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Competence – Not A State But A Continuous Process

Towards a Strategy for Maintaining Competences of Municipal Crisis

Management Officers

Project Team:

Eline Euwe

Tessa Jussen

Geoffrey De Kock

Sabrina Ulrich

Maike Will

Organizational Coaches:

Sylvia Stronkhorst (IFV)

Nancy Haupts (V&R Academie)

Academic Coach:

Selma Van de Haar

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List of Abbreviations

AGOZ Academie voor GHOR en Opgeschaalde Zorg

CoPI Commando Plaats Incident

EA Environmental Analyst (Omgevingsanalyst Bevolkingszorg OA-BZ)

GBT Gemeentelijk Beleidsteam

GC General Commander (Algemeen Commandant Bevolkingzorg AC-BZ)

GHOR Medical Assistance Units

KSA Knowledge, Skills and Attitudes

OoD Officer of Duty (Officier van Dienst Bevolkingzorg OvD-BZ)

IFV Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid

OTO Oefenen, Trainen, Opleiden

ROT Regionaal Operationeel Team

RBT Regionaal Beleidsteam

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................................................. 3

Executive Summary ................................................................................................................................................... 5

1 Introduction .........................................................................................................................................................7

2 The Temple of Competence Maintenance – Set-Up of the Project Report ................................. 10

3 The Context of the Project ........................................................................................................................... 11

3.1. Bevolkingszorg and IFV – The Need to Care for the Population .................................................. 11

3.2 A First Step Towards Adequate Population Care – Project GROOT and GROOTER .............. 12

4 Pillar I – An Academic Perspective on Maintaining Competences .................................................. 15

4.1 Conceptualization of Competences ........................................................................................................ 15

4.2 A Special Case – Competence in Crisis Situations ............................................................................. 17

4.3 Skill Deterioration ......................................................................................................................................... 17

4.4 Continuous Learning as a Way to Upkeep the Competence Level.............................................. 18

4.5 Supporting a System of Continuous Learning ................................................................................... 23

5 Pillar II – Inspiration from Practice ............................................................................................................ 26

5.1 The Method .................................................................................................................................................... 26

5.2 Takeaways from Practice ........................................................................................................................... 27

6 Pillar III – Inputs of the Municipal Crisis Management Officers ...................................................... 38

6.1 The Method .................................................................................................................................................... 38

6.2 Takeaways from the Municipal Crisis Management Officers.......................................................... 41

7 Bringing Together The Three Perspectives – Ingredients For A Vision ......................................... 51

7.1 Towards a Vision on Maintaining Competences ................................................................................ 52

7.2 Recommendations ....................................................................................................................................... 57

8 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................................ 67

References .................................................................................................................................................................. 72

List of Figures ............................................................................................................................................................ 77

List of Tables.............................................................................................................................................................. 77

Appendices ................................................................................................................................................................ 78

Appendix I ............................................................................................................................................................. 78

Appendix II ............................................................................................................................................................ 79

Appendix III ........................................................................................................................................................... 83

Appendix IV........................................................................................................................................................... 86


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Acknowledgements

Municipal crisis management officers fulfill a crucial role to ensure safety in exceptional

circumstances in the country. In cooperation with other rescue services they guarantee

that the population is taken care of during crisis situations. It is often a matter of

seconds to decide on the right behavior and a wrong decision can have fatal

consequences. As such adequate performance in their role, which is related to being

competent, is of great importance to fulfill the role of a crisis manager. Continuous

development is necessary in order to uphold that high level of competence. Because of

that need, factors that can contribute to maintaining competence of municipal crisis

management officers are especially worth investigating; and therefore, constitute the

main subject of our investigation. This research project is part of our final course of the

Master’s program Management of Learning at Maastricht University. Feeling privileged

to be given the opportunity to consult the Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid, we would like to

express our appreciation to everyone who contributed to the final product and

provided us with support and feedback throughout the process.

First and foremost, we would like to thank the twelve municipal crisis management

officers who participated in this study and provided us with insights into their roles as

Officer of Duty, General Commander and Environmental Analyst. Despite their tight

schedules, they took some of their valuable time to share their learning needs with us.

This also showed us that although crisis management is not part of their regular job,

staying prepared for crisis situations is of high priority to them. We appreciate that very

much and are very thankful that they took the time. It was very valuable for our research

but also interesting for us personally to listen to their stories. The same appreciation

goes to the eight employees from the rescue services such as the GHOR, the Fire

Department and the Police as well as municipality secretaries and a representative of

V&R Academie who enriched our knowledge about possible strategies to maintain

competences of crisis management officers.

Furthermore, we would like to express our gratitude to our university. Firstly, we thank

the Department of Educational Research and Development for providing us with the

unique opportunity to engage in such a project and for all the support throughout the

process. Secondly, we particularly thank our academic coaches Simon Beausart, Dr.

Ruud Gerards and Sonja Zaar for their inspiration and input for the report’s theoretical

framework. Their ideas and contributions were crucial and facilitated building the

academic foundation for our project, in which we were able to apply the concepts and

knowledge acquired throughout previous courses of this Master program. Thirdly, a

special thanks goes to our tutor Selma van de Haar who stood by our side throughout


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the whole processes and provided us with detailed feedback, additional information,

motivation and valuable suggestions for a successful completion of the project.

Last but certainly not least, our deepest appreciation is given to our client, the Instituut

Fysieke Veiligheid and Sylvia Stronkhorst in particular, not only for providing this unique

opportunity to work on such a special and challenging project, but also for the pleasant

cooperation, her expert knowledge and feedback, her inspiration and also the

opportunity to and trust in us to share our results to a wider audience within the field of

crisis management.


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Executive Summary

Context: Given that municipal crisis management officers do not fulfill their crisis role on

a daily basis, the question emerges how they can maintain and further develop their

crisis competences in order to stay prepared for possible crisis situations.

Purpose: The main aim of this project is to provide IFV with insights in 1) an academic

perspective on maintaining competences, 2) the vision of different rescue services and

additional information sources on maintaining competences (for instance GHOR, Fire

Department, and Police) and 3) the learning needs of the municipal crisis management

officers. The results of this project support IFV in developing a vision on how they can

support municipalities to effectively maintain the competences of crisis management

officers.

Methodology: In our report we build an

architectural model of maintaining

competence. Pillar I includes an extensive

literature review on maintaining competences.

Pillar II includes insights into the vision of

different rescue services on maintaining

competences through eight open interviews

and supporting documents. Pillar III includes

the results of semi-structured interviews

which were conducted with twelve municipal

crisis management officers. Based on these

three pillars ingredients for a vision and

recommendations how this can be achieved

are formulated.

Results: Based on the integration of the findings of the three pillars, we conclude that

maintaining competences is a continuous process which requires a systematic

approach. Additionally, this systematic approach should be uniform and bottom-up

designed, in order to foster acceptance and ensure the same level of preparedness

among regions. Furthermore, the continuous learning process should include formal,

informal and social learning in which the specific crisis context should be taken into

account. Also, these learning activities should be flexible and adaptable to the learning

needs of each officer. Lastly, we found that the responsibility should be shared between

the individual, the municipality, the safety region and IFV. The following table provides

information about how a system of continuous learning can be designed.


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Recommendation How?

Formal learning

1) Multidisciplinary simulation trainings

Obligatory

Frequency of 1-3 times a year

Focus on thorough evaluation

2) Follow-up training

Tailor made to the specific learning needs

Focus on core competences

Informal learning

1) Observe other municipalities who are dealing with crisis

2) Use e-learning and/or Mobile Applications

Social learning

1) Learning is fun!

Organizing trainings/seminars/workshops in other

places than the workplace (e.g. a trip to de Efteling)

2) Create a mentor system

3) Assign ‘piket-partners’

4) Attend crisis evaluation meetings of other

municipalities

5) Play a figurant-role in simulation trainings

6) Building a network

Periodic assessments

1) Periodic assessment

Training and/or (written) follow-up exam

2) Feedback meetings after training and/or crisis

incidents

3) Colleagues who fill in an (anonymous) survey

4) The use of competence scans

Reflection

1) Team reflection

Create a psychological safe environment

Use ‘learning-arenas’

2) Individual reflection

Keep a ‘progress-diary’

Use 360° feedback

Use the STARR method

E-learning system and/or mobile

application

1) E-learning system

Include information regarding training content

Include evaluations of training and/or incidents

Use Quiz-questions to support the periodic

assessment

System enables knowledge sharing, building a

network and keeping officers up to-date


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1 Introduction

When written in Chinese, the word 'crisis' is composed of two characters. One

represents danger and the other represents opportunity.

John F. Kennedy

Crisis incidents can occur anywhere at any point in time. Recent events such as a gas

explosion in Heerlen, Limburg are proof of that. This explosion left 42 apartments

uninhabitable, seriously injured three persons and left dozens of people homeless for

weeks. The costs of the repairs were estimated on around 59 million euros (1Limburg,

2015). As this example shows, often crises can have catastrophic consequences both

from a human as well as a governmental perspective; lives are at stake, people lose their

homes and everything they possess. Furthermore, failure to respond to and effectively

handle a crisis situation can cause public unrest with severe consequences. It follows

without saying that it is highly important to have competent people handling crises.

They are in charge of preventing or managing catastrophic disasters, communicating

with the public, saving lives and property and providing security for their citizens

(Farazmand, 2007).

When thinking about crises, our minds immediately turn to the well-known heroes from

the Fire Department, the medical assistance units (GHOR en Opgeschaalde Zorg

hereafter referred to as GHOR) or the Police. However, incidents such as the one

mentioned above, do not only require the involvement of those rescue services but also

the work of municipality officers. Next to the rescue services, they are involved in crisis

incidents from the very first moment they occur. While the Fire Department, the Police

and GHOR disappear after the immediate danger of the crisis is over, the most

substantial work of the municipalities has only begun. These tasks for example include

giving out information to inhabitants of municipalities, providing shelter and care for

those that are in need, supplying post-care to inhabitants as well as registering victims

and cases of damage (Bruinooge, Bitter, Helsloot, Dekker, Stierhout & Langelaar, 2014).

This shows that not only rescue services but also municipal crisis management officers

are essential for successful crisis management.

To prepare municipalities for the difficult tasks of crisis management, the Dutch Council

of Safety instructed the Institute for Physical Safety or Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid (IFV)

to set up and maintain high quality education and training for officers of municipalities

who fulfill a role during crises. IFV has identified 17 different municipal positions for

different crisis management tasks. For these positions qualification profiles were

defined, which for instance include the type of competences needed for effective


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performance during crisis incidents. Based on these qualification profiles, commercial

training institutes designed initial trainings for municipality officers, which are followed

by an official exam (IFV, 2015).

While this training certifies municipality officers as crisis managers, they still largely differ

from the rescue services in one important aspect. Whereas for instance police officers

and fire fighters deal with difficult, crisis-like situations on a daily basis, municipality

officers’ regular jobs are often distinct from crisis management. This has implications for

the level of competence of these officers as experience is one essential factor in staying

competent to effectively handle crisis situations. This is also shown by the quote of J.F.

Kennedy. While every crisis represents a large danger, it at the same time also

represents an opportunity for practice and learning. Specifically, every time a crisis

incident is dealt with, people and organizations involved in the process gain experience

and learn what is going well and what could be improved. This ultimately contributes to

continuous learning and thus staying prepared. As municipality officers often perform

different job-related tasks during their daily job (cold phase) than they would in a crisis

situation (warm phase), the specific competences that are taught in the initial training

are not necessarily used on a regular basis. This implies that the level of proficiency of

those competences is likely to decrease over time. The question emerges whether

officers who participated in the initial training are still competent to perform effectively

in a crisis situation.

While IFV has already sufficiently covered the assignment of ‘becoming competent’, the

subject of ‘staying competent’ has not yet been investigated. This subject however gains

in significance in the context of municipal crisis management, especially in the case of

very low crisis incident frequency. Consequently, the follow-up question arises: how can

the acquired skills, knowledge and competences in the initial training be maintained

and/or further developed. So far, a uniform approach to maintaining competences of

municipal crisis management officers is lacking. Therefore, IFV aims at developing such

a vision. To support this objective, in a period of seven weeks, we have planned and

conducted a project. In this project we have explored an academic perspective on

maintaining competences, have gained an overview of current views and insights from

rescue services and additional information sources from the field, and collected

information about the learning needs of municipal crisis management officers. For the

scope of this project, we focused on three specific municipal crisis management roles.

These were the General Commander (GC), Officer of Duty (OoD) and the Environmental

Analyst (EA). These insights helped us to provide IFV with possible ingredients for a

strategy to effectively maintain competences of those officers. The results of our project


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support IFV in developing a vision on how municipality officers can maintain

competences relevant for their roles during crisis incidents.

The following overall and specific objectives guided us throughout the process of our

project.

Overall objective

Provision of an overview of strategies to facilitate continuous learning of municipal

crisis management officers for staying prepared for crisis situations.

Specific objectives

Summary of theoretical insights on how competences can be maintained

through continuous learning (formal, informal and social learning).

Summary of practical insights on how competences for crisis management

can be maintained. Insights are collected through field research within

different rescue services (GHOR, Fire Department and Police) and

additional information sources from the field.

Summary of the learning needs of a sample of General Commanders,

Officers of Duty and Environmental Analysts. These are identified through

interviews in different safety regions to get an insight into the diversity of

the learners.

Summary and analysis of all gathered input including our field research.

Inputs are translated into ingredients that can be incorporated in the

overall vision of IFV on how to approach the maintenance of competences

of municipal crisis management officers. Additionally, recommendations on

how a vision on continuous learning can be implemented are given.


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2 The Temple of Competence Maintenance – Set-Up of the Project Report

In this section we provide the reader with

the set-up of our project and a

suggestion on how the report can be

read. In order to give some insights into

the context of our project, we start this

report by providing an overview of

population care in the Netherlands and

what IFV’s role has been in this

undertaking. The remains of this report

are designed in an architectural structure.

