Copper State Firemen Podcast
Copper State Firemen
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Podcast for Firemen burning the ships of Complacency, Laziness, and Excuses. We are promoting love and passion for the job, encouraging eagerness, and mastering the craft of the Fire Service!
The information, opinions, values, recommendations, and ideas are of the host and individuals on this podcast, and are not affiliated or endorsed by the fire department, organization, or companies the individuals works for. This podcast is for general information only! Indorced by Copper State Fools and Solid Fondation team LLC.
Copper State Firemen Podcast
Firefighter Recruitment, Training, and Generational Influence
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Discover the ever-evolving world of firefighter recruitment with our esteemed guest, Connor Healy, a seasoned captain with a decade of experience in the American Fire Service. Connor shares his invaluable insights into the modern hiring landscape, discussing both the digital and traditional approaches to firefighter interviews. Gain an understanding of the merits and drawbacks of today's recruitment processes, from online assessments that efficiently filter through candidates to the authenticity and pressure of in-person interviews.
The journey doesn't end with hiring; we also delve into the grueling demands of firefighter training. Connor vividly describes the fire department orientation weekend, where mental toughness and physical prowess are tested to the extreme. Learn about the intense challenges like the 250-pound dummy carry, which not only assess individual strength but also demand seamless teamwork and communication. The camaraderie forged in these taxing environments emphasizes the crew-oriented mindset essential for success in the fire service.
As we examine the broader recruitment landscape, Connor addresses the impact of generational shifts and the waning participation in team sports among today's youth. Drawing on his own experiences, he highlights the benefits of a military or sports background, which can enhance team dynamics and communication skills crucial for firefighting. We also discuss the rewards and challenges of the profession, including the importance of mental health resources and the need to reach out to potential recruits early. Together, we aim to inspire the next generation to embrace the passion and dedication required for what many consider the best job in the world.
gets people used to working in turnouts and experience that inability to lose heat. You've seen D1 athletes come down here who are in great shape and then they put turnouts on and they're not able to perform. You put the guy that you try not to judge by his cover, but they put turnouts on and all of a sudden they're studs and they're out there performing and that's what you love to see.
Speaker 2:Welcome everybody. Copper State Firemen podcast. Welcome everybody, copper state fireman podcast. This podcast is for firemen, burning the ships of complacency, laziness and excuses. We're promoting love and passion for the job, encouraging eagerness and mastering the craft of the fire service. Remember the information, opinion, values, recommendation and ideas are the host and the individuals of this podcast and are not affiliated or endorsed by the fire departments, organization or companies the individuals work for. This podcast is for general information use only. Brought to you by the Copper State Fools and sponsored by Solid Foundation Team LLC. Let's go All right. Welcome back everybody.
Speaker 2:I'm sitting down here with Connor Healy. He has 10 years in the American Fire Service. He's currently a captain. He's TRT hazmat. He's a paramedic. He's been the recruiter of the class in his academy, been a mentor to multiple probationary firefighters, runs a practical portion of the hiring process for the current department he works for. He's a dad, husband, instructor and loyal friend. So welcome, connor. Did I miss anything in the intro? Brother, sounds good. Thanks for having me. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for taking time out of your day. So we're going to sit down here now. So you have a pivotal role in the fire service right now. So you're part of the hiring process. I really want to take a deep dive into that. So, without really holding anybody back, let's talk about just real briefly, what is a hiring process with the department you work for, right?
Speaker 1:now. So process for my department right now it's changed a lot recently and I think a lot of that has to do with, kind of the way the culture is changing in the departments right. So where we're at right now is we do a. The candidates will fill out a written application. If everything looks good there, they'll do a online. It's kind of like a personality plus a little knowledge test. That is completely a third party organization that sends us results. We kind of tailor that to what we've seen has worked well with.
Speaker 1:It is in the first round that first sit down. You know, you walk in, you're brand new. You remember when you come across the board and there's five senior members staring at you and you're nervous, you're, you're, your nerves are rolling, your anxiety's up. Um, you don't, might not get across what you're looking to get across. So that first round online interview hopefully people get comfortable. They get a chance to rerecord the questions if they don't feel comfortable with it. Once they do that, they submit them. We have members of our department that are interested in the process. They review those kind of narrow down what we're looking for and they move on to a second round. That's in-person interview.
Speaker 2:Okay, so before you get to the in-person, so on that video interview because I know a lot of departments are kind of going to that do you personal opinion, right? Do you prefer that? Do you not like that? Like is that? How do you? How do you feel about? Because I've heard from both, I've heard guys say it's good because, hey, now when we're interviewing these candidates we can pause and be like what did he say? Kind of reround it or whatever, but then at the same time you know guys like us that enjoy that one-on-one. Obviously you're missing that. So what's your personal opinion on that online first step?
Speaker 1:Personally, I do prefer in person. I think you just, it's what I grew up in, it's what I prepared for and you see how people are going to respond when you know when the pressure's on, which is what our job is, right, um, but I will say the positives of it is as, as a department, we save. We save a lot of time because what it is, guys aren't prepared. They come in there. They might give a five minute interview when we've slotted 30 minutes for that interview.
Speaker 1:So you know you lose a lot of time in that Um plus, you know it's hard to believe cause how bad we wanted this job, but we've have plenty of no shows as well. So you kind of weed that out in that first round online interview. We weed that out in that first round online interview. We can, hey, you know, maybe hopefully they come back next time, maybe they're interested another time, um, but we kind of weed out the ones who aren't truly involved in and serious about the hiring process.
Speaker 2:Gotcha Cool, yeah, like uh, I agree with you wholeheartedly. It's funny because when I first heard about the online interviews, I hated the idea honestly. Yeah, right there with you. And then I had the chance to sit down and be part of reviewing online interviews and then saw the benefit of it, especially as a member of a fire department where I'm trying to judge the person. So it gives me I feel like it gives me an opportunity to be able to like we were talking about pause and be like okay, hold on a second. You know kind of process. What he said or she said so cool, so anyway, so they do that online, right, and then you do have it in person. So what's that look like?
Speaker 1:now. So the second round is your traditional interview that I think most of us are accustomed to. It's the A. You get assigned a block. We have an interview panel that comes in Everybody panel that comes in everybody's ready list of three or four or five questions, depending on kind of where we're at at the time, Um, and then about five minutes is the average per question, with a closing statement maybe, Um, and they're they're a little tougher than those first round interview questions. They're a little more personal, um, more adversity based. What have you dealt with, what have you learned from those processes and how are you going to bring that to our department to make us better? Okay, Dude that's great.
Speaker 2:I love the fact that you just the very tail end of what you said, like because that's something I preach with the young kids now it's I always say I know what we have to offer you. You know we have a dream job, a great schedule, decent pay, great benefits, a calling right. But again, like you said, what do you bring to the department that you want to work for? Because we always say, hey, leave it better than you found it right and it's, you have to bring something to the table. You can't just take, take and take. You got to, you got to give back.
Speaker 2:So I love the fact that you guys are incorporating that into that second round. But so you said you have a first and second round. Is there anything you guys? Is there a difference you're looking for in that first compared to that second, or no? Is it just basically, you know, I've heard guys say things like, hey, the first interview, you want to see if we can tolerate you, like, what kind of personality? Or can we live with you for 24 hours? Okay, so explain to the audience. For that first round, second round, what's the difference? What are you guys looking for?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So I think that that first round is as much as this job is dealing with the public and and making sure, you know, said meeting the customers needs we. This is not there's. There's a very low turnover rate in this job, right? We don't lose guys very quickly.
Speaker 1:So I have to be able to live with this candidate for 30 years plus 25, 30 years plus right. So every third day for a third of my life, I'm going to be able to live with this candidate for 30 years plus 25, 30 years plus right. So every third day for a third of my life, I'm going to be with you. Are you somebody I want to hang out with? Can I trust you? My family might come down to the station. My friends come down to the station. Are you going to run my family lives in first, due of multiple departments that I know of? Are you going to treat them with the respect that you're going to give everybody else, right? So I think a lot of that first round is looking for who are you as a person and why do you want to do this job?
Speaker 2:I love it. So, um and then. So you said that's pretty much that first round, right? So that, so that second round. What do you guys kind of catering those questions to? I think?
