I had the privilege of watching an award ceremony last night. A local emergency management agency was honoring some of their partner agencies, acknowledging the effort that was put forth for National Preparedness Month. I went into it thinking, “What a great idea; throw a nod to the agencies that mean the most to your organization.” And, on the surface, it is a great idea. What better way to strengthen your partnerships than holding a small (read, cheap) cocktail party, inviting a bunch of people, and giving a plaque to a couple of agency heads who you are definitely going to need on your side in the coming weeks. The plaques were nice. The acceptance speeches were OK (about average for this kind of event). But as I sat looking around the room, it occurred to me what was wrong.
It appeared that the only people who were invited were those who worked for the emergency management agency. (I went as a guest of one of the employees). Seems to me, if you really want to acknowledge someone, you would make a bit bigger deal about it.
Municipally speaking, there is very little partnering going on in the Country. Local agencies (even in the smallest of towns) have their rivalries with each other. As a longtime emergency management planner I can tell you, getting a bunch of agency reps in a room and trying to come up with a citywide approach for any response, even with each agency having clearly defined roles, is no easy feat. Everyone wants to be in charge. It is, without a doubt, one of emergency management’s most difficult tasks, overcoming the egos in any given room.
So the idea of awarding partnerships with public acknowledgement is a phenomenal idea. In fact, I think it’s such a great idea, I plan on ripping it off in the not so distant future. But if it’s not done right, you run the risk of looking almost unappreciative. I know dollars are tight for events of this nature, especially among smaller government agencies. But there is no reason you can’t build in a small “event” fund into your annual budget (and I know that a lot of agencies do). Doing a half-assed job will only make your honorees feel like second-class partners.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Win together. Fail together.
By all measures, regardless of industry, 2009 has been a rough year; budget cuts, personnel cuts. Everyone knew this was coming (read Emergency Management Magazine’s, Eric Holdeman’s December 2008 assessment). We’ve hunkered down, sunk in our heels and evaluated our Emergency Management Program goals and priorities…the HVA still needs to be addressed regardless of the limited staff. Don’t even ask for overtime, you’ll give your boss a heart-attack.
So what can we let go of?
The answer is nothing. The fact of the matter is, now, more than ever, emergency management needs to be prepared. As the poor economy eats away at organizations and individuals, preparedness initiatives and family disaster preparedness becomes a luxury. People will not decide on a three day supply of water in the closet over feeding their kids. Companies will not be allocating their limited resources to evacuation and severe weather planning. Now, more than ever, our efforts as emergency managers must not fail.
The solutions, however, may not lie in our usual tool boxes. After all, our organizations are financially strapped as well. So what do we do?
I was reading this month’s issue of Inc. Magazine, (July 2009) dubbed “the ultimate start-up guide, how to beat the recession and new rules of compensation.” It hit me like a brick; we need to go into start-up mode.
Start-up companies typically have very small staffs (usually 2 or 3 people to get off the ground) and very limited financial resources. Yet, they must produce great results or die out. The first year of a start-up is literally sink-or-swim every day. For those companies that make it, the results and products are usually astounding. Every little win is felt by the entire group…they win together and fail together. The camaraderie and motivation in a start-up is unparalleled. This is the mind set we need to achieve with our staffs throughout emergency management; a feeling that everyday counts to the most, and every win and every failure is owned by everyone.
Here’s one way to go about it…
Start by bringing everyone together. Try it without blackberries in-hand, you’ll get more out of it. Write down all of your initiatives – evacuation planning, family assistance planni
ng, communication planning, hurricane exercise – whatever exists in your set of priorities should be on a board in front of the group. More than likely, projects already have a point person assigned to them, but if they don’t assign a person to each. Spend a few minutes talking about where each project sits, and brainstorm next steps. Engage the entire group. If you’re talking about planning an exercise, ask someone who isn’t working on the exercise planning team to weigh in. Get as much as you can from the group on the board so everyone can see what’s in progress and what still needs to be done.
Once everything has been listed, written on the board and brainstormed, make a game of it. Decide on a prize. For those of us that work in public sector positions, compensation may not an option due to union agreements, grant funding and things like conflict of interest law (not to mention a few other legal gray areas), but comp-time can sometimes be negotiated, and after-work outings for your team or certificates of achievement will often get you further than you’d think in motivating your staff. Set milestones for each project, one week out and two weeks out to start. Set to meet again in a week in order to check in on everyone’s milestones. But here’s the catch: if EVERYONE doesn’t accomplish their milestone, nobody wins. Up the anti, and follow up again in a week.