As we received information from a variety

of sources, we categorized this

information into three separate pillars that

build the foundation of our architectural

model. The higher layers of our model

represent our advice regarding possible

ingredients of a vision on maintaining and

developing competences as well as our recommendations on how this can be achieved.

The roof (IFV’s vision) has to be constructed by IFV on this basis in a later step. If follows

naturally that there is a certain overlap between the three pillars as commonalities were

deliberately highlighted and used as the foundation for our ingredients for the vision

and recommendations. Figure 1 provides an overview of our structure. Throughout the

report, we will enrich this model step by step.

Guideline for Reader

To guide the reader through our line of reasoning, we have highlighted our main

takeaways from each of the three pillars with the use of blue boxes throughout the

report. Additionally, we have provided a summary box at the end of each pillar. This

summary gives an overview of the main findings of that particular section. In Figure 7

(Section 7), a summary of our architectural model brings together all our findings. The

detailed explanation in the text provides a solid reasoning on how we reached these

conclusions.

Figure 1: Temple structure of the project report


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3 The Context of the Project

In this section we briefly explain the background of our project. We start by describing

population care in the context of municipal crisis management. In a next step, we focus

on the topic of becoming and staying competent in reference to the project GROOT

and GROOTER. It is not the aim of this section to provide a complete overview of

population care in the Netherlands. Rather we highlight the most relevant information

for the scope of our project.

3.1. Bevolkingszorg and IFV – The Need to Care for the Population

Bevolkingszorg or population care is an essential part of crisis management prior,

during and after a crisis. To ensure adequate population care, the Instituut Fysieke

Veiligheid has supported in providing a realistic vision on how population care can best

be coordinated. IFV has been involved in this as they support the 25 safety regions1 in

the Netherlands in the field of crisis management (www.ifv.nl).

The new vision on population care describes a

uniform and standardized approach and is

reported in the document Bevolkingszorg 2.0. This

document represents a general national guideline

on what municipality care should look like. It

provides stimulation and a source of inspiration for

municipalities to organize population care in a

contemporary and realistic manner. The main

elements of the population care are summarized in

Figure 2.

One central theme and a major transformation

within the population care is that governments

should not provide maximum care at all times, but

that a part of the care can also be provided by the

citizens themselves (self-sustainability). The tasks

of the government should then be to provide

information and set up a communication structure

to support the self-sustainability. This aspect is based on the finding that the majority of

1 A safety region in the Netherlands is an area in which multiple boards and services of municipalities

work together with respect to several safety related subjects such as firefighting, disaster- and crisis-

management, and maintaining public order and safety.

Figure 2: Municipal Population Care

(Bevolkingszorg 2.0, 2014)


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citizens involved in a crisis can act rationally and thus can take care of themselves, while

only a small part is dependent on governmental care. To ensure that everyone is taken

care of, it is the government’s task to stimulate and facilitate self-sustainability for those

who are able to provide for themselves while giving special care to those who are not.

Additionally, it was shown that citizens can take care for other citizens during and after

the crisis. As such it should be the government’s task to incorporate and make use of

spontaneous help from the society (Bruinooge et al., 2014)2.

While the Bevolkingszorg 2.0 provides national guidelines on what should be done, a

further step was taken to answer the question of how the population care should be

organized. In this context the qualification profiles as a product of the projects GROOT

and GROOTER are relevant.

3.2 A First Step Towards Adequate Population Care – Project GROOT and GROOTER

To ensure the execution of adequate population care as described in the

Bevolkingszorg 2.0, the project GROOT was initiated in 2009 which was followed by

project GROOTER in 2012. Project GROOT was based on the initial question of what can

be done to improve practice and learning of municipal crisis management officers. Until

then, within Bevolkingszorg there was no differentiation with regard to the basic

training for the particular municipal roles in crisis management. Acknowledging the

diversity of roles within municipal crisis management, several roles with corresponding

qualification profiles, training frameworks and models for examinations were developed

as part of this project. Each role is unique and contains the competences that would be

most crucial in the field. In cooperation with commercial parties, suitable trainings were

developed to ensure sufficient preparedness of the municipal crisis managers. To ensure

an adequate qualification level after the initial training, IFV has taken the responsibility

of accrediting these commercial parties and of taking the examinations of trainees.

Three of these roles will be of primary interest for the scope of our project. These roles

are the General Commander, the Officer of Duty and the Environmental Analyst. The

most central aspects of these profiles are outlined below (Figure 3). The full qualification

profiles (language Dutch) are accessible online.

2 For further information on what population care should provide we refer to the document

‘Bevolkingszorg 2.0’


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Figure 3: Extract from Qualification profiles regarding core tasks and qualities of the three roles

While the main attention has so far been paid to adequately prepare municipal crisis

managers for crisis situations in terms of identifying the needed competences and

ensuring adequate initial training, the qualification profiles also include a section which

addresses the maintaining of competences:

“The [role] maintains the abovementioned knowledge, skills and competences

during his regular job and through (re)training and practice. With competences is

meant: being able to execute the mentioned core tasks with the needed quality

and considering the specific context, partly dependent on the specific choices

and dilemma’s inherent in the role. The [role] at minimum fulfills the obligations

set by the regional Educational, Training and Practice (OTO) Policy. Maintaining

competences is both the employer’s and the employee’s responsibility.”3

Additionally, the Werkboek Competentiegericht Oefenen (2006) addresses some

developmental opportunities in the ‘Language of Learning Theory’. This includes the

following categories: learning by looking at others, participating, obtaining knowledge,

3 Original Quote in Dutch.


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practicing, discovering. This implies that in theory the obligation to maintain

competences already exists. Also, in practice almost all safety regions already possess a

program for practice, training and exercise, Oefenen, Trainen, Opleiden (OTO). This joint

program is however initiated by the regions and mainly focusses on the key officers of

the multidisciplinary bodies (CoPI, ROT and RBT) (De Swarte, 2014). As such, it does not

provide specific learning experiences for each municipal role. Additionally, strategies for

OTO differ significantly throughout regions and there is no uniform approach to staying

competent yet. As such, a vision and concrete guidelines on how to maintain and, if

necessary, further develop the competence level of municipal crisis management

officers over time is as of yet, non-existent.


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4 Pillar I – An Academic Perspective on Maintaining Competences

In this section we introduce our first pillar and provide findings from the academic

perspective on competence maintenance. First, we review literature on the

conceptualization of competence and competences specific to crisis management.

Second, we explain the problem of skill deterioration from an academic perspective.

Finally, we explore ways to overcome this skill deterioration by introducing the concept

of continuous learning. This includes several sub-concepts such as formal, informal and

social learning as well as reflection and e-learning. Next to creating a first pillar on

which recommendations for maintaining competences are based, the concepts used in

this section formed the theoretical basis for our interviews by helping to develop

questions for the rescue services and to design the questionnaire for the municipal crisis

management officers.

4.1 Conceptualization of Competences

In the context of maintaining competences of municipal crisis management officers, it is

important to clearly understand what competence is and how it is linked to skills,

knowledge, and personal characteristics. Understanding the single components of

competence can help to understand which specific tools can support maintaining both

the individual components such as knowledge and skills as well as the overarching basic

and job specific competences.

Competence is defined as “an acquired capacity to adequately perform a task, duty or

role” (Roe, 2002, p. 2006). As such, being competent depends on the degree to which

someone takes appropriate and effective action for a specific role or performs

adequately in a particular context (Batram & Roe, 2008; Rodolfa, Bent, Eisman, Melson,

Rehm, Ritchie, 2005). This for instance requires judgment, critical thinking, and decision

making capabilities. Possessing knowledge and skills alone is however insufficient for

someone to be considered competent (Rodolfa et al., 2005). Roe’s (1999) architectural

model of competence (Figure 4) provides a useful tool to understand the relationship

between competence, skills and knowledge.


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Knowledge, Skills and

Attitudes

As three pillars, knowledge,

skills and attitudes (KSAs)

function as a basis on which

competences are built. The

knowledge refers to specific

knowledge which is relevant

to adequately perform a task.

Skills refer to the “actions (and

reactions) which an individual

performs in a competent way in order to achieve a goal” (Ericsson, 1996). Also for

municipal crisis management officers, specific skills and knowledge are required to

perform effectively in a particular situation. These are defined in the qualification

profiles respectively. Besides knowledge and skills, an appropriate attitude is necessary

for the proper practice of the profession (Batram & Roe, 2005). As one can see in the

architectural model, the development of KSAs is determined by various factors, such as

abilities, personality traits and other characteristics related to individuals’ biographies

(Batram & Roe, 2005).

Basic and Job- and Context Specific Competences

The actual competences are built on these three pillars and are displayed in the roof of

the architectural model. There are two types of competences (Batram & Roe, 2005). The

first type is the basic competences. These are more generic in nature and are focused

on the fulfillment of certain types of tasks or demands (Batram

& Roe, 2008). These types of competences can be used in a

wide range of situations and include competences such as

decision-making or planning capacity (Batram & Roe, 2008).

Above these basic competences, there are job and context

specific competences. These are a combination of knowledge,

skills and attitudes as well as a number of basic competences. They refer to a specific

set of knowledge, skills and attitudes needed for a particular role and correspond to the

distinct work duties (Batram & Roe, 2005; Batram & Roe, 2008). In the context of crisis

management officers, these job-related competences are those that are specific to the

particular role of the crisis officer and lead to effective functioning in his or her role. As a

lot of knowledge and skills are context-related, it cannot readily be assumed that being

competent in one context also implies being competent in another context (Batram &

1. Competences

are not always

transferable among

different contexts.

Figure 4: Architectural Model of Competence (Roe, 1999)


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Roe, 2005). This is also crucial in crisis management as crises vary in their scope and

consequently being competent in one crisis situation does not necessarily mean being

competent in all crisis situations. Therefore, it is not sufficient to regard the

development of competences as a one-fits-all approach but activities need to take the

changing contexts into account.

4.2 A Special Case – Competence in Crisis Situations

Competences within the field of crisis situations are different from other professions.

This is because coping with “inconceivability and hyper-uncertainty” in modern public

management requires a set of knowledge, skills, and a sense of urgency that is distinct

(Farazmand, 2007, p. 149). Due to the ever-changing environment, crises produce

dynamics that no one can predict and control (Farazmand, 2007). Tomorrow’s

emergency crisis management systems will be much tougher, much more complex, as

the world’s challenges will be more “inconceivable” (Dror, 2001), “unthinkable” (Handy,

1998), and “unknowable” (Stacey, 1992). A lack of preparedness and training may lead to

complete chaos and costly misunderstandings as a result

of communication failures (Farazmand, 2007). Therefore,

competence in those situations requires crisis

management officers to be adequately prepared for these

new demands through on-the-job learning and

continuous application.

One essential problem here is that there is generally a big gap between the routine

tasks of governance and administration that municipal officers face in their daily job and

the emergency, non-routine tasks during a crisis situation (Schneider, 1995). The

competences needed to effectively handle crisis situations are mostly not used during

their daily work but are specific to the crisis situation. Skills and knowledge that are not

used on a daily basis may deteriorate and become obsolete. In the following, we will

discuss why this is the case.

4.3 Skill Deterioration

Skills obsolescence is defined as “the degree to which […]

professionals lack the […] knowledge or skills necessary to

maintain effective performance […]” (Kaufman, 1989, p. 74).

Two ways to look at skills obsolescence are particularly

relevant for the scope of this report. The first perspective

2. The unpredictability

of crisis situations

requires constant

learning.

3. Skills deteriorate

over time if they are

not used regularly.


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looks at skills obsolescence as atrophy of skills. This atrophy considers the deterioration

of the skill itself and is caused by a lack of or insufficient use of particular skills (De Grip

& Van Loo, 2002). Skills and knowledge that people do not apply in their job may decay

or may even be lost completely over time. This leads to a feeling of insufficient

preparedness for a particular situation. The second relevant perspective refers to job-

specific skills obsolescence (De Grip & Van Loo, 2002). As a result of technological

developments and consequential new skill requirements, the skills of workers become

obsolete. Thus, it is important to stay up to date and constantly acquire and develop

new skills and knowledge (De Grip & van Loo, 2002).

To overcome skills obsolescence and to remain sufficiently prepared, continuous

investment in human capital throughout the career is required. Developmental activities,

both formal and non-formal, can contribute to continuous investment as they can help

to combat obsolescence (Kaufman, 1982). The next section discusses continuous

learning as a way to combat skills obsolescence and provides insights on how it is

related to practice.

4.4 Continuous Learning as a Way to Upkeep the Competence Level

In order to stay competent throughout the career, it is important to consider learning

activities not as discrete steps but as a continuous process. Continuous learning – also

known as life-long learning – is a concept that appears throughout many research

disciplines as well as in organizational practice. With its origin

in educational research, continuous learning describes an

ongoing learning process of a person throughout his or her

life (Cropley 1980). Transferring the concept to organizations,

continuous learning can be defined as the process by which

individual and/or organizational learning is facilitated on a

constant basis (Tannenbaum, 1997). Such lifelong learning

becomes increasingly necessary to stay on top of the

changing environment and to prevent obsolescence of skills and competences (Maurer,

2002). As mentioned before, this plays an especially important role in the fast changing

environment of crisis management as competences not only have to be maintained but

also further developed and updated on a regular basis.

Tannenbaum (1997) envisioned continuous learning as an ongoing cycle of learning

experiences, application, recognition and motivation to learn (see Figure 5). Learning

experiences can present themselves in many different forms. They can for example be a

training, advice from a colleague or they can stem from learning by doing. Through this

4. Continuous

learning helps to

prevent skills

obsolescence as well

as it helps to stay up

to date.


