Author Archives: Bill Stipp

Creative Writing

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Every month I attend the West Valley Writers Workshop. It is a great group of people that support one another as they focus on getting published. I have really enjoyed my time there, I’ve met some great people and have learned a lot about writing. Every month we’re given a prompt to write 500 words on. I’ve attached my response to this month’s prompt – “I suddenly saw her in a new light”. I took a prompt from a couple of months ago and built on it, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it.

I swung my feet out of the car, stood up, and found myself plunging down a hole. Everything went black – no shadows or stars. I now knew the definition of pitch black. I tried to refocus but the sensation that I was rapidly falling took over all of my senses. My pulse was pounding and I could hear my heartbeat echoing in my head. What happened? I began falling a little slower, as if in slow motion, when I was suddenly brought back to reality. A kick to the gut took the wind right out of me. I focused less on the pain in my head as I tried to catch my breath. I had a hard time trying to get air through the burlap bag over my head.

Burlap has a sent all of its own – a unique musty smell. If it carried potatoes, it smelled dirty, this one had carried a bird of some kind. I was in the back of a van listening to the road as we bounced and weaved through the congested streets of Washington DC. I had done this very snatch and grab a hundred times in my career and now I found myself on the receiving end of one. I got lazy and allowed myself to be distracted by Julia, an incredible woman that I met nine months ago. Her long brown hair and dark, almost grey eyes were mesmerizing. She wore Musk perfume better than any woman I’d ever met. I let my guard down and she played me perfectly.

We drove for about an hour before coming to a stop and I heard a chain-link fence roll open. The van lurched forward and the gate closed as the van parked. My captors grabbed my cuffed arms and dragged me out of the van. I was saving my energy to fight back when the time was right; my training started to surge through my veins, telling my entire body how to respond without a single thought. If I was going to survive, it was all that I had.  They put me in a metal chair and secured my arms and legs with plastic ties to the chair. I heard the familiar sound of high heels walk across the concrete floor; it was Julia! I missed this part of her personality; she was so gentle with me – until now.

Her incredible shape stood before me as the burlap bag was pulled off my head by some hired muscle; I spit a small feather off my lips as I adjusted to the light. Julia stared deeply into my eyes not saying a word as she pulled a knife from the holster strapped to her tight thigh and leaned in close. The sweet smell of Musk interrupted my focus until blood sprayed across the side of my head. She had just slit the throat of the hired muscle standing at my side. I suddenly saw her in a completely new light – who was this woman?

Success vs. Significance

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I was fortunate in my career to have a number of people who helped me along the way. Sometimes they were just there to listen and other times they offered really sound advice that helped guide me in the right direction. Having worked in three states, in three different regions, I have met some great people along the way but one person comes to mind – Randy Bruegman. Randy is now the fire chief of Anaheim CA. and I met him almost 20 years ago. He was always there with great career advice and really helped me deal with my retirement when it abruptly occurred. Following his term as the President of the International Association of Fire Chiefs, Randy started speaking nationally about the concept of being successful or being significant.

His premise is that some people define success as reaching the top position in their industry, making a ton of money, have a nice house or success can simply mean not having controversy in your life. He then describes what being significant might look like: being a mentor, having an impact on those around you, doing things for others with no expectations in return or simply being significant to others. Most of us in the fire service like to think that we are selfless people and that working in this profession is what makes us significant. Sure, we do get to help people “on the worst day of their lives” which IS significant to them, but would we do it if we weren’t getting paid?

You can go through your whole career without ever knowing if you were significant to someone besides your patients or fire victims. I was given a great gift in these past few weeks from people who wanted to tell me how much I helped them. I heard from the supervisor of one fire officer that I had trained, who was glowing about what a great leader and manager this person was. While he didn’t give me all of the credit, (I wouldn’t have taken it anyway) he wanted to know what I was emphasizing to the young officers and would I be willing to mentor him as he looks at a future promotion. Another call came from someone who I just met over the summer. The military exercises that I participate in put me in touch with people from all over the country. My new friend called me to ask for advice about taking a position in another state. We met while working at the same command post but he was given my name by someone who knew me really well. We spend the better part of two hours on the phone as he prepared for his final interview. He called to let me know he was offered the job and was getting ready to start. He couldn’t have been more appreciative of my advice.

My point here is this: Are you being successful or significant to those that you work with? What you accomplish in your work will pale in comparison to what you help someone accomplish. People find great satisfaction in helping others; I know that I did.

Who do you work for?

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Another word for work is labor. The dictionary defines labor as hard physical work. If you’re not sure, ask any mother if labor was hard work and I’m sure she can give you a unique perspective on “labor”. Sometimes what we do, day in and day out, isn’t what we’d like it to be. It’s not that its too hard, it simply isn’t satisfying. When we lose our job satisfaction, we loose sight of our purpose and whom we’re serving. At times, we struggle to remain positive, to work hard and meet the mission or vision that is before us; complacency takes over and the “I don’t care’s” start to fly. As leaders, no matter what we’re faced with, we must keep our focus on the mission or the work before us. Are you a front line leader whose actions will have a direct impact on your customers or are you a support team leader that works to serve those impacting the customers? Complacency is where customer service starts to break down and in some professions, can become deadly. Think of the paramedic who is treating you for a heart attack, do you want the one who doesn’t care? Our job as leaders is to keep complacency out of our work and the work of our people.

