The longer you've been in office, the further you are from the day you were received with open arms. During your tenure you either will gain the confidence and trust of the members of your organization, or the relationship will begin to deteriorate and create opportunities for misunderstandings and disenchantment. A chief's swearing-in ceremony is not unlike a marriage vow. In accepting a badge to serve in a particular community, you promise to uphold many things.

Perhaps you also need to remember that as you raise your right hand, your vow is being observed and interpreted by a large number of people who are trying to determine if they will feel as good about you in six months as you feel about yourself that day. In this life you often don't get what you deserve; you get what you can sustain. Some also say you don't get in life what you want, but rather what you can negotiate. Either saying implies that hoping to get something is the worst strategy, unless it is backed up by skills in either negotiation or justification.

Chiefs who are lucky enough to have an extended honeymoon often see it end during the annual budget battle. There are many things that fire departments wish they had and often feel they deserve to have but don't. You may have been hired to get those things because in the past, those needed items weren't able to obtain adequate public support or continually came in second in the competition for public funds.

Neither situation is desirable for a fire chief, and this may be where the honeymoon ends. The budget process is not just about sitting down and making a laundry list of what the department wants; it also includes delivering them. Part of the budgeting process that many chiefs completely fail to pay attention to is the long and somewhat arduous task of understanding why something is needed in the first place. If you can't justify it and you can't negotiate it, then the only time you are going to get it is when there's either an excess of funds or a person who's just feeling downright benevolent toward the fire department.

Unfortunately, the justification and negotiation skill set isn't found between the pages of Fire Chiefing 101, and it certainly doesn't get a lot of play at the annual fire academy. There are hundreds — maybe thousands — of fire departments out there that are under-funded, inadequately supported, poorly staffed, poorly trained and under capacity compared to what they need to protect their communities.