19

experience, skills and knowledge are developed or updated. For municipal crisis

managers, such learning experiences include everything that is done to prepare for the

crisis situation. A very important learning experience is the initial training but also other

learning activities – formal or non-formal are included here. After the learning

experience, an opportunity for application has to follow through which competences

are consolidated. If this application is missing, skill deterioration can be the

consequence. In the best-case scenario, the officers get the chance to apply everything

they learned in a real crisis. Since that is not always possible, a simulation might also

provide a chance for application that is at least close to reality. Simulations place

trainees in life-like situations that

provide immediate feedback

about questions, decisions, and

actions (Issenberg, McGaghie,

Hart, Mayer, Felner, Petrusa,

Waugh Brown, Safford, Gessner,

Gordon, Ewy, 1999). Compared to

a real crisis, simulations provide

an opportunity where

competence can be acquired

under the supervision of an

instructor (Batram & Roe, 2008). If

an opportunity is taken, either in a real crisis or simulated setting, and the competences

are utilized, some kind of recognition or reward has to follow. Such recognition will lead

to an increase in motivation to learn and will fuel the individual and/or the organization

to engage in new learning experiences. Recognition does not have to be materialistic

but can also be the positive feedback of a superior. Only if all the elements of the cycle

are regarded and properly aligned, continuous learning will be achieved (Tannenbaum,

1997).

There are several ways to encourage and support

continuous learning. Most importantly, actions have to

be taken by both the organization and the individual

within it to ensure continuity (Marsick & Watkins, 2003).

The individual has to take on the responsibility to

recognize and communicate his or her own learning

needs. It is essential that the individual has some intrinsic

motivation for his or her self-development in order to take initiatives and to be

receptive for learning opportunities (London & Smither, 1999). It is however not

sufficient to only hold the individual responsible. The organization has to provide a

5. The responsibility for

continuous learning

should lie with both the

individual and the

organization.

Figure 5: Continuous Learning Cycle (Tannenbaum, 1997)


20

learning environment that enables continuous learning as well as it has to provide the

resources necessary for it (Marsick & Watkins, 2003).

A learning environment that fosters continuous learning and supports the transfer from

training to application is characterized by a high degree of psychological safety, ample

opportunities to apply new competences and high social support. To explain this in

more detail, psychological safety describes a state in which every member of a team (or

an organization) feels safe to take interpersonal risks (Edmondson, 1999). Such safe

environment does not only help individuals to engage in training activities but also

encourages them to voice concerns or reflect on poor performance. This also plays a

role for the second characteristic, the opportunities for practice, as these opportunities

will add the most value if they can be openly reflected upon (Catino, 2008). Last but not

least, social support refers to the help and encouragement of co-workers as well as

supervisors. Helping to reschedule work activities to enable the individual to participate

in training or showing support and interest for it are examples of this (Tannenbaum

1997). Relating back to crisis management, municipality officers need to feel safe to

fulfill their role as a crisis manager. They need to feel supported by their colleagues and

superiors during a crisis incident but also in the whole preparation process. One step to

ensure a continuous learning cycle is to design a system of continuous learning which

can include the formal, informal and social learning.

A System of Formal, Informal and Social Learning

As stated before, learning can take on many different shapes and sizes. For the purpose

of this project, we focus on three kinds of learning. These are formal, informal and social

learning. Various authors have suggested that these three types of activities have a

significant meaning for learning and can thus contribute to the maintenance and

development of different aspects of competences.

Formal Learning

Formal learning is defined as those learning activities that are structured and planned. It

is particularly important in the development of knowledge and skills, but also for basic

competences such as leadership (Rodolfa et al., 2005). These structured and planned

learning activities usually take place outside of the working environment in a formal

educational setting (Marsick & Watkins, 2001). Examples of formal learning are the

training and development programs that are offered by an organization (Manuti,

Pastore, Scardigno, Giancaspro & Morciano, 2015). Hence, in the case of municipal crisis


21

management, formal learning is taking place via the initial training and the exams.

These are developed by the Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid and the commercial training

institutes such as V&R Academie. In this formal learning process municipal officers

participate in order to get certified. This can be seen as a kind of recognition for

engaging in the learning activity. Naturally, all other trainings that are set up in a similar

manner also belong to this category. One important aspect that has to be regarded in

the design of formal learning activities is that the trainings should always be fitted to the

participants’ learning needs to avoid wasting time and energy of everyone involved

(Salas, Tannenbaum, Kraiger & Smith-Jentsch, 2012).

Informal Learning

Informal learning in contrast describes rather unstructured learning activities that often

occur spontaneously (Dale & Bell, 1999). Examples of informal learning include self-

directed learning, learning by doing through an inductive process of reflection and

action as well as incidental learning that takes place unconsciously (Marsick & Watkins,

2001). Informal learning is much more difficult to grasp than formal learning as it does

not take place in a structured classroom setting but can occur wherever people have

the need, motivation, and opportunity to learn. It is even to some extent influenced by

chance (Marsick & Volpe, 1999). As it was stated by Eraut (2004) informal learning

cannot be forced, but only be nurtured. Nevertheless, informal is very important in the

context of competence development and thus also maintenance. While knowledge and

skills can be developed in an initial training and formal education, actual competences

continue to be enhanced throughout the career (Batram & Roe, 2005; Rodolfa et al.,

2005).

Social Learning

A third kind of learning that can be differentiated is social learning – or learning from

others (Wilson, Van Velsor, Chandrasekar, & Criswell, 2011). Even though it is closely

linked to informal learning, this learning type explicitly evolves around the relationships

between people. It is argued that participating in a community will automatically have

some effect on the members’ learning and development due to both social and

knowledge exchanges (Wenger, 1998). Such communities are also called ‘communities

of practice’. They are self-organizing as they focus around specific topics or activities

and therefore attract everyone who is interested in or concerned with them. For a

community of practice to function, a shared repertoire of ideas, experiences and


22

commitments needs to be generated. Furthermore, resources such as routines,

documents, stories, vocabulary and symbols that represent the accumulated knowledge

of the community are needed. This requires practice within the community, hence there

need to be specific ways of doing things (Wenger, 2000).

Connecting to municipal crisis management officers, social learning could make a very

valuable contribution to the overall learning process. Especially people in the same roles

can learn from each other’s experiences. To support and structure this learning, regular

conferences, formal or informal meetings or get-togethers can be organized. Moreover,

a common channel for communication as for example an online platform can be

provided as a tool to collect and share stories, documents and other experiences.

Each type of learning contributes to the continuous learning process to a different

amount. Tannenbaum (1997) for example found that only 5%-9% of the development

can be attributed to formal learning activities. Such

numbers are also reflected in the 70-20-10 framework of

learning. This popular model is based on the idea that

about 70% of all learning and development is done by

means of informal learning. 20% can be attributed to

social learning and only 10% to formal learning activities

(Wilson et al., 2011). Whereas this model is very popular in

theory, it is rarely implemented in a systematic way in practice. Hence, rather than as a

guide for how learning should be structured, the model should be seen as way of how

different learning activities can be combined to form a system (Garavan, Carbery &

Rock, 2012). Furthermore, the ratio of distribution between the three types of learning in

this model does not mean that informal and social learning add more value than formal

learning. Instead it is important to remember that all types of learning have their place

in the continuous learning cycle. Moreover, formal learning has been found to stimulate

informal learning and can therefore help to stimulate and continue the cycle (De Grip,

2008). Hence, even though formal training cannot be relied on as the only source of

learning, it nevertheless embodies an important part of continuous learning and should

be well thought through (Tannenbaum, 1997).

6. A system for

continuous learning

should include elements

of formal, informal and

social learning.


23

4.5 Supporting a System of Continuous Learning

Reflection

A very important component of continuous learning and thus maintaining competences

is reflection. Whereas reflection is mainly attributed to informal learning, it can also take

on a valuable role in formal and social learning. Reflection is defined as “the process of

stepping back from an experience to ponder carefully and persistently its meaning to

the self through the development of inferences” (Daudelin, 1997, p.39). While the

catalyst for the reflection is external, and while others may help in the process by

listening, asking questions, or offering advice, the reflection occurs within the mental

self and is thus a highly personal cognitive process. Reflection provides individuals with

the opportunity to slow down, and engage in processes that permit individuals to reflect

upon important areas (Daudelin, 1997). In fact, incidents in form of crises provide

valuable learning products (Drupsteen & Guldenmund, 2014). Reflection on past

incidents, either personally experienced or by someone else, helps to evaluate what

went well and what did not go well and thus offers potential for improvement (Madsen

& Desai, 2010). Reflection should thus not only be seen as an ‘add-on’ to learning, but

as an essential component of good quality learning and the representation of that

learning.

Reflection can take place both consciously and unconsciously on several levels. It is not

unlikely that reflection happens outside an individual’s awareness and therefore rather

informally (Daudelin, 1997). During unconscious reflection, a spontaneous sorting

through the existing information allows one to momentarily suspend the intense flow of

new information to the brain. This enhances the processing of existing information,

thereby better preparing the person to handle the demands of the rapidly changing

environment (Daudelin, 1997).

Reflection can however also happen in a systematic and planned setting. Numerous

tools for reflection on incidents are discussed in literature (Drupsteen & Guldenmund,

2014). One way for formal reflection could be to build it into the formal classroom

training by adding some time for reflection at the conclusion of each experience. Also,

the process of individual reflection can trigger questions that can be then taken to be

answered during further developmental activities (Wahlström, 2011). Tools for individual

reflection could be learning journals, learning logs or learning conversations.

Next to this individual level, reflection can also take place on a group level though. This

is especially linked to social learning as it is often the case that support is needed for

individuals to make sense out of developmental experiences (Daudelin, 1997). People


24

that can provide support are mostly more experienced or have the ability to function as

a facilitator. Within a group or a community of practice, reflection often helps to

develop new ideas by sharing different perspectives. People share good practices or

negative experiences to learn from each other and to increase their knowledge (Lampel,

Shasie & Shapira, 2009).

As mentioned before, a very important prerequisite for successful reflection activities is

a safe and supportive learning environment. As for any kind of learning, this

environment should be characterized by trust and openness in which blaming behavior

should be avoided. People need to feel comfortable to share their experiences with

others (Catino, 2008; Dekker, 2009). An absence of trust can lead to faulty reporting

which limits the information availability to be learned from. Also people need to be

respected and feel that their knowledge is useful and that there is also a need for open

communication through common language and shared tools (Edmondson, 1999).

E-Learning

Besides reflection, e-learning can also support formal,

informal and social learning activities. This academic field is

still in its infancy. Nevertheless, several authors have

conducted promising research into the effectiveness of

technological tools and training. Burke and Hutchings (2007)

suggest that technological tools are very useful in reinforcing

training and learning. Moreover, these tools provide a

significant increase in transfer of training. Furthermore, research by Harun (2001)

suggests that e-learning can be conducted at the workplace as well as at home. Thus,

introducing such tools can also aid in developing a crisis mindset outside of the incident

situation. Harun (2001) also argues that e-learning is particularly useful in jobs that face

the “constant and unrelenting need for appropriate management and leveraging of the

knowledge base so that it is readily available and accessible to all stakeholders within

the workplace environment” (p. 301). This is relevant for the context of crisis

management which is characterized by a high degree of uncertainty with changing

demands. As such e-learning can be a valuable tool to overcome the problem

regarding maintaining a contemporary knowledge base. Whilst implementing such tools

is related to high costs, there is great potential for bridging gaps between formal

training and informal training on a continuous basis. Hence, through technological tools

municipality officers can actively maintain their competences, where and when they

have time and motivation.

7. Opportunities of

reflection and e-

learning can support

continuous learning.


25

… municipal crisis management officers need to have appropriate knowledge,

skills and an appropriate attitude to be competent.

… skill deterioration caused by insufficient use of skills and unpredictability of

crises leads to the need for continuous learning.

… continuous learning should be designed as a system. Formal learning activities

help to maintain and develop skills and knowledge. They need to fit to the

learning needs of the trainees. Informal learning is a way to enhance

competences outside of formal training activities. Social learning fosters

knowledge exchange and learning from (others’) experiences.

… a system of continuous learning can be supported by reflection and e-

learning. Reflection is a way to learn from experiences and directs attention

towards improvement. E-learning helps to stay up to date and to develop a

crisis mind-set as it can be also used outside of work.

… the responsibility for continuous learning has to be shared between the

individual (communicating learning needs) and the organization (providing

learning environment and resources).

From Pillar I we have learned that…


26

5 Pillar II – Inspiration from Practice

The second pillar of our approach is built upon interviews with representatives of

different rescue services, namely the Police, the GHOR and the Fire Department. We

supplemented these insights with a variety of additional sources on maintaining

competences such as a vision of education from the GHOR and the Fire Department.

The goal of these interviews was to gain an overview of how these organizations

currently approach the maintenance of crisis management competences as well as to

gain insights into possible ingredients for a vision. Additional interviews were conducted

with representatives of the municipalities who are involved in the organization of crisis

management and the project GROOT(ER) as well as V&R Academie. These interviews

contributed to more insights about the overall project and the design of the initial

training.

5.1 The Method

We conducted eight interviews via Skype, FaceTime and in person that lasted an

average of one hour. Table 1 in the Appendix I provides a list of all interview partners,

stating their job role and the organization they represent. The interviews focused on the

following core topics: their approach to and vision on maintaining competences

including specific activities, the influence of stress on the performance level, room for

informal learning and cooperation. See extract 1 in the Appendix I for an example of an

interview agenda. In a next step, we summarized each interview based on the core

topics discussed. The statements from the interview partners as well as additional

information sources are categorized according to several key findings. It is important to

note that these themes are not ranked according to priority but follow the order of the

interviews.

When reading this section it is also important to keep in mind that not all information is

related to our main topic maintaining competences. However, during the interviews we

noticed that we received a lot of valuable additional information or takeaways. These

will not be included in the design of our ingredients for a vision and recommendations

but will be revisited in the conclusion.


