personnel for a promotion, specialized training, or attendance at out-of-town conferences or seminars.
Setting the Priorities
The first step in the process of developing the department’s training priorities is to look at the skills that will be the most commonly required and to evaluate how well they are currently performed by the members. Skills that are judged to be performed well will likely require only periodic “maintenance” training vs. the skills that the department currently does not perform well, which may require significant, additional skill-development training. Typically, the skills that the department performs the most often will be the ones that are identified as being performed “well,” as the repetitive performance of a skill generally leads to good performance and, as such, intensive training on those skills will likely not be identified as a priority.
It’s important to understand that, even with often performed skills, it’s possible that bad habits can develop over time, which may require some retraining of members. Using an established evaluation system will give the department a mechanism for evaluating changes in how the members are performing skills. It’s likely the retraining process would be identified as a priority, as bad habits tend to get worse, not better, over time and need to be addressed as soon as possible.
Certainly, if turnover in the department is heavy, this will be even more of a challenge because the new members will require initial training on what the department does well. This can easily eat up much of the department’s training schedule and will often cause the more experienced members to not attend training, as they will be simply performing skills they feel they already do well. One way to approach this issue is to develop a solid rookie training program that will teach these basic skills so that once they start attending regular training, the newer members will have these skills.2
Training Priorities and Skills Inventory
So, how do we identify these possible deficiencies? One method is through simple observation by the training staff at both training and incidents. The staff can use not only subjective standards but also objective standards such as checklists or established time goals to accomplish specific tasks. Examples of time goals may include deploying and flowing water from 200 feet of 1¾-inch or 100 feet of 2½-inch preconnected handlines within 90 seconds, placing a hydrant in service within two minutes, or starting a saw within 60 seconds. These time standards should not be a secret but instead discussed during training so members understand the performance expectations of the command staff. In addition to the training staff, other chief and company officers can also take part in this process. This can be either an informal process, with verbal feedback on a member’s performance, or through a more formal electronic or written format. Again, it’s important that all involved understand that the purpose of the process is not to lay blame on the members if their performance is found lacking but rather to identify areas in which personnel or companies may require additional classroom training or field evolutions.
In some cases, the TO/TC may also solicit input from the officers of mutual-aid departments, especially if mutual-aid responses are common. This also has the benefit of using personnel in the evaluation process who can look objectively at the members’ performance without being concerned with “protecting” their or the department’s reputation.
The training staff can also use after-action sessions and reports to identify and discuss what went right and what went wrong at an incident, no matter how small. Although you should not use these sessions or written reports as a tool to beat down members for errors or delays in the operation, it is critical that leadership, including the TO/TC, use them to examine the department’s fireground operations to identify operational problems that can lead to training-based solutions. They may also identify needed changes in department standard operating procedures, equipment, hose loads, or apparatus layout. When issues are identified, it is the training cadre’s responsibility to develop training solutions and deliver them to the members.
For example, after looking at how well the members in one of my volunteer districts performed specific operations over the prior six months, my training priorities for the next six to eight months may look something like the following:
- Initial and expanded incident command, size-up, and radio reports.
- Initial hose deployment operations, especially 2½-inch handlines.
- Rural hoselay operations using the clappered siamese.
- Vehicle rescue operations, specifically basic stabilization and basic hydraulic tool operations.
- Pump operations beyond the initial line.
- Structural self-rescue techniques and Mayday procedures.
- Vehicle fire operations, especially in alternative fuel vehicles.
- Twenty-four-foot ladder raises and ladder operations such as climbing and moving tools/hose to the roof.
After you have identified the specific priorities for the department for a specific time period, the next step is to identify and list the specific skills needed to perform the required actions for those operations. The list should be detailed enough to identify the skills needed to effectively perform the operation including task size-up, selecting the tools needed to perform the skills, identifying the safety considerations for the operation, and the skills or actions needed to accomplish the task. For example, following are the “skills inventory” for the identified priority of suppressing a passenger vehicle fire:
- Members properly don personal protective equipment (PPE) and self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) within time requirements.
- Members establish command on arrival.
- Members perform officer- and firefighter-level size-up.
- Members perform radio arrival report.
- Members identify the safety hazards associated with vehicle fire operations:
- Battery-powered vehicles.
- Liquefied natural gas-powered vehicles.
- Running fuel fires.