Speaker 1:that gets more uh, kind of what have you, what have you learned? What have, what experiences do you have in life and your family? Have you learned that you're going to bring to this department, right? So how, how did your past work experiences, military experience, life, family stuff are you going to bring to this department and how is that going to help you through your 25, 30 year career?
Speaker 2:Right, perfect, dude, I love it. So basically round one hey, what kind of personality do you have, right, can we, can we live with you? Right, for the next, or for the next 25, 30 years, but 24 hour shots at a time, right? And then the second one is, if I understand you correctly, like, how prepared are you, what do you bring into the table? What kind of personal um, whatever it is I do do you bring? So that's kind of this assumption.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and there's a little bit of both, you know mix. Still, you might get one personality question in the second round, but we all have so many different life experiences, right, and this job, you never know what the next call is going to be. That one guy, some new guy, might have the answer for a call that 320 year guys have never been on, right, it's just. It's just the life experiences that we have that we bring to this job. And how, how can that help you? As a four-man crew, we don't respond as a one or two-man crew, we respond as a four-man, five-man crew in certain situations like how are we going to resolve this? So I think that's that where that interview, those interview questions in that round, can really bring out that.
Speaker 2:Gotcha. So now you have X amount of candidates, they make it through round one. They make it around through round two. Right, and I know the next part of this process and that's why I really stand down talking, why the department you work for really sets themselves apart from most departments in the country. So tell us about that next step.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's something that has been set up that I kind of got brought into and I've been really passionate about it for the last couple of years. It's pretty new to the American Fire Service we're only the second department that I know of in the Valley that started it and we've kind of taken a little bit of what they had, adopted it to what meets our needs. And now multiple departments are reaching out because they've seen the product that we've hired and that we get out of this and they want to make it their own Right, which is good. But our process we've tailored it. We've put tons of man hours into this process to try to feather it to exactly what we want it to be Right. So it's a it's just a weekend process we have on a Friday night people come down, we do an orientation, kind of give some expectations, we hand out turnout gear. I think that's one thing that's way different than what we were when we were hired. Right, it's there's.
Speaker 1:I had worked in turnouts for years before I got hired, doing skills courses and getting ready, and I think most of us had, because you knew you had to separate yourself. Well, now we're getting a ton of people coming down who have never had turnouts on before and this is the first time that they're that they're doing that. So we get them fit for turnouts how to put it on, how to get ready Right. And then Saturday Sunday is 10 hours each day on the grinder working. We have a variety of different um skills and uh drills that we put them through. Uh, we do some teamwork exercises.
Speaker 1:We do just laborious events and try to bring out the most in people that we can. I think it's pretty amazing to see the multiple processes that I've been involved in now, watching people grow just in that weekend, people coming down not realizing how far they can push themselves. You know pushing past that when your mind's telling you to shut down, that you can keep going farther. You got to beat your mind. Push your body where we're at, it's hot, so people aren't aren't prepared for that always. So you see that part of it too. I think we we really bring a lot out in that weekend and then we hire off of that.
Speaker 2:All right. So so that weekend, um, just just tell us back. So so you said they come in on a Friday evening, right, and then they have Saturday and Sunday. They're doing skills. So what skills are you guys putting these candidates through to really test them? And we know they're in turnouts, right, which is amazing because a lot of departments don't do that. They do a couple interviews, right. They might do some sort of physical agility like a run and ball, jumps and pushups and things along those lines. But you're right, that's for someone that's never been in turnouts before. That is the equalizer. You can't cool down as quickly as you're used to. You're not as flexible as you normally are. Uh, and I know you guys fit them for probably old turnouts, right, non-fire turnouts, but I'm sure they don't fit perfect it's a challenge.
Speaker 1:I mean money's money, right. So we use some old grinder gear, try to keep it in the best shape that we can, but you make do with what you got and some departments aren't even that you know that fortunate to have that. So the fact that we get that here is great.
Speaker 2:So Saturday, so Friday night orientation. Do they do any skills on Friday?
Speaker 1:No, no skills Friday. It's just get ready. Hey, mentally prepare yourself. This is what to expect this weekend. It's going to be a grind. Come down here, give us everything you've got, because we're going to give everything we have for you because we want to hire the best people and leave this department better than we found it. Right, and that's just moving down the process with that. So, no skills on Friday night. Saturday come in early, early. We get a group. We have a group of evaluators from the department, okay, and then we have a group of logistics members who kind of help facilitate the process, and those guys and gals are the key to success down there. They keep that thing flowing well. Um, saturday morning it's a warm-up, pt stretch run, um and get into it. We have a lot of our uh fitness members from our department who run the, the warmup, and we start weeding people out instantly from that warmup minutes and people aren't, aren't ready, and that's a lot of people grow from that experience, that gauge, and realize where they're at Um.
Speaker 1:After that we break people into engine companies Um, so four or five man engine companies, depending on how many people we have down there. And then we we start working. That first morning is, uh, intro to skills courses. We do some dummy carries, um, we do some tire drags, do some hose line management stuff. Just a lot of typical your fire ground stuff that you can do, that that gets people. We're used to working in turnouts and experience that inability to lose heat. We've you'll. You've seen d1 athletes come down here who are in great shape and then they put turnouts on and they're not able to perform. And you put the guy that you try not to judge by book, by his cover, but they put turnouts on and all of a sudden they're, they're studs and they're. They're out there performing and that's what you love to see.
Speaker 2:So when you guys are putting them through. Let's say day one, right, so you do the and I'm sure there's a a mental game to it too, like uh, starting off with hey, we're gonna do a light warm-up, right, and you pretty much kick their ass for 20 minutes. You know, and I it's a boot camp ish mentality, where it's hey, mentally, we're trying to break you a little bit just to see what kind of character you have. So that first day they're in turnouts, they're going through the evolutions, what's probably the hardest event that they have to go through, that first day-ish that you find that you see most candidates struggle with. And then why do you think they struggle with that one the most?
Speaker 1:I think it's probably we do an event with a dummy carry, which is about roughly a 250-pound dummy strapped to a board, to a backboard, ems backboard and all they have to do is carry it through two flights of stairs, maybe over an obstacle, and then back down those flights of stairs and set them down. The way we kind of run it, though, is hey, don't set them down. You can't set them down onto the ground, and that's where you get a lot of people. Their grip strength's not ready. They're wearing fire gloves for the first time possibly, so they're not used to that dexterity loss, and the other part of that is a lot of teamwork. Hey, how do we?
Speaker 1:You know, this event generally lasts probably 12 to 15 minutes, depending on how strong they are, but if you don't rotate as a crew and communicate well, either you're going to drop them, which is obviously something that's unacceptable in our job, or you're going to burn out one side, one grip strength side. We've seen people yell at each other lose it over, you know, poor communication, or somebody just not communicating well on what their needs are. There's, there's heavier sides of the board, there's lighter sides of the board, and if, if crews aren't um, communicating that and hey, let's rotate, let's, how are we going to get over this obstacle? And they just try to brute strength it. That's not the answer. And if you, um, don't communicate, well, well, that's not the answer either.
Speaker 2:So all right, so it's, it's uh, and I know the event you're talking about. So, um, it's cool, because the biggest struggle that you're talking about with communication everything else too is you have the engine company that's made up of, you might have a guy that's 6'4, 250 and you might have a female that's 5'1, 10, right, and trying to pair those two up together. Obviously that doesn't work, right, but they have to make it work, don't they?
Speaker 1:I mean, look at the crews that we have. That's an engine company, that's a ladder company that we have. The good thing about it is hey, we're a diverse group, right, we have different strengths and weaknesses everywhere, and hopefully together we make a solid group as one. How are we going to overcome that? Exactly, you're not going to pair the five foot two person up with the six foot four person.
Speaker 2:Um, but how are you going to how are you going to overcome that Copy? So through that day, one right. So they're there for 10 hours. Um, that's kind of what they struggle with. What outside of an individual event. So throughout that entire first day, what do you, what do you feel like people um struggle with outside of just the events? Is it the grind? Is it, uh, just how long the day is? Is it communication or all the?
Speaker 1:I mean what I think the biggest ones are well where we're at and and the geographically is the time of year that we do it, it might be pretty hot out here, we might have some decent weather, so I think that weighs a lot on people. The other part of it, I think, from what I've seen and what I've heard back as feedback, is just the mental part of unknowing what's next.