27

5.2 Takeaways from Practice

Selection Process

The first topic that was discussed is the selection process. According to two

representatives from the Police, the goal of the selection process should not be to

attract a vast pool of people, but to carefully select the right individuals for crisis

management roles. They argue that it is not only important to see if a person possesses

the right skills and mindset, but also whether the person would be willing to invest in

maintaining competences. As “people are obliged to keep up their own knowledge”, the

Police place a high importance on selecting motivated individuals. As such good

selection is seen as “the starting point for maintaining competences”. The emphasis on

selection as a step towards competence maintenance is also

apparent in the Fire Department as well as the GHOR

(Handleiding Blijvende Vakbekwaamheid, 2009; Handleiding

Onderwijsvisie AGOZ, 2011). Specifically, the learning principle in

the Handleiding Onderwijsvisie AGOZ (2011) from the GHOR

states that the individual is responsible for maintaining

competences as learning is an activity undertaken by the individual. For them,

possessing certain competences, skills or knowledge is not the only criteria for selection.

Instead, showing initiative for learning is also crucial as personal drive is an important

aspect of developing competences, skills or knowledge. Motivation to learn and to

perform in a crisis situation is a crucial trait of people to enhance the outcomes of

learning activities and it is worthwhile already selecting suitable candidates upon at an

early stage.

Also, in municipal crisis management the need to have motivated individuals has

received attention. Not only selecting motivated individuals is a way to achieve this.

During the interviews it became clear that it is also possible to trigger engagement in

developmental activities to a certain extend. A municipality secretary revealed that they

had trainings in for instance an amusement park. During this event, fun was combined

with learning activities. Initiatives like this could contribute to more interest among

municipality workers. The municipality secretary stated that if people are able to

combine fun with work, this may eventually lead to more people engaging in learning

activities.

Although it is not related to our objective on competence maintenance, we would like

to share some general remarks about the selection of municipal officers. Throughout

the 25 safety regions the process of selecting municipality officers for crisis roles differs

as there is no national, uniform approach on selecting officers for crisis duty. One

1. It is important

that the right

people are in the

right position.


28

municipality secretary, with a background as an Officer of Duty, stated that generally

applicants are assessed on a psychological basis to identify whether they possess

leader-, follower-, or advisor qualities. However, it seems that not all regions have the

possibility to comply with this process. It was argued by some interviewees that some

safety regions do not have enough applicants to appropriately select candidates based

on qualifications. Rather, the regions are satisfied if all the positions are filled. It appears

that there are two main contributing factors to this issue. First, it was stated that a role

as a crisis officer is not seen as a popular job. Second, crisis management is not the core

business of municipality officers.

Simulation Training

Another topic that was frequently addressed during the interviews was how formal

training can be approached. When discussing competences and how they can be

developed, a municipality secretary stated that there is a difference between knowledge

and skills. Knowledge can be obtained through reading and self-

study. Skills however can only be gained and further developed

through practice in simulations or real incidents. Since the

frequency of incidents can vary and not all crisis management

officers have the opportunities to regularly practice in real

incidents, exercising skills in simulations is essential. This

perception is also supported by the Police. An Environmental

Analyst from the Police stated that simulations can be very helpful

if they are able to replicate the stressful and dynamic settings of real incidents. In some

cases, individuals even forget that they are in an exercise and therefore gain very

valuable realistic experience. Simulations are especially valuable because they can

simulate a stress level of the crisis and thus prepare for a real situation. According to

one municipality secretary, being unaware of the reaction of an unexperienced officer

towards stress in an actual crisis incident is potentially dangerous because “they are of

no use anymore when they freeze”. Observing how someone deals with stress in the

setting of a simulation can be useful for two reasons. Firstly, the exercise can be

interrupted in order to investigate the cause of the reaction. Secondly, it is possible to

take appropriate steps to deal with the ‘frozen’ person in advance to the actual crisis

situation. In such cases, the Police have introduced a three-strike policy that results in

the removal of the officer from his crisis role.

One of the biggest advantages of simulation training is the routinization of tasks. It was

stated that during stressful situations, it is important to function according to

2. Simulations

are an effective

tool to maintain

and further

develop

competences.


29

predetermined steps and procedures. Whilst the unpredictability of crises always

requires some improvisation, it is important to adhere to predetermined steps as they

provide clear expectations for everyone involved. An officer who has developed a

routine for crisis incidents will fall into these routines and be less affected by stress.

Nonetheless, there are some drawbacks to simulation trainings. Firstly, it was also stated

that some individuals do not perceive the stress level in an exercise similar to that in an

actual crisis incident. Consequently, training can never fully replace real experience.

Secondly, simulation training is rather expensive, especially when more rescue services

are involved. Lastly, simulation exercises are very time consuming. Since crisis officers

from the municipalities have different jobs next to their crisis role, it is essential to find

the balance between too much and not enough exercising. Suggestions on frequency

for simulations range from once or twice a year to once every three years.

Periodic Assessment

When analyzing strategies to maintain competences, it is first of all important to identify

whether maintaining competences is sufficient or whether further development is

needed. It became clear via the interviews that it is important to assess crisis officers on

their level of competence. This assessment should not stop with

the final exam, but should be expanded to periodic assessments

throughout the tenure of a crisis management officer. A

representative from the GHOR stated that it is important to

assess regularly whether a crisis management officer is still

competent. Suggestions on frequency range from one to five

times a year. This assessment could for example be achieved through the means of e-

learning. In line with that, the Police have already yearly assessments on the

competences of their officers. Those who do not pass the ‘evaluation scans’ are re-

assigned as a consequence. Furthermore, in the Handleiding Vakbekwaamheid

Brandweerpersoneel (2009) it is stated that the Fire Department also uses a competence

portfolio system and implements periodic assessments of their personnel.

Many of the approaches described above could also contribute to the general level of

competences for the municipality officers. A municipality secretary stated that there is

already an e-learning program that could be altered to incorporate such an assessment.

He believes that the administration of such a tool should be handled on a national level

through IFV or a similar organization to ensure a coherent execution.

Once it has been identified how competent people are, it can then be assessed how

many hours of training or exercises a crisis manager needs to remain competent and

3. Competences

should be

assessed

periodically.


30

prepared. In some regions a system has been designed for that. There are also regions

that have appointed commissions to check if the trainings are enough to be qualified

for a crisis situation. Moreover, the Police started to use peer-review on a team level as

an assessment tool. The results of the peer-review evaluations are used to design the

education/training policy plans for those officers who need to further develop their

competences. Thus, the specific learning needs of the officers can be incorporated into

the design of the training. This is important as for instance a representative from the

GHOR acknowledged that people have different learning styles and in order to be more

effective, educational activities need to be designed with different learning needs in

mind. If these learning needs are responding to the individual level, then competence

based activities are advisable. Likewise, if learning needs exist on a team level then

learning activities should also be designed in a team setting.

Reflection, Feedback and Evaluation

Throughout all interviews, the value of reflection, feedback and

evaluation for continuous learning has become evident. Hence, it

comes as no surprise that all contributing parties described at

least one form of reflection or evaluation they are using or would

like to implement. Most common is the approach of reflection

and incident evaluation on the team level. However, some regions

of the Police decided to also reflect on individual performance

and competence.

For the GHOR, reflection is incorporated in their handbook. In the Handleiding

Onderwijsvisie AGOZ (2011) it is stated that having reflections enhances the ability to

learn and perform. Moreover, receiving concrete and constructive feedback is an

important aspect in the process of reflection. To aid in this process the Academie voor

GHOR en Opgeschaalde Zorg facilitates peer-to-peer coaching sessions which train the

participants in giving better feedback and in reflecting on received feedback.

In addition, the Fire Department has included the elements of self-knowledge and self-

reflection as parts of the concept of life-long learning in their Handleiding

Vakbekwaamheid Brandweerpersoneel (2009). One way to achieve self-knowledge and

self-reflection is through 360˚ feedback, also known as multi-rater feedback. This implies

to not only ask peers for feedback but also people from lower and higher hierarchical

levels. It also includes a self-evaluation. Moreover, the Fire Department utilizes the

STARR method for means of reflection which can provide a good overview of individual

as well as team competences. The STARR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result,

4. Reflection,

Feedback and

Evaluation play a

crucial role in the

learning process.


31

Reflection) looks at a specific situation to assess how a person handled it, what the

result was, whether it was effective and what could be improved in the future. Specific

learning needs might therefore arise from analyzing situations with the help of the

STARR method. Besides reflecting and evaluating on a technical level, it was also

suggested through the representative of the Fire Department to consider the emotional

aftermath of working in the crisis context. She gave the examples of the Environmental

Analyst who might be exposed to horrible graphic images, as well as the Officer of Duty

who is on site of the incident. Nevertheless, so far the emotional and psychological level

is mainly left unregarded.

Knowledge Maintenance

Representatives of the GHOR, V&R Academie and the Police all addressed the

importance of maintaining a proficient knowledge base. This means that crisis

management officers need to be up to date on all key

knowledge factors such as developments in the field,

literature, laws and technologies. Being up to date with all

the important information is crucial for performance and

maintaining a general level of competences as it combats

knowledge deterioration. One example of why this is so

important can be observed with the Officer of Duty. During

a crisis it was seen that an Officer of Duty experienced knowledge deterioration as a

result of frequent procedural changes. Specifically, the leader knew about a certain

relevant procedure but did not know how to implement it. Thus, it is important to

ensure that the competence of trained municipality officers is not lost due to a lack of

knowledge maintenance. Our interview partners argued that a solution could be to

provide additional training on knowledge of processes as well as methods to stay up to

date. The key objective would be two-folded. One the one hand, such training provides

information on where the knowledge can be found while on the other hand, it also

creates awareness of why it is important to consult these sources regularly.

Further Training on Specific Competences

In order to stay sufficiently prepared, a sufficient level of knowledge is not enough. To

maintain skills, further training on specific competences is needed. A representative of

V&R Academie suggests that there should be master classes which can serve as

refreshers and expand the level of the competence. These classes would single out

5. Crisis management

officers need to

update their

knowledge base

regularly.


32

specific processes that have to be followed or tasks that have to be fulfilled during a

crisis and zoom in on the specific competences needed for that. An example would be a

master class about the further development of leadership skills.

Additionally, a representative of the GHOR believes that

there should be multiple levels of training implying additional

training for the competences on an advanced level. In her

opinion there is a step missing between what is trained

during the official initial training initiated by IFV and the

follow-up activities of the regions. For specific competences,

IFV should offer further trainings to deepen and extend the competence. This would aid

in providing more tailor made trainings that truly cover the needs of the officers.

Consequently, the needed competences can be developed and it can be ensured that

already acquired competences are maintained. However, it is important to consider

whether such trainings would be necessary for all officers in a municipality or region.

Evaluation of Training and Exercises

With respect to the trainings in the GHOR, there seem to be some issues with the

evaluation of training effectiveness. The Handleiding

Onderwijsvisie AGOZ (2011) includes an evaluation of the

training process (how were learning goals achieved) and of

the product (to what extent do the results satisfy the

previously developed criteria) as a last step in the learning

activity. However, merely asking participants whether they

found the training useful is not seen as being substantial

enough to truly evaluate the training. It is more important to assess whether the

trainings effectively develop the needed competences of the officers. Guiding questions

could be: Does the training add value to their performance, and what is needed to

expand the competences and maintain them once the individual has reached a

proficient level? Especially the representative of the Police Academy stressed the

importance of training and solid evaluations. Thus, it is important to consider if the

evaluation method of the current trainings is enough.

6. Specific

competences can be

addressed through

in-depth trainings.

7. Training and

exercise evaluation

techniques should

be assessed on a

continuous basis.


33

Regional Cooperation and Knowledge Exchange

Many interviewees believe that there are potential gains from close inter-regional

cooperation. In terms of maintaining competences such cooperation offers many

opportunities to share knowledge and experience between regions to increase learning.

Additionally, cooperation is important as crisis incidents do not stop at the borders of

the municipality and/or safety region as was shown by for instance the Moerdijk 1

incident. Thus, it is important that neighboring regions are capable of working together.

The level of cooperation between safety regions

differs throughout the Netherlands. In some cases,

regions work closely together and extensively share

knowledge whilst others are rather disconnected. One

example of cooperation between regions can be

observed in the South of Holland as different regions

train and practice together. Moreover, these regions exchange scenarios and learn from

each other’s experiences. However, as this happens on a voluntary basis, many

opportunities of meaningful knowledge exchanges might be missed. Another example

was mentioned from the crisis communication (including Environmental Analysts) in

Gelderland-Zuid. A trip to a hospital in Nijmegen did not only expand the network of

the municipality officers, but also fostered knowledge exchange. This trip was combined

with knowledge on current issues such as Ebola. During these trips participants could

not only exchange information and evaluate the events but also learn from it by asking

questions about specific behaviors. Participation rates for the trip were high which

implies a positive attitude towards such activities.

When asking how knowledge exchange can be facilitated, a municipality secretary told

us about a seminar that is hosted by safety regions which rotates in turns. He suggested

that such seminars could be organized in cooperation with IFV and could take place

more frequently. IFV could contribute knowledge to those seminars while the safety

regions could share their experiences. Next to such formal seminars, it was also

suggested that regions with low incident frequency could use incidents experienced in

other regions to learn from their performance. One way this could be facilitated is

through e-learning.

Furthermore, it was suggested that officers from one region or municipality could

volunteer to help colleagues in neighboring territories. This could be valuable as one of

the additional information sources from the field concluded that regions feel the need

for support of other regions in terms of knowledge and capacity in times of crisis.

Respondents especially expect a need for advice during the warm phase, so during an

8. Cooperation and

knowledge exchange

between safety regions are

valuable for social learning.


