Crew Resource Management for the Fire Service - Assignment Example

Management Report Plan: Fire and Rescue Service Management (Author’s Name) (SID#) (Module/Subject) (Professor/Tutor’s Name) (Date) Management Report Plan: Fire and Rescue Service Management Introduction Fire and Rescue service is a high-risk profession, so human resource management must be treated with utmost importance. Classical management theories and the human relations approach will be discussed in the first section of this report (Okray & Lubnau II 2007:91). Leadership strategies and styles, the characteristics of an organization and the types of organizations will be expounded on sections two and three, respectively. In section four, fire and rescue strategies in the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom will be assessed (Okray & Lubnau II 2007:82). Section One Classic management theory is a management practice which gives an emphasis on the management structure and hierarchy (House 1971:321). When a certain production result is set, workers are driven to perform designated tasks through a functional managerial approach which would exhaust worker’s labor capacity. Workers are treated like machines. There is very minimal regard for worker’s concerns and maintains a well defined lineation between authoritative posts and subjects and labor is divided to be able to extract labor productivity without spending much effort and resources on workers (Hersey 1977:82). A scientific method of forecasting the possible production outcomes is also employed so that the predictability of work habit can be taken advantage of. Any deviant actions would lead to a replacement. (House 1971:321). Compensation is based on scientific calculations and has a uniformity of treatment while at some point compensation is used to encourage productive work. It is accepted that this form of management practice has produced efficiency but has not given due consideration to other means of improving productivity. It is more qualified to be referred to as a “control” than a “management” practice (Hersey 1977:82). The manager has a crucial role and certain responsibilities to ensure that the system is running with accessibility to organization’s resources and assess if efficiency is being employed and make necessary recommendations. The manager also takes charge to achieve the goals of an organization (House 1971:321). Usually, managers are concerned with the plan, organization and staff, coordination of the plans and assess worker’s performance. A good manager must always have an open communication with the staff such as asking the staff of their condition, work experiences and other details. The manager should respond to the question with professionalism and has to be cautious of the language game. In those ways, the manager could stir motivation among the workers. McGregor’s X and Y motivational approach could be likewise consulted to be acquainted with theoretical foundations of effective management skills. McGregor’s X management style view slow workers’ productivity was a cause of de-motivation among workers which emanated from the management style. On the other hand, managers who are conscious of their staff and workers’ needs would produce Y or motivated staff for the managers (Okray & Lubnau II 2007:82). Managers must treat their staff as a team and should set a clear direction for the staff. By showing a good example to the staff he could get their utmost cooperation and would tend to open up more easily when problems are encountered in workplaces. To be able to run the organization, delegation of responsibilities must be practiced to achieve a more organized flow of tasks. From a humanist psychologist like Abraham Maslow, in order to motivate the workers the hierarchy of needs must be fulfilled. This motivation will be driven by the accomplishment of needs inherent in all beings, especially humans. These levels of human needs are essential so that man can grow and reach his maximum productivity potential. Maslow showed a diagram of this. This diagram of the hierarchy of needs, human relations approach in workplaces is employed. This approach is recognition of human needs in order to perform his tasks with the maximum possible output by ensuring that the workers or staff is experiencing the most conducive environment (Okray & Lubnau II 2007:85). The basic principles of human relations approach are decentralization, participatory decision-making and concern for developing self-motivated employees. Decentralization means that the decision making process should not only be confined based on hierarchy and individual workers are free to make decisions in certain cases. This principle gives weight to lateral communication with informal methods rather than a rigid hierarchical coordination. Participatory decision-making must be encouraged to formulate their own solutions to the problems that they encountering since they are the ones who were in the best position to assess the damage and actions to be undertaken. These two principles require self-motivated employees; device means that would recognize these efforts and provide organizational structure of reward (Okray & Lubnau II 2007:89). This human relations approach is totally in contrast with the classical management theory which is only concerned with the worker’s. In the long run, this system would only lead to unstable work relations. There is a need to move from the classical management approach to human relations approach to ensure mutual benefit in the workplace. Hence, the approach will be diverted to humane treatment of employees that would secure loyal, motivated and productive workforce (House 1971:321). Section Two In performing the human resources approach in the workplace, the manger should be aware of the leadership style or styles in order to have a clear and organized framework of handling human resources. These styles could be democratic, autocratic, or laisez faire or combinations of these styles. A democratic leadership uses participation on all levels of power. This characterizes two way communication process from top to bottom (top-down) and from the bottom or lowest decision making bodies to the central authority (bottom-up). In this manner, all points of view and opinion regarding the operations of the organization are considered and valued and employees are empowered to perform their tasks while maintain a control over delicate issues. Autocratic leadership on the other hand employs a more controlled organization and the top-down flow of power and decision-making is very evident (Hersey 1977:82). The organization runs its daily activities through instructions and other similar forms of policy communication. Laisez faire type of leadership entails minimal control over the organization and a combination of democratic and autocratic types of leadership. Autocratic leadership is employed in emergency situation when urgent decisions are needed in order to respond to certain problems, while there is democracy in staff