Results

​This section should be read in conjunction with the control measure: Situational awareness Situational awareness is a person’s perception and understanding of the situation they face. It...

Effective situational awareness ensures that the interpretation reflects the actual situation. This is critical for making appropriate decisions and predicting the likely effects of activities....

Resolving an incident involves the efforts of many people and multiple teams. This might include a number of fire and rescue service personnel as well as responders from other agencies. For any team...

There are three stages of situational awareness: 1. Information gathering The commander will gather information from a variety of sources to gain accurate situational awareness. They use it to...

Mutual trust between team members is essential for effective communication and co-operation, which drive co-ordination, as they both affect shared situational awareness and...

Fire and rescue services should ensure their incident command policies recognise leadership behaviours and the responses they elicit. They also need to adequately prepare commanders to carry out...

A decision trap can be described as a thought process that can lead to a situation going wrong and include biases. Refer to Situational awareness. There are a number of decision traps that may...

This section should be read in conjunction with the control measure: Interpersonal communication The purpose of communication is to provide another person with information. This typically involves...

Some typical demands or impacts that may cause acute stress are detailed in the table below. Demands Impacts Working environment Noise Heat Reduced visibility Weather...

Stress may lead to: Impaired situational awareness: Impairments such as a narrow focus and becoming easily distracted may result in difficulties with scanning the scene. People may struggle to...

Command skills are the cognitive and interpersonal qualities critical for assertive, effective and safe incident command. To apply them, incident commanders should be able to understand the situation...

Leadership culture The leadership relationship begins before attending an incident. Fire and rescue services should be aware that the culture of their organisation can influence behaviours on and...

Incident commanders and the command team are accountable for the decisions they make. They should be able to provide reasoned justifications for what they did and why. This is supported by the use of...

Operational discretion involves the use of professional judgement to make decisions in relation to incidents that are extremely unusual and not reasonably foreseeable, or a combination of...

Effective communication is when information has been exchanged and is understood in the way it was intended. Quality, relevance and clarity of interpersonal and radio communication is essential, for...

This section should be read in conjunction with the control measure: Personal resilience An incident can be a challenging environment to work in. The location, tasks and uncertainty of what might...

Fire and rescue services should prepare their commanders and personnel to function under stressful conditions. They should consider how they develop incident commanders to acquire the highest levels...

​There are many factors that influence teamwork and these are represented in the basic team performance model below. It illustrates how team factors such as individual experience and operational...

​There are several stages of team development: Forming stage An incident commander is expected to create a team that will effectively and safely resolve an incident. Yet, the urgent...

Team or joint decision-making involves team members working interdependently to make decisions to achieve a common goal. It is dependent on many factors, including: Individual or organisational...