Mom

This week being Mother's Day, I felt it only necessary to discuss some portions of my Mom Theory on Officership and Leadership.

 

Some of you are aware and many are not that I have created an entire leadership program that is called..." What would you do if your Mother was the Incident Commander?"

 

I certainly won't give the entire presentation away here but I will share a couple of pertinent thoughts this mother's day that I believe can make the fire service a better place. My basic premise for this is that as firefighters and fire officers, instead of reading all of these high tech management guru books (which I do read incidentally) I think we reach down within ourselves and capture and practice the value system given to us by our mother while we were growing up.

 

I have seen the sign in many fire stations that says something like " I am not your mother" or "Your mother doesn't work here" and so on and so forth. My theory says maybe we should bring a couple of points of Mom back into the fire house.

 

Here are just a couple that maybe as fire officers we should think about:

 

* Were you ever scared when your mother was right near you and holding your hand? Wouldn't it be nice if your presence and composure was able to have that effect on your personnel? If your people believed and trusted in you so that they felt better and more comfortable when you were around?

 

* Could you tell that your mother cared about you? How about your personnel? Can they tell?

 

* Do you remember when as a child there were only four pieces of pie and there were five people at the table and your mother began explaining how she never cared for that pie anyway? What personal sacrifices have you made for your personnel or others lately?

 

* We mouth the words safety, concern and be careful pretty easily. When you left the house and your Mom said be careful, is that the same way you say it to your troops, or are you just mouthing the words?

 

* If your mother sent you to the second floor of a burning building would you be on any other floor but the second? Why?...because you were held accountable and she would check on you often. Do you hold your people accountable and do you check on them often?

 

* Can you remember hearing your Mom say " This will hurt me more than hurts you". But yet she still performed the uncomfortable task of disciplining you and helping shape and mold you into the person you are today. Do we embrace the difficult and uncomfortable task of disciplining our personnel like Mom or is it just easier for US not to be uncomfortable or deal with people when it makes us uncomfortable?

 

There are a million Mom analogies and if you would like this presentation held in your fire house with your officers, please drop me a note, I would be happy to share this humorous but serious message with you in a more formal setting, but in the mean time please submit your best Mom / fire officer analogy and I will include it with your credits in the program.

 

Take a minute today to think of your Mom and smile just a little when you think of what she created!

 

You!