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 planning, 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.