34

actual crisis. Knowledge transfer between regions or from a central institute is especially

relevant for specific crisis situations which do not occur frequently.

Cooperation between Municipalities and Rescue Services

Both representatives from the Police and Fire Department have expressed the need for

more cooperation between the municipalities and the rescue services. There are several

reasons why this is important. Firstly, there are

multidisciplinary trainings and exercises involving both

municipalities and the rescue services. These are

valuable because practicing together is a way to

maintain and improve competence. However, it was

expressed that the quantity of such trainings is too low

and thus it would be valuable to have more

opportunities to practice together.

There are also other reasons that support the need for closer cooperation that are not

directly related to maintaining competences. One reason is that it was described that a

majority of municipality officers were excluded from the communication chain during a

crisis because they did not have ‘portophones’. These phones are used for crisis

communication between the rescue services. Ultimately, this results in a lack of

information for municipal officers such as the Officer of Duty. Secondly, there is a lack of

understanding in the true value of municipality officers as perceived by the rescue

services. Thus, it is important for all rescue services and municipalities to understand

why the work of others is important. This can be comprehended easier if cooperation

takes place more extensively.

Last but not least, it was argued that cooperation and practicing together improves the

network which is crucial during crisis situations. The representative of the Police

Academy stated, “it is a principle of knowing people and people knowing you. You

know what the other persons can bring to the table, which really works out when there

is a crisis”. Therefore, it is suggested that there should be more training that involves all

relevant actors.

Crisis Mindset on a Daily Basis

Many municipal crisis management officers do not work in crisis related fields in their

regular job. It was argued during the interviews that although some competences

necessary for crisis management, for example political insights, could be practiced

9. Cooperation and

knowledge exchange

between municipalities and

rescue services are

valuable for social learning.


35

during the daily job, others such as performing under stress are not possible to practice.

The consequent lack of overlap for many officers has the potential to increase the

deterioration rate of such skills. It is thus valuable for

maintaining competences to have certain overlap between

the skills used in the daily job and those of the crisis

situation. Therefore, it was suggested that it is necessary,

especially when incident experience and frequency is low,

to create overlap where possible. Informal learning is of high relevance here. It can be

achieved through actively monitoring crises in other municipalities or regions and

assessing them. This can be done on both an individual level as well as on a team level.

Firstly, an individual can look at incidents to see what was done by others in the same

role and compare that to the actions he or she would have chosen. Secondly, this can

be done together with others, to gather more insights on the matter and facilitate the

exchange of knowledge. Thus, it is important to either try and integrate crises as much

as possible in the daily job, or frequently reflect on incidents in other locations.

Additionally, it is important to get as much crisis experience in the daily routine as

possible, because “one generally does not do things well if one does not do them

frequently.” On a smaller scale it was suggested that taking five minutes per month to

read an article about crisis would already help in staying competent.

E-Learning

Throughout the previous takeaways, the suggestion of using

e-learning or apps has been widely spread. Currently, some

regions have been working on developing such tools or have

already introduced them. Using such tools can provide

numerous opportunities for maintaining competences of crisis

management officers. They can be used for sharing and

collecting knowledge, exercising and learning. An implicit message was that it could aid

in bridging the gap between daily job and the crisis role.

An Approach to Maintaining Competences

Throughout our interviews, several opinions were raised on how a system for

maintaining competences should be designed. A representative of the GHOR criticized

the lack of national standard for activities to maintain competences. She argued that it

11. E-Learning can

be a tool for

continuous learning.

10. It is important to

keep a crisis mind set

on a daily basis.


36

leads to less effectiveness. A more standardized approach would ensure that all officers

throughout the regions are on the same level of competence and preparedness.

Additionally, a representative of the GHOR expressed that every region needs a vision

on their desired level of proficiency. Specifically, they need to know how competent

their officers need to be. The argumentation behind this is that it might not be

necessary to get every officer on an expert level. Deciding on who needs to be at what

level, might improve the allocation of resources. This has been already been done by

some regions within the GHOR. They have developed a qualification file in which the

applicable core duties, competences, choices and dilemmas and performance criteria

are established after which a standard of proficiency is set. All consequent OTO-

activities are focused on obtaining and maintaining this standard of proficiency.

A third perception relevant to the approach of a system

to maintain competences refers to its design. A

municipality secretary stated that any vision on

maintaining competences needs to be developed

together with the regions. Similarly to the GROOTER

project, any vision for the regions needs to involve the

regions in order for it to be accepted. Moreover, a

different municipality secretary suggested that any

changes to the system should be approached through

organic growth. This means that the system should not be changed all at once, but by

gradually adding new elements and building one building block at a time.

At this stage it is important to state that a municipality secretary as well as an

educational officer expressed a perceived issue with regard to the number of officers

being trained. On the one hand, a mismatch between people who would like to take the

official training and exam and opportunities to do so seems to exist. It was described

that there is shortage of examiners due to the high demand for training and exams. On

the other hand, in at least one region there have been too many individuals trained for

the crisis roles and it is difficult to provide follow-up training for all. The region is

currently trying to reverse the problem by creating smaller teams of crisis managers that

can be trained intensively. The amount of people that need to be trained and also the

level on what they should be trained is again something to be considered when

designing a vision.

12. A system for

maintaining

competences needs to

be standardized,

designed together with

the regions and grow

organically.


37

From Pillar II we have learned that...

… selecting motivated individuals is important because maintaining competences is

an individual responsibility.

… formal learning in form of simulation is necessary to practice skills that cannot be

developed otherwise. Realistic simulations help to deal with stress as they increase

routinization.

…. an up-to-date knowledge base and a crisis mindset are needed to combat skill

deterioration and stay competent.

… regular periodic assessment is necessary to see whether it is sufficient to maintain

competences or whether further development is needed. Their results can be used

to design training that fits the individual learning needs.

…. reflection is valuable and should be used frequently as it enhances the ability to

learn.

… (multidisciplinary) cooperation between regions is valuable as it simulates

knowledge exchange and offers additional opportunities for practice.

… an approach to maintaining competences should be standardized for all safety

regions.


38

6 Pillar III – Inputs of the Municipal Crisis Management Officers

In this section, we provide information from the third pillar. Pillar III addresses the

specific objective of gathering insights from the crisis management officers themselves.

We give an overview of the learning needs the officers have as well as we present their

suggestions for continuous learning. After we include the selection of participants, the

procedure, the design and the way we analyzed the interviews, we present our results

summarized by the main takeaways.

6.1 The Method

Participants

To identify the learning needs of municipal crisis management officers with regard to

maintaining competences, we interviewed twelve municipality officers. Being well aware

of the diversity of safety regions, we gathered data about the safety regions to identify a

suitable sample of regions. Regions were selected based on high and low scores on the

following categories.

1. Number of GRIP Incidents in the Past. This provides a possible indicator for the

awareness of importance of maintaining competences (Van Duin & Wijkhuijs,

2015).

2. Regional Risk Profiles. The risk profiles provide information about the types of

crises likely to occur in this region and also about the likelihood that a crisis

occurs. Different types of crises require different ways of functioning and are also

related to a different attitude towards the occurrence of a crisis (for instance high

impact, low likelihood risk profiles).

3. Location of Region. The location can indicate the amount of coordination

needed between municipalities, cross-country and across borders.

4. Tenure. Participants who differ in the tenure of their role have different level of

experiences and thus might differ in their feeling of preparedness and need for

further development.

5. Frequency of Crisis. Participants with more crisis experience might perceive the

need to maintain competences differently.


39

Based on these criteria we initially

selected five regions that were

distributed equally throughout the

Netherlands. Due to reasons such as

availability we were not able to get in

contact with officers from all our regions

of first choice. Nevertheless, the final

selection of safety regions still fit the

criteria above. Figure 6 provides a visual

presentation of the geographical

position of these safety regions, namely

safety region Brabant-Noord,

Gelderland-Zuid, Midden- en West

Brabant, Utrecht, Zeeland, Zuid-

Holland-Zuid, and Zuid-Limburg. The

argumentation for the selection of

safety regions is more extensively

discussed in table 2 found in Appendix II.

The distribution of participants of the different roles was Officer of Duty (n=3), General

Commander (n=5) and Environmental Analyst (n=4). For an overview of tenure, gender,

crisis experience and initial training of the interviewees, please see table 3 in Appendix

II. We approached several officers for the interviews and aimed to interview twelve to

fifteen persons. In the end, we were able to talk to twelve officers and therefore reached

our initial target.

We believe that the awareness towards the significance of their role as crisis officers

could have played a role in their willingness to participate in our interviews. This issue

will be revisited in the conclusion of this report.

Procedure

We approached the participants via telephone and e-mail and collected the data via

twelve in-depth interviews during the project period. Nine were conducted via Skype,

one face to face and two via telephone. We perceived no difference between

conducting an interview via skype and face-to-face. Thus, this method allowed us to

interview more people in a relatively short period of time. Prior to the interview, we

asked the participants to sign a consent form for a recording of the interview and agree

Figure 6: Geographical Location of Selected Safety

Regions (Ministry of Security and Justice, 2010)


40

to the use of anonymized quotes. Furthermore, eight participants preferred to do the

interview in Dutch. The remaining five interviews were conducted in English.

Design

The questionnaire used during the interviews was designed on the basis of a topic list,

which was based on literature research. The main aim of the questionnaire was to

uncover the learning needs of the officers as well as to gather their suggestions for

learning. Competences, skills and knowledge that are needed to deal with the ever-

changing environment of crises change constantly. Therefore, learning cannot stop after

the initial training. This is why we include all different facets of continuous learning,

knowing the initial training, the current experience and the follow-up training and/or

the reflection as main core themes. We refer to table 4 in Appendix II for the topic list,

including the main core themes and the design. The questionnaire is semi-structured

and presented in Appendix III. The use of semi-structured interviews is justified on the

basis of the benefits that it offers (Louise Barriball & While, 1994). Especially in light of

the limitations of time and participant availability the method of in depth semi-

structured interviews provides a multitude of merits comported to similar data

collection methods such as surveys. Firstly, it has the benefit of eliminating the risk of

poor response rate one might expect from questionnaire surveys (Austin, 1981).

Secondly, semi-structured interviews provide the potential for “exploration of attitudes,

values, beliefs and motives” (Richardson, Dohrenwend & Klein, 1965; Smith, 1975: as

cited by Barriball & While, 1994). Thirdly, personal interviews have the added benefit of

giving further insight into the answers given through observing non-verbal indicators

(Gordon, 1975). Fourthly, it is ensured that each participant answers the same amount of

questions (Bailey, 1987). Based on these facts we believe that our approach was the

most promising method to collect value-adding data for the purposes of this project.

Analysis

Several steps were necessary for the analysis of the interviews. We conducted the

interviews with two persons while a third person took notes. This prevented bias with

regard to interpretation of the results and ensured that all relevant questions could be

asked. In the next step, we summarized the interviews. We used the audio recording as

a backup for information and to extract quotes for the report. The next step was to

create a coding scheme on the basis of the summary scheme and the topic list. All

group members revised the coding scheme to control for correctness. The goal was to

develop a conceptual framework to create an overview in the data. In the last step, we


41

examined the integration and connections between labels and core themes via selective

encoding. By doing so, it became clear which labels and core themes were recurrent in

the interviews and the learning needs could be identified. We present an example of a

completed coding scheme in table 5 in Appendix IV.

6.2 Takeaways from the Municipal Crisis Management Officers

On the basis of the literature research and the topic list, four core themes were

determined, which are the Job in General (daily job and job during crisis), Preparedness,

Learning Needs and General Opinion about Maintaining Competences. The scoring of

the labels on the different core themes is discussed in the following paragraphs.

Anonymous quotes are used to illustrate the data.

Job in General (Daily Job and Job during Crisis)

We started each interview with general questions regarding daily occupation, role in

crisis, tenure, if the participant had initial training and completed the exam and finally,

how many incidents he/she experienced. The purpose of these questions was twofold.

First, this way important, practical information was gathered. Second, by starting the

interview rather broad and talking about general issues, the interviewee was found to

be more relaxed.

Skills and Knowledge Needed in Crisis

In terms of skills, the following three main skills were

recurrent in the interviews with EA’s, GC’s and OoD’s: (1)

stress resistance, (2) teamwork and (3) communication

(including political skills). In terms of knowledge,

especially the OoD’s state that it is important to have a

good understanding of how your municipality/city hall

and region work, regarding content of work and structure.

Additionally, all three roles state that you need to have a

comprehensive understanding of how the other rescue services operate: “If you know

the surroundings well you can operate very easily”.

1. Stress resistance,

team work and

communication, and

knowledge about

structures are important

in crisis situations.


42

Overlap in Terms of Skills and Knowledge

Four EA’s stated that there is a big overlap in the skills

needed for crisis situations and their daily job: “Anticipating

on what could happen and adjusting activities to it is

basically the same for my daily job and my crisis role.” Four

GC’s also have a managing function in their daily job, which

corresponds to the skills needed as GC: “giving people space

and direction is something which is applicable in both

situations” and “someone who leads a department or bureau in the daily job is

someone who can consequently also more easily move within the management role of

the ROT.” One GC stated that there is overlap on a knowledge level, but regarding skills

there is not much overlap. Two OoD’s stated that there is not much overlap of skills

needed in their daily job and the skills needed in crisis situations. Altogether, a certain

extent of overlap exists for many of the officers.

Preparedness

When investigating learning needs on maintaining competences, it is important to

consider continuous learning as a whole in terms of before, during and after the

maintaining activity. Therefore, the core theme ‘preparedness’ refers to a general feeling

of preparedness, initial training, crisis experience, stress level experience and skill

deterioration.

