What does your agency expect of a member in this position?

To properly prepare, you need to understand the position that you are testing for. (Wayne Barrall photo)

By Lisa Baker

To be successful at anything, you need to understand what you are being asked to perform, and an assessment center is no different. In many organizations, an assessment center is used as a means to promote members to company officers and above. Assessment centers have been found to be a fair method to test aspiring officers because all applicants are going through the same process. All applicants are being asked to perform the same exercises and are being graded by the same assessors (the individuals who are scoring the applicants). Assessors are trained members from the fire service who serve in the rank being tested or in a rank higher than the rank being tested.

Many fire service members have probably heard someone in their own organization or a neighboring agency state that they are going to an assessment center. What actually does that mean?

An assessment center is not a location; it is a process where aspiring fire service members.

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