Speaker 1:But, that plays into our job perfectly. You don't know what's next. Like are you going to do a hard workout and then we're going to get a fire right after, or you're going to eat a big meal and then get a fire right after that. That's. That's the world we live in, so I think that part of it keeps people guessing and that that can eat away at you if you're not prepared and it's.
Speaker 2:it's great that you guys incorporate that or try to simulate that in a sterile, quote-unquote sterile environment. Obviously it's a training academy, setting um as you can, because I remember hearing something, uh, from a navy seal that said that he had actually he looked up to firemen. For one reason, well, multiple reasons, but one thing in particular. Because he says, as the seals, the elite right of the military, even when they get a mission, that's very short notice, it's like a four or five hour deal, preemptive hey, we're going to have this mission, it's a, you know, we brief it right, then we know where we're going, then we start getting our equipment ready. He goes firemen don't have that opportunity. It's literally that call comes in. They have no idea that call is happening, right, and then the tones go off, the light bar goes, and then you go, and then the information you get might not be correct or it might be very correct. You have no idea. So he was always saying the mental fortitude of firemen is insane, just of the unknown.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and that's what this weekend tries to bring out in people. We don't know if the call before doesn't care what your next call is right. So we could run the worst call of our career and the next call could be a drowning again, the next call could be a fire, it's just that.
Speaker 2:Or a lift assist. It could be, yeah, from super mundane to the most stressful event you've ever been through in your entire life.
Speaker 1:Exactly. And you know you go on the car accidents that sound like it's trauma and bodies everywhere, and then we show up and it's a fender bender and you get the vice versa right. So you can't. That's that teaching that mental fortitude of not completely relying on the information you have and being prepared for the unexpected all right.
Speaker 2:So you guys beat them senseless for the entire day, send them home. What do you tell them before? You tell me come back the next day, anything in particular?
Speaker 1:it's. It's a lot of hey. Get your bodies. If you haven't been preparing before. You have to hydrate before. You need to eat some good meals. You need to rely on your family. Hopefully, you've got a good support system at home. You need to get some sleep and come back tomorrow and give us everything you got again. The good thing is it's two days, right. We can do anything for two days. Give us everything you got. This might be turned into a career for you and everything you put into that is what you're looking for for the rest of your life.
Speaker 2:So you find on day number two in your personal experience does everyone show back?
Speaker 1:up. No, okay, absolutely not. We've had multiple no call. No shows that next day, really, yeah, and you know, whatever it is, we try to reach out and find out. You know why not? And some of them answer, some of them don't. Um, some of them are honest with themselves and say, hey, I realized I wasn't ready for this, this wasn't, this was a great weekend for me, but this wasn't what I want. I'm not. They're not going to waste our time anymore, is the words that I've heard before. Okay, you know, we appreciate it. Thanks for coming down, thanks for the feedback. Hopefully you're interested again in the future. Um, but we get multiple that show up the next day ready to go. Some people that you think, hey, that guy's done, they're, they're not coming back. And all of a sudden you see that mental toughness in them and they find another gear and push. And that's, that's what we look for.
Speaker 2:Nice. So they they come back day two. What do you guys do on that second day? Is it? Is it more lax day or is it the same thing? We do some more.
Speaker 1:I would say team, team-based uh work. We do some real mental drills. We do some uh, we do what's one? It's probably my favorite event of the weekend. Um, we call it just an equipment race. So we put two or three engine companies together and we have a set of equipment Maybe it's five or maybe it's like probably 10 or 12 pieces of equipment that's laid out in a certain layout.
Speaker 1:Right, they come down, they get 30 seconds to look at this, they look at the setup. They have to run a short distance. They come back and they have a distance that's about, let's call it, an eighth of a mile away. They carry everything and there's a in that equipment. There's tire drag, there's a array of spare bottles, pike poles, equipment. There's tire drag, there's a array of spare bottles, pike poles equipment, tire irons, anything you can think of. That's just a setup of equipment.
Speaker 1:Right, they have to, as a team, as a crew, get all that equipment to a certain point, turn around, bring it all back and then set it up in the exact organization that it was, and that one's great because we get people, you get your strong, your oxes, who come down there and half of them pull the tire, which is great. They're taking that workload. And the other half of them grab a pipe pole and an axe and they take off running and the rest of their crew is hanging back and you see some maybe not as strong members back there trying to pull a tire and struggling right, which is not in the fire service. What do we not do? You don't leave your crew behind right, so that that station brings out a lot of mental exercises, some teamwork in there, that, and there's still a physical aspect to that which always plays a part in our job. So that part is great.
Speaker 1:They go through we run all our engine companies through that and then we do it again and we see if they make the same mistakes. We tell them hey, you know, we will tell that group, hey, why don't you guys do this? Why did you guys make that choice? Um, and if they come down there and do the same mistake again okay, you're not learning from your mistakes or they come down there and maybe they crush it that second time and they have the best time of the weekend and you see how people grow and we're not going to make you know, we're nobody's immune to mistakes.
Speaker 2:So hopefully you just don't make the same mistake twice, and that event is great for bringing that out now, in that particular event, since you said you like it so much, what you right as an individual if you're evaluating that day. I know obviously everyone's kind of looking at something different, but to you, what's the most important part of that event? Is it the the, the guy or gal that's taking that leadership role? Is it the ox that's trying to load as much up as he can? Or I mean, what? What personally? What does Connor look for when it comes down to that event? Since you like it so much?
Speaker 1:I would say I look for that growth the second time.
Speaker 2:If we tell you.
Speaker 1:You're mistaken, you make that same mistake again, or you don't learn from that. That tells me, either you're exhausted and you're just not listening to what we're saying, or you're not a team member, you're not a crew member who's trying to better your group. You can pull a tire, but if you leave your whole crew behind and you're just standing there down there by yourself, what good does that do? Right, because you didn't finish as a crew. You're not. You're not looking.
Speaker 2:That's not what we're looking for and that's probably a big change from a lot of departments, um, with their hiring process, because guys will come out and, uh, they're looking for blood, because they're like, hey, I got to finish number one, so I have to literally outperform everyone. I mean in the verbal sense, cut their throats. You know, like you come down and I'm the last man standing, so I'm number one, I guarantee a job, right, but that's not what you guys are looking for, correct?
Speaker 1:No, I mean, we all want the physical studs. We want them out there there and there's that our job plays a has a factor with that right. Um, but part of that. Going back to our, our interview questions, some of them are team teamwork based. Like hey, did you play sports as a, as a, as a uh child like, or in high school college? Did you learn the value, the value of teamwork? We don't, we don't want that individual member who's only out for the glory for themselves. This is a crew exercise. How are you going to achieve that as a crew's only out for the glory for themselves. This is a crew exercise. How are you going to achieve that as a crew and not look for the individual glory?
Speaker 2:You know it's funny. You said that too because the whole team aspect of it, or the workload, because I just heard a story the other day and they were talking about a recruit class that had just graduated not too long ago and they had asked the entire class I believe it was just shy of 30 people and they said, hey, everyone is made first week of the Academy. And they said, hey, everyone raise your hand. If you've ever played, from when you're five years old all the way up through college or whatever, all the way up to the date before you got here, have you played a team organized sport? Right, so, out of 30 people, all between the ages of probably 19 to 30, right, they said, seven people raise their hands, which is crazy.
Speaker 2:Like this shocked me because I know with us growing up, right, it was almost everyone played a team sport of some sort, but that's just. The generations have changed a little bit, you know, and it's a team sports aren't nearly as popular, or especially not. I wouldn't say popular, but they're not as pushed by parents, I believe, anymore, or things along those lines, because there's so many things out there you can do as an individual. So do you find that's a struggle with the newer generation of candidates coming through not having that team experience in high school, college, elementary school, whatever it might be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, I'm glad you brought that out because that was one thing I wanted to talk about is the generational differences I think of where we're at in the fire service. I've grown up in the fire service. I've heard history, long before I was around, on, basically we didn't have, we never had to recruit people. People came to us right, like it's that. That blows my mind. There was, we seen this change where we have to actually recruit for the first time and we have to go out and find people who we want to come to this department. When I was riding along, we'd have you'd have 10 people at a station any given day to try to get a chance to get an interview question at the table and talk and show that what they got. Now, every every couple of weeks we get one or two riders maybe and and it's just that that change and it's I don't know if it's for the better or not, but it's just a change. Nobody likes change, right? So that part is crazy. On, we're having to go out and find people to come to this job.
