Organizational Behavior of Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service - Case Study Example

Names : xxxxxxxxxxx Institution : xxxxxxxxxxx Course : xxxxxxxxxxx Title : Organizational Behavior Tutor : xxxxxxxxxxx @ 2010 Introduction Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service aims at being a leading player on a national scale, regionally and locally. The service serves about 500 square miles and has about 2.5 million people. County Fire Officer leads the service with the help of Brigade Management Team. The service has thirty elected members and has about 42 fire stations with about 2,600 workers. Key regeneration projects have offered noteworthy financial development recently to the service. Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has a set Integrated Risk Management Plan which defines what the service does to lessen the risk of individuals being hurt if fire incidents and lessening fires within buildings. Foremost, it prioritizes in preventing fire from taking place and after that concentrates at decreasing the fire impacts by improved protection of buildings for businesses and individuals’ homes. Where an emergency response is required, this will be swift and efficient (Drucker 2005). Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service puts the main focus in delivering to the community and borough level and the service dynamically participates in numerous local partnerships. Developments are being delivered continuously and many developments are significant. For instance, a lot of properties and vehicles intentionally set on fire have decreased. It has taken more than 65,000 home and fire risk evaluations and the number of individuals who get injuries from fires within homes has also decreased considerably. Performance in regard to health is excellent and improving as well. There are several actions that are being implemented to lessen the risk of staff who get attacked during operations and this includes active identification and pursuant prosecution of the perpetrators. Effective ideas, such as “Drive to Arrive” policy have lessened many accidents and neglects entailing fire engines. At region level, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has adopted approaches to enable it work efficiently with varying community needs (Kumar 2007). Management Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service Chief Fire Officer and the workers have influenced numerous developments at nationalized level. There have been many developments which include using and evaluating new equipment. The management as well as the personnel have been inventive in their approach to modernizing the service. Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service utilizes its resources efficiently and provides good value for money. Funds have been used competently and the service has the utmost good organization savings figure countrywide and in regard to deprivation levels, the service rates second lowest cost per head countrywide. The management has been successful in eliminating spare capacity through development of more flexible duty programs that avail the right number of workers connected with the risk at any time. Sick health retirements are managed efficiently and costs have been decreased (Abbas 2005). The senior mangers are well informed regarding the costs but this weakens further away from main headquarters and at junior levels within the organization. Further training is planned to increase financial alertness. The management compares the costs and performance with other services and this has enabled the Service to better comprehend how its support expenses compare with other services. Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service is in an era of change. The managers consult with the workers regarding the service and they are anticipating noteworthy forthcoming challenges associated to the possible future diminution of public region funding. Partnerships Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service manages risks efficiently, and is meeting the national framework requirements. It works closely with other partners and hence the service has developed efficient plans to be able to respond to each and every known kind of risk and emergency circumstance. Standard training is taking place to assist the service in being ready for such incidents should they take place. The service offers excellent leadership and professional expertise in the applicable partnerships allover Greater Manchester and it as well supports this activities through financing a “emergency Planning Unit. It revises its operational evaluation through accredited peers from fire division (Samuel 2001). Community Delivering broader community results is the other most important element of the fire services work in boroughs for Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service. Boroughs have considerable sovereignty while developing their approaches to Community Safety and involvement, and therefore the diversities within approach. This is based on the precise requirements of those communities and risks facing them, and to a smaller degree the expertise and interests of the crews in the boroughs. All have region action plans; however the quality of these differs. The action plans for every community have information proving the most deprived regions within the region, the cultural mix, ages and kinds of families and the kind of housing they stay in. the service utilizes this information to inform them on the where they should target some of their operations; for instance, in home fire evaluations. Moreover, the service has numerous initiatives that offer education and advice to each and every community regarding fire safety and protective as well as preventive measures. There more efforts that are being implemented to reach the most susceptible communities. Initiatives like “Beatweeps”, where services join to target a region; concentrating on felony, safety and the environment are utilized in several regions. There are many examples of FRA participating actively in breaking initiatives like Prices Trust Schemes and volunteers from the community. Housing associations and other co-workers carry out fire risk evaluations within homes for the service and this frees up firefighter capability. Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has been successful in getting chances to incorporate and influence communities and the most risky communities at a very local point. Within Oldham, the targeted operation decreased refuse fires and the fires that are normally set in dilapidated buildings. Working in partnership with the Council, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service offered fire alarms for individuals with hearing difficulties. It assisted with establishing a Community Fire Cadet program; this brought everyone who was interested in fire safety matters and worked with several others to decrease fire associated anti social behavior within affected regions (Robbie 2008). At Rockdale, a group has been established to comprehend the exact fire and safety matters the black and minority ethnic communities are facing and this is has helped the community work with such communities better and making the place safer. The service is also utilizing the groups to inform the communities regarding job opportunities within the Fire Service and this is aimed at making the community members to participate within the Service. At Salford, some