6 Expectations For ALL New Firefighters

in today's video i want to address an area of tension in the fire service it seems like in a lot of departments there's some tension generational tension between the older firefighters and the younger firefighters the older firefighters tend to think that the newer and younger firefighters are lazy and titled soft whatever and the younger firefighters tend to think that the older firefighters are overbearing lazy and so on so in today's video what i want to do is i want to lay out some basic expectations that will be put on all new firefighters it doesn't matter if you're working in a big city a small suburban department rural volunteer career it doesn't really matter these same expectations will apply no matter where you are now obviously if you're a new firefighter it's important that you reach out to your immediate supervisor lieutenant captain whoever and find out exactly what will be expected of you as a new firefighter it's important for you to know what they expect of you going forward so that you can progress through your probationary period smoothly and excel but first i want to talk to you about our sponsor columbia southern university they reached out to me not long ago to offer to sponsor the channel and i had the opportunity to sit down with them and i was very impressed by what they offer they are 100 online which makes it easy and flexible for you to take classes at your own pace when you feel like it the other thing is they offer a variety of different programs whether it be associates bachelors masters doctorates certificate programs in a variety of areas obviously a lot of you watching this are interested in fire and fire science and ems and things related to public safety but they also offer information technology business and more i would encourage you to check them out right now they are offering a 50 off your first enrollment and they are very very first responder and military friendly so please if you get the chance check out columbiasouthern.edu backslash ffn i will put the link in the description down below and be sure to check them out let's get started so if you're watching this wondering why is this important the answer is simple when you're a new firefighter and you're on your probationary pewter even earlier than that your first couple weeks in your first month you are laying a foundation for the rest of your career like it or not first impressions do matter and if you do something that earns you a bad reputation it will be very hard for you to break and it will follow you around for a while if not your entire career so make sure that you try and follow these general guidelines and like i said earlier be sure to sit down with your officer your supervisor whoever and make sure your expectations are clear or i should say their expectations of you are clear so that you know exactly what you should be doing the first one is rather simple and obvious and if you hear this you might even roll your eyes and say well of course i know that but you would be surprised how many people don't get this right the number one thing you can do is be on time and have a good attitude if you can't show up to work on time they might let it slide once but people are going to talk about it they might let it slide twice but people are definitely going to talk about it you show up late to work three four five six times during your probationary period don't be surprised if you get let go if you can't do something so basic is show up to work on time and on time doesn't mean showing up the minute your shift start the shift starts on time means showing up 15 to 20 minutes before it starts so that you're ready to go by the time your shift starts whether it's 7am 8am whatever that's going to be a basic expectation on you make sure you can do that the other thing is have a positive attitude and again that sounds so cliche and so many of you are going to say well of course i'll have a positive attitude but public safety has a tendency to burn people out quickly for a variety of reasons lack of sleep poor working conditions depending on where you are some of the things you'll have to deal with personal life work life there's all sorts of stuff that can burn people out make sure you don't let that bad attitude rub off on you you might show up all smiles and ready to go in your first week but on month six don't let somebody else's poor attitude rub off on you in addition to the advice about poor attitude don't come in there with an entitled attitude meaning whether you be 40 years old or whether you be 19 years old it's important for you to come in there and understand that you are the new person on this crew i don't care where you used to work i don't care what your past career was i don't care how much education or special training you have it does not matter you are the new person and you would be expected to come in with an attitude of somebody that's ready and willing to learn so make sure you come in with a good attitude and you at least show up on time the next one is the less you talk the more you learn now what i don't mean by that is what some firefighters think is that when you're the new person you sit in the corner and only speak unless spoken to i do not agree with that at all i think all people have something to contribute whether it be from a career that was totally unrelated to fire or maybe there's a new training or a new tactic that has been is being taught in fire academies and maybe you're not familiar with it and at least check it out but what i am saying is is you are going to be walking into a crew with decades of experience and a lot of close ties working together for years at a time when you are that new person you have a lot to learn so when you are a new person if you aren't familiar if you aren't familiar uh you will be expected to go through a probationary period and i actually did an entire video on things you should be doing while you're on probation i'll make sure that i link it up here if that's something you're interested in but your time on probation will be expected to learn you're going to need to learn the trucks you're going to need to learn your district or your city you're going to need to learn your maps and your streets you're going to need to learn your protocols you're going to need to learn your sops and sogs and so on the less you talk meaning trying to tell everybody else and impress everybody else with what you think that you know the more you will learn so be sure you come in there with an attitude of somebody that's ready and willing to learn the next thing you will be expected of you is you will be expected to do household duties and usually not the good ones you'll be expected to clean toilets you will be expected to mop floors you will be expected to wash trucks you will be expected to do all sorts of other things along those lines that aren't exactly glamorous and flashy this is for two reasons number one is because those things need done this is essentially your home away from home and you and the rest of your crew and the other crews will be living there for 24 to 40 to 48 hours at a time the other reason is