vdf recruitment & retention: understanding and meeting the challenges
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Professional Military Education Basic NCO Course. VDF Recruitment & Retention: Understanding and Meeting the Challenges. Fit For Duty. REFERENCE FEMA 310 Retention and Recruitment for the Voluntary Emergency Services; Recruiting, Training, and Maintaining Volunteer Firefighters. Overview. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Slide 1
VDF Recruitment & Retention: Understanding and Meeting the Challenges
Professional Military EducationBasic NCO Course
Slide 2
Fit For Duty
REFERENCE • FEMA 310 Retention and Recruitment for the
Voluntary Emergency Services; Recruiting, Training, and Maintaining Volunteer Firefighters
Slide 3
Overview
1. Retention and Recruitment Challenges: Lessons from Volunteer Firefighters
2. Retaining Volunteers through Effective Leadership
3. The “Volunteer Viewpoint” of Effective Management of Volunteer Programs.
4. Recruitment: Looking in Right Places for the Right People for the Right Jobs.
5. Retention: Meeting the Challenge
Slide 4
Overview
• VDF has more characteristics of volunteer organization than a professional military force.
• Individuals with prior military service more comfortable with military environment
• VDF volunteers receive monetary compensation if on State Active Duty – a rare occasion that is outweighed by the hundreds of hours dedicated to company drills and weekend training.
Slide 5
Overview
• VDF overall retention rate between 2012 and 21013 was 45%
• Lowest retention rate was 32% of enlisted
• Commissioned, Warrant, and Non-commissioned Officers rate was 55%
Slide 6
Overview
• No published recruitment and retention policies although many units have successful practices
• No published the results of analysis or report on the effectiveness of its current recruitment and retention practices.
• FEMA FA-310 on Retention and Recruitment for the Volunteer Emergency Services: Challenges and Solutions
• Deals with volunteer firefighters but may be instructive to the challenges faced by the VDF
Slide 7
Challenges
St. Joseph’s University study: Reasons for leaving volunteer fire department (more than one reason):• No time to volunteer 92.3
%• Conflicts in organization 47.8 %• Organizational leadership created 46.7
%• Too much training 45.6 %• Attitude toward newcomers 39.1
%• Criticism from officers/older members 38.0 %• Lack of camaraderie 19.5
%
Slide 8
Challenges
The Two-Income Family:
• Very little time to volunteer
• Time is spent at work, with the children, and house
• Time available too little for active fire service
• Volunteers discover that time requirements, particularly the startup demands associated with initial training, are too great
Slide 9
Challenges
Less Emphasis on Social Aspects of Volunteering:
• Loss of the social aspects
• Volunteers want to serve community and develop social relationships
• Constraints of everyday life left no time to spend time outside of the station with other firefighters
• Many fire departments closed firehouse areas used as social centers for many volunteers.
Slide 10
Challenges
Urban and Suburban Transience:
• People who move often are less likely to become involved in a volunteer fire department
• Fire departments do not want individuals who spend a year getting trained and then leave
• Acute in resort areas or communities with military populations
• Surge in transience when farms and ranches are subdivided into housing developments
Slide 11
Challenges
Changing Rural Communities:
• Time demands and focus on self are similar to the changes experienced in urban areas
• Replacement of small main street businesses with large, multipurpose department stores
• Managers are less willing to let employees leave when the alarm sounds.
• Large corporations less willing to give employees time off to volunteer.
Slide 12
Challenges
Poor Leadership and Lack of Coordination: -
• Lack of direction given to members, particularly new members in the area of training
• New recruits often become frustrated and quit
• Mentoring and coaching needed
• Engaged departments have easier time with recruitment and retention
• Members take more pride in the department
Slide 13
Challenges
Authoritarian Management Style:
• Dictatorial leaders drive members out of volunteer fire departments.
• Volunteers are given orders in day-to-day jobs, and not want actions dictated around the station.
• Participative management styles attract and retain members.
• Volunteers want a sense of worth and feel using their talents to contribute to the overall good.
Slide 14
Challenges
Failure to Manage Change:
• Change is inevitable in any fire department and can be painful if it is not managed properly.
• Major changes that are not well-managed usually will lose members.
• Most common causes of management problems is poor communications.
• Poor communications sign of an authoritarian manager who is a weak leader
Slide 15
Retaining Volunteers through Effective Leadership
Recruiting, Training, and Maintaining Volunteer Firefighters: essential to retaining members:
• The program must meet individual needs.
• The program must provide its membership with reward and recognition.
• The program must provide adequate supervision and leadership.
• The program must challenge members.
Slide 16
Retaining Volunteers through Effective Leadership
• Ability to retain volunteers has direct relationship to its ability to manage its people
• Many problems can be traced directly or indirectly, to inadequate or misguided efforts of managers
• Effective leadership helps retain members as well as reduce dissatisfaction
• Ineffective leadership is perhaps the leading reason for a decline in membership
Slide 17
Retaining Volunteers through Effective Leadership
• Most volunteers agree that effective leadership can resolve retention and recruitment problems
• Leadership qualities and skills are not simply acquired, they must be learned and practiced
• Bylaws, rules, and regulations also are important.