General Feeling of Preparedness

During our interviews, all twelve participants stated that they

felt prepared for a possible crisis situation. Four Environmental

Analysts argued that due to the big overlap between the daily

job and the crisis role, they have the opportunity to practice

their crisis role more often which supports in the feeling of

preparedness. Five General Commanders and three Officers of

Duty stated that the initial training and the experiences with

crisis supported in the general feeling of preparedness. Additionally, in accordance with

two General Commanders and one Officer of Duty, all four Environmental Analysts

stated that although they feel prepared for a possible crisis situation, “it is never

enough”. They stated that municipality officers should always focus on improving their

2. For some officers,

an overlap between

tasks in crisis role and

tasks in the daily job

exists.

3. Initial training

and crisis experience

support in creating a

feeling of

preparedness.


43

skills and keep up with developments in the field in order to keep that feeling of

preparedness.

Training4

Two OoD’s argued that the training helped them in “learning the basic structure of what

to do if your pager is going off”. One of the OoD’s stated that even though you

sometimes have to improvise in crisis situations; knowing a set structure will help you in

logical reasoning and basing your actions on solid argumentation. She therefore used

the training solely as an opportunity to exchange knowledge and to get to know people

out of the field, as she already obtained the needed skills in former education. In

accordance with this statement, one OoD and one GC argued that there should be

different levels of training in order to accommodate different experience levels, as not

everyone starts at the same point: “For the ones that were new it was probably

absolutely of added value. However, not that much for me.”

Three out of four EA’s state that they were not fully satisfied

with the training they received. One EA did not take the initial

training. Representing the opinions of the EA’s that took the

initial training, one EA state that the training is more of a

checklist: “did you press this button, did you check this? I

would like to have a focus on the reasoning behind choices:

why did you make the choices you did?’’ Another EA states:

“we really don’t do it that way in our region. So my personal opinion is that these

trainings are not adequately professionalized yet and specified to the region”. While

these insights mainly relate to already outdated trainings, this still presents a valuable

point for the learning needs of the officers. So far, they do not feel that the initial formal

training has met their needs. Additionally, two of the GC’s stated that the training can

be seen ”as a basis, but you need to deepen it, this was mainly theory” and therefore “if

I would have had only training, it did not prepare me adequately”.

4 Some officers have participated in an initial training before the qualification profiles and thus

corresponding trainings were designed. Hence, not every officer has participated in a training facilitated

by IFV but within their municipality and/or region.

4. The effects of

the initial training

are limited to

building a basis of

preparedness.


44

Crisis experience

Ten out of twelve participants stated that there is a rather

low frequency of incidents in their region/municipality and

therefore they do not experience crises often. However,

due to the fact that they have been in this position for a

longer amount of time, they did gather a lot of crisis

experience over time. In addition to the low frequency of

incidents, some participants state that there is a large pool

of people who can have on-call, so “if you’re unlucky, you will never experience a crisis”.

Others state that due to the small, select group of people in their region, they have

more on-call-duties and thereby, more chances of experiencing a crisis. Additionally, all

participants believe that “experience helps to supplement preparedness in combination

with trainings and exercises”.

Stress Level Experience

The opinions regarding training the competence ‘dealing with stress’ are divided. Some

officers state that formal training and education do not help

you to develop focus and experience in stressful situations.

Others stated that the simulations did help in creating a

realistic, stressful environment and that stress is definitely

something that needs to be trained on. Regardless of

training this competence, all twelve officers state that the

increased stress level does not have a negative influence on

the effectiveness of their functioning in crisis situations.

Some attribute this to their experience and some to their personal characteristics. “I

already experience stress in my daily job”, “I have had lots of experience in crisis

situations” and “it is not in my character to be stressed”.

Skill Deterioration

In the interviews, all officers state that their skills are

not deteriorating, due to the big overlap of skills in

their daily job and the crisis role and the experiences

with crisis situations. However, there are still concerns.

Half of the EA’s state that they need to maintain a

sharp focus on this topic as there are many

7. Experience and overlap

between daily role and crisis

role can compensate for

skill deterioration.

6. Crisis experiences

and personal

characteristics

determine how stress

is experienced in a

crisis situation.

5. Crisis experience

supplements training in

regard to perceived

preparedness.


45

developments in the field, for instance related to social media: “Are the things how I do

my job still up to date? We have been doing stuff in this way for a long time, but is it

still the right way?” When there is regular practice, two third of the OoD’s believe it is

not possible to have skill deterioration. Two of the GC’s state that although in their

safety regions incidents happen rather frequently, due to the switch of on-call-duty,

there is still a big time lag between the incidents. One GC who has had the role since

five months still feels prepared, but is afraid his skills will deteriorate if there is no

follow-up training: “Take a look at the EHBO exam, that diploma is out of date after two

years. My diploma of General Commander will never be out of date.”

Learning Needs

The core theme ‘learning needs’ refers to what kind of activities the officers are currently

undertaking to maintain the competences. It also related to the vision on how

competences should be maintained. Also, it is related to the questions if there is

reflection after crisis incidents, the possibility of informal learning and if there is

cooperation between and within safety regions/municipalities. As such, it is a central

theme in developing a strategy for maintaining competences of municipal crisis


Current Maintenance Activities

The participants differ in the frequency and time they spend

on maintaining their competences. Nine interviewees state

that they undertake maintenance activities, such as

participating in formal (multidisciplinary) trainings each year

and/or go to knowledge-exchange dates. Frequency varies

but an average is one to three times per year. One GC is

considered an exception, as he also has other crisis roles and

thus, participates in training around ten times a year. Three

officers state that they do not maintain their competences in a formal way as there is

nothing organized and/or there is no need for training due to the overlap of skills or a

high frequency of crises. One EA states he does not have any official activities but does

try to learn for himself by practicing doing analyses at home when there is a crisis in

another region.

8. There are large

differences between

safety regions with

regards to activities

for maintaining

competences.


46

The Dream: Vision on Maintaining Competences

Many statements were made regarding the vision of the municipality officers on what

they felt that there could be done to maintain competences. One of the most recurrent

statements was the wish to have multi-disciplinary

trainings with other municipal roles and the rescue

services (half of the participants). The officers feel this

would support them in expanding their network and

officers will already come to know the people they will

work with in the warm phase (one third of the

participant). This would in turn have a positive influence

on dealing with the crisis effectively. Also, four officers

stated that there is “a sort of awareness of the crisis role”,

but colleagues still do not have a “solid understanding of what a crisis role exactly

entails”. This implies that the perspective on crisis management needs to change from

“something that must be done” to “it is of vital importance to give attention to these

topics”. If the perspective would change, officers feel it would be easier to incorporate

more time for the crisis role in their daily job. Furthermore, four officers state that the

follow-up training or knowledge exchange days should be made obligatory. Those

follow-up trainings could be adapted to the different risk profiles of safety regions and

to the different levels of proficiency of the municipality officers. At this moment, people

who do not have any experience are in the same course as people who already have a

lot experience. Four officers feel that this keeps the training on “a basic, too general

level” and is therefore “not enough to be prepared for a crisis situation”.

Reflection

A distinction can be made by reflecting on the actions

during the crisis on a technical level (for instance: How did

the incident go? Was everybody on time?) and on an

emotional level (What is the psychological aftermath of a

crisis?). Seven officers state that they have a technical

reflection, of which two state that they would also like to

have an ‘emotional reflection’. Many officers state that

reflection takes place after the incident and is guided by questions such as ‘what was

the impact? How do I feel?’. Some state that reflection takes place unconsciously, for

instance during the night. Furthermore, five officers state that they have reflections with

the safety council but also internal reflection within the region and/or municipality.

9. Maintaining

competences should

include obligatory

multidisciplinary trainings

(adapted to the level of

proficiency) and

networking possibilities.

10. Opportunities

for reflection are

valued by the crisis



47

Topics which officers mention are peer colleague reviewing, learning from mistakes and

having regular evaluation meetings. Thereby, two participants noticed that the

evaluations are often conducted on an organizational level, while they would also like to

focus on the individual level: “This is not to point fingers, but it can help in seeing if

specific persons need more training and/or education”, which can help them improve

their level of proficiency.

Informal Learning

Eleven participants stated that informal learning, or ‘learning on the job’ is possible and

is something that should be used very often. This can be done via training yourself. All

three EA’s and one OoD stated that by looking at the news

“with your iPad on your lap”, you can study how other regions

are handling crises. “For example, you can make an analysis

yourself on your couch and see what the mayor is saying in the

press conference. This can serve as a check to see if you

looked for the right information”. Learning on the job can also

happen via talking to others at seminars and exchange

knowledge and experiences, and/or by talking to and observing colleagues. “You can

learn so much from looking at other municipalities and how they handled crisis

situations.” Furthermore, officers stated that if there is an overlap between the skills

needed during crisis and the daily job, there is also a potential for informal learning. E-

learning, or the use of an app is also seen as informal learning by two officers. Finally,

one officer says that informal learning might be valuable, but “a good crisis is the best

way to learn”.

Cooperation

Half of the participants stated that they are cooperating with other

municipalities/regions on a knowledge level, by exchanging knowledge on organized

seminars/workshops and/or in Whatsapp groups. Five

participants stated that they are cooperating with other

municipalities within the region and the different rescue

services in multidisciplinary trainings. Additionally, some

participants said that they give tips and tricks to less

experienced officers and/or give them the opportunity to

observer and hence, improve their skills and knowledge. In

contrast, one participant stated that they are not or barely

11. Many officers

see value in

informal and social

learning.

12. Cooperation

between different

municipalities/safety

regions is valued but

differs from region to

region.


48

cooperating with other municipalities/regions, as “other regions are at a really basic

level. I believe our region has more focus on up keeping competences”, and “every

municipality/region acts in a different way and it is therefore not possible to apply their

best practices to my municipality”.

6.2.4 General opinion about maintaining competences

The core theme ‘general opinion about maintaining competences’ refers to the amount

of time the municipality officers want to spend on maintaining competences, who they

feel has the responsibility for maintaining competences and to what extent they feel

supported by their municipality to maintain their competences.

Time

Five officers state that one to three trainings a

year is sufficient to upkeep your level of

proficiency, but only if you also have overlap in

your daily job with the skills you need in your crisis

role. Two persons stated that in addition to

training, 40-50 hours a year should be sufficient to maintain their competences. When

asked for their “dream” amount of time available for this purpose, two officers state one

day a week, one states 100 hours per year and one two days per week. They all agreed

though, that their wishes might not be realistic.

Responsibility

The participants are divided regarding the

questions of who should have the responsibility

for maintaining competences. Half of the

participants state that the responsibility should

lie with the individual, three people say it is the

responsibility of the safety region, one names

the municipality and two persons say that the

responsibility lies with all three.

13. There are differences in

the time desired to satisfy the

learning needs of the officers.

14. Responsibility for

maintaining competences should

lie with the individual and be

supported by the safety region

and municipality.


49

Support Municipality

Seven out of twelve participants feel supported by their municipality to maintain their

competences, as they are able to make time in their schedule for for instance

trainings/seminars. In contrast, five participants state that they do not feel supported by

their municipality to upkeep their competences. One officer

stated that “last year we did not even have time to participate

in the training, so no one went. Willingness is not the

problem. People are willing. They simply do not have the

time”. Those officers state that the municipality should reserve

more time in their schedule to maintain their competences,

however this is challenge: “Well, there is some understanding,

but still a lot of my colleagues do not know what I do and they have me rather working

on my daily job.” Another officer states that “sometimes you need a crisis to create the

awareness”.

15. The biggest

obstacle is lacking

time and support

for maintaining

competences.


50

… some municipal officers perceive an overlap between the skills and

knowledge needed in their regular job and those needed during crisis.

… while the officers we interviewed feel prepared, they agree that it is still

crucial to constantly update and improve their competence.

… an initial training can help to build the basis for preparedness. Real

competence though can only be gained through application and

experience.

… while stress is always apparent during crisis, the officers we interviewed

think that practice, experience or even personal characteristics can help to

deal with it.

… the maintenance activities currently undertaken differ a lot between

safety regions.

… the learning needs of the officers differ. They would like learning

activities to be tailored to their specific level of proficiency.

From Pillar III we have learned that...


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Figure 7: Summary of the Temple Structure

7 Bringing Together The Three Perspectives – Ingredients For A Vision

Whereas the previous sections purely described the information we gathered, we now

turn to addressing the overall objective of this project: to provide an overview of

strategies to facilitate continuous learning of municipal crisis management officers for

staying prepared for crisis situations. We are doing this in a twofold way. In the first

step, we identify common themes throughout the three pillars and subsequently the

ingredients for a vision on maintaining competences. In the second step, we provide a

palette of concrete recommendations on how our suggestions can be approached.

Together these two steps provide the conceptual basis for the future vision of IFV on

maintaining competences. Our line of argumentation is visualized in Figure 7 below.


52

7.1 Towards a Vision on Maintaining Competences

To start with the first step, we now provide our suggestions for ingredients for IFV’s

vision on the basis of the three pillars.

The Need to Maintain Competences of Municipal Crisis Management Officers

Our research has revealed ample evidence for the need to maintain competences. The

academic perspective has shown that skills that are not used on a regular basis will

become obsolete over time. This finding has also been supported by our field research.

Municipal crisis management officers that have a lot of opportunity to apply their skills

regularly, feel better prepared than those that get less experience. Also, if they would

not have an opportunity to practice, they would expect to lose their skills and

knowledge. This supports the need to maintain competences by taking actions to

prevent such deterioration. However, before any actions for maintenance are taken, it

needs to be determined what level of proficiency is aimed at. The question should be

raised which level equals competence to handle crisis effectively for each municipality.

Once this has been clarified, further actions can be designed accordingly.

In the following, we discuss how these matters can be addressed and what needs to be

taken into account when crafting a vision. Our main proposal how competences can be

maintained is through designing a system of continuous learning. Before we explain this

proposal in more detail, we first discuss the overall important ingredients.