Speaker 1:Back to what your original question with the teamwork was yeah, absolutely, we see so many, you know. I don't know what it is just the I don't want to say sheltered life that so many people live now. Maybe you know there's online schools, more popular, individual sports stuff like that. But yeah, I would say the lack of teamwork has definitely shown itself. But the people that do shine are the ones that have that the military-based in the background, the prior team sports D1 athletes, college athletes, high school that definitely shines and you see them being able to communicate a little better.
Speaker 2:Dude. That's good. And you hit the nail on the head because I mean, just at the firehouse talking to dudes around, you're a roving captain right now. Correct, correct, all right. So I mean that's pretty much what that means for the guys listening, right, pretty much every single shift you're probably at a different firehouse, right, but with that like just sitting around the kitchen table talking to guys, I've never heard and right or wrong, it doesn't matter, right or I've never heard of so many people being homeschooled before. Like I remember growing up it was like if you were homeschooled you were the weird kid, you know. Now it's like I'd almost say it's damn near 50% of the people I talk to. It's either like I almost preempt it oh, you homeschool your kids, or do they go to private or or a charter school or a public. You know there's like there was never these freaking options. Growing up, everyone just went to public school, you know. So now there's no more gym class. Now there's. You know it's and that's. I'm sure that's part of it.
Speaker 1:I don't see it not playing a factor, right, it's, it's the world we live in, that's, and we have to adjust to the fire service is going to have to adjust to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love the fact that you said that too, because I think we're finally understanding now collectively across the country, that we do have to adapt to multiple things. Just our tactics, building construction. And then now, like you're saying, recruitment never recruited. All right, the american fire service in general has never recruited right, and everyone's saying it. I know all the departments around here have the same struggles. It's like we don't get the numbers that we used to get and they're like why?
Speaker 1:it's a tenth of the of the applicants that we used to have I didn't know it was that low.
Speaker 2:That's insane, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what's crazy, is so right, we have to catch up. How are we going to start recruiting? I know we have programs that have grown into high schools much more now, so we have a lot more fire science classes in high school and college that have hopefully helped recruit that. Personally, I want to start reaching out to and you have a military background, reaching out to, and you have a military background. But how do we reach out to the members of service who are coming out and transitioning back to a regular life? How do we get to them before and say, hey, have you ever thought about the fire service before? Take a couple of college classes, maybe you're interested. We'd love to have you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, hey do you have your EMT right. If you don't, that's what you need, right. Everything else we can get you kind of deal. And I wholeheartedly believe in what you're saying too, and it's just like everyone that's listening to this. Like, if you're having a recruitment issue like we all are, obviously and it's something that I've mentioned to multiple people and everyone has kind of said the same thing like, oh, why don't we do this? Right. But if you have a military base, right, why don't we do this? Right? But if you have a military base right, there's a very large one around this area Right, they have, like in any of the prior military guys listening to this, you know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:You have like a week long class, and I know every branch calls it something different. So I was in the coast guard. We called it tabs class, which is basically is a demilitarization of your personality, right? So all the things teaching you how to be a civilian again, right, okay, these are things you can no longer say to people, right, or do. Right. Then everything else.
Speaker 2:But it boggles my brain that we don't reach out to these large bases and say, hey, can we have a seat at the table? And exactly what you just said, like because part of that TAPS class or that demilitarization classes, they ask you that question hey, what do you want to do now? Right, and I know, when I sat through it I'm like I don't know. You know, it's like I had no clue. All I knew is I was no longer. I no longer wanted to be active duty, right, and I wanted to move on with my life. I wanted to start a family. I didn't want to be gone away from home as much, but career-wise it's like you know, shoot. But if capturing those people, especially in the American fire service, it's a no freaking brainer, because across the country we're all paramilitary, so they already understand the hierarchy of rank structure, orders, everything else. So like it's almost shame on us for not actively recruiting, especially prior military guys, I think it just goes.
Speaker 1:We just never had to. We had so many people lined up at the door that we have to. And now we need to tap into that. Because if I went to a class of your TAPS class, like you're saying, and I told people hey, you could go to a place where we have a paramilitary type structure you can promote, you hang out with three to four members who are similar minded and have similar goals, you work 10 days a month on our schedule, right, you get to work out, you get to serve the citizens and do good. What part of that do you not want to go for?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and they're already used to the government pay. So it's like, hey, it's equivalent to what, probably what you're making right now, but you have a, you have a chance to make decent money later on in life and and you get the benefits and security and everything else. And I know a lot of guys when they joined the military their biggest heartache leaving was those, those benefits. Right, and fire service offers amazing benefits. So it's yeah, absolutely. It's one of those things we definitely need to to start looking across the country for sure.
Speaker 1:And I think what are your thoughts on this is my. You know the if you build it, they will come. I think a lot of that used to be our culture and what we had, and everybody saw how great it was. And I'm not saying it's not great anymore, it's just we know what the five American Fire Service has changed to being a little different than the past. We hear the stories from the old timers and you're like, man, that's what I want, right, we still strive for that, but things have changed. I think we look at departments as hey, how do we make sure we create a department that's going to retain people, right? So retention is huge right now.
Speaker 1:I think what scared a lot of people. And tell me if you think similar or not. I think we have put out so much word on cancer's huge in the fire service right now. Right, we're studying that constantly and seeing so many of our friends who have come down with this illness two years after they retire, 10 years into the job. You know, all over the place, it's hitting everybody, um, I think that's played into it. We've talked about the sleep deprivation. Um, we've talked about the PTSD from, uh, the things that we see and we take home and you know you don't want to become a shell of of yourself. Um, you know when I'm sure I'm missing something else that's negatively coming into light on this job, but what do you think about that?
Speaker 2:Dude, I agree with you and actually I was just having a conversation with a captain from another city the other day because we were talking about recruitment issues. Obviously it's a hot topic, but I literally almost said the same thing. I said the problem is publicly we do a horrible because anybody correct me if I'm wrong on this one If you see the fire department in the news, if it's not a freaking job, right, like a good job where we made grabs or whatever the case might be, it's on. Somebody died, either on a call, right, or they die from cancer, or they have cancer or they lost a limb.
Speaker 2:It's always negative, right, and of course the public hates to see that. But I don't blame you know, mom, when 18 year old Billy says hey, mom, I want to be a fireman and she goes honey, can you please look at something else, right? I don't want you to die, I don't want you to get cancer, I don't want, you know, I don't want you to get divorced, right, like all those other things. Like I don't, I don't want any of these things for you. So I don't. I don't blame parents at all for not wanting those evils, or whatever you want to call it on them.
Speaker 1:But again, someone has to do the job right, somebody has to do the job and I think I think our benefits that you talked about still outweigh that the negativesically where we're at. I you know I can't speak for the entire country I think we just need to keep pushing those stressor, the, the, the benefits, and work on the stressors on the side on how we can minimize those and continue to. You know, keep this job as good as it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think if we, I think if we advertise the, the benefits more to the public, I think it would be better, like I, I believe most departments now really understand. On the priority of mental health, right, someone had said to me the other day and uh it, it really makes sense, and so that's why I never really looked at. They go, hey steve, they're like our job is not that dangerous. And of course immediately I bucked, you know, as all real firemen would like. What the fuck you mean? It's not dangerous, fuck it.
Speaker 2:Who else goes in fucking burning buildings? Right, and then they explain themselves, which it makes sense to me. We have between our gear or equipment or apparatus, our personnel, our education, our training, everything we can mitigate collectively as a group and when I say as a group I mean the American fire service right, we can mitigate any fucking emergency out there, anything, literally, uh, the world is falling right down and we will figure out a solution to it, and we have the gear and the equipment to protect us and everything else, right. So if you look at line of duty, deaths, we all know most are medical right. Now if you narrow it down even farther and say career firemen, right, that number gets even smaller because the majority of the medical are from volunteers. So take that out of it right, that line of duty deaths drop even lower.