• Leadership’s responsibility to maintain discipline and carry out departmental regulations fairly
• Clear, measurable standards of performance and conduct should be developed and enforced
Slide 18
Effective Volunteer Leadership
Volunteer Viewpoint: If you want my loyalty, interests, and best efforts, remember that...
1. I need a sense of belonging, a feeling that I am honestly needed for my total self, not just for my hands, nor because I take orders well.
2. I need to have a sense of sharing in planning our objectives. My need will be satisfied only when I feel that my ideas have had a fair hearing.
Slide 19
Effective Volunteer Leadership
Volunteer Viewpoint: If you want my loyalty, interests, and best efforts, remember that...
3. I need to feel that the goals and objectives of the organization are within reach and that they make sense to me.
4. I need to feel that what I’m doing has a real purpose that contributes to human welfare--that its value extends beyond my personal gain, or hours.
Slide 20
Effective Volunteer Leadership
Volunteer Viewpoint: If you want my loyalty, interests, and best efforts, remember that...
5. I need to share in making the rules by which, together, we shall live and work toward our goals.
6. I need to know with some clear detail just what is expected of me--not only my detailed task but where I have opportunity to make personal and final decisions.
Slide 21
Effective Volunteer Leadership
Volunteer Viewpoint: If you want my loyalty, interests, and best efforts, remember that...
7. I need to have some responsibilities that challenge, that are within range of my abilities and interest, that contribute toward reaching my assigned goal, and that cover all goals.
8. 8. I need to see that progress is being made toward the goals we have set.
Slide 22
Effective Volunteer Leadership
Volunteer Viewpoint: If you want my loyalty, interests, and best efforts, remember that...
9. I need to be kept informed. What I’m not up on, I may be down on. (Keeping me informed is one way to give me status as an individual.)
10. I need to have confidence in my superiors--confidence based upon assurance of consistent fair treatment, or recognition when it is due, and trust that loyalty will bring increased security.
Slide 23
• Recruitment should be focused on filling specific billets with capable volunteers rather than just boosting the numbers of recruits
• VDF units have high turnover and low retention because volunteers were recruited with expectations that did not match reality.
• The key is looking in the right places for the right people for the right jobs.
Recruitment
Slide 24
1. Assessing Needs: Identify what jobs need to be filled and qualities are required.
• Compare your unit’s Defense Support of Civilian Authorities (DSCA) Playbook assignments to your current Manning Table of Operations (MTO.)
• Discuss career goals with your current troops to determine where they would like to go and what training they will need. This will give you a sense of your current and future personnel needs.
Recruitment
Slide 25
2. Targeting: Select and reach the right people.
• Most effective approach is through referrals
• Local groups that train citizens for emergency management, such as CERT and police auxiliary
• Work with local National Guard recuiter
• Other civic service grous: Elks, VFW, Knights of Columbus, Neighborhood Watches and churches
• Community events and county fairs are often good sites for recruiting efforts
Recruitment
Slide 26
3. Orienting: Hold prospective volunteer events
• Do not ask potential recruits to show up at a regular drill when people are too busy to talk
• Set up special informational sessions at specific times in the year.
• Every recruit should be interviewed for background, interests, skills, aptitude and potential placement in the VDF unit.
• Only then invited to attend a regular drill
Recruitment
Slide 27
4. On-boarding: Process paperwork, create professional development track, and assign mentor
• A recruit should take oath after at least two drills
• File the paperwork to determine rank and billet
• Discuss training schedule for the next two years, including regular drills, military training (IET, PLDC, and BNCOC for enlisted), and specialized training for their team assignments.
• Assign mentor such as the 1SG or Team Leader
Recruitment
Slide 28
Emphasis on Social Aspects of Volunteering:
• Allow for more social time and interaction.
• Examples during drill: extended group meal times during regular drills; special group training such as survival and land navigation
• Outside drill: picnics and parties that include spouses, significant others, and other family members.
Retention: Meeting the Challenge
Slide 29
Poor Leadership and Lack of Coordination:
• Each commissioned, warrant, and non-commissioned officer should be a role model
• Make recruits feel welcomed and useful.
• Drill schedules should provide activities for each individual though the entire drill time.
• Individual career development and training goals should be reviewed on a regular basis.
Retention: Meeting the Challenge
Slide 30
Authoritarian Management Style:
• Build volunteer management skills
• Volunteers need to understand reasons for orders and feel as if their input has been considered.
• Rank does not equal experience.
• Many senior VDF officers and NCOs lack the management expertise of their troops
• Commanders and other unit leaders may succeed better by tapping the experience of their troops.
Retention: Meeting the Challenge
Slide 31
Failure to Manage Change:
• Change is inevitable and it can be painful if it is not managed properly.
• Units that do not manage change well will lose members.
• Improve communications.
• Redoubled efforts are required to retain the current troops, as well as the new recruits.
Retention: Meeting the Challenge
Slide 32
DISCUSSION: Provide suggestions for retention:
• Making the VDF experience rewarding and worthwhile
• Making the time demands adaptable and manageable.
• Rewarding VDF troops with sense of value.
• Encouraging good leadership that minimizes conflict.
Retention: Meeting the Challenge