Bottom-Up Instead of Top-Down

One element that needs to be considered is the approach of how a continuous learning

system itself is designed. Our research revealed that many of the safety regions (out of

the sample we interviewed) are already aware of the general need to maintain and

further develop the competences of their crisis management officers. It also became

apparent that while maintaining competences takes place, the frequency and the

activities differ among the regions. To ensure that everyone in the Netherlands is

prepared sufficiently, a more standardized approach should be taken. This approach

should be designed in cooperation with the safety regions and municipalities, as

involving the users of the system in the design of it will foster acceptance.


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A Special Context

Furthermore, when designing continuous learning activities, one has to be aware of the

target group and its specific needs. Findings from all three pillars suggest that this is

particularly relevant with regard to the specific context. The context of the regular job

differs from that in a crisis situation. Literature suggests that even if certain

competences are acquired in one context, these competences do not automatically

transfer to other contexts. This is supported in our interviews for instance in relation to

the difference in stress levels. If stress is added to the equation, people might behave

differently in comparison to a relaxed training atmosphere. This implies that the specific

context of crises should be taken into account when designing learning activities for the

municipal officers.

Consider Different Learning Needs

Next to the specific context, findings of Pillar II and Pillar III highlight the issue of the

diversity of learners. As it was stated by both representatives from the training provider

and municipal officers, there are large differences in terms of their learning needs. This

diversity is caused by several different factors. First of all, each officer has a different

background and a different regular job. Due to these differences, it is not possible to

make generalizations regarding the overlap between their regular and crisis role.

Additionally, their levels of proficiency in handling crises differs, which implies that one

uniform approach of continuous learning will not meet all of the different learning

needs. Instead of a static design, the system of continuous learning should be flexible

and adaptable to these needs.

To identify the different learning needs and to check on the general level of

preparedness, regular competence assessments should be conducted. Such

assessments do not only help to match the right learning activities to each individual

but they also provide an overview whether the right people are in the right position. As

it has been shown that people need to be motivated and need to take initiatives

themselves to maintain their competences, it is crucial that crisis management officers

possess such characteristics. Hence, when designing a vision on maintaining

competences, it is important to take the selection procedure into account. We believe

that certain criteria that determine the willingness to maintain competences on a

regular basis, should be used to identify suitable candidates for the specific roles.


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Facilitating

role: IFV

Designing role:

safety region

Supporting and

monitoring

role:

municipality

Individual

responsibility

Shared Responsibility: The Individual, the Municipality, the Safety Region and IFV

A vision on maintaining competences should also include a clear indication of who

should be responsible for it. This has been mentioned implicitly as well as explicitly in all

three pillars. According to our research, the core responsibility lies with the individual. It

has been stressed by multiple interview partners that the crisis management officers

themselves need to take on the responsibility to maintain their competences, as well as

to further develop those competences. As such, motivated and engaged individuals

should be in the role of crisis officers in the first place. However, the municipal officer

should be given the opportunity to participate in training and education. Based on the

findings from our research, we suggest a core model which is presented in Figure 8. It

summarizes the distribution of responsibility based on the research of our project.

Based on our research, we conclude that the role of IFV could be to communicate the

vision of continuous learning to the safety regions. Additionally, IFV should then provide

the possible ingredients for a

continuous learning system. This

implies that IFV would be

responsible for the overall

coordination and guidance of any

learning activities and has therefore

a facilitating role. Possible ways to

reach this, is to inform the safety

regions about what training

opportunities and/or different

designs are available for the

different blocks. This refers for

instance to the different ways of

learning, namely formal, informal

and social learning. In terms of formal learning this implies that IFV connects the safety

regions with commercial training providers. Working together, the training providers

and safety regions are more able to identify the different learning needs within the

region and hence, develop a training which is tailor made.

With the support of IFV, the safety regions should provide the opportunity for

maintaining competences. This presents a shift from the municipal level to a regional

level. Instead of each municipality, each safety region should design a system of

continuous learning that regards the specific learning needs of the officers in their

region. In our research it became evident that many regions have adapted an

Figure 8: Distribution of Responsibility


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interregional pool of municipal crisis management officers and also conduct learning

activities within this pool. This approach was considered to be more efficient and less

costly.

The new responsibility of the municipalities should focus on monitoring the learning

process and providing support by creating a learning environment that enables their

officers to self-develop. This is crucial because the lack of time to focus on maintaining

competences has been stated as the biggest obstacle to staying prepared for their role

of crisis management. This implies that additional time should be allocated to this task.

One part of that would be to instruct direct supervisors to allow and encourage learning

both at the regular job and outside of it.

A System for Continuous Learning

Keeping all the different elements in mind, we are now turning to the system of

continuous learning. To ensure a uniform approach, the vision should specify what

learning activities can be used to maintain competences. Naturally, staying prepared

starts with becoming prepared. The initial training forms the foundation of competence.

Insights from the municipal officers revealed however that only keeping up the level of

competence that was reached after an initial training is not sufficient to stay prepared

for crisis incidents. Instead, maintaining competences is a continuous process that

requires a systematic approach. Moreover, all three pillars revealed another reason why

a continuous learning system is necessary for staying prepared. Literature on crisis

management has shown that crisis situations are highly unpredictable and one crisis is

not like the other. Environmental changes and technological advancements contribute

to this unpredictability. As such officers should be required to constantly refresh their

skills and update their knowledge about the new developments to be prepared for

unpredictable situations at all times. To keep up and further enhance the level of

competence reached after the initial training, a never-ending cycle of continuous

learning has to follow. Literature suggests that such a cycle should include formal,

informal as well as social learning activities.

Support for such an approach was also found in Pillar II and III. Different suggestions

and wishes have been made regarding the three types of learning. Formal learning is

mostly seen as a starting point or an opportunity to refresh what was learned initially.

To support this, formal learning activities should be designed. An especially large value

was seen in activities that simulate real crisis incidents. In both Pillar II and Pillar III it was

furthermore stated that there is a potential to incorporate informal learning in the

continuous learning cycle. When considering the three crisis management roles in


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question, it can be argued that there are differences in the potential for informal

learning. The largest potential for informal learning was perceived by the Environmental

Analysts as they have the largest overlap between their regular job and their role in

crisis management. Social learning activities are perceived valuable in all pillars as they

foster interaction and enables sharing of knowledge. A necessary antecedent is the

creation of an environment in which social learning takes place. Our research also

revealed that social learning is often a by-product of formal and informal learning

activities.

When designing this system of continuous learning, it is important to integrate all three

components. Only focusing on some of them separately will not lead to the same effect

as most of their value derives from the combination of all three components. Reflection

and e-learning can be valuable tools to support all three elements of continuous

learning. The element of reflection was reccurring in all three pillars. As the intense

pressure to function effectively does not allow for time to reflect during a crisis, it is

crucial to learn to engage in such activities afterwards. As such, it is necessary to provide

individuals with the opportunities and tools to reflect on situations or competences. This

way they can assess their behavior, the reasons for their behavior and ways to improve.

Additionally, Pillar II and III acknowledged the potential need or usefulness of e-learning

or apps.

In the next section we will discuss how the components of the system could look like.


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7.2 Recommendations

After we have discussed the general ingredients for a vision, we now focus on the

system of continuous learning as a way to maintain competences. It is the aim of the

following recommendations to illustrate how this system could look like in practice.

Therefore, we identify a palette of options for each component. These options can then

be applied in accordance to the individual learning needs. For the recommendations,

we do not differentiate between the three different crisis management roles because

our research has shown that differences emerge rather from factors such as crisis

experience or overlap between the crisis and regular role and not as a result of the

different function.

It is important to note that before any actions can be taken to develop a system of

continuous learning, more research has to be conducted to confirm and strengthen our

recommendations. This is discussed in more detail in the last section of this report.

Recommendation 1: Simulating Reality – Formal Learning

As discussed in the previous section, a system of continuous learning should include

three different components. We now turn to the first one, which is formal learning. To

support and enable formal learning, we suggest two kinds of interventions which are

simulations and in-depth/follow-up trainings.

Simulations

Simulation can be a tool to create situations similar to reality. These can be designed

similar to the ones that are already initiated by IFV in cooperation with V&R Acadamie.

However, on the basis of our research we stress the importance to follow certain criteria.

- Realistic Design. The simulations should be as close to reality because only then

the officers will be prepared for a stressful situation (for instance under high time

pressure) and will be able to routinize appropriate behavior that they can

consequently more easily fall back to in a real crisis. This way, they will also have

knowledge of the existence and application of applicable processes. They will

have worked in a team setting, know the dynamics and perhaps have also been

able to build up a network.


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- Multidisciplinary Set-Up. To create a situation that is as close to reality as

possible, a simulation exercise should not only include municipal crisis offers but

also other stakeholders relevant to crisis situations, for instance rescue services.

- Frequency. As it is important to practice regularly to avoid skill deterioration, the

frequency of the simulations should range between one to three times a year.

- Mandatory Participation. Linked to the previous point, it is important that the

offers participate in the simulations regularly. To ensure their presence, it could

be an option to make it obligatory to attend a certain amount of trainings a year.

- Evaluation. To enhance the learning experience of participants, a thorough

evaluation of the exercise should take place.

In-depth Follow-up Trainings

Next to simulations, another type of formal learning we consider relevant is in-depth

training. As the levels of proficiency differ between the crisis management officers, such

trainings can help to overcome individual deficits. The following guidelines can help to

set up such trainings.

- Individual Learning Needs. As a first step, the specific learning needs of the crisis

management officers should be assessed (see recommendation 6). Based on this

assessment, training contents and level of the training (‘beginner’ or ‘advanced’)

can be adapted. This would not only ensure a better fit of the training to the

learning needs but also avoid a waste resources (time and money).

- Core Competences. The most important skills needed for crisis management

have been identified as stress resistance, team work and communication

(including political skills). Furthermore possessing the knowledge about the

organizational structures has been emphasized multiple times. Therefore, in-

depth follow up trainings can be set up around these core skills and knowledge.


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Recommendation 2: Learning at the Workplace – Informal Learning

The second type of learning that needs to be included in a continuous learning system

is informal learning. Even though informal learning cannot be forced, it can be

encouraged and nurtured in several ways. Concrete ideas are listed in the following.

Learning From Other Crisis Incidents

Sources for learning do not have to be limited to own experience in practice or

simulation. Instead, also incidents experienced by others can contribute to the learning

experience. Specifically, this can be achieved by following these suggestions.

- Observation. Crisis management officers can observe incidents that take place

elsewhere through the press or media and conduct an analysis or evaluation of

the incident by asking him/herself questions such as “What has been done?”,

“What would I have done?” and “What can I learn from that?”. IFV could

encourage all crisis management officers to actively scan the media for such

incidents.

- Practice Cases. Next to evaluating incidents found via the press, other practice

cases could be provided via e-learning or an App. This approach would have

several added benefits. First, it would allow IFV to choose which incidents to

provide. Second, IFV could frame these incidents in a more digestible layout and

thus reduce the time investment on the part of the officer. Third, IFV could

provide questions for each case and thus amplify the learning potential. Lastly,

IFV could monitor the progress of each crisis officer and provide additional

information and cases where needed.

Overlap – Learning During the Regular Job

Depending on the degree of overlap between daily job and crisis role, informal learning

can happen as a side effect of performing one’s daily tasks. While most of this happens

unconsciously, it can be facilitated through some concrete actions.

- Technology. There are several ways technology can be used to aid informal

learning. Based on our research, an e-learning tool which are set up and

administered centrally would add the most value in this case (for more details

see recommendation 5).


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Recommendation 3: Learning From One Another – Social Learning

As it has been shown before that social learning is one valuable form of continuous

learning, several aspects should be considered to facilitate and trigger social learning.

Make Learning Activities (even) More Fun

It is necessary to create an open environment where people feel comfortable and

willing to share their knowledge as this is a crucial antecedent of social learning. One

way to do so is by organizing networking events which combine learning activities with

fun. The following guidelines can help to organize such events.

- Unconventional but Pleasant Destination. To create an atmosphere where people

feel comfortable and share knowledge, a learning experience can be designed

outside the classroom. This could for instance imply visiting a theme park or

organizing city walks in one of the safety regions. Participating in such activities

can trigger conversations beyond the scope of formal learning agendas and thus

trigger deeper knowledge exchange.

- Offer a Platform. IFV can take an active role in facilitating knowledge exchange

between crisis management officers through organizing seminars/conferences.

Guest speakers for relevant topics can provide information about newest trends

specific to the crisis role, for instance new technology that needs to be used by

Environmental Analysts. Contents of the seminar can then be discussed in small

groups which allows to exchange knowledge and learn from each other. Another

option can be to encourage the regions to organize rotating seminars. In this

format, IFV can contribute knowledge, while the regions contribute their

experiences.

Sharing Experience

As in all work environments, in crisis management there is a lot of diversity in the level

of proficiency and the amount of crisis experience of municipal crisis management

officers. This diversity should be utilized to learn from each other. Concrete steps to do

so can include the following.

- Mentor System. More experienced municipal crisis officers from one role can

share their expertise with less experienced crisis officers from the same role. Not

only can the less experienced learn from the more experienced. It can also work

vice versa. Questions or insights of both officers can add to the learning

experience. As such learning needs of both parties have to be shared. As crisis


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experience is a crucial determinant in staying prepared, it can be valuable to

benefit from more experienced officers. IFV could facilitate this by aligning

mentors and mentees. As such a mentor database could be developed and

officers could be asked during the initial training whether they would like to

benefit from a mentor.

- Use Technology to Facilitate Contact. If a municipality is not equipped with

highly experienced officers, social communication channels can help to

overcome the distance issue. Discussing current crisis incidents via social media

can help to learn from each other but also to stay up to date.

