Roles and Responsibilities of Managers within the Fire and Rescue Service - Case Study Example

Management and Leadership Name: Course: Tutor: Date: Management and Leadership In this case study, on management and responsibility, the fire and rescue service firm that is under study is the Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service in the United Kingdom. According to Cheshire Fire and Rescue service website (2011), Cheshire fire and rescue has the responsibility of ensuring that fire and rescue services are adequately provided in all areas of the Cheshire county of England. Headquartered in Winsford and established in 1948, the service runs twenty-four fire stations and has some nine hundred and eighty nine staff. It operates under the authority of Cheshire Fire Authority. Roles and Responsibilities of Managers within the Fire and Rescue Service There are various managerial positions at the Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service in all the its fire stations, which are meant to make work easier through ease of coordination and the flow of information. The positions range from the crew administrator, watch supervisor, station director, group director and the area manager. Crew manager The crew manager position is present in both the firefighter staff and the control staff. At the Cheshire Fire and Rescues service, the crew manager ensures that there is effective performance of all the fire fighting and the control staff at the service. This involves planning for and helping the training and development of all the staff through the appropriate means. These may include education seminars, training workshop and any other forms of training that may be offered. This is essential especially for the volunteer staff who joined the service with little or no technical experience. In the respective fire stations, the crew manager must ensure that these people get the best possible training and are kept in excellent working shape through regular exercise and drills, and follow up training. The crew manager also ensures that the public in the designated area of operation within the Cheshire County is informed and educated on safety. This is to ensure that there is increased prevention of incidences rather than intervention when an incident has already occurred. This involves mobilizing the community for safety procedures training and facilitating these training. These are done in public places or even in schools and institutions. The crew manager contributes to fire safety solutions that are meant to minimize risks. When there are incidences that require the involvement of Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service, the crew manager has the responsibilities of leading and supporting people in such incidences. He mobilizes the staff and after that, carries out the role of coordinating the rescue operation. After such operations, the crew manager must carry out the investigations on the events and make a report. This report is useful in education the public on safety and also the crew so that they will be more efficient when faced with similar incidence. Watch manager The watch manager at the Cheshire Fire and Rescue service has the responsibility of managing information for action within the service. He must ensure that all the relevant activities are carried out to meet the stipulated by the fire authority. To ensure this, he has to take responsibility for the effective performance as well as support the technical and professional development of the teams and individuals. He shares the responsibility of investigating and reporting on events with the crew manager, with the aim of informing future practice and preparedness. The watch manager also leads and supports the people involved in order to resolve operational incidences. During these operations, the manager ensures that all the assets accessible are used resourcefully and successfully. It is within his jurisdiction to acquire the necessary resources, store them appropriately and issue them to the necessary personnel when needed. In the team, the watch manager must also respond to cases and reports of poor performance in order to ensure that any mistakes or flaws in performance are rectified as soon as possible. Additionally, the watch manager does the assessment of the performance of any candidate (Cheshire fire and Rescue, 2004) Station manager In Cheshire Fire and Rescue, the station manager has the responsibility of determining the solutions to hazards that are identified through the process of inspection. These must be timely determined and implemented to ensure that hazards are dealt with. In addition, the station manager must carry out the planning and implementation of activities that meet service delivery needs. As the person in charge of a station, he ensures both the physical and human resources are used effectively to ensure efficient service delivery. The station manager overseas the performance of teams and individuals in order to make sure that they achieve their objectives. This is done through proper selection of the required personnel to work in these teams, as well as developing these teams and individuals so that there is an enhancement of work based performance. The station manager also has the responsibility of providing information that will aid in support of decision making within the entire management of the Cheshire Fire and rescue service. These roles of the station manager are aimed at ensuring optimal performance in the stations. Group manager The group manager supports leads and monitors people to resolve operational incidences. He implements organizational strategies that are meant to ensure optimal performances at the Cheshire Fire and Rescue or the respective fire station. Whenever there is a change strategy, he implements and manages the change in the organizational activities as well as planning and implementing various activities that ensure service delivery. The group manager in conjunction with the team manager ensure effective use of resources, select the required personnel and ensure the development of teams and individuals to enhance work-based performance. The group manager implements various quality assurance systems that are a requirement of the Cheshire Fire and Rescue service and those stipulated in the IPDS. He also advises on their development and implementation. Once implemented, the manager carries out the task of monitoring compliance with these quality assurance systems. In addition, the group manager develops various information systems that support delivery objectives in the service and fire stations. This is achieved through careful analysis and research in the operations of the services. Area manager The area manager is the main player in ensuring the implementation of organizational strategies. He ensures the implementation and management of change in the activities of the organization. The activities that are carried out to meet the service delivery needs are planned and implemented by the area manager. In collaboration with the group manager, he ensures that there is effective use of physical and financial resources, selects the required personnel, and manages the performance of teams and individual in order that objectives are effectively and timely met. The area manager also gives advice regarding the implementation of the quality policies and to ensure quality, he is tasked with the responsibility of implementing the various quality assurance systems. This also involves monitoring compliance with the quality systems. He also has to develop information systems within the Cheshire Fire and Rescue service that support the delivery of services and objectives. He gives consent to project plans that are to