community based projects have contributed in reducing fire incidents that are associated with anti-social behaviors and this consists of fires that get started within stolen wheelie bins. This region gains from mutual approach to lessen the negative effects of fires on the environment and community’s quality of life. This has led to a decrease in fires and about 50% decrease in stealing of bins. Still, at Wigan, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service works efficiently with the region age Concern division. This has led to more 500 home fire risk evaluations being carried within the last two years in addition to the assessments carried out by the Fire Service. Finally, in Trafford, there is Community Advocate that works jointly with the youths who have been spotted as likely arsonists. Youths are also reached with fire safety information through a specifically organized inter-school game competitions and a program runs with Manchester United, still to make use of the game to educate people regarding fire safety and arson lessening (Robbie 2008). The service addresses the population with health complications and physical disabilities within the community through implementing special educational programs regarding fire safety. For instance, in south of Manchester, there is a combined post that has been established to work together with the individuals having mental complications. Consultations Nevertheless, consultations at Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service are ad-hoc at a regional level. Even if there is sufficient local knowledge, there is a capacity regarding the manner in which this is translated into improving the Service. While the service has several diverse schemes on consultations among the managers, employees and the community, there is a need to examine their good organization more properly. The assessment is supposed to demonstrate results in core priority areas, like incident and death decreases in addition to making contributions and illustrating impact on broader community results. Some can be introduced allover Greater Manchester while some can be introduced in a few regions and can be implemented easily and some can be stooped in case they are not effective (Abbas 2005). Culture Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service carries out frequent meeting which has improved the culture of the performance being challenged and sharing accomplishments and methods of working across the entire service. This has additionally improved the value for money at the Service. In Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, roles are defined by the organization’s aims and objectives. The service’s objectives include reduction of the number of emergency occurrences and the resultant consequences while ensuring safety, healthy and experienced workforce. The managers have established trust within the workers regarding any decision they make and this has ensured transparency within the management procedure. The employees within the service thus feel that incase they put more efforts, it will result into raised performance and as a result the employees will get rewarded. This has thus created a culture within the employees of valuing the rewards the organization provides for their efforts and thus it has improved the performance significantly. Here, each and every worker feels that the managers have offered an encouraging working environment and hence this further motivates the workers. When the workers think that some set conditions are not pleasant, they freely communicate this to their bosses and this has established a culture of free communication within Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service. Political and managerial leadership Political and managerial leadership has been efficient and reasonably stable. The leaders offer valuable advice to the management team and also challenges the management if need be. The Service’s members actively take part in planning, delivering and getting induction training and contribute their views during the meetings, which has been helpful. Involving the members and accepting the challenges in the Service Excellence Steering Group has improved the service’s operations greatly. Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service manages changes efficiently and modernizes their operations and accomplishing efficiencies while at the same time sustaining and improving the performance of the service. The service’s approach to consultation is “proposal discussion paper” and this demonstrates that the service has both political will and leadership to address all difficult matters in an increasingly challenging financial atmosphere. The service has set plans on how to address operational training and development, expertise management and performance review of the workers. The plans offer people the professional skills to compete for the new vacancies within the Service; this offers a pool of talent for every vacancy. This has greatly improved capability among the employees (Kumar 2007). The service has resourceful connectivity and leadership between regional commands and the key management. Individuals from varying areas work together and this allows sharing of ideas amongst everyone. The management has recruited new equality and diversity advisors and this quickened the rate of change. Women as well as firefighters from minority communities are being recruited in the service. There are new policies and processes in place in addition to development of training to support the implementation of these policies. The service’s management has recruitment target for 20% females as operational personnel and 21% of minority communities as staff members. Each and every new firefighter gets Equality and Diversity training. The training covers discrimination, bias, aggravation, equality, diversity and also introduction of the new employees to policies, processes and the legislation. This has been so helpful in fitting the communities that require enlightenment in such areas. Such changes are very vital within the organization and if implemented successfully they lead to changing the organizational culture effectively (Drucker 2005). Conclusion Culturally, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has a working environment that supports new employees as well as the other employees. It has done this through establishing transparent management and by setting up free communication as well as the management listening to the workers’ views. The service recruits every gender, trains the workers and this investment has improved the culture within the service. The firefighters and other operational employees have competent skills, have their roles defined and as a result Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service has been very successful in its operations (James, 2009). Bibliography Abbas, L., 2005, Organization Development. Elsevier Inc, New York. Drucker, J., 2005, Leadership within Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, Springer, New Jersey. James, A., 2009, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service authorities, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Kumar, V., 2007, Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, Sage, Manchester. Robbie, P., 2008., Preventing, Protecting and Responding to Fire Incidents, Mosby Elsevier, London. Samuel, N., 2001, Fire and Rescue Service Management, Saunders publishers, Sydney. Read More