Breakaways

BY BOBBY HALTON

Recently, a fire chief was describing how his organization uses visual images to help inspire and lead his department. He mentioned they use the visual image of a bicycle racing peloton to describe the strength and unity of the command staff. The term “peloton” refers to the main group of racers who take turns leading and drafting to support the goals of the team. He mentioned how occasionally a team member, a chief officer, might fall back or drop out of the peloton for a variety of reasons but that they never allow them to fall back or out for too long. It is important, he said, for the officer to get back into the tight pack, leading and drafting on different issues as soon as possible to keep the group strong and united.

One of the behaviors the chief mentioned was what bicycle racers call “doing a breakaway.” A breakaway is when usually one or more riders sprint away from the peloton in an effort to build a lead. The chief mentioned he felt breakaways were sometimes unproductive wastes of energy.

The chief is a world-class leader in an exceptional department and using imagery is innovative and creative. Using visual images makes it easy for department members to understand goals and expectations that the chief has for his department. On the subject of the breakaway, the chief has a point that sometimes breakaways are for self-glorification or personal gain; then there are breakaways that are motivated by pursuit of excellence. Throughout history, major innovations as well as tremendous contributions to the fire service have been made by team members whose actions could only be described as “making a breakaway.”

The world recently lost a leading breakaway force whose life’s work epitomized the positive value of the free market as a force that betters people’s lives. He was a college dropout who built a business in a garage with his buddy and rose to the top of his industry. His repeated habit of breakaway maneuvers, however, got him voted out of the very company he helped create.

Several years later, with the company floundering and on the brink of bankruptcy, the company asked him to come back. He did and immediately started doing his personal breakaways again. This time, however, he also began another type of breakaway, team breakaways. This is one behavior the chief didn’t mention and one that is the hallmark of this business legend and several legendary fire service leaders, the team breakaway. This happens when the team leader coordinates a breakaway with multiple teammates, giving the breakaway group a distinct advantage over a breakaway rider who has no team support. Steve Jobs was a breakaway artist; he rode hard and strong, was a fiercely independent perfectionist, and loved his Apple Company devoutly.

That very same description could be attributed to the legendary Leo Stapleton, Ray Downey, Alan Brunacini, Peter Ganci, and Ray Orozco. If we look back a little further, we remember people like Dick Sylvia, Emanuel Fried, John O’Hagan, William Clark, Frank Brannigan, and Fire Engineering’s own Tommy Brennan.

Some firefighters today may not know it, but if it weren’t for the breakaway efforts of Leo Stapleton working with the folks from NASA, SCBA might still be a work in progress. Chief/Commissioner Stapleton broke away from the crowd and recognized the value of the SCBA; he rode hard and strong against tremendous headwinds and vicious opposition to make sure that the SCBA would be accepted by the fire service. Stapleton brought the SCBA into everyday use, and no one will ever be able to measure how many lives were saved by the early adoption of the SCBA. No one will ever be able to know how many firefighters avoided cancer, but firefighters everywhere should know that it was the efforts of Leo Stapleton that made the difference.

As disasters unfold and we respond in USAR and SUSAR task force teams providing the most effective, coordinated, well-trained, and well-equipped response, we should never forget it was but one of the breakaways of legendary Deputy Chief Ray Downey. The breakaway rider Alan Brunacini recognized early on the value of the incident command system. In the ’70s, he worked tirelessly to take the national wildland system and convert it into a workable structural command system. Because of his courage and tenacity, we now have locally managed blue card incident command. He also took the time to remind us to be kind because we exist for Mrs. Smith’s safety, and not the other way around.

Maverick breakaway rider Tom Brennan, when everyone else was becoming myopically obsessed with little drops of water, systems, and albeit other valuable training, brought us all home to the single most important element of structural firefighting, tactical excellence. Tommy reminded each and every one of us that success on the fireground was ensured only through the relentless pursuit of perfection at the task level, thereby assuring synchronization of the tactical level into the strategic plan.

To these early fire service breakaway riders, we owe much. Every single one of them gave us much more than one innovation, just as Steve Jobs gave industry more than just the iPad. The questions for fire service leaders today have to be, “Who will be the next breakaway riders?” and “Will we encourage them to break away and ride hard and ride strong, or will we drag them back into the pack and ensure them a modicum of success in a world of mediocrity?”

The fire service is better than that. We will celebrate the breakaway riders; even more importantly, we will always elevate and honor the leaders of those heroic breakaway teams.