Engage: The Xbox Generation

As I’ve shared previously in “From the Xbox to the Box Alarm” and “Dig In!” — I’m continually conducting my own observational research of the people who are already, or soon will be our replacements in the fire service: GenY.

My personal research of what I’ve dubbed the “Xbox Generation” is supported and enhanced by more formal research conducted by folks a lot smarter than me (not that it takes a lot to qualify for that! LOL). As I often do when faced with a challenge, I look outside the fire service for resources from other disciplines to gain a fresh perspective and see how I can apply their solutions to the industry I love. For as two of my favorite authors Chip Heath and Dan Heath say, “Find a bright spot and clone it.” These resources may include books, magazines and other media outlets — especially if they mention the importance of storytelling as a means of conveying our message!

One such resource I regularly rely on to get a clue about these Millenials and their unique attitudes and attributes is a periodic eNewsletter titled “Engage: GenY” from MediaPost Publications. The short articles offer a variety of perspectives from a variety of contributors and you don’t have to read far to find titles that quickly grab your attention and correlate to our efforts to learn more about these young people infiltrating our fire service.

Time to get SAFER!

The application period for the US DHS SAFER grant program for the recruitment, retention and hiring of firefighters opened today: July 16, 2012.

Applications are due by August 10. “SAFER grants provide funding directly to fire departments and volunteer firefighter interest organizations in order to help them increase the number of trained, front-line firefighters in their communities,” according to this article on the National Volunteer Fire Council’s website.

The FireRECRUITER has been extremely successful in assisting fire departments and county-based fire service organizations in securing significant SAFER funding when acting as a clearinghouse on behalf of the volunteer fire service in their region.

NVFC: Quantity of Volunteers is Down

According to this report released at NVFC.org, there were 44,000 fewer volunteer firefighters in 2010 compared to 2009, a reduction of 5.4 percent, according to the U.S. Fire Department Profile Through 2010, an annual report that was recently issued by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). The loss of volunteers is primarily coming in communities with populations of 2,500 or fewer, which were protected by 377,550 firefighters in 2010 compared with 408,550 in 2009, a drop of approximately 7.6 percent.

[Read the balance of the article here.]

Without reading the entire study, one could wonder whether or not those numbers are a bad thing or just a truer reflection of the real number of volunteers directly involved in firefighting, not just total number of active and inactive members of volunteer fire departments. If you read on in the NVFC article you’ll learn that while the total numbers are going down, the average age of those left behind is going up. That’s a real issue we need to address immediately and constantly.

Can you rise to the challenge?

An article posted to FirefighterNation.com today outlines the challenges faced by volunteer fire departments in Pennsylvania in recruiting and retaining their members. Although these types of articles are becoming all too frequent, this one in particular is better than most in that it focuses on the positives of being a volunteer firefighter — not all the negatives. I’ve cited many examples of what not to say if you’re actually looking to solve your R&R challenges in a previous post titled “Is this our best approach?” Too often, we hand a prospective candidate all of the reasons and excuses why they wouldn’t join on a silver platter.

Lots to Tweet About

Check out Burlington Township (NJ) Volunteer Fire Department's new pub ed banners

There’s been plenty to tweet about lately regarding recruitment and retention in the fire service. Some of the info shared is good news and some is bad news, regardless, it all contains lessons we can learn from. Sometimes there’s so much activity and so much being shared, that it’s tough for even someone as “connected” as I am to keep up with.

With many fire prevention activities wrapping up for the month of October, many fire departments took advantage of the added exposure to share and maximize their volunteering, public education and public relations opportunities; including the Burlington Township Volunteer Fire Department which the FireRECRUITER has been working with for the past six months. The featured photo shows off the new banners they’ve created for their successful pub ed efforts — which are smartly and directly linked to their recruitment efforts.

Some of my Tweets are original finds I stumble upon while others are retweets of others’ discoveries. Nonttheless, in case you missed them, here are some of the highlights of recent tweets with plenty of examples of what does and doesn’t work in in recruiting, motivating, leading, training and retaining today’s firefighters. Follow the links for great reads, resources, tips and tricks.

FireRECRUITER Goes to Indy

Tiger Schmittendorf, aka the “FireRECRUITER” will be going back to Indianapolis later this month to present at FDIC – the Fire Department Instructors Conference – the largest gathering of firefighters in the world.

He’ll be presenting “Understanding and Motivating Today’s Firefighters” as a repeat performance of “From the X-Box to the Box Alarm” presented at FDIC 2010.

Here’s all the details from http://tigerschmittendorf.com/2011/03/07/x-box-live/.

See you in Indy. Look me up.

Walking the Walk and Living it up like a Live-in!

Photo Courtesy of http://www.RaisingLaddersPhotography.com

I’m so intrigued by firehouse live-in programs that later this week, the FireRECRUITER is traveling to Hyattsville MD — home to one of the longest standing and most successful bunk in programs in the fire service — and home to the X-Box Firefighters who created FDLiveIn.com. And to get a better understanding and appreciation for the program, I’ll be bunking in the station Friday night and they’ve arranged a tour of several live-in fire stations for Saturday.

Is this the ultimate bunk-in program?

Last week’s release of the highly popular article: Can you afford to live without a live-in? garnered a lot of attention and peaked my own attention to the idea. Thus, the FireRECRUITER has significant plans to connect with www.fdlivein.com soon to expand on this innovative concept and share success stories of staffing firehouses with college students or other appropriate team members who live at the firehouse in return for volunteer service.

Before we get to that though, I thought it important to highlight a particular bunk-in program that claims to offer the “ultimate college based firefighting experience” – the College Park Volunteer Fire Department – located on the campus of the University of Maryland.