BY CRAIG PRUSANSKY
In recent years, the fire service has seen a vast increase in the technology available for its use. The problem with this technology is that it often is implemented without an infrastructure sufficient to adequately support its use. Many times, a department will implement some new “cutting edge” or “paperless” technology without adequate training or hardware to make the most efficient use of the system.
It has been a challenge in private industry to try to quantify computer use to get the most out of the applications without losing efficiency. The fire service has this same challenge, except that the fire service is usually run as a paramilitary organization, not a business, which generally means that fire stations are underequipped for the type of technology being implemented.
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Palm Beach County (FL) Fire-Rescue has found that some of our busiest stations do not have enough computers to handle the increased workload the new technology has brought with it. There are now e-mail; online training; and online human resources programs for vacation time, sick time, staffing and overtime processing, online union message board access, and online policy and procedure manuals. Imagine a station with six firefighters trying to check their mail and process their “online paperwork” on two computers. Add to this the usual medical and fire reports as well as fire inspection and prefire plans, and you can see how this easily can grow to be a large problem. The station officer of a busy station may also find that he has to play “catch-up” because often he cannot get on the computers because incident reports take precedence over all other computer uses.
FORMULA FOR DETERMINING THE NUMBER OF COMPUTERS
In our battalion, we developed a formula that can be used to effectively determine how many computers should be put in each station. We then use these data to create a report to our administration to justify the requests for additional computers in our stations. To acquire the data needed to develop an accurate formula, we sent out surveys to our employees, making sure each area of the battalion was appropriately represented (Table 1). In the survey, we asked the employees how long it took them (on average) to complete certain types of computer reports and other computer applications. We specifically asked for the approximate time the employee spent on incident reports, e-mail, HR (payroll), word processing, prefire plans, inspections, station and medical supply ordering, fuel entry, training, and administrative applications (if applicable). We also had our data processing people create reports on unit activity over one year.
Once we collected the data, we first calculated the Average Report Time (ART), or the time it takes for an average crew member to complete a report. The ART is calculated by taking all of the report completion times (collected on the surveys), adding them together, and then dividing that total by the number of people surveyed.
Next, we calculated the Average Personal Workload per shift in minutes (APW). The APW is calculated by adding the following times:
E-Mail + Human Resources + Word Processing + Prefire Plans
+ Inspections + Station and Medical Ordering + Fuel Entry
+ Training + Administrative Duties
Most of these values should be in minutes per day. Since word processing, station ordering, and training are usually done only once or twice a month, it is easier to get a monthly amount (minutes per month) and average it over 10 shifts per month. Other departments may need to average this differently, according to how many shifts they work per month. Each item is averaged separately; the averages are then added together to get the total APW.
Next, we calculated the Total Unit Activity (TUA) of each station.
It would have been desirable to determine the number of reports entered per unit, but since our department does not track this, we had to use the number of calls per unit. If your department is capable of reporting reports entered per unit, that would give a more accurate TUA. The reason we use calls per unit instead of calls per service area is that it depicts the workload of a specific station more accurately. As an example, we have a station in which one-third of the responses occur in an adjacent station’s response area. If you were to look only at the calls in that station’s service area, it would show fewer calls than the station actually ran. We take the number of calls run over a year and take an average for each vehicle in a particular station, and then add the vehicle’s totals to get a TUA for the station.
The end result of these calculations is the average Computer Workload Unit (CWU), which is an accurate measure of the time the computers are being used. This is determined by first multiplying the average time spent completing reports (ART) by the average number of incidents per shift (TUA). That number is then added to the total personal workload (APW).
So, basically, the formula we use to gauge the overall computer workload for a fire station and its crew is
(ART × TUA) + APW = CWU
As with any mathematical calculations, this information is much easier to calculate using a spreadsheet. If all this seems too complicated, have someone in your department who has experience using a spreadsheet or who is a math whiz assist you.
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From the experiences gathered in our fire department, we have determined acceptable CWU values. A value of 8 or below is desirable; it allows all the crews, including the officer, ample time to enter their reports and complete the necessary daily computer work. At a value of 9 or 10, the work gets done, but people are sometimes standing around waiting for a computer to become free. Often, the station officers are forced to do their computer work when the call load slows down. Values of 11 and above usually indicate a station that might be a candidate for getting an additional computer. At these stations, crews probably have to hold their reports to the next morning, and any computerized training or services are put on hold for future shifts, when the call load may be lower.
By using a little mathematics, you can ach-ieve a balance for efficiently keeping up with computer technology, not overloading the people using the computers, and staying within the confines of your budget. ■
■ CRAIG PRUSANSKY, EMT-P, is a lieutenant/paramedic with and 14-year veteran of Palm Beach County (FL) Fire-Rescue. He served as the department’s systems analyst from 1998 to 2001. In addition, Prusansky is the CERT team liaison officer for Palm Beach County Battalion 4 in the Delray Beach/Boynton Beach, Florida, area.