Spend the week between meetings motivating your group; send emails, stop off at their desks, go to a few of their project meetings. The key is lots of involvement and lots of kudos. When the group is together, recognize the positive work done by the whole, with less focus on individuals. When a project doesn’t meet its goals, try asking someone who isn’t the point person why they think the project is off-track and what they think could be done to get it back on track. Discuss options as a group and make positive suggestions to the project manager for moving forward.
This level of positive reinforcement will accomplish great things. First, it will bring your team together and motivate them to work across projects – the collaborative results may surprise you. It will also keep you, as a supervisor, more in tune with your people and their progress. Additionally, it will get your workload under control. Celebrate every achievement with the group and bring every shortcoming to the table and allow it to be rehashed and reworked.
Promote this concept of “win together, fail together,” because in emergency management, the wins and failures are not just our own, they are far reaching. While our failures can have devastating impacts, our wins can save lives.
So what can we let go of?
The answer is nothing. The fact of the matter is, now, more than ever, emergency management needs to be prepared. As the poor economy eats away at organizations and individuals, preparedness initiatives and family disaster preparedness becomes a luxury. People will not decide on a three day supply of water in the closet over feeding their kids. Companies will not be allocating their limited resources to evacuation and severe weather planning. Now, more than ever, our efforts as emergency managers must not fail.
The solutions, however, may not lie in our usual tool boxes. After all, our organizations are financially strapped as well. So what do we do?
I was reading this month’s issue of Inc. Magazine, (July 2009) dubbed “the ultimate start-up guide, how to beat the recession and new rules of compensation.” It hit me like a brick; we need to go into start-up mode.
Start-up companies typically have very small staffs (usually 2 or 3 people to get off the ground) and very limited financial resources. Yet, they must produce great results or die out. The first year of a start-up is literally sink-or-swim every day. For those companies that make it, the results and products are usually astounding. Every little win is felt by the entire group…they win together and fail together. The camaraderie and motivation in a start-up is unparalleled. This is the mind set we need to achieve with our staffs throughout emergency management; a feeling that everyday counts to the most, and every win and every failure is owned by everyone.
Here’s one way to go about it…
Start by bringing everyone together. Try it without blackberries in-hand, you’ll get more out of it. Write down all of your initiatives – evacuation planning, family assistance planni
ng, communication planning, hurricane exercise – whatever exists in your set of priorities should be on a board in front of the group. More than likely, projects already have a point person assigned to them, but if they don’t assign a person to each. Spend a few minutes talking about where each project sits, and brainstorm next steps. Engage the entire group. If you’re talking about planning an exercise, ask someone who isn’t working on the exercise planning team to weigh in. Get as much as you can from the group on the board so everyone can see what’s in progress and what still needs to be done.Once everything has been listed, written on the board and brainstormed, make a game of it. Decide on a prize. For those of us that work in public sector positions, compensation may not an option due to union agreements, grant funding and things like conflict of interest law (not to mention a few other legal gray areas), but comp-time can sometimes be negotiated, and after-work outings for your team or certificates of achievement will often get you further than you’d think in motivating your staff. Set milestones for each project, one week out and two weeks out to start. Set to meet again in a week in order to check in on everyone’s milestones. But here’s the catch: if EVERYONE doesn’t accomplish their milestone, nobody wins. Up the anti, and follow up again in a week.
Spend the week between meetings motivating your group; send emails, stop off at their desks, go to a few of their project meetings. The key is lots of involvement and lots of kudos. When the group is together, recognize the positive work done by the whole, with less focus on individuals. When a project doesn’t meet its goals, try asking someone who isn’t the point person why they think the project is off-track and what they think could be done to get it back on track. Discuss options as a group and make positive suggestions to the project manager for moving forward.
This level of positive reinforcement will accomplish great things. First, it will bring your team together and motivate them to work across projects – the collaborative results may surprise you. It will also keep you, as a supervisor, more in tune with your people and their progress. Additionally, it will get your workload under control. Celebrate every achievement with the group and bring every shortcoming to the table and allow it to be rehashed and reworked.
Promote this concept of “win together, fail together,” because in emergency management, the wins and failures are not just our own, they are far reaching. While our failures can have devastating impacts, our wins can save lives.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
H1N1: We don’t have to be perfect, we just need to be real.