Speaker 2:Now look at strictly just deaths that were on scene between house fires, maybe on the highway, for cars running into our apparatus, things along those lines. And you're talking yearly, maybe double digits, 10, 11, 12, or legit line of duty right Inside a burning building, whatever the case might be on the highway, whatever, whatever it is right. But then he throws a little mix to and says if you look at the statistics, help me out here.
Speaker 1:Thank you, jesus.
Speaker 2:So if you look at the numbers, right, it is the. It's in the top three of the most stressful jobs in the world. Right, and then Susie said I looked at him like son of a bitch. You're right, right, you know like, and those stresses play a huge role. So I think, with us really across the nation, understanding mental health is a big fucking deal, right, and how we can benefit our members by providing those peer support teams and all the resources that we can, I don't know. I think that would maybe help recruitment a little bit.
Speaker 1:You know, I don't know Absolutely. I mean, I think anything. I think a variety of everything we're talking about, like reaching out to different organizations, getting to people early in high school, talking to them, you know, stressing those benefits, like, hey, this is what this job can afford you though. It's good pay, it's stable benefits, it's a lifestyle that you can. You know you get to hang out with your family 20 days a month or do what you need to do over time, whatever you want to do. This job offers a variety of different routes. You can take whatever different uh, you know, edit skills, you want to add um, all those things you can. You can pave your own path in this department or in this career and kind of make it what you want.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and that's that's a, that's a rarity across any other job out there. You know, right now, just between the retention of how long we work in a singular department doing a singular job, to the resources we have, I mean just everything across the board, it's the best. And, of course, everyone on the job that really loves a job and probably, I guarantee everyone listening to this right it's the best fucking job in the world. We know that, uh, for a fact, and I wouldn't trade with all the things that we're exposed to and the stresses and I've been through a divorce, uh, as more than half of us have, and everything else and most of it's, you know, towards the job, and time away from the family, and then I would do it all over again because this is what I love to do. I'd away from the family and then I would do it all over again because this is what I love to do.
Speaker 2:I never feel like I work. It's my passion, right, and I know you feel the same way. So, with that game back on topic, really, with that, with the process that you guys run, do you talk about any of that stuff with these guys or is it strictly just a let's weed them out and then we'll we'll kind of figure out that stuff later. Do you guys address that on that first night? Is it even talked about?
Speaker 1:It is talked about, maybe not to a major extent, but it is talked about for a short period of time on that Friday night.
Speaker 1:Okay, if people are just, you know, getting into, if they're just showing up and this is their first exposure to the fire service, we want them to make sure they know what they're getting into. Right exposure to the fire service. We want them to make sure they know what they're getting into. Right. We're buying on to people for 25, 30 years like who? We? We stress to people hey, there's a high risk of cancer there's, you're going to be tired, you're going to bring, you're going to see shitty things that you don't want to see, that nobody is made to see, right? Um, but I think we also hit that aspect of how good this job can be and there's a reason why there's still, even though we're at a 10th of the recruitment that we used to be, there's still a lot of people that still are fighting for this job and want this. You don't see a high turnover rate because once people get in, they see how great this is and they're they're sticking around, all right.
Speaker 2:Speaking of turnout, right, real quick, before I get into, uh, finishing up talking about your guys' process. What do you think because I've been seeing this, I know you have too what do you think is the issue right now where it seems like five years is that magical number? Guys will get hired in the American Fire Service, right, they're freaking amped up, they're good to go, they have their dream job and then within five years, they're either transferring to a slower fire department right, or they're just getting out and doing something else, like they're going to nursing school, I mean, whatever it is. You know, it could be anything across the line, but it kind of feels like if they make it through five years and they're probably going to stick around. But why do you think guys are leaving between the one to five year mark?
Speaker 1:My, my personal opinion on that, I think looking back and talking to people before looking back to um economically, looking at the, the recession in 08 and prior to that I think right now the good, the one part of our schedule right 24 on, 48 off, is if you want a side job or you want to do something else, you you have the freedom to do it. So right now the last couple of years economy is booming, people's side jobs take off and they make all this money and they think they can sustain that. And if that is personally, if you're done with the fire service and you want to get out and that's the path you want to follow, I hope you're happy. I wish you all the best. But I think if you look at historically, when economy is booming, you're not going to become rich in this job. You go into it knowing that.
Speaker 1:But maybe they go off. They say, hey, I'm going to follow my second job, I got this business going on, I'm going to continue and make that my full time. And then when the economy slows down, all of a sudden business isn't there anymore. And guess who's still? Steady flow, public safety, right, they're not going to cut us, you can't. It's the last thing that ever would get cut from a city or an organization. Um, and they come back to try to come back to what the stable job that this has you. Look at covid times, recession in 08 this job kept going right and the paycheck kept coming for my family. I kept going to work and it's hard to lose that stability once you have it and once you see, you know you don't want to struggle and you got to make sure you provide for your family and I think that's what this job ultimately offers all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, dude, that's I love it. Yes, stability, consistency, right, you know, and that's always what we ask of our members, but that's what we provide as American Fire Service is consistency. Our schedule is consistent, our pay is consistent, right, the calls are not unfortunately.
Speaker 1:I know what day I'm working five years from now. I know exactly what day, what times and where I need to be, and that's that's hard to beat. You know. I know the paycheck is going to keep coming. I'm going to keep showing up to work for the next 15, 20 more years, however long I got. Yeah, dude Hell yeah, all right.
Speaker 2:Well, before we get a little bit deeper in here, so I know about the sub 20, right, and I really want you to talk about that because I believe that sets you guys apart from the rest of the country right now. So you have an event that happens during this combine, right, this three-day fire candidate whatever they're calling it fire candidate process right, wholeheartedly, like, lovingly, called the combine. So, with that said, there's something called the sub 20. So please explain to everybody what it is and then why it's so difficult, absolutely.
Speaker 1:So the end of day one, after we've done all the teamwork events in the morning, candidates will break off. They go to lunch. Try to give about 45 minutes to an hour. Tell them keep it light because you're going to be keep working. This afternoon the sub 20 is a PT with work gloves event. Um, it starts off. So no turnouts, correct. No turnouts, nope, just PT shorts, uh, shirt, work gloves, tennis shoes and the goal is to reach sub 20 minutes on your time. Um, I can tell you it's not not too common that we get too many people getting sub 20 their first time doing it, especially on this weekend. We know they've been working all morning. They're not coming in completely fresh, but this is what we look for. So it's not a pass fail for the time, correct? No, if you get over 20 minutes, it's not. Hey, you're done, thanks for coming, see you next time. Right, it's just a kind of a help to see where you're at. Hopefully you've done it before, or you come back next time and you see your improvement. Or, if you get hired, you keep it up and try again.
Speaker 1:So it involves one round. It's a sled push in the bay. So you do it three times there and back. So a weighted sled correct Weighted sled there, back there and then go for a short jog. You run and we do um five towers, so just you can, two at a time, jump your step. However, you need to do five towers up down, um. You come back down, you do five pull-ups, 25 push-ups, some box jumps, some sit-ups and then a tire iron carry, all those kind of work on some grip strength, some core strength. We look for a variety of different things, all those kind of work on some grip strength, some core strength. We look for a variety of different things through those and then you go for another jog around. It's about probably another just short of about a quarter mile, and then you repeat that process again.
Speaker 1:So we'll see plenty of people who are tracking. Well, they might be at 9, 10 minutes on that first round. You'll feel like they're looking good and then start, you know cardio is not there, grip strength fail, starts to fail, and when they start doing tire iron carries, um sled, their legs are smoked from just doing a couple runs and towers. So that second, that second round, is definitely where you see that mental grit and we'll see 10 minutes on the first round and 20 minutes on the second round and all of a sudden they come back with 29, 30 minute times. So it's pretty, it's a good. It's a great event. It's the ending to day one. It kind of shows people where they need to be. I think is probably the biggest thing.
Speaker 2:So why did you guys pick the 20 minutes? Is it relation to the work cycle that we normally do A?
Speaker 1:exactly, exactly that. So it's. It's the relation to the bottle. It's where we think people need to be on their cardio level. Um, it is more cardio base than than weight, uh, strength, but we have other events to bring that out, so it's the kind of exposure to all of that I got you, so it's so.
