How do we manage our missions, responses and incidents every day? With the Incident Command System, of course. But have you ever thought of implementing some of the theories that form ICS and using them in your recruitment? The scenarios aren't all that different.

At the beginning of the year I was asked for my goals. Among them, I had listed the need to increase recruitment efforts and bring personnel numbers back up. My county commissioners, knowing that volunteers are the life-blood of the fire district, took me to task. How many volunteers would I need? Which station needs the most? How was I planning to get this done? They gave suggestions and examples of their best volunteer recruitment efforts.

That was the turning point for me. I asked myself, “How do I fight fires?” and “How do I attack other missions and tasks?” The answer was clear: I needed to implement my knowledge of fighting fires.

Take command

There are five key functions in ICS: command, planning, operations, logistics and finance. Each one would play a role in our recruitment efforts. Once command was established, I proceeded like I was at a fire. At an incident, a consolidated action plan is necessary. I found that developing an action plan can't be done in a vacuum; the key to a successful action plan is the planners. What made my planning committee different was that I brought in people from outside the fire service. One was our county extension agent, who had an extensive background in recruiting 4-H volunteers. I used executives who I knew were active in several volunteer organizations. I used some of my own volunteer staff and rounded it out with one person who had never been a volunteer.

The committee looked at our recruiting efforts, past and present. What had the department done to recruit? How many volunteers were really needed? How many could be reasonably expected in a short time, and how many of those could be expected to stay on? The planning committee brainstormed reasons why people would want to volunteer and what would make them shy away. They looked at other volunteer agencies where the department could recruit those who already like to volunteer, and they introduced retention strategies.

The planning group believed that one-on-one communications from a current member to a prospective recruit had been the most useful tool in the past in identifying what it took to retain the volunteer and how it could be used to entice him or her to join. They identified an ideal number of volunteers to staff apparatus, taking standards used by paid department for staffing on apparatus and tripling it. The group identified our current staffing per station and came up with a minimum staffing of two-thirds of the ideal number.

In motion

After the brainstorming was completed, the committee started to put together the action plan. The action plan included tactical benchmarks and listed what months we would approach communities that have a critical, moderate and marginal need for volunteer firefighters. Once we identified where we needed volunteers, the committee came up with strategies that included recruitment operations, a communications plan, finance and logistics.

Recruitment operations included who would recruit the new volunteers. Of course the answer is everyone, but we trained our volunteers on whom to approach and where to look, and we put the chief in charge. As prospective volunteers were approached we made follow-up calls by phone, snail mail and in person.

We needed to be able to get the word out to prospective volunteers in every way possible. We identified key locations where our population congregates. Our communications plan had to address fliers, media campaign, public forums, special events and even door-to-door follow-up. Next we examined the resources that needed to be expended and the financial impact to the district.

We came up with an estimated cost of about $40 per volunteer, which included radio ads, PSAs, fliers, signs, banners and newspaper ads. We outlined prospective donors and sponsors and explained to them how their small investment would help the entire community. One local automobile dealership even paid for the production and televised an advertisement to attract volunteers for us. The short video was a success, bringing calls from prospective volunteers as far away as 75 miles — though the best logistical support you can get still is a positive, fact-based, recruitment effort by existing volunteers.

Our action plan includes benchmarks that let us evaluate if our plan was working and if we need to change our strategies. Each month we evaluate where the recruitment plan is and whether to implement the next phase. The plan also includes a monthly recap to our county commissioners.

In the past six years we have recruited a total of 64 people into the Riley County Fire District, and 34 of those have been since the initiation of the recruitment plan. The plan helped us virtually double the number of recruits attained in the previous five years. Our goal is to add an additional 30 people this year.

Each of us uses the Incident Command System to put out fires and manage the fireground. By implementing an ICS approach in recruiting, we can pave the road to a bright future for our departments.

---

Patrick R. Collins is chief of Riley County Fire District #1 in Manhattan, Kan.