Colossians 3:23-24 “What ever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men… It is the Lord Christ you are serving.”

In times when we’re locked in a battle against complacency, we can be comforted in knowing that when we do our best work, with all of our heart, it is pleasing to God. God is with us all of time, even when we don’t feel like he’s there. When times get harder you should be focusing more on your relationship with God, not less. Our human instinct is to focus everything on the work before us and let the rest of our life take the back seat for a while. Nothing can do more harm than putting God in the back seat! Bring God closer; he will help you through the struggles of work or overcoming complacency. You are serving Him, doing his work as a faithful disciple. God cares about the work that you do and how well you do it. When you are feeling down about work, imagine God smiling at you because He knows what is in your heart. Look to him to get you through, He’ll light the way.

Through the waters

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Are you there for your employees? Leadership includes providing direction, vision and support for your mission. Your employees should be able to count on you to be there for them when they are struggling. It is important for them to know that they can count on your help when they need it. Imagine a child who is working through a problem and they need to find a parent to help them. As parents, we see them get lost very easily and just being there with a simple reminder is all that they needed. This is not to say that our employees are children, but a good illustration of an effective leader is someone who is a good parent. Leaders should want to help their people navigate through their challenges (waters) and when things get worse, you can stand by them so that they are not swept away. Do your people feel confident that you’ll be there through thick (rivers) and thin (water)?

Isaiah 43:2 “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you…”

You can feel confident that God will be with you through thick and thin. This is another promise that God has made; to be with us in all that we do and that nothing will sweep us away – we have eternal life through Him. It is a great relief to know that we are not alone; we will not be challenged beyond what God knows we can handle. While we might think that we can’t possibly take any more and we feel like the waters are rising quickly, we should also feel the comfort and peace in knowing that He will be with us. If we develop trust and establish a relationship with our people, they will have faith in us to believe that we will take care of them. We too then, need to develop our relationship with God and continue to learn about His promises. Don’t rely on God only when you pass through the river, get to know Him and see what happens when you are only passing through the waters.

The Armor of Light

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Calling someone a Christian leader should naturally come with the assumption that they will lead ethically, unfortunately there is temptation everywhere. We all have the ability to justify any action we take, whether right or wrong; the devil is always at work to throw us off course. The Josephson Institute lists twelve rationalizations that people will use justify not making good ethical decisions: “1. It’s necessary, 2. if it’s legal, it’s okay, 3. it’s part of the job, 4. if it’s for a good cause, 5. doing it for someone else, 6. fighting fire with fire, 7. it won’t hurt anyone, 8. everyone’s doing it, 9. it’s okay if I don’t gain from it, 10. I’ve got it coming, 11. I can still be objective and 12. it’s creating necessity.” No mater how we try justify our actions, when we violate the trust of our people, we have lost the one thing that is hard to get back; their respect. If we think about what happened on “Wall Street” and compare the rationalizations listed, it is easy to see how things got out of control and greed took over. We must guard against temptation at every turn and stay vigilant against the pressures of world around us.

Romans 13:12 – “…let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.”

The “deeds of darkness” can be those things that we consciously do and those things that we do or think unconsciously. As Christians, we are under attack by the devil everyday; he’s trying to win us over from God. Remember how he tempted Jesus by offering him the riches of the world and how did Jesus respond? He used scripture to rebuff those temptations. God has given us everything we need in His word through the bible. If we have the word on our hearts and in our minds, we will know what to do when the urge to justify our actions starts to rise up. When we put on “the armor of light” we can hold our heads high and confidently look at ourselves in the mirror and smile knowing we did the right thing; even when it was hard to do. In the long run, people will respect you for acting ethically despite how they may initially respond. The struggle is daily but our armor will keep us protected.

Can you really do more with less?

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I mentioned earlier this week that I submitted an article on automatic aid to the International Association of Fire Chiefs. For my non-fire service readers, automatic aid is when two or more fire departments respond to emergencies in each others communities without having to be specially requested. It is an awesome concept in the Phoenix Valley where regardless of the name on the truck, if you need help, the closest truck will be there. Talk about customer service! All 26 agencies participate equally protecting 3.9 million people in 2,036 square miles.

I start to get a little heart burn when local government starts using the phrase “do more with less”. I’m finding out pretty quickly that it simply isn’t possible. You can do less with less or you can do what you did but not as well with less but not more. The federal government shows us that as they continue to trim billions of dollars we, the average citizens,  don’t really see or feel it. The bigger you get the less efficient you are. Think about your waist line, the bigger you get the less you can do without a little strain. You can also starve yourself resulting in malnutrition and simply move through your day not being exceptionally productive and just getting by. A number of federal agencies have duplicated efforts to serve the same population need but local government is, by its nature, not able to grow that big or be that inefficient. Elected Officials at the local level hold the purse strings a little tighter than congress does – thank God!