Speaker 2:Make sure I got it here. So it's uh, three weighted sleds right, back and forth through the bay, jog around. Then they do the 25 push-ups, 25 sit-ups, right. Then they get into the box, jumps, go through that five pull-ups and then the towers you said five. So it's all the way up, all the way down. That counts as one Correct Right. So they're going up and down five times, right. Then they run a quarter mile, they rinse and repeat, do the whole freaking thing again and a tire iron carry okay, oh right, that's a railroad care right so how road ties what?
Speaker 2:are they like 45 55? About 45 pounds okay, so yeah and one in each arm and the handles are thick right like humat valve thick, exactly, okay. So that's really where they, you find they struggle with their grip strength on that yep, yep, absolutely trying to walk.
Speaker 1:Keep their core strength not not falling over. They're already smoked, so that that's a good short little and it's not a candidate doing the sub 20, what are like your little check boxes that are like okay, this guy or this gal gets it right.
Speaker 2:What what stands out to you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think the biggest thing is no quit. If you start walking, if you look, you know just mentally defeated and you're done and you're quitting. It's probably not your time.
Speaker 2:So not even saying I quit just that body language, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can tell who really wants it, even if they might not be at that complete level that they want to be at, but you can tell who mentally quits. I think the other part on back to the 20 minutes thing is that's kind of where we've seen a lot of people who are very successful in the academy, because this is the final stage of our hiring process. If you do well in this combine or the practical, you're going to go on to the academy and we want to make sure you're as ready as possible and I think, being around that 20 minutes, we've seen that, hey, this is where people are succeeding well physically. You know whatever problems they might face in the academy otherwise, but that's that's a big part of it all day one.
Speaker 2:They end up with that sub 20. Now everyone has a good general idea on how much of an ass kicker and I've. I've gone through it multiple times and it is. It sucks, right, it's hard. Um, so they finished day two like you said. This is so. That's the last step for you guys. So after that, what do you? What do you do? Do they do you have a list immediately Like what? How do you? How do you make that list? Is it like you take the best times for everything? I mean what? What is important collectively, as your group, when you're evaluating, to make that list, to say what, what makes a guy or a gal number one compared to number 50?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so everything, there's so many different factors, right? So we have it's not one evaluator, we have eight to 10 evaluators down here and we might have 50 or 60 candidates. So one person might not get their eyes on everybody. So that's why we have so many different evaluators and we talk, hey, what did you see in this person? What did you see in this person? Let's compare notes. I think this, I think they're here.
Speaker 1:Obviously we, we have to create a list for hiring um, that's. That's going to create their seniority numbers later. That's going to create how many people we send to the academy um. And our biggest thing in that is our evaluators might be here for hours that second night because they're after the candidates leave. After the candidates leave, yep, we, we, hey, thanks for coming. We give them a, you know, a little pep talk, thanks for giving it everything you have. We, we've, we've appreciated you guys. Hopefully you've gotten a lot out of this, hopefully you've seen where you're at mentally, physically, where you're at to become a firefighter, um, and then we do our, just our logistical breakdown and get everything set up. Evaluators go in and debate, and there's been heated debates, there's been camaraderie, there's been, uh, you know, agreement and and we and they sit down and make a list and we they basically lock themselves in a room and don't come out until they have a have a formidable list now when they, uh, when you guys make that.
Speaker 2:So if you have, you just said you could have 50, 60 going through this combine right. Does everyone place on that list? Is it just one through 60? How does that work?
Speaker 1:Generally we just do a, we'll rank the passing scores and then anybody who was under a passing score, we kind of give that back as, hey, here's you can reach out. We'll give you feedback on what you can work on the next time. We encourage you to come down and do some ride-alongs. Maybe you haven't gotten enough exposure to the fire department and hey, here's what we're looking for next time. So that part's just what you can work on. But the passing scores get ranked and we try not to. I think the best thing that we've done is try not to. Hey, we have to hire X number right?
Speaker 2:So the chief comes down to you and say hey, connor, we need 20 in this academy class. So does that mean you have to make a list of 20?
Speaker 1:And that's somewhat where the labor management communication has come from and say, hey, if we don't feel there's 20 candidates that we're ready to send to Academy tomorrow, we're not going to put 20 on there, it might be 15.
Speaker 2:It might be 12.
Speaker 1:It might be 30. And you guys are supported with that, then Absolutely, and that's that's the great thing we don't want to hire somebody who's not ready.
Speaker 2:And that's the biggest game changer out there, I feel like, because if obviously the chief is saying, hey, we need to hire 20, that's coming from above him, right, because that means there's vacancies, or we're trying to open a station, or trucks or retention, whatever the case might be. But I love the fact that you're saying that you're supported because if you collectively, as a cadre, as a group, say 15 people from the 50, we are willing to make firemen in this city, right, that's a list you make. Is that pretty much how it is? That's exactly. And then you're supported and then you just do another process, right later if we need more.
Speaker 1:Hopefully we can run another process, hopefully we get some different candidates, hopefully people have grown and they come back and and now they're ready and I and that's a huge separator, then I I believe that you have going compared to a lot of departments, because you're supported, but more importantly, it is you.
Speaker 2:I say you, the members of your fire department right, or choosing the future members of your fire department Right, which is amazing because most departments do HR hires Right. And then so, since you've been doing this right, what kind of outcome have you seen from guys not making it through the academy?
Speaker 1:It's I don't know the exact numbers from before I was hired or before we started this process, but from what I know, we've only lost one member in my department since we started this combine, and that's amazing. Nine years through the academy we've. So the retention rates through the academy is skyrocketed. Um, and it's that's before. We just you, never saw the physical side of people. So maybe that's one thing that's changed greatly in this the last couple of years, as we see that now. Before we saw a lot of more personality. Prior to the, to the hiring processes, we got to know people more personally. Now we get to see a little more physically. So if we can find a way to continue to grow both processes together and have both sides of it, you know we'll create a hundred percent success rate till the end of time.
Speaker 2:I love it and the fact that that process and correct me if you feel differently, right, I feel honestly, wholeheartedly, that it weeds out the guys that are just really good bullshitters, right, and we all know them. We all have them in our fire departments too, you know. But it is, hey, you do, you're an amazing interviewer because you're a good used car salesman, right, but then when you have that car salesman come to your combine, what do you see?
Speaker 1:exactly they they get, they get found out, their bullshit gets. You can't bullshit a bullshit it goes through. So we're gonna find out. We're gonna put you in teamwork events, we're gonna put you in individual events. We're going to put you in individual events and there's no hiding. That's the best thing. And we have enough evaluators to get eyes on everybody. In two and a half days that we're going to find out what you got.
Speaker 2:You know and I'll just leave this quick little story before we get into kind of wrap up the process you guys run now, but I know personally a guy that went through the process, right, and he was a horrible interviewer, horrible, one of the best dudes in the world, right, but he literally came into that combine as ranked last right, barely squeaked by, probably got the like, hey, it's a really good dude or whatever, but he's not very good at talking. Let's just see how he performs, right. And then that dude ends up right at the end of the weekend, number one. Number one, yeah, because he's an amazing guy, right, great fireman, stud of athlete, but, more importantly, never gives up and has a great attitude the entire time, never stops smiling, and he's a leader.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and he's a leader, right? So that's the kind of process that you guys run. That's like I wish I would be adopted everywhere, because that's the kind of candidates you get now, correct?
Speaker 1:Exactly that. That is exact and it's exactly what we're looking for, and it's taken years to refine the process. Um, but we feel like we've gotten something that's that we're going to hold onto for a long time and it's our that's kind of our baby.
Speaker 2:We love it, dude. That's kind of our baby. We love it, dude. That's awesome. And you know, I've I listened to a bunch of podcasts out there and there was a one, uh, the scrap is one of my favorite ones to listen to.
