At the Ready is thrilled to announce that Battalion Chief (Ret) Robert Avsec will be joining the 2014-2015 Expo Series to offer “Managing Organizational Risk” for agency executives! This full day course includes the identification of legal, physical, and reputational risks, and steps that may be taken in prevention and mitigation of harm. Attendance for this course will be FREE, pre-registration is required. The Region IV Expo will be 9-12 October, 2014, and the Expo Host will be announced in August. Mark your calendars and join us at this event!

Terminal Performance Objective:

Given specific areas of Organizational Risk, the Chief Officer understand how to reduce the organization’s exposure to those risks using accepted risk management principles and practices.

Enabling Performance Objectives:

   •   List strategies for reducing risk of injury or death to members resulting from improper conduct.
   •   Identify areas of legal risk to the organization or its member resulting from improper conduct.
   •   List the types of risk of embarrassment to the organization or its people that may result from improper conduct.
   •   Develop strategies that could reduce the risk of internal investigations of misconduct within the organization resulting from the improper conduct of members.
   •   List the types of risk that could lead to criminal charges being filed against the organization or its people resulting from improper conduct.

Methodology

Morning session (0800-1130 hours): Instructor presents material contained in PowerPoint presentation Organizational Risk Management

   •   Reducing Organizational Risk
   •   This session will include a case study that focuses on the organizational risk of on-duty use of wireless technology, e.g., cellphones, PDAs, and camera/video.

Afternoon Breakout Sessions (1230-1600 hours)

   •   The instructor will organize the class members into small work teams consisting of 3-5 members per team.
   •   Teams will be assigned one of the specific Areas of Organizational Risk as they pertain to Fire & EMS organizations:

      •   Application of Fair Labor Standards Act
      •   Sexual Harassment & Hostile Work Environment
      •   Hiring & Employment Practices
      •   Operation of Emergency Vehicles

Working as a group, each team will address their assigned Area of Organizational Risk by answering the following questions:

      •   What types of risk to the organization are associated with your assigned topic?
      •   Why should the organization address the identified risks?
      •   What are the minimum requirements for effective policy and procedure to manage the specific risks?
      •   What are strategies to address the specific risk?

   •   Class will reconvene at 1600 hours at which time each team will report out on the results of their efforts (Maximum of 15 minutes per presentation.)

Each of the four small groups will have an applicable Task Book to give them the information they need to research their work.

Biography:
Battalion Chief (Ret) Robert P. Avsec served with the men and women of the Chesterfield (VA) Fire & EMS Department for 26 years. His career as a fire officer is rather unique in that he spent a cumulative total of 9+ years in staff officer positions as: Director of EMS Division, Co-Manager of Emergency Communications Center (911), and Director of Training & Safety Division. Chief Avsec also served multiple tours of duty in the department's Emergency Operations Division.

Chief Avsec holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Fire and Safety Engineering Technology from the University of Cincinnati and a Master's degree in Executive Fire Service Leadership from Grand Canyon University in Phoenix, AZ. He also is a graduate of the National Fire Academy's Executive Fire Officer Program. His post-retirement career has included consulting work with a private sector EMS agency, staff instructor and course developer with the Georgia Fire Academy, and private sector consulting with Department of Defense and federal agencies. Today he is a freelance writer for a major fire service trade journal on-line and has his own blog, ‘Talking “Shop” 4 Fire and EMS,’ at http://fireemsleaderpro.org.