- Unknown cargos such as propane tanks, drug lab materials, and pesticides/fertilizers.
- Members identify proper-sized attack line.
- Members stretch and position the proper attack line.
- Members identify threatened exposures and cool and protect exposures using the proper stream.
- Members cool the front bumper and underside before advancing.
- Members, using the proper streams, advance the attack line to extinguish the fire.
- Members identify situations that require a backup handline.
- Members tie second-due engine into the attack engine for water supply.
- Members select proper tools to open the hood and trunk.
- Members open the hood.
- Members open the trunk.
- Members perform overhaul operations using a foam application system.
- Members place the foam application system back into service.
- Members perform on-scene decontamination and equipment procedures.
- Members place SCBA back in service.
- Members properly repack hose loads.
- Members place apparatus back into service.
- Members identify signs of possible arson.
- Members conduct a “hot wash.”
- Members complete a fire report.
If we developed a skills inventory for large truck fires, an example of these skills would likely be very similar to those required for a passenger vehicle fire. However, the TO/TC may wish to add additional relevant skills such as the identification of the cargo and the presence of hazardous materials. Identifying the need for tanker support for additional water supply in areas where hydrants are not available or the use of high-flow Class A foam in trucks with a significant load could also be added as a required skill.
Another example may be a response to vehicle extrication, for which the skills inventory required may look something like the following:
- In addition to donning PPE, establishing command, and conducting a size-up (i.e., the number and position of vehicles, number of patients, extent of damage, leaking fuel, and so on), members should identify relevant safety issues (i.e., power lines, traffic, terrain, and so on) and perform a radio report.
- The driver positions the apparatus to block traffic/protect the scene.
- Members control fires with appropriate extinguishers and proper-sized handlines including the use of Class B foam for vapor suppression.
- Members identify the fuel type for the vehicle.
- Members provide appropriate scene lighting.
- Members stabilize the vehicle using the parking brake, step chocks, cribbing, struts, air bags, and other department stabilizing resources.
- Members access patients, conduct initial patient assessment, and perform basic and advanced life support until arrival of EMS.
- Members radio or transfer relevant medical information to responding EMS units face-to-face.
- Members identify the need for additional EMS, rescue, fire suppression, heavy wrecker, hazmat, or command resources and medical helicopters per department/EMS criteria.
- Members protect occupants and perform glass removal operations using hand tools including axes and halligans, hand glass saws, and reciprocating saws.
- Members start the hydraulic pump and deploy hydraulic tools.
- Members deploy appropriate hand tools to support hydraulic tool operations.
- Members perform disentanglement operations including cutting and spreading operations that include developing purchase points; door pops; door removals; roof removals; and third door conversions using department electric and hydraulic cutters, spreaders, and rams.
- Members perform tunneling and trunk access operations.
- Members perform operations using pneumatic tools.
- Members remove patients from the vehicle.
- Members assist EMS with patient care, as needed.
- Members place all hand tools, hydraulic tools, and apparatus into service.
- Members perform appropriate decontamination procedures.
- Members conduct a “hot wash.”
- Members complete relevant EMS and run reports.
This can all be broken down to address a particular skill. Examples of this may be the specific action of a door removal or performing a roof flap. If this is the case, you can develop an even more detailed skills inventory for those actions.
As discussed earlier, the skills inventory can also include time standards for performing the skills including donning PPE and SCBA, deploying hoselines, placing a hydrant in service, and flowing water from the apparatus booster tank. Make all members aware of these standards and have the TO/TC track the members’ progress toward meeting these standards.
Although developing a detailed checklist for a variety of operations may be a time-consuming task, developing your skills inventory to this level of specificity allows you to develop comprehensive lesson plans for training evolutions, and you can use it to analyze possible issues and shortcomings over multiple operational areas. An example may be the identified inability of members to don PPE and SCBA in a timely fashion or the issues or inability to correctly stretch a 1¾-inch handline. If these problems show up as a deficiency in, for example, vehicle fires, it’s highly likely that it will also be an issue across other types of incidents where those skills are used, such as structure, brush, or dumpster fires.
One way to make this process easier and less burdensome to the TO would be to assign each officer the responsibility of developing the skills checklist for specific operations in which they have expertise or primary supervisory responsibility. An example would be assigning the truck company’s captain or lieutenant to develop the checklist for those operations and assigning a rescue captain the responsibility for vehicle extrication operations. Command staff officers could be tasked with the responsibility of developing incident command-related skills checklists.