I have a good bit of experience as an emergency management planner; I spent time planning for the NYC Office of Emergency Management, some experience in communications planning and strategy, and I’m currently learning about health care emergency planning. For me, the H1N1 virus just turns out to be good timing; more actual experience for my resume and career development. Anyone who knows anything about Emergency Management will tell you the best way to learn how a plan actually works is to watch it in action. For me, H1N1 represents Pandemic Flu planning 101 with the added bonus of being in a health care setting in Queens, NY, the site of the largest cluster of H1N1 in the country.
So now here we sit, a solid 2 months into a pretty notable flu outbreak – the kind of outbreak we talk about in Emergency Management circles all the time, even if it isn’t a sexy global pandemic (although, according to Japan it might global) – and activities in Queens seem so isolated, it’s like the rest of the city (if not the Country) thinks we’re overreacting. Some of the safety measures that should be automatic with this kind of fast-spreading virus, like forward triage and proper use of PPE (personal protective equipment, like masks and face shields), are being met with resistance within our own healthcare community. Indeed, only a handful of hospitals in Queens are even setting up forward triage to separate out those patients with flu symptoms and isolate them from the other patients entering the facility. So what did we do all that planning for?
What kind of message does it send when healthcare professionals and public health officials have to be talked into activating the plans they paid big money to write? If history does repeat itself here, we can expect that mostly-localized outbreak we’re experiencing in New York City and in other smaller pockets across the globe, to come back with a vengeance in the fall. What then? I see us putting small Band-Aids on the issue now, but what happens when the issue gets bigger, more widespread? Are we doing enough in this small outbreak to prepare for the possibility of a larger outbreak? My view point is admittedly limited, but I’m not so sure…
Management of this event obviously hasn’t been perfect, but Emergency Management is never perfect. There have been the usual issues, identifying critical assets, obtaining and stocking supplies, and gaps in expectations for the Citywide stockpile (have you been fit-tested for a Kimberly Clark N95 mask, ‘cause the stockpile doesn’t have the 3M primarily used in a healthcare setting). But we don’t need to be perfect. We just need to set better expectations.
There has been a lot of disconnect in citywide communications which could be setting better expectations for the public as well as for healthcare providers and facilities. We are in a unique position to identify gaps now that could become complete road blocks later; not an opportunity often had in Emergency Management. I just don’t see us taking a realistic look at this from a preparedness point of view. I don’t see us taking advantage of the opportunity being given.
So now here we sit, a solid 2 months into a pretty notable flu outbreak – the kind of outbreak we talk about in Emergency Management circles all the time, even if it isn’t a sexy global pandemic (although, according to Japan it might global) – and activities in Queens seem so isolated, it’s like the rest of the city (if not the Country) thinks we’re overreacting. Some of the safety measures that should be automatic with this kind of fast-spreading virus, like forward triage and proper use of PPE (personal protective equipment, like masks and face shields), are being met with resistance within our own healthcare community. Indeed, only a handful of hospitals in Queens are even setting up forward triage to separate out those patients with flu symptoms and isolate them from the other patients entering the facility. So what did we do all that planning for?
What kind of message does it send when healthcare professionals and public health officials have to be talked into activating the plans they paid big money to write? If history does repeat itself here, we can expect that mostly-localized outbreak we’re experiencing in New York City and in other smaller pockets across the globe, to come back with a vengeance in the fall. What then? I see us putting small Band-Aids on the issue now, but what happens when the issue gets bigger, more widespread? Are we doing enough in this small outbreak to prepare for the possibility of a larger outbreak? My view point is admittedly limited, but I’m not so sure…
Management of this event obviously hasn’t been perfect, but Emergency Management is never perfect. There have been the usual issues, identifying critical assets, obtaining and stocking supplies, and gaps in expectations for the Citywide stockpile (have you been fit-tested for a Kimberly Clark N95 mask, ‘cause the stockpile doesn’t have the 3M primarily used in a healthcare setting). But we don’t need to be perfect. We just need to set better expectations.
There has been a lot of disconnect in citywide communications which could be setting better expectations for the public as well as for healthcare providers and facilities. We are in a unique position to identify gaps now that could become complete road blocks later; not an opportunity often had in Emergency Management. I just don’t see us taking a realistic look at this from a preparedness point of view. I don’t see us taking advantage of the opportunity being given.
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