be implemented and coordinates the ongoing projects meant to help the service to achieve its objectives. Theory and practice of leadership styles with reference to a fire and rescue service and one other UK emergency service In the provision of emergency services, extreme care has to be taken to ensure that the expectations the public is met. These calls for some extremely efficient management styles that ensure services are delivered timely and exceptionally, since response time is essential. The organizations providing emergency services in this case include Cheshire Fire and Rescue service in the Cheshire county of England, and the London Ambulance Service, which provides ambulance service to the Greater London. One thing that is particularly evident in all of these organizations providing emergency services is the need to ensure that roles are clearly defined and plan for actions are predefined. This makes it achievable for everyone to know what to do in case of an emergency. Additionally, the management roles are well devolved to ensure that the managerial figures span the whole staff from the top up to the personnel responding to emergencies or disasters. This is extremely crucial since in times of emergency there needs to be a leader in site who has some decent expertise and will be accountable for the team’s performance. According to the International association of fire chiefs (2009), the leader exerts some form of autocratic leadership since he is accountable for the group’s performance and usually, there is a limited time to converge on agreement on what is to be done. This is the reason why both the Cheshire Fire and Rescue service and the London Ambulance service invest in devolved leadership styles. The crew managers are trained to be effective and efficient since there decision will determine the cause for action for the team at the emergency site. Such situations call for proper training and nurturing of every leader since the actions of the staff in the grassroots has some lofty consequences to the performance of the whole organization. Additionally, each of these emergency services provision organizations has well laid out operations procedures. These are taught and are to be followed in every case of emergency service (Bruce 2006). The idea here is to ensure that when there is quick provision of services, and no time is wasted in figuring out what to do or which procedures to follow. There is also some sort of duplication of duties among adjacent managerial levels. This ensures that duties can be delegated or carried out even when one link is missing. This is the case in both the Cheshire Fire and Rescue service as well as the London Ambulance Service. Presentation Fire and rescue services have undergone a lot of transformation in the United Kingdom since the enactment of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade in 1865 and the fire Brigades act in 1938. Prior to 1965, fire brigades were running from the insurance companies. The fire brigades operated independently prior to the Second World War, when they were all brought together under the National Fire Service. The Fire services act that was put into service in the 1948 after the Second World War reverted the control of these fire brigades from the National Fire Service to the county councils and county boroughs. There has been a lot of effort to unite the various fire fighting units in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, to bring them to operate uniformly and independently. After the Second World War, some units that were located in the same county were merged to operate under a single fire and rescue service. There have been other attempts after that to lessen their number through mergers, like in 1974 and in 1986. The fire fighting services have been devolved from the National Fire Authority to the control of the county council, in line with the model of a devolved. Currently, every county in these areas runs a Fire and Rescue Service that is entrusted with the task of providing emergency and rescue services in times of fire outbreak. Various efforts to restructure and remodel fire-fighting services in the United Kingdom have existed. These are aimed at ensuring efficient delivery of service, quick response and guidelines to ensure safety and protection for the fire fighters at work. The biggest of this was catalyzed by the release of Professor Sir George Bain report, ‘Independent Review of the Fire Service.’ This was implemented in a bid to ensure efficient fire response service in the wake of increased threats from terrorism, arson and natural and negligence disasters. At the moment, the United Kingdom boasts of one of the most efficient fire response services in the whole world (Fire brigades union, 2008). There are a number of resemblances linking the national and international changes in fire and rescue services. The United Kingdom moved to spread out fire-fighting services from the public administration to local authorities. This is the current trend whereby many countries have delegated this work either to municipalities, towns, villages or to any other suitable geographical demarcation. This is the trend in various countries like Germany, Japan, the United States, and France. The rationale of this is to simplify management and minimize response time. There is a trend place a single body that is responsible for regulations and quality assurance in the fire and rescue services. This ensures uniformity and accountability to the public. These bodies may set limits on various issues like response time and so on. In addition, various countries run additional specific fire fighting services, just like in England. These either supplement the local fire fighting services or have distinct areas of operations like in airports, military installations, forests and sensitive areas like nuclear plants. Many countries are moving to enhance their fire fighting and rescue ability and efficiency. Throughout the world, relevant authorities are coming up with guidelines to ensure that the fire fighting and rescue services are more efficient, competent, reliable and responsive to the areas of need. In both the United Kingdom and the world at large, sharing of information on safety is being encouraged to prevent disasters before they occur. This is aimed at reducing damages and casualties in terms of victims and also to the rescue staff. However, differences do exist in some areas. In some countries like Germany, Japan and Austria, the fire and rescue service staff consists of mainly the voluntary staff members, some on a full-time basis and others at a part time. In some rare cases, the entire staff is a volunteer team, like in Chile. Another key area of differences is the role of military in fire and rescue services. Some countries have adopted militarized fire brigades, where the military plays a significant role in fire fighting and rescue. While in almost every country, the military runs its own fire brigade, some countries like Brazil have the system ran almost entirely by the military (Fire brigades union, 2008). Bibliography Bruce, M. 2006, Outdoor leadership: theory and practice, Human Kinetics, United States of America. Cheshire fire and Rescue, 2004. Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service, Cheshire, viewed 7th April, 2011. www.cheshirefire.gov.uk London Ambulance Service, 2011, London Ambulance Service, London, viewed 7th April, 2011. http://www.londonambulance.nhs.uk/ Fire brigades union, 2008, In The Line Of Duty: Firefighter Deaths in the UK Since 1978, College Hill Press, London. “International association of Fire Chiefs,” 2009, Fire Officer: Principles and Practice. Jones & Bartlett Learning, United States of America. Read More