Delivering Training Solutions
Now that we have identified training issues that should become our training priorities, let’s develop programs to address these issues. Although program development is not the topic of this article, we will briefly review some key points.
The training programs designed to address identified department priorities should be targeted to the specific issues identified as deficient. In some cases, the deficiency may have to do with a single skill and, in these cases, the training solution may only require a single training night. Examples of this may include something as basic as positioning apparatus, starting power equipment, and deploying and advancing a handline into a particular type of structure such as a 1¾-inch line into a residential structure or a 2½-inch line into a commercial building.
If there’s a problem with a complete evolution such as structure fire operations, you may need more than one training session to address the multiple problem elements of the entire operation. Another example of this would be performing a complete vehicle extrication evolution that has been identified as an operational issue. In this case, you may need to address stabilization, disentanglement operations, and patient extrication. A training night may be required on each skill, with a final night for performing the complete evolution. Even issues involving a common occurrence such as a passenger vehicle fire may require multiple nights to cover areas such as fire attack, suppressing running fuel fires, and hood/truck forcible entry.
The TO/TC may schedule a follow-up training session or incorporate the specific skill into a future training session to confirm that the identified performance issue has been corrected. He could also use on-scene observations to evaluate the success of the retraining process.
Like any class, develop detailed lesson plans for any training program or class, whether it be classroom- or field-based or a combination of the two. These lesson plans may include the reason for the training, especially if the training has been developed to address an identified training deficiency. At a minimum, any lesson plan should outline the classroom and field resources needed for the training, program length, the required PPE, potential safety issues and how they will be addressed, and learning objectives for the class. These objectives should be clear, concise, and specific and should provide the instructor with a clear picture of what the class is designed to accomplish and what skills need to be covered; they should not be overwhelming nor exceed a total of three for a single-session class.
Balance addressing these priorities with the department’s other “routine” training needs such as firefighting, rescue, hazardous materials, and EMS skill development and refresher training. Also, deliver the requirements as outlined by the rating system such as hazardous materials and driver and officer training. In addition, other required training needs may include mutual-aid training; training on new construction and occupancies; critiques of major fire, rescue, or EMS incidents; yearly mandated incident command system training; firefighter health and safety; and initial training on new equipment. The department may also be required by the state or EMS regulatory agency to deliver training on bloodborne pathogens or sexual harassment. If the department runs EMS at any level, this list may also include required EMS refresher and recertification training.
For some of these requirements, computer- or web-based training may be needed and will require the TO/TC to investigate what options are available or possibly purchase training software to deliver this information. It is critical that any computer-based training provide a method to document the training for rating system or legal purposes. This delivery method can be especially effective if the members can access it while at home as compared to having to use department computers.
Given the wide variety of topics we need to cover, developing the training priorities for your department will likely be a very significant challenge. You will have to balance identified priorities, routine skills training, training requirements posed by the rating system, and other required training in a way that allows the members to function safely and effectively on the fireground or at a rescue scene.
The TO/TC should use the experience and knowledge of the department’s chief officers in the process of developing the priorities or even consult with neighboring departments as to how they schedule their training. In most cases, there will simply not be enough training time available to cover all the topics you would like to cover, which is why developing well-defined training priorities should be the first job of any fire department TO/TC.
References
1. Callahan, R. “Planning for Low-Frequency/High-Risk Events in Small Departments.” Fire Engineering, June 2021.
2. Callahan, R. “Three Options for Training Rookie Volunteer Members.” Fire Engineering, April 2020.
ROBERT CALLAHAN is a 40-year fire service veteran and the fire prevention officer and a captain with Bossier Parish (LA) Fire District 1, the training officer and a captain with Webster Parish (LA) Fire District 7, and the training chief and former assistant chief with Webster Parish (LA) Fire District 3. Callahan is also an adjunct instructor with the Louisiana State University Fire & Emergency Training Institute (LSU-FETI), a contract instructor with the National Fire Academy, and a district representative for the Firefighter Cancer Support Network. He has instructed at conferences throughout Louisiana including at the Louisiana Arson and Fire Prevention Association Conference, the LSU-FETI Officer Conference, the LSU-FETI Municipal School, the Louisiana Fire Chiefs Association Annual Conference, and the F.O.O.L.S. Brothers of the Boot events.
