THE USE OF FIRE INCIDENT SIMULATORS IN ASSESSMENT CENTERS
Assessment centers have proven more reliable for judging candidates’ abilities to perform at higher positions than the more traditional written and oral examinations.
“Fire simulators” have been used for many years by the U.S. Forestry Service and other federal agencies, including the U.S. Fire Service. They originally were designed to train wildfire commanders to handle line jobs and staff positions. Interest in their use for training fire officers to handle structure fires always has been great.
Several simulator programs have been available to fire departments, but they typically use slides and overhead transparencies. The success of an assessment center, however, depends to a large extent on the relevancy of the exercises and the realism of the scenarios they contain. Each exercise and scenario ideally should be designed to reflect the actual duties and responsibilities of the position for which candidates are being evaluated. Obviously, the more realistic the exercise and scenario, the more effective the assessment.
Two factors are essential tor successfully incorporating a simulator into an assessment center: The simulation must be as real as possible, and the exercise must be identical for every candidate. In other words, the simulation must test for what you really want tested, and it must test consistently in the same way so that each candidate is treated equitably.
TACTICAL FIRE PROBLEM
file tactical fire problem is one of the exercises typically used in a fire service assessment center. It is particularly relevant for candidates being evaluated for line supervisor and command positions and is intended to assess a candidate’s knowledge of firefighting techniques, the incident command system, organization and planning skills, and decision-making ability.
Tactical fire problems as used in assessment centers vary considerably in type, scope, and degree of complexity. Perhaps the most basic format is the paper-and-pencil tactical problem, where candidates are given information about a fire incident and asked to prepare a written report describing how they would approach the problem. Checklists can be used to judge whether a candidate has handled the situation in an appropriate fashion. Paper-andpencil tests, however, lack the intensity and realism usually desired in an assessment-center process.
A more realistic fire incident tactical problem can be created by using an overhead projector to display a map of the building’s location or a building diagram. The candidate is given basic information about the fire situation and then asked to use the overhead projector to explain die plan of attack. Assessors may change the situation during the exercise to judge the candidate’s ability’ to deal with changing conditions at the fire scene.
Using a fire incident simulator brings much more advanced technology to the tactical problem. Since fire incident simulators have been used in the fire service for the past several years to train fire supervisory and command personnel in fire suppression techniques, it is a logical step to use them in the assessment process. They can inject an added dimension of realism into the tactical problem.
ASSESSMENT CENTERS
THE GAINESVILLE EXPERIENCE
This method was used by the Gainesville (FI.) Fire Department in a recent assessment center for fire lieutenant and district chief candidates. Under the direction of Chief Donald Harkins, Training Chief Allen Loworn worked closely with a team of consultants to develop a series of simulations to be used in assessment centers. Three different simulations were used in both cases. They included some combination of residential, commercial, and industrial occupancies.
Loworn obtained color slides of the locations and using the fire incident simulator created an escalating fire incident —beginning with smoke, then advancing to fire and smoke, and concluding with extensive fire. Once the slides had been developed, they were projected on a screen and videotaped.
Because the videotape was made of the various slides as smoke and then flames were being painted onto the structure, the monitor screen shows a building with moving smoke and flames. As the fire grows in intensity, the increase in moving smoke and flames is quite evident. A better and more realistic video picture resulted when a nonprescription Polariod1M lens from sunglasses was placed over the video camera lens. Each stage of the fire situation was timed to last approximately five minutes; the total time allowed for each scenario was no more than 20 minutes.
A number of support personnel conducted the simulation. A fire department dispatcher was seated in the room to provide voice communications with the candidate. In each scenario, a dispatcher communicated with the candidate using a prepared script. A resource person—a former member of the department with considerable knowledge of the standard operating procedures—also was seated in the room to simulate voice contact between the candidate and arriving or support units at the scene. In addition, Loworn was present to assist in any technical matters that might arise during the scenarios. The candidate also was provided with a mobile data terminal (MDT), used to access premises’ fire history and to supplement regular communications with the dispatch center. A flip chart was placed near the TV’ monitor screen so that each candidate could refer at an}7 time to the prepared plot plan showing exposures. access areas, and hydrant locations. Experience has shown that information such as distances to hydrants and exterior exposure distances should be indicated.
If desired, the flip chart or a handheld sheet can indicate the location of the items noted in the department’s regular preplanning documents. Since a mobile data terminal is used in the Gainesville assessment center and on vehicles, any amount of preplan data could have been transmitted, just as the premises’ fire history and inspection data had been.
The realism of the videotape made it possible for candidates to see without difficulty the details of the structure, the exposures, and the extent of fire on arrival. Fire growth on the videotape was timed to correspond to free-burning fire spread for the first several minutes of the tape. A more advanced treatment could use branch programming scenes so that typical results could be shown in a tape sequence, depending on the major course of action the candidate selected. Ignoring an exterior exposure with flame impingement and radiant heat impact, for example, would lead to exposure involvement.
One member of the assessment panel also was seated in the room in a position to watch and evaluate the candidate’s actions on “arriving” at the fire scene. The assessor previously had been provided with detailed information about the department’s SOPs, use of the ICS, mutual-aid procedures, and the like. In addition, the assessor was provided with a checklist, prepared by Loworn, as a means of evaluating the candidate’s handling of the incident.
At the beginning of the exercise, the candidate was brought into a room equipped with a TV monitor and VCR. After being given basicinformation concerning the fire incident, the videotape was shown and the candidate saw the first photograph of the fire scene. The candidate then assumed command of the fire situation and began to communicate with the fire department dispatcher as if in a real fire situation.
As additional units arrived, the candidate communicated with the resource person, who played the role of arriving unit command personnel. The candidate then recited the action being taken as the firesituation progressed.
The interactive communication between the dispatcher and the resource person, along with the videotape of the fire scene as the firesituation gradually escalated, provided realism and credibility. The intense nature of the scenarios, coupled with the real-time element, forced candidates to make decisions that closely paralleled those they would make at an actual fire situation.
The one flaw in this method is that actions taken by the candidates at the fire scene do not arrest the progress of the fire. Candidates were advised of this fact before the process began to alleviate any frustration that might arise from the lack of positive results of their actions.
Candidates who participated in the assessment center process indicated that they found the fire tactical problem using the fire incident simulator mentally and emotionally demanding but extremely relevant to the process.