Enriching leadership of volunteers in the emergency services

By Associate Professor Michael Jones and Dr Yoke Berry. This article first appeared in Issue Two 2017 of Fire Australia.

In Australia it is economically impractical to employ the number of emergency service workers needed to adequately respond to fires, storms and floods. As a result, Australia benefits from the benevolent support of around 235,000 emergency services volunteers, many of whom have followed in the footsteps of their family’s tradition to volunteer.

This volunteering is a way of life for many in our communities, and has been for a long time. Volunteer fire brigades were established as early as the mid- 19th century. Emergency and rescue agencies, such as the state emergency services, have their origins in the Civil Defence established in the aftermath of World War II.

Volunteer brigades and units are managed by the volunteers themselves. This quasi-independence of volunteer groups—in contrast to the corporate environment of paid staff in a regional, district or head office—can sometimes cause tensions, especially related to communication and authority along hierarchical structures. However, these tensions also occur within volunteer groups, where effective leadership is a critical element for job satisfaction and for the retention of recruits. As a result of these problems, many volunteer-based emergency service agencies experience high rates of volunteer turnover.

In some cases, volunteer turnover is as high as 20% each year. At times, up to half of all new recruits leave within the first two years.

Volunteer turnover is an economic liability to volunteer-based agencies. Training, uniforms and protective equipment are expensive. More importantly, volunteer turnover has a bearing on operational capacity, flexibility, resilience, and to some degree, morale. Research on poor volunteer retention is therefore valuable for the emergency sector.

Finding out why this happens— and developing ways to improve volunteer retention—has been the focus of a Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC project with the University of Wollongong team. Along with Associate Professor Dominique Parrish, Ms Vivien Forner, Dr Joakim Eidenfalk and Dr Senevi Kiridena, we have been investigating changes in volunteer leadership behaviour.

We found that there was no need for a leadership program per se, because most agencies offer a variety of programs that meet the traditional needs of leadership development. Instead, our interdisciplinary team—all experienced in leadership—were keen to find other angles for developing changes in leadership behaviour. We have now identified self-determination theory as a simple method to introduce to volunteer leaders.

Self-determination theory recognises that people have three basic psychological needs for optimal functioning and wellbeing:

• Autonomy—having the opportunity to express personal initiatives and ideas
• Belonging—perceiving themselves to be part of the group
• Competence—feeling effective through positive feedback and appropriate training.

This ‘ABC’ of self-determination theory has been taught to people who interact with others in diverse environments, such as homes, workplaces, schools, sports, universities and volunteering. Organisational research shows that when selfdetermination theory principles are applied in the workplace, employees and volunteers are more motivated, engaged and satisfied with their jobs, and also less likely to leave the organisation.

A nine-week program, called Inspire.Retain.Engage, was developed, which consisted of:

• One day of learning about leadership, self-determination theory and generation of ideas
• Nine weeks of on-the-job application and active reflection on the principles of self-determination theory with the support of an online mentor
• A final day of reflection and sharing within communities of practice.

The program was piloted with volunteer leaders in 2014 with the NSW State Emergency Service and the NSW Rural Fire Service. It was delivered again in 2016 to volunteer leaders and staff of Victoria State Emergency Service and Queensland Fire and Emergency Services.

The Inspire.Retain.Engage training and the use of self-determination theory improved the retention rate of volunteers, as shown by the statistical effectiveness of the program on behavioural change in the participants, job satisfaction and turnover intention of team members.

While more longitudinal measures would provide a more in-depth evaluation of the Inspire.Retain.Engage program, we are satisfied that the simple tools offered to volunteer leaders, staff and their organisations will benefit their lives, agencies and communities. The program is available to all emergency service agencies in Australia.