Speaker 2:So if you guys ever get a chance to check out the scrap, check them out. They're on all major podcasts. But uh, with that said, they just did a recent episode that um was talking about how tough I believe it was Frederick County, maryland's Academy was. And listen to the gentleman that runs it. It is. I mean, it sounds like bootcamp and it sounds like they have an amazing Academy, right. But he's talking about like how and how many people they lose, right, because they don't have this preemptive almost Academy, right. So I couldn't imagine the guys that they would turn around with having this and then having that sort of that extreme Academy too. If we could collectively come across as a country and figure that out, that'd be amazing. And then so, to end it out real quick, I really I have a question for you and it's something I've just bounced across. Guys just out of curiosity, and most guys will be like man, I never thought of that before.
Speaker 2:But so we talked about the military, right? So let's take the United States military. It doesn't matter what branch you join, right? So I'll talk about Coast Guard, just because I can talk about it in an educational manner, but just because I went through it, right? So if you sign up for the United States Coast Guard and you get accepted, you get an ASVAB score high enough, blah, blah. Right. You go to boot camp. You go to Cape May, new Jersey, right, it's the only bootcamp for the Coast Guard. They're smaller, right? Other branches might have two to three across the country.
Speaker 2:Could you imagine, right, if we did the same thing with the fire service? So, hey, there's going to be three academies one on the East Coast let's go New York City or New York, the state of New York, big enough, right. State of New York, somewhere Midwest right. And then maybe let's say California, right. And then, depending on wherever you want to get hired, right. If you want to get hired with the department that you currently work for, connor, right, you would go, because we're over here on the West coast, you would go to California, right?
Speaker 2:But the cool, could you imagine, right? Everyone from California, everyone from New York, everyone, let's just say Michigan or whatever right, they all learn the same curriculum. They all learn how to fight high rise fires, like New York City does right. They all learn to fight residential fires, like, say, detroit does right. And then you could literally implant Connor Healy into New York City, chicago, la, it doesn't matter, because we all operate the same. It doesn't matter because we all operate the same, like, why really and that's my question to you why don't you think we have ever done that? Because guys have been like, well, there's too many egos. Look at the fucking military right.
Speaker 2:They break them all down and make them team members Right, and they all function. And then they can be deployed to any base across the across the country and they know how to operate. They all function and then they can be deployed to any base across the across the country and they know how to operate like. Could you imagine if the fire service was like that? That'd be a wild concept.
Speaker 1:You, you know, just jumping, jumping wherever you wanted to go. That would be. That'd be incredible. I think you'd get you know, I think the culture would grow immensely. Can you imagine picking up different, different things from everywhere you go? That would be huge for the fire service. That would be so cool yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:It wouldn't be like oh well, we don't have high-rise buildings, right? But well, guess what? We have mid-rise. But we know how to do it because we all learn the same exact way, same curriculum, right, granted. Are we going to be as good as, say, new York City? No, no, because they get more reps, right. But at least we all have the bare basic bones and we can function on those types of incidents without any hiccups.
Speaker 1:We talk the same, we operate the same, Everything else those guys teaching, the guys who don't do it all the time and you grow right and we teach them things that we have, that we are bread and butter.
Speaker 2:House fires every day right, that's. Every department, depending on a region, is really good at something. You really good at something. You take any big city department right, and they're typically very good at high-rises row homes because that's what they have in their city right Now. You take a suburban department they're very, very freaking good at house fires right, it's because that's their bread and butter. But I just couldn't imagine everyone being really good at all those aspects.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it probably should be explored more. I agree with you, that's cool. Yeah, it was like.
Speaker 2:I just I thought about that the other day and I've just been throwing it around to guys, man, and it's. It's funny because of course everyone I talked to they're firemen, right, they love the job, and it's. I think everyone's reaction has been like bro, yeah, that would be really cool. Like how do we even start that?
Speaker 1:you know? Yeah, I know you know where do you begin. But the military's figured it out. We could find a way, yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean, there is a way for sure, All right. So first of all, before we get into the questions for season one, is there anything that we didn't get to talk to about the hiring process, recruitment, whatever you want to talk about on the topic that we didn't get a chance to cover at all?
Speaker 1:I don't think so. I feel like we hit you know most of what, what, uh, what we operate on here um, regionally, I think it's huge. What is you know? Is there any major differences from where you came from originally on on the hiring process and recruitment stuff? Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So um, and I don't know how they do the hiring process now, but when I got hired back east it was strictly an HR hire and we had a huge turnaround in the academy. They're typical at that time and again, I can't speak for how they are now, but at that time typical academies were 50 to 60 people. Losing 10 to 15 members every academy was typical. That was standard, you know, and it's, it's it, and I believe it's just because they were hr hires. You know, their fire department had no say in the members and they were very, I remember just the interview questions were very hr ish. It was like the old school. Like your buddy joey shows up to work drunk, what do you do, you know, and they, they want you to hang them out to dry you.
Speaker 2:You know, they, they want you to report to your supervisor and they don't get you know like, but I mean, that's just how it was. So our process and I remember, um, when I came out here because so a little story about me like I went through the process that Connor's talking about, uh, in in its infancy. It was the third time they ever did it when I went through. So it's been altered, excuse me, and improved dramatically throughout the years. But I remember I was on the job, right Testing to come out here. My ex-wife really wanted to move out here for the weather and everything else, and I'll never forget I came back here, sat at the kitchen table the first shift.
Speaker 2:I was back and of course everyone's like how to it go? How'd it go? How'd it go, right, and I'm like I don't fucking know. And they're like what do you mean? You don't know. I'm like everyone deserves a job because in in my experience going through it, everyone showed back up the second day for. So for me, that was my biggest mind fuck, because we all do it. We all judge people immediately just by physical statures, how they talk, whatever the case might be, and so immediately, as a gamer, I'm already picking out who's not going to show up. Day two, right and to my surprise, everyone did, and it was disheartening for me because I'm like man, but I did.
Speaker 2:I sat down at the kitchen table and I literally pointed at guys and said none of you motherfuckers would get hired here. And they're like what? And I'm like, they're like. And I'm like, they're like is that hard? I'm like it was literally one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life for that period of time, you know. And they're like wow, so it's it for me. I had buy-in immediately because I'm like, if it is this hard to get hired here, this is where I want to work. Oh yeah, because this is, this is like.
Speaker 1:These are the dudes that freaking get it Right and and that's, that's a great story. I love that, cause it's. Even. I've had people who haven't been successful in the process and I've had people that have been and have reached out and you know whether, whatever their backgrounds are, they're like. That tested me in much that weekend. I've seen what I can do and this either, you know, just solidify the fact that I want to get hired as a department or somewhere around here, or this is the department I want to be, and you'll see me next process. You're like hell, yeah, come back down, let's do it. Come for ride alongs, come down to the station.
Speaker 2:We'll get you doing skills courses and we'll get you ready. Yeah, and the fact that the members were there was my biggest impression. Was that there?
Speaker 2:was firemen there from that city running it and I'm like the table yeah, and they were just like and they were in my face the whole time and I'm like, oh man, this is I'll never forget. And the guy that I'm talking about knows who. He is Right. But I was so impressionable at that point and I'm at shoot, I'm probably thirty three, thirty four, at this time, when I was in the academy I was thirty five through here, but I'll never forget.
Speaker 2:I remember this big motherfucker comes up to me we're lined up on the dots, you know and he, literally I'm trying to just, I'm looking straight, I'm listening, I'm trying to be as professional as possible and he comes right up to my side. I catch him out of the side of my eye, right, and all I can see is his sunglasses reflecting off his big blonde motherfucker Right, and he's like towering over me, and he goes bro, turn it up. Right, and I'm like and all I could think of is he looked like Iceman from from Top Gun, right, and I'm like, bro, they got Iceman that works here. I got to work.
Speaker 1:I got to be here. This is my spot. I'm destined.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm like this is amazing. I could be his maverick, that's awesome. But no, I'd be good all the way around. All right, so listen again. Thank you for your time. Are you ready for the questions, brother? It all, right. So same questions for everyone for season one, right? So first question is why we ask this for everything. We ask this when guys are trying to get hired, right, uh, prior to arriving that combine shit. We ask it when we're trying to promote. We ask when they're even trying to get a different job within the organization, the why but this is why did connor healy get into the fire service?
Speaker 1:well, that's probably an answer that a few guys have, but it's mine was family, my, uh, I grew up in the fire service. Uh, uh, fortunate enough to be a fourth generation now firefighter. Um, and the biggest was was my father. Um, he never pushed me. Did your dad work for the same department, Correct? Yeah, Yep, Uh, he retired a couple of years ago. He did 33 years here.