training and other human relations aspect of the organization. Less control is also exhibited by the decision-makers as they let the organization perform its dynamism to arrive at desired goals. McGregor X and Y approach are also combined with autocracy and democracy, a combination of soft and hard methods to ensure the organization’s continuous function. Autocratic methods are used for de-motivated worker to get them back to work and democratic approach to motivated workers to encourage them to maintain their excellent working performance. In fire and rescue drills for example, laisez faire is used in order to simulate actual performance in fire fighting and rescue operations where there are no hierarchies that would be effectively visible (House 1971:321). Section Three Motivation makes workers more productive based on external stimulus. In essence, motivation is giving the desired condition of the workers so that they could perform their activities easily. Motivation can be achieved through positive reinforcement, effective discipline and punishment, fair treatment of workers, satisfying the needs of the workers, setting goals which they can relate to, job restructuring and providing rewards for excellent job performance. To achieve this goal, the workers should not be working individually but as a team. Team building creates a connection between and among workers. Teams must be driven towards achievement and that is where real team concept comes in. the feeling of belonging to a winning team drives workers to strive more. In fire and rescue services, the basic working group is a team so there is much emphasis given to this concept (Becker et. Al. 2001: 102). In all these discussed strategies, the most important ingredient is communication. Communication is the situation wherein the members of the team are open to talk about their complaints, commend each other for a job well done, and helps each other in obtaining knowledge in their field. Through communication, these workers feel the sense of belonging and conflicts and misunderstanding could be easily resolved. United Kingdom Fire and Rescue Services The firefighting brigades in UK was started when Metropolitan Fire Brigade act was legislated in 1865 giving way to the formations of various fire brigades in the country. Then in 1938 and during the war, fire brigades were also organized by local authorities to attend to fire and rescue operations in their localities during war time. The fire and rescue services department are directly under an executive agency, Her Majesty’s Fire Service Inspectorate, which directs all legislation and policy making powers concerned with this sector. To date, there are about 1600 fire brigades in different local and city fire departments all over Great Britain. Some of these fire and rescue services organizations are funded by the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety while rescue services are under local police and armed forces or the fire agency. The management theories used in these organizations are combinations of all the leadership strategies and employ human resources management. Autocracy is used in the execution of executive orders while these are democratically discussed in legislation. Though there are some aspects of classical management theories in these organizations, the change has already started to incorporate the human resource management theory (Leicestershire 2007). United Arab Emirates Fire and Rescue services in the United Arab Emirates were established since the start of oil discoveries in the Middle East. The government has put prime importance in the preparedness of these agencies in responding to scenarios in the oil industry and the expanding cities. Recently, the UAE government has started to move towards tourism as one of its priority concerns. The fire and rescue services of this state are directly under the police force which means that the management system is similar. There is no given exact number of firefighting forces as it is already integrated with the police. The management system used is more of autocratic since it is patterned to the government system. With this style of management, human resources management is quite limited to some concerns. It is usually accomplished in actual conduct of activities. The government must at least consider creating the fire and rescue services as an autonomous agency from the police force to give these sectors clearer and more defined mandate than that of the police (UAE 2006). Section Four Fire fighting and rescue services in both countries have drastically changed after terrorist attacks were conducted in major cities around the world. The fire and rescue strategies in the UAE are mainly connected with the police activities in the state. With a small populations and concentrated in the main cities, the fire and rescue system aside from the police is also provided by the companies and other establishments (UAE 2006). The United Kingdom on the other hand had decentralized its management of fire and rescue brigades to local authorities. Aside from government funded fire brigades other sectors are encouraged to maintain fire and rescue teams to respond to small and local fire situations. There is also a strong emphasis on educating the population and preparing citizens to perform fire fighting and rescue operations seminars. For the meantime, the United Kingdom has the best firefighting and rescue services than the United Arab Emirates because of the scope and management style that is being used (Leicestershire 2007). Conclusion The role of the manager must also be acquainted with the situation of ordinary employees. To attain that, there should be integration among the workers. The leadership styles should not be bounded by rules but dynamism must be employed. Management theories are useless if these are not taken into practice (House 1971:321). National fire and rescue service deals with local concerns while international fire and rescue can be composed by many national organizations especially in various humanitarian missions. While national fire and rescue service can be managed through classical management theories, human resource management must be applied to international. Bibliography Accel-team. 2008. "Employee Motivation: Theory and practice." Becker, B.E., M.A. Huselid and D. Ulrich. 2001. "The HR Scorecard: Linking People, Strategy, Performance." Hersey, P. 1977. Management of organizational behavior 3rd Edition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. House, Rj. 1971. "A path-goal theory of leadership effectiveness." Administrative Science Quarterly 16:321-339. Ministry, UAE Information. 2006. "UAE Interact." Okray, Randy and Thomas Lubnau II. 2004. Crew Reosurce Management for the Fire Service. Oklahoma: Fire Engineering Books. Pauuwe, J. and P. Boselie. 2005. "HRM and Performance: What Next." Human Resource Management Journal 15:68-83. Service, Leicestershire Fire and Rescue. 2007. "Management of the Fire and Rescue Service." Read More