Procedures and Protocols

Hey team,

Our station is currently under a major revamp and therefore I am looking into your guidance into the creation of procedures and protocols for the station.

The basic story here is that currently there is no procedures / protocols / standards of practice that have been laid out in our station apart from 'verbal' (which are made up on the spot, may I add) therefore as stated there is no hard copy 'these are the procedures, you must abide them' for our station.

Its a big ask, and I appreciate and thank you in advance. But what I would like to know is.. what are your procedures / protocols / standards of practice for your stations?

I would like to know them for everything... from attending incidents..on the fire ground...social network usage / mobile phone usage.. on station etc. Just so there is no possible holes that the crew can slip through.

Also, I would like to know how do you display / get your crew to acknowledge these? Handouts? signed contract? book? wall plague? etc

And finally, if it comes down to it, how do you enforce or discipline crew that fail / repetedly go against the procedures / protocols / standards of practice laid out?

Many thanks and I really appreciate the time you put into your answers

Stay Safe out there

Ben 'Snapper' Auger

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Permalink Reply by Charles Maloney on March 7, 2011 at 7:26pm
Check those from Phoenix Fire and modify them to fit your department/circumstances

href="http://phoenix.gov/FIRE/forfiredepts.html" target="_blank">
Permalink Reply by Ben 'Snapper' Auger on March 7, 2011 at 10:58pm
Will check it out now,

Thanks Charles :)
Permalink Reply by Captain William Frazer on March 8, 2011 at 1:13am
This is possibly one of the biggest undertaking in a department. I could spend an hour giving you suggestions, lol as I went thru this with a few other officers when we did ours, ( they are ongoing still)
1. Make them Guidelines, but place the procedures in them, if there are set procedures to do something such as placing a piece into pump etc.
2. Always use the words "will " and "shall" if you do not want deviation from a rule or procedure
3. Keep them simple, no 3 page SOGs, they will not be absorbed and adds confusion
4. Assure consistant enforcement from all officers, and that they have the same interpretation , officers interpret , members follow.
5. Follow a five or six step discipline process, outlined in a fire officer 1 book, it works well. There will be times when a SOG is not followed, and it will require higher levels of discipline for the first offense, such as showing up to a call after drinking, where as swearing in public while on scene may only need a stern verbal warning as a first offense, but always be sure to back that up with a copy of your SOG
6. When you drill or train, use your SOGs to enforce your training, and use your training to enforce your SOG
7 reference any local or state regs, nfpa standards etc, but only reference them , typing them into a SOG will leave you typing forever leading to the 3 page SOGs
8. assure everyone gets a copy or there is a computer in the station that everyone can access to view them, and yes they should at least sign they have read and understood them, not just recieved them.
9. Break them up by topic such as Topic 100 Administration, SOG 101 Purchase order procedures, SOG 102 Shift Requirements etc, Then Topic 200 Apparatus Ops, SOG 201 Aerial set up, SOG 202 Backing up apparatus etc and so on,,

You will update these things every year it seems, and at times a specific SOG may have to be changed 2 or 3 times to better fit your ops, just because. Email me if you would like copies or more info. Its a grueling task and we still struggle to keep up with them every month. GL! Hope this helps
Permalink Reply by Tim Griffin on March 8, 2011 at 9:11am
Ben It will take me a couple of day but i will get you some of our sops. and before i do that in the military if you mess up after knowing the rules there is written discipline and after that suspension. just a suggestion
Permalink Reply by Mike Schlags (Captain Busy) Retd on March 8, 2011 at 9:26am
just reading over your response Bill pretty much sums it all up... well thought out response sir.
Permalink Reply by Ben 'Snapper' Auger on March 9, 2011 at 12:46am
That sounds great, thanks Tim

Yeah I agree with you Tim, that sort of discipline for breaking sops / procedures is something we need to put in place at our station.

Thanks for your input
Permalink Reply by Ben 'Snapper' Auger on March 9, 2011 at 3:41am
Thanks for the tips cap,

As you outlined in point 4, that is one problem we have at our station. Officers break them therefore the higher authority never seems to impose the discipline on the officers.. as in turn the officers do not give the discipline towards the lower authority
Permalink Reply by Captain William Frazer on March 9, 2011 at 11:33am
Believe me, some of our officers are the same here, they break the OG, or have a hard time enforcing them because they want to be a nice guy, and its not a great example. I tell our Lts, look, you will be more respected for enforcing the SOGs then the officer that does not enforce them. There are cases where officers will deviate from a SOG procedure for certain reasons, but they should explain to everyone after why they did so. In almost every case, a simple reminder to someone who does not follow these is all that is needed, and it stops there. I know of a time not to long ago I wore my duty jacked to a MVA with my turnout pants, I was command and was away from the scene, but the OG states that out coats will be worn at such a scene. A private walked up to me and made mention of it to me and I told him he was correct and it was a poor example on my part and then told everyone that if I did it again, I would by everyone a coffee. (they will be waiting a longggggg time for that coffee lol ) again GL in this endeavor, let us know if you need anything to help you in this!
Permalink Reply by Captain William Frazer on March 9, 2011 at 11:34am
TY Cap..!
Permalink Reply by Captain William Frazer on March 9, 2011 at 11:35am
It all starts at the top, if you dont have his/her back up, it does make things tough
Permalink Reply by Ed W. on March 14, 2011 at 9:12pm
Thanks for the info! We are currently updating ours and this will work for a good guide line.

Ed
Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on March 17, 2011 at 3:17pm
I just stumbled across this, which might be helpful.
From FEMA
Developing Effective Standard Operating Procedures
For Fire and EMS Departments

Attached as a PDF
The link is here - https://api.ning.com/files/FeiiRoWJgkz1dokCWDqhTKfrmrQIX*LEzzTjsMCS2R*ubAFrZEEeSxkoby0m6XS1mN8OvKM59ZWGZbYMVoksmhXg*xxoVKlt/SOP.pdf
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