Speaker 1:He never, you know, pushed me, said, hey, this is what you need to do, this is what you want to do. He let me figure it out on my own, but just watching him come down for ride alongs, watching the way you know he, he was able to provide for my family and and the joy that he had for this job was like, why would I not want to do that? There was, there was never, never a doubt for me. This is, that was the why, and you know you just try to live up to that every day. And hopefully my son I won't push it on him, but hopefully, when he's older and starts exploring what he wants to do for with his life, he, he sees the fulfillment that this job can provide and why, you know, in my eyes, I still love this job and it's the best job out there I do.
Speaker 2:I love that. I love that answer because I am. I have a real soft spot for generational firemen. I don't know why I'm not one, my kids will probably not be one, right, just knowing their personalities but I just something about that I think is so cool, like I would love if my kids one day, or my stepkids one day, like chose to do this profession. Like I just think that's and it has nothing to do with me, I just think that the tradition of the fire service is that it's that generational fireman I mean, that's just how it was from the beginning. So kind of to continue on that old generation dude, it gives me literally the chills.
Speaker 1:I love it. I was so blessed we had multiple shifts together towards the end of his time.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, that's right. So you had an actually chance to work with him while he was still on the job.
Speaker 1:We were backseat partners for a couple months there had to fire our very first shift together. I won't forget that that was on Thanksgiving. You know, just memories and things you can't prove, can't, can't. Uh, you know. Yeah, you can't put a price on that. Yeah, it's crazy so that's I.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that about you. Like it's. Uh, I had no clue that you guys were backstabbed together and caught a job together. That's that's. That's freaking super cool. Um, all right, so we got the why, right? So the next question is the who, but this one's a little different, right? So who's been the most influential person for you in your fire service career and again, with that doesn't have to be a fireman right but who has made the largest effect in your career currently today?
Speaker 1:oh, you know, if you know that I would go with my dad, but I'm gonna, you know, for sake of mixing it up. Um, probably, I've got two buddies that are in the fire service boat for different departments and there one of them was a buddy, my buddy Kyle, who I went to high school with. We've got good buddies. We went to fire science classes together and he's been instrumental in kind of help progressing, helping me progress and grow and show who, um, you know the fireman that I want to be, he's, he's the epitome of a fireman and you love it. He reminds me of a guy that we work with. He was on before you yes, correct, so he's been instrumental. I've told him that before and I still bounce questions off him all the time on. You know, hey, how would you handle this situation? And he's a very knowledgeable member.
Speaker 1:And then my other buddy, jason, just as smart. He's helped me a lot on my medic side of things and growing, and he helped me through medical school. He was my roommate back then. We've grown up together. We've known each other our whole lives, but he was helping me grow as a professional. He's on the job now. He got hired shortly after me. Um, but he's been a medic long before me and helping me progress. My knowledge base, customer service base, he's. He's dialed in on that nice dude. I love it all right.
Speaker 2:So question number three, my favorite question, favorite fire, fire department tradition, but more. Why is your favorite?
Speaker 1:Mine and mine's department, mine's, my station that I was at forever.
Speaker 1:And it's very specific it's. You know, I think a couple places have it, but my old station was every Friday, saturday, Sunday, whatever we worked was crew skills courses, smoked, doesn't matter what time of the year it was, okay, crush it. And then crew breakfast and we had a big old brunch. You know, you get eight, ten people out there, um, just all coming together, nobody, you know, phones are put away, pretty much guys out there grinding. We're working, we see what each other has to offer on fire, ground stuff in a stable environment, um, breathe down a bottle, do a workout, and then crew, crew brunch, breakfast, like. And if it's a Sunday watching football, it's still like dude, it was, it's the best time, it's the trauma, camaraderie, it's everything you want in a job in a department and a station Like that was the epitome of what everybody wanted, was what we had right there and it was. I loved it. That's awesome.
Speaker 2:And that's's and that's a special thing that not everyone will get to experience, because it sounds like you had a very, very tight crew that was able to do that, because it's always hard to get buy-in for especially that crew workout to get everybody out there. But that's what makes it special is when you get every single person, from the captain all the way down to the booter right, yep, and we had dual, dual company house.
Speaker 1:So you get, you know, if you had six, seven guys out there, the one guy is not going to sit out, he's going to be out there with you, whether he wants to or not. Like, and that was the best part it was. You know, nobody wants to do a workout by themselves out there, but you get everybody grinding, you get that competition, you push each other. Hey, whose bottles ringing lat? First, who's going to keep growing? It's it's good right. And then you get the reward hey, it's going to keep growing, it's good Right. And then you get the reward?
Speaker 1:Hey, it's going to suck but we're all going to eat together afterwards. It's going to be really good.
Speaker 2:Right, and none of us are going to feel guilty, because we already just burned off a thousand calories, exactly. So it's time for gravy and freaking biscuits, right. Yep no that was my favorite part. Cool, I love it. Service. What would it be? But, more importantly, why no sweat equity? Right, no time. It's an immediate through fm fucking magic. It's now either changed, gone or implemented. What would it be?
Speaker 1:oh man, where do you go? You know? More fires, more sleep. Which one? Which one do you want to pick um, dude? I my choice, I think, dude, it's got to be just just more jobs, more jobs too.
Speaker 2:I love it, that's. You're the first one to say that I love that.
Speaker 1:I mean, you don't respect people's property. I don't want anybody to lose everything, but if something's going to happen, I want to be the one to be there. I want to have more.
Speaker 2:You know what you just said, the magic words right there, because I say that all the time and I asshole would always come across. And I'm calling them asshole because they are right, but oh, you want because they're. They're saying it just to get you to razz up. Oh, so you want someone's house to burn down? No, motherfucker, I did not say that, right?
Speaker 2:No, because exactly what you just said for some reason in my brain and obviously we think the same, like if there's a major call going on a house fire, a building fire, structure fire, whatever the case, major medical, a fucking extrication, whatever the case might be a good fucking job, right, yeah, I want to be there, I don't care where it is, I feel like I did, I should be there, right, and that, and I, the real fucking firemen, right? Um, they all feel the same way, right, and it's not because we wish harm or ill will on anybody, it's because we feel like we're the highest trained, we're the best, we're the most professional, so it's going to happen. So why not have the best dudes there to mitigate their emergency in the most aggressive, quickest way possible?
Speaker 1:this is what I've been training for. I want to put my skills to the test right and I want to fix somebody's problem. You know, and I feel like I tell my crew you know, since I've been promoted and before like move up time, like hey, we're gonna, you know, whether basically you mess call whatever it is, hey, we're going to. You know, whether basically you mess call whatever it is, like, hey, we're going to take this and we're going to do it because we're going to provide better customer service and we're going to do a better job than anybody else out there. Not that there's not great crews around us, but that's the mentality I try to try to push it.
Speaker 2:Hey, we're going to do a better job. That wraps everything up. Is there anything you want to close us out with?
Speaker 1:No man, I appreciate you having me on. I hope to continue to grow the recruitment around here and hope to get the word out that this job is still what it was.
Speaker 2:It's still a great job, gotcha. I love it. Well, anybody listening to this, right? If they want to know anything more about our combine or our recruitment process, just reach out to us. You can DM us on Instagram or just YouTube anywhere there's a comment you can reach out to us. Or you can reach out to copper state firemen at gmailcom. Please check out copper state fools. We are all over social media right now. It's who sponsors us. That's why this even exists, right, copper state fools are all about just making firemen cool again. So it's about love of the job, the passion, training people, getting better but, more importantly, learning, and that's the whole reason why this podcast exists.
Speaker 2:So I hope everyone that's listening got something out of this today to learn something that they didn't know or just may be intrigued and want to know a little bit more. So if you do, please reach out to us. If you have more questions for Connor, I can always get you guys in contact with him too. So, without further ado, we'll just sign off and we'll catch you guys in a couple more weeks. Thank you. Thanks for joining us. Always remember, the most important grab you'll make in your fire service career is saving a complacent firefighter from themselves. Catch you next episode. Thanks for joining us. Always remember the most important grab you'll make in your fire service career is saving a complacent firefighter from themselves. Catch you next episode.