My point is this, we can’t do more with less and it may be time for the fire service to stop pretending that they can. Automatic aid can help fill the gaps on emergencies but can we do more together on other levels? Can we partner in administrative functions? If we can’t, perhaps its time to start talking about what we can’t do anymore because we have less instead of trying to hold on to what we have always done. There are always efficiencies to be found, that was all done a couple of years ago. Now we’re faced with trying to sustain a 40″ waist on a 32″ budget; you can only suck it in for so long before you blow the button off and kill someone.

What memories come from old songs?

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Before I climb aboard my soapbox in the next post, lets take a trip to the old fashion boom box. A colleague of mine and supporter, Jason Hoevelmann has created a new blog that will take you down memory lane at Http://lifeinmusic4u.blogspot.com. Jason is reflecting on those old songs that we all loved and is applying them to today with an interesting perspective. Jason, a fellow fire officer, is sure to bring back some memories. On to the topic at hand…

 

 

Chaos is Right!

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I’d like to start by thanking everyone who sent me comments or posted here. Your support has been awesome. We added two links this week to area writers – Olivia Tejeda and Michael Bradley. They each write something different and have been a big help to me, please check out their web pages on the “Links” page.

My first week with a blog didn’t go as well as I had hoped. I’ve planned time into my schedule to writing here and in my book. You know what they say about the best laid plans? As the Chairperson of our local Public Safety Retirement Board, I spent time learning the new amended regulations and reading the Arizona Revised Statues – not the most exciting reading I must admit. Our public safety professionals are pretty young as it relates to retirement, so we haven’t had a need to do much work in the past. As we age, injuries have started to creep up and the “older guys” are starting to retire. Its hard to believe that I’m now an “older guy”. Our job is to administer the requirements of the law for our members. In this case, thank God for lawyers. I spent the rest of the week writing my next article for the IAFC on Automatic Aid. Stay tuned for a post on that by the end of the week.

Dwell Among Them

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Does your workforce get the chance to see you regularly and what do you leave behind as you depart? There is an old theory called the Seagull Management Theory – you fly in, leave droppings everywhere, and fly out. When was the last time you caught someone doing something right – and said something to them? Your workforce needs to hear from you, see you and be connected to you. Put your dwelling place among them. You don’t have to move your office and become a permanent fixture but become a “regular” in their space. You should strive to reach a point that when they see you, its not a cause for concern and they feel comfortable having you around. Walk among them, catch them doing things right and build unity of purpose. You’ll be amazed to see the results of a team built around the same purpose.

Leviticus 26:11-12 “ I will put my dwelling place among you… I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people.”

The Leviticus verses are telling us that God intends to dwell with us, walk among us and be our God. It’s saying “God will lead you through it all, get used to Him because He’s not leaving, He’ll live with you, walk with you and never leave your side. God will be here for the good and bad times, you can count on Him – He is your God. We are His people today because we believe; we see His actions daily and feel His presence. Does your workforce believe in you?

Management By Walking Around is far more effective than the seagull management theory. Build a strong relationship by being present and engaged. You’ll find that the view from the ground is better than the view from above.

Chaos

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The old saying that chaos breeds discontent is very appropriate when it pertains to morale. In these economic times many people are leading as though “these people should be grateful they have a job, that’s the only morale they need to worry about”. The top employers remain on top because they remember who is on the front lines with their customers; unhappy employees have a direct impact on customer service. Some believe that keeping the peace means coddling people, they are dead wrong! Peace keeping can be multi-focused; it’s not always about benefits. Good supervisors offer coaching, provide developmental opportunities and encourage teamwork as a way to create a peaceful environment. Employees that are encouraged by their work, as Maslow told us, tend to perform at higher levels which often results in greater satisfaction and customer service excellence. Many managers will say that “our employees are our greatest asset” but when it comes to helping them be productive and happy; they are just another asset. As a leader, our job is to work with the employees toward a common goal. We all will work smoother and happier with a little order, routine and consistency, the opposite of chaos.

1 Corinthians 14:33 – “For God is not a God of disorder but of peace…”

God does not want us to live in disorder and chaos. Jesus Christ, His son, was known as the Prince of Peace. Jesus was a great reconciler for us; bringing us to peace with God our Father. Jesus taught us to be humble, loving and forgiving of one another. These are all synonymous with peace. God does not want us to live in fear but be loving and forgiving toward each other with the knowledge of everlasting life with Him through Jesus Christ. There is no greater display of peace but to promise ever lasting life in heaven with God our Father and His son, Jesus Christ. Now that’s peace! The disorder we see around us today is not created by God, it is the temptation to turn away and believe in our own power rather than rely on our God of peace.