Bureaucratic structure and leadership - Research Paper Example

Fire Administration, 2013). This is a kind of appropriate leadership technique where there is an involvement of serious safety risks (such as working with fire, machinery, dangerous heights and toxic substances (NFPA International, 2002). With these considerations, the paper aims comprehend the different feedbacks provided by the staff in a fire department in a leading southeastern city. Bureaucratic/Organizational Structure Issues Impacting the Fire Department’s Effectiveness Bureaucratic leadership style is a framework which is grounded upon certain fixed rules and regulations.

This leadership style is particularly observed to be useful in case of performing routine activities which is generally the work structure of fire departments. With reference to the feedback provided by staff of fire department in a foremost southeastern city, it can be determined that fire department follows bureaucratic style which is a fixed framework but on the job at times the fire fighters require to take a lot of flexible decisions which might not be possible within such a rigid framework.

Thus, a question arises whether the bureaucratic leadership style is acceptable in this organization or not. . People do not have any specific idea regarding what their jobs actually are. Public actually perceive them as "dead weight" because they actually are not visible as the department of police. There have been various problems regarding the organizational structure of the fire department (Cochran, n.d.). Though media has been one of the most connective allies of the fire fighter departments, there is a lack of awareness and education about what the fighter does.

Thus, there should be proper exposure of the fire department to the public, in terms of establishing greater cultural relationships. Thirdly, the fire fighters generally follow the standardized rating of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). It is observed from the feedbacks that the organizational structure or practices in the department bestow greater emphasis on the ratings of the ISO and less concern towards the needs of the communities. Fourthly, due to globalization new industrial buildings are setting up which is causing an increase in operations for the fire fighters.

The fire services and equipment are getting increasingly expensive which may raise questions in the minds of the public regarding the quality of the service they are obtaining. Moreover, quick responses by the fire fighters may not be possible as some of the coverage areas are far from the stations. Training schedule needs to be structured properly so that multiple units of fire are actually not out of service at onetime leaving large areas of the city without protection. Nationally, there is a drop in the percentage of the number of fire fighters by nearly 10 percent from 880000 in 1984 to 790000 in the year 2001.

This indicates that the