By Karl Bauer
People may like what they do, but they can do it wherever they like. Consequently, fire departments across the country spend untold sums of money assessing a candidate’s commitment to their organization; but despite all the money spent, firefighters still come and go like the tide.
Those who have studied the concept of commitment to a job or an organization believe there are three leading forms of commitment: affective, normative, and continuance. While the clinical appeal of those terms somewhat belies the significance of their meaning, according to authors Paul Sweeney and Dean McFarlin,1 their distinguishing features are quite familiar. Affective commitment refers to an employee’s emotional attachment to the organization, while normative commitment denotes a member’s obligation to remain, more or less succumbing to a sense of organizational peer pressure. The third type, continuance commitment, speaks to the familiar syndrome from which many a long-term employee suffer: All things considered, it simply costs too much to leave. Of these three, affective commitment compels the most.
If, as McFarlin and Sweeney propose, affective commitment supercedes the other two, then it reasonably follows that fire officers wishing to improve the quality and quantity of their subordinates’ commitment to their organization must develop an understanding of how their particular managerial style may influence the emotional attachment of those they supervise.
Undoubtedly, the other two types of commitment merit attention. But, given the power of human emotion over human action, it would seem that fire officers would do well to pay assiduous attention to the sway their managerial style holds over their subordinates’ emotions.
The Athenian Model
Using Athenian organizational democracy as a model for modern organizations, Brooke Manville and Josiah Ober2 make a strong connection between managerial style and its influence over subordinates. While citing the unprecedented autonomy enjoyed by modern workers, they point out that most subordinates today have little voice in the direction of the company for which they work and, therefore, remain disenfranchised; distrustful; and, in many cases, cynical of professed desires to empower them. In essence, they claim that too many supervisors continue to motivate through “Pavlovian carrot-and-stick incentives.”
In contrast to classic militaristic management style, they proffer Athenian organizational democracy as a preferable architecture of organizational citizenship. Not imposed, but rather grown organically out of the needs, beliefs, and actions of its members, the Athenian style constitutes a spirit of governance founded on the governmental precepts of the ancient Athenian people. It eschews the stifling bureaucracy so often found choking contemporary government and business and flattens the quintessential hierarchical, militaristically driven organization to one more attuned to fostering collaboration and instilling a sense of full-fledged ownership in the fortunes of the organization. Moreover, it calls on supervisors to collaborate with fellow workers and cultivate an environment that supports self-governance without task-oriented bureaucratic oversight.
That’s fine, but how should fire officers apply such ideals to the rough and tumble world of the fire station?
Memos Vs. Feelings
No doubt, most fire officers know how to write a good memo. After all, they’ve been reading them since they were probationary firefighters and have come to view them as the principal method of communication between supervisor and subordinate. If supervisors want to change the way buckets of foam are stored inside the station, they write a memo. If they’re changing a firefighter’s shift, they send him a memo. Want to inspire an entire engine company to treat the average drunk facedown in the gutter with the same care as they would a young child who’s been run over by a car? Write a memo.
John Kotter refers to this cold, clinical style of communication as the “memo approach.”3 Simply stated, by overrelying on detailed explanations of the logical reasons to change (or simply laying down a terse order to do so), we’ve underrelied on what he and others have found to be a much more effective approach: presenting that which is emotionally compelling. According to Kotter, people change their behavior when they are motivated to do so, and that happens when we speak to their feelings. Great leaders are brilliant at doing precisely that.
Could an emotional approach work with firefighters? According to John Buckman, chief of the German Township Volunteer Fire Department in Evansville, Indiana, not only yes, but fire officers need to recognize that today’s firefighters are motivated by intrinsic, emotionally charged values.4 If allowed to operate under management that relies less on close supervision and detailed rules and more on self-management and initiative, firefighters in many cases will feel energized by their work, even passionate about it. They will view their job as something significant, something that makes a meaningful difference in our cynical world. They will begin to believe in the value of their endeavor because they feel intrinsically rewarded. They will become emotionally attached to the organization.
The Trust Factor
Perhaps nothing potentially engenders affective commitment more than a sense of trust. Conversely, members’ affective motivation, or emotional attachment to the organization, can quickly sour once they feel betrayed.
Chief Randy Bruegman, Clackamas County (OR) Fire District and president of the International Association of Fire Chiefs, perhaps says it best: “This may seem almost cliché, but the trust within an organization is the bond that holds it together. Trust is the emotional response that you and those you work with share. It’s co-dependency toward common objectives.”5
The implication for fire officers desirous of improving the quality and quantity of their subordinates’ commitment seems rather clear: They will experience greater success by addressing the affective or emotional component of their subordinates’ organizational commitment—as long as they do it honestly.
This does not mean that fire officers must suddenly adopt the lugubriousness of an afternoon talk-show host. But the Athenian model provides at least a framework for giving organizational members a voice in determining the organization’s development and direction. In contrast to the Olympian peaks of classic militaristic organizations, the Athenian model of organizational democracy flattens organizations, values and relies on intrinsic motivations, and engenders a sense of fulfillment in every member. Moreover, it demands honesty and a shared sense of trust to bind the organization.
Reduced to its essence, the notion of emotional leadership speaks to the need for fire officer training that goes beyond developing sound technical expertise to include a genuine understanding of how managerial style either encourages or dissuades a subordinate’s emotional commitment. It suggests that, as fire officers, we must seek to understand a subordinate’s emotional tie to the organization and learn how to effectively use self-management techniques while genuinely and enthusiastically rewarding initiative. It implies that successful fire officers will find a way to speak to their subordinates’ emotions and thereby foster change in the desired direction. Above all else, it demands that, as fire officers, we will deal openly and forthrightly with those we supervise.
Endnotes
1. McFarlin, P.D. and D.B. Sweeney. Organizational Behavior Solutions for Management (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2002).
2. Manville, B. and J. Ober, “Beyond empowerment: building a company of citizens,” Harvard Business Review, Motivating People, January 2003, 1-7.
3. Kotter, J., “The power of feelings,” Leader to Leader, Winter 2003; www. pfdf.org/leaderbooks/l2l/winter2003/kotter.html.
4. Buckman, J., “Management for Intrinsic Rewards,” Fire Engineering, July 2002.
5. Bruegman, R., “A matter of trust,” Fire Chief, August 2002; http://firechief.com/ ar/firefighting_matter_trust/index.htm.
KARL BAUER has been chief of the Palomar Mountain (CA) Volunteer Fire Department for the past five years. He is enrolled in the National Fire Academy’s Executive Fire Officer Program and is working toward a master’s degree in executive fire service leadership from Grand Canyon University. He is executive director of the San Diego County Task Force on Fire Prevention and Emergency Medical Services, a collaborative of fire departments, special districts, political leaders, and labor organizations.