that this is because you have to start at the bottom again i talked about this before i don't care if you're 40 or you're 19 or what you used to do you are new here you have no experience here and most departments operate under that system of when you're new you do the non-glamorous jobs and as you move up the next crew does the non-glamorous jobs so make sure that you are okay with doing that even if you're not okay that is something that will be expected of you do it do it with a smile on your face and remember that you need to have a good attitude the next one you will be expected to meet and exceed your job requirements so over the course your probationary period um you will do things every department has a little different name for it we call them jpr's job performance reviews if you're a senior firefighter somewhere and you have something similar tell me what you call them everybody i've heard several different names but essentially what a jpr job performance review is is it's a sheet that your officers or senior firefighters are supposed to mark you off on at regular interview regular intervals throughout the course of your probation saying that you're capable of throwing a ladder or advancing a hose line or whatever other tasks that they deem necessary some tasks in your jprs will be timed or they will be scored for example a popular one for a lot of people is a fitness test if the requirement for the fitness test for whatever it is let's say you have a fitness circuit and you have to the minimum passing time is four minutes do not be the new firefighter that passes at three minutes and 59 seconds or barely makes it under the wire at four minutes be the person that exceeds whatever those requirements are again you're building a reputation for yourself for the future you do not want to come into a new department and be the person that barely skates by right off the beginning the fire service has a lot of those people and they don't want more so make sure that you're able to exceed the requirements of the job the next thing and this one causes some controversy is make sure that you're able to fit in with the group now if you've never been a part of a group i actually did a video on this of how to fit in with a new group if you're the new person gives you some pointers and some tips of what will be expected and good ways to go about fitting in however i think people that have a background in sports higher level sports maybe high school college or professional and people that were in the military have an advantage with this the reason being the culture of most fire departments is similar to that of a higher level sports team or that of the military meaning you're a group of people that are expected to work together to achieve whatever goal it is when the military attack a target or or sports team play a game and win it's the same sort of idea with firefighting you're a group of people that must work together and stake as a cohesive unit to run an ems call or or put out a fire or whatever it is that you're tasked with that particular day if you have that kind of experience you have a leg up but if you don't have that kind of experience it certainly doesn't mean that you're not going to be able to fit in it will be a little bit different for you in that when you're in a group like this people are going to have expectations on you and you will have expectations on of them for you you will have to rely on one another and in that process of learning each other's boundaries and learning whether or not this is somebody you can rely on someone you can trust you're going to be testing each other's boundaries now there's a lot of i'm actually going to do another video on this in the future uh where there was an officer that wrote a thing that hazing on any form is unacceptable across the board but but there are going to be instances where you will get made fun of where they will play pranks on you where they will test your boundaries and say things to see how you react now if you're not comfortable with that this might not be a good fit for you and i am in no way endorsing any sort of uh sexual harassment any sort of racial harassment any sort of um going after somebody picking on somebody that's not what i'm trying to say that i endorse for example when i got hired at my first apartment one of the things they did is they they took the the slats out of the bottom of the bed so that when i went to go get in my bunk uh it was my first week or two i don't remember i went and laid down in the bed and the mattress just kind of fell through it only fell about a foot it was actually a pretty funny joke they got me but they do those types of things to test the boundaries and see how you react are you that type of person that some sort of meaningless silly prank like that you're gonna flip out because if you are they're gonna have a hard time trusting you in really tough situations and again i'll go more into this and what i mean by this in a different video in the future but just know that you will be expected to fit in with the group by no way that means that it's okay for you to be personally harassed on immutable characteristics uh sex race things like that but just know you might get pranks played on you and you need to have thick skin going into this and finally the last one that i want to address is you need to be first you need to be the first on the truck for any type of call now obviously you're not always going to be the first on the truck but you need to be out there you do not want to consistently be the last person to the truck whether a fire ems whatever you need to be the first person to volunteer in trainings when you're doing trainings advancing hose line you need to be the person on the tip you need to be the first person there you need to be the first person up in the morning you should be up a half hour before everybody else getting coffee ready now every department or every crew i should say has uh that one person on the crew that's the coffee nerd and if they're really protective of their coffee pot stay away from that but you need to be first in everything that you do and that goes back again to having a good attitude and being eager and willing to learn so as always i hope you found this useful i hope you found this helpful and if you did give it a thumbs up consider giving it a like and giving it a like consider subscribing to the channel i do do lives on this channel now hopefully you can uh sign up and you can jump on you can ask me questions about firefighting ems fitness whatever it is that you want to talk about this talk about i want this to be a place where you are encouraged to pursue whatever it is that you're working on and i hope to see you guys in the next [Applause] [Music] video

Channel: Mike Pertz

Views: 44,175

Keywords: Firefighting, Firefighters, First Responders, how to become a firefighter, firefighter fitness, firefighter interview, firefighter testing, study, firefighter nutrition, firefighter reaction, paramedic reaction, firefighter breakdown, paramedic breakdown

Id: U7A19qJeYZQ

Length: 12min 51sec (771 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 01 2021