Learning Disaster Management Lessons Faster & With The Resources You Have

What if learning ‘lessons identified’ could be done faster, cheaper, with existing resources, with more focus, and with clear criteria for success? What if you did not need to ask for more resources? How would this change disaster and emergency management programs across Canada?

Disaster and emergency managers spend a great deal of time, resources, and energy trying to get better. A fundamental process embedded in the profession is post-incident assessments or after action reviews, more commonly known as a feedback loop.

After every exercise and live event a post incident assessment is performed to review what worked well and what could be done better. Lessons are identified with the goal of eventually learning those lessons. But it takes a lot of time, resources, and energy to learn them. And more often than not, organizations don’t get around to learning all of the lessons identified before the next disaster or emergency. 

Some of the ways disaster and emergency management professionals try to learn from their mistakes is by:

• updating existing training and taking new training, 

• attending post-secondary programs, 

• exercising bigger and more complex events, 

• attending conferences, 

• joining associations, and 

• running drills. 

Productivity and efficiency in learning lessons 

The above list outlines great tools for disaster and emergency management practitioners; however, there is a new option entering the profession. A tool that:

• decreases the implementation time of lessons identified, 

• only requires existing resources, and

• increases return on investment.

What is the new tool?

Non-directive coaching improves disaster and emergency management leadership, it helps with recruitment and retention, it engages employees, and it enhances the bench strength of teams. Coaching is most appropriately used during prevention/mitigation, preparedness, and recovery. It can be used during the response phase but only during certain situations. 

Coaching is non-directive and inquiry based so it’s not the best tool for when events are moving quickly and experience, instinct, and plans must be used to direct resources. But for larger events (Type 1-3) and after a few operational periods, coaching can be an effective tool in all areas of the incident command post or the emergency operations/coordination centre. 

Professionally trained coaches work with people one-on-one, or in teams/groups. It is a structure that empowers people to find innovative solutions that are right for them and their organization. 

Coaching assists with people coming up with ways of working that can be implemented using the network, resources, and skills they currently have. When they are coaching, coaches are not consultants, they are not trainers, and they are not psychotherapists. They help their clients assess challenges in order to find solutions that can be implemented faster, with a defined criteria for success. 

Coaches can help with

• exercise design,

• training development,

• post-incident assessments, and

• program development.

They won’t do any of the work it takes to implement the solutions but they will help staff complete the work more efficiently using clear criteria for success, and using the resources available to the agency. 

If you would like to know more about how you can use coaching in your emergency management agency contact me and I’d be happy to provide more details.

Brad Ison 

Brad Ison is a professional coach, disaster management professional, facilitator, and speaker. To find out more contact Brad directly by emailing him at brad@bradison.ca. You can also learn more about Brad here.