- Assign “Piket-Partners” (on-call partners). Forming teams of officers with different

experience levels that are on call together can improve knowledge exchange and

contribute to social learning. The less experienced officer can observe, while to

more experienced ones can take the lead. If there are not enough officers from

the same municipality, regional teams can also be formed.

Cooperation and Knowledge Exchange Within and Between Regions

Sharing knowledge and best practices between municipalities within safety regions and

also beyond regional borders has been perceived as valuable for continuous learning.

As such several steps can be undertaken to facilitate this.

- Learn from Crises of Others. Especially significant crises incidents are evaluated

by the Dutch Council of Safety. A lot can be learned from this evaluation.

Therefore it should be considered for municipal officers to attend such meetings

at they can support in learning from each other’s best practices and mistakes.

- Train Together. Training in multidisciplinary and inter-regional teams can offer a

platform for knowledge exchange. Additionally, they can be beneficial to learn

about best practices. However, it needs to be taken into account that structures

are sometimes distinct for certain municipalities or regions and thus best

practices might not add the same value for each region. Municipal officers can

also observe and play a way-on role to get insights into the exercises of others.


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Recommendation 4: Periodic Assessment

Periodic assessments provide insights in the current level of competence and whether it

is sufficient to simply maintain this or whether and on which competences an individual

needs to further develop. This leads to the statement that a periodic assessment

supports in determining the learning needs of the officers. There are several ways of

how a periodic assessment can take place.

- Incorporate in Activities. Periodic assessments can be incorporated into

different learning activities. On the basis of how effective an officer performs

in for example simulations in a follow-up training can support the evaluation

of the level of proficiency on those competences. The Police has a three-

times-strike out policy, which means that if an officer fails to perform on the

required level three times in a row, he will be assigned to another job within

the Police.

- Peer Colleague Reviewing. Peer colleague reviewing is an activity which is

used by the different rescue services and provides insight in the level of

proficiency of the officer. This can be done via face-to-face feedback

meetings with peers and leaders, or filling in an anonymous survey regarding

the level of proficiency on competences of colleagues. Another tool which

can support is a so-called ‘competence scan’, which is used by the Fire

Department. First, the officer needs to score his own level of proficiency on

different competences. Second, two other colleagues also fill in this

competence scan regarding the competences of their colleague. The officer

has then three competence scans which might have the same results or differ.

The results and different perspectives are discussed in a feedback meeting.


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Recommendation 5: Stop and Look Back – Feedback, Reflection and Evaluation

Reflection can be a tool that helps to slow down and evaluate what went well and

where there is still room for improvement. Although, reflection itself is a highly cognitive

process, it can take place in various scenarios. General tips on reflection as well as

suggestions on three of these scenarios are outlined below.

Reflection in General

- An Atmosphere for Reflection. For reflection to be valuable, an open and

psychological safe (trustful) environment needs to be created. As reflecting

on mistakes during a crisis situation can have a significant emotional impact

on the officer, he needs to feel comfortable in dealing with such situations.

To create such an environment, feedback should be formulated in a

constructive way. Furthermore as it was stressed in our interviews, it needs to

be assured that blaming behavior is substituted by open conversation.

Reflection meetings should be designed in a way that officers can talk about

incidents rather than the question of “what went wrong?” has priority (also

see address the positive)

- Solidity Reflection. In case municipal officers do not feel comfortable enough

to share their experiences, they can also reflect on an individual basis. This

can take place for instance through journal writings or using learning guides.

Individual reflection is valuable as it helps to re-live the situation and engage

in it once more. Questions that come up during individual reflection can then

also be addressed in formal learning activities or discussed during social

learning processes.

- Address the Positive. Reflection should not only focus on areas of

improvement. Positive points should be addresses as well to upkeep

motivation.

Individual Reflection

Individuals reflect on an individual level either unconsciously or consciously. While

unconscious reflection cannot be easily influenced, there are several ways to facilitate

and trigger conscious reflection.

- 360° Feedback. To not only rely on one source of feedback, it can be useful

to consult a variety of people that experienced a person’s performance

during the crisis situation. These can for instance include colleagues from


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higher or lower organizational levels or members from the rescue services.

360° feedback also includes a self-assessment. If needed, specific questions

on the required competences in crisis situations can be incorporated in this

process.

- STARR Method. It is important that individuals ask for concrete examples to

identify specific areas of improvement. This method is especially useful in

providing insights into the competences of oneself or of others. A useful tool

to design the reflection process as concrete as possible is the STARR

Method5.

- Help of Others. Seeking the help of someone more experienced or someone

who can facilitate the process of reflection can be useful to make use of

developmental experiences. Peer-to-peer coaching sessions can help here.

Team Reflection

While individual reflection mainly focuses on developing on an individual level, team

reflection can help develop new ideas by sharing different perspectives. There are

several tools that can help to reflect on a team level.

- Multidisciplinary Reflection. Reflection should also be done together with the

team that operated during the crisis. Individuals can share their best practices

and negative experiences to learn from each other and to increase their

knowledge. Questions to support this process are “what went well?” “Where

is room for improvement?”.

Guided Reflection/Evaluation – Learning Arenas

The goal of learning arenas is to provide an opportunity for reflection and to guide

municipality officers in learning from incidents. The design can be similar to what

already exists for the Fire Department.

- External Professional. In a learning arena an external professional supports in

bringing specific learning points to the surface. As a result, an advice can be

formed on how to proceed with these learning points.

5 The STARR method analyses a specific situation, in which the individual had to fulfill a specific task. The

individual indicates what action he took to fulfill the task. The method ends with discussing the result and

reflecting on the process.


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- Process Reflection. Once reflection took place, specific questions or needs

might arise from this process. These should be then addressed in a next

learning activity to design these in a more suitable way.

Recommendation 6: Multi-platform E-learning System/Application

The approaches of implementing blended learning through e-learning platforms or

applications vary throughout the different safety regions. Nearly every aspect of the

continuous learning cycle can be integrated into these media. Some examples of how

such tools could be used include.

- Part of the Formal Learning Process. They could provide supplementing sources

of information to trainings or even provide further trainings on specific

competences.

- Support Evaluation Procedures. These could include evaluations of trainings,

evaluations of incidents and performance, evaluation of cases such as other

incidents or evaluations of competences through testing. In combination with

questions or quizzes, these tools could aid in developing periodic assessments

of municipality officers competence levels. The element of games and quizzes

could additionally further facilitate a fun way of informal learning.

- Platform for Knowledge Exchange and Networking. Platforms can be established

within and between municipalities/safety regions. This could be achieved

through an interactive e-learning platform or app that allows for interactions

between the learners.

- Informing about News. IFV could use an e-learning tool in cooperation with the

regions to update all municipality officers on any new developments. This could

be done through newsletters or even video or audio podcasts.

Using e-learning or apps for these processes has the benefit that IFV can control and

monitor any developments. Moreover, these tools allow cooperation and knowledge

exchange between members of municipalities, regions, IFV and even the rescue

services. IFV and the regions could actively monitor the progress of individuals or teams

in multiple learning stages and facilitate interventions as needed.


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Developing such tools on a national level has multiple benefits. Firstly, costs could be

reduced if there is only one approach across the entire Netherlands, rather than several

municipalities developing such tools independently. This does not mean that every

region needs to use the exact same elements and functions but rather that there is one

supplier and architecture that can then be customized. Secondly, having one approach

allows for multiple contributors of content into the system. This would allow IFV and the

regions to truly share information on a national level and thus enhance the knowledge

exchange.

One potential downside to these instruments is the high costs involved. These costs

consist of both a monetary nature but also require large amounts of time investments.

Therefore, we recommend that IFV introduces a national approach to blended learning

through either an e-learning platform or a multiple device application. This system

should include elements of formal and informal learning.


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8 Conclusion

We start this final section of our report by summarizing our research findings. Following

this, we discuss limitations to our research and highlight next steps to ensure effective

implementation of a vision to maintain competences. As a last step, we address valuable

insights from the field that were not directly related to our research objective. We still

want to share these findings as they represent valuable needs from the municipal

officers and should thus be addressed in further studies.

8.1 Research Summary

The core of this research was to provide IFV with possible ingredients for a strategy on

maintaining competences of municipal crisis management officers. To achieve this goal,

we gathered data from three different sources. In the first step we identified main

findings from an academic perspective. To supplement this information we conducted

eight interviews with staff from rescue services and additional information sources.

These interviews were focused on best-practices from the field. In a last step we gained

insights into the learning needs of a twelve municipal crisis management officer by

asking them questions about their feeling of preparedness and general awareness on

maintaining competences. Based on these three pillars we identified commonalities that

served as the foundation for our advice and recommendations.

Based on the information from the three pillars, our main conclusion on possible

ingredients for a vision are the following: first, our research has shown that there is

indeed a need to maintain competences as skills can deteriorate over time if they are

not used regularly. Before any system is implemented, it is important to define what

level proficiency is equal to being competent and thus what competence level should

be maintained exactly. Secondly, a uniform approach is desirable. However there is the

need to include the municipalities in the design of such as system. Insights from

municipality secretaries and the attitudes of the municipal officers have shown that this

is important to foster acceptance of the system. Thirdly, there should be a shared

responsibility in regard to maintaining competences. This implies that the individual is

responsible for the communication of his or her learning needs as well as participation

in learning activities. It is thus important to select the right people for the roles of

municipal officers, as they need to be motivated to maintain their competences.

However, the organization should provide support and opportunities in this

undertaking. Especially room for maintaining competences is important, as our field

research concluded that the biggest obstacle was lacking time. Last but not least, a


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strategy on maintaining competences should include a system of formal, informal and

social learning. To support these three components, reflection and e-learning can be a

valuable tools.

Based on these ingredients, our research provided recommendations on possible ways

to implement a system of continuous learning. These recommendations are based on

best practices from the field as well as the translation of the learning needs into actual

steps. Our recommendations comprise a wide palette of possibilities. This is because

learning needs of municipal officers differ widely depending on their level of experience

or frequency to engage in crisis management. As such, IFV can use this palette of

recommendations to develop a vision for effectively maintaining competences.

The next natural step for IFV is now to use the possible

ingredients as well as recommendations to formulate a

vision on maintaining competences. It is however

important to be aware of several limitations of our

research. These limitations need to be evaluated carefully

before implementing a vision on maintaining

competences. We address these limitations below and

recommended steps for further research to overcome

these limitations.

8.2 Limitations and Implications for Further Research

We believe that it is crucial to precisely know the target group with regard to current

maintenance activities before implementing a vision. During our field research we

noticed that many safety regions and municipalities already have initiated activities to

maintain competences. As our project was limited to a sample of twelve municipal

officers, it is recommendable to widen the scope of interviews and investigate what

activities are already implemented to maintain competences.

The restricted sample of municipal officers is also a limitation

with regard to the learning needs of the officers. Our advice

for a vision and consequent recommendations are based on

the insights of our research partners on for instance specific

learning needs. With the selection of safety regions we already

acknowledged and ensured diversity of learners. However,

1. Use the possible

ingredients and

recommendation to

develop a vision on

maintaining competences.

2. Identify the

learning needs of a

broader group of

municipal officers.


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each safety region and municipality has distinct needs; as such it is advisable to gather

insights in the whole population of municipal officers. This can help to ensure that the

strategies for maintaining competences clearly match these diverse needs.

Additionally, with regard to our sample there remains the risk of an availability bias.

Only the municipal officers willing to participate were interviewed. This might have

biased our results with regard to awareness of the need to maintain competences. All

municipal officers either felt adequately prepared or

were willing to engage in activities to further develop

their competences. To identify adequate measures for

municipal officers who are less aware of the need to

maintain competences, it is recommendable to

identify their learning needs as well. Asking the

municipal workers about what they perceive

important in staying prepared also helps to foster

acceptance of a uniform approach to competence maintenance. Linked to that, our

map of geographical positions of selected safety regions has shown that we have

mainly interviewed municipal officers from safety regions in the South of the

Netherlands. This was partly due to availability reasons of these officers. It would be

valuable to conduct further research of regions with a different geographical position to

identify whether the lacking willingness to cooperate in our study has implications for

their awareness for the need to maintain competences.

A further limitation refers to the design of our research. We used semi-structured

interviews to identify the level of preparedness of the municipal officers. As such, the

level of preparedness is based on their own perceptions and thus lacks an objective

component to assess whether they really stay competent after the initial training. We

recommend using an objective measure to identify their true level of preparedness. It

would also be advisable to instruct an expert in the field of crisis management to

conduct a second qualitative study to validate our research results.

Additionally, with regard to the design of our research, the method of conducting semi-

structured interviews has weaknesses in its nature. On

the one hand, it entails the risk of socially desirable

answers. Although we perceived the municipal officers as

open and authentic, this risk cannot be completely ruled

out. One the other hand, there is always the risk of an

unobserved heterogeneity bias. Hence, although having

used the same interview questionnaire and thorough briefings with the entire project

group, the interviews differed in time, language, setting (Skype, phone, personal),

3. Investigate whether

willingness to participate in

this study is linked to

awareness of need to

maintain competences.

4. Use an objective

competence assessment

tool to avoid limitation of

qualitative research.


70

interviewer and interviewee. Hence, several factors such as the interviewee’s time, mood

and ability to express him-/herself in a different language could have influenced the

result.

8.3 Next Steps for Effective Implementation

We have already pointed out the next step of IFV should be

to use our suggestion for developing a vision on maintaining

competences. At this point we would like to emphasize that

we designed our recommendations as a palette of possible

ways to achieve continuous learning. As such, it is not the

goal to use all sub-components of the recommendations for

all safety regions. It needs to be carefully evaluated which

sub-parts of the recommendations apply best to which

safety region depending on their diversity of learnings. Informal learning for instance

might not be possible to the same amount in all safety regions. A possible next step

should now focus on the evaluation of these recommendations in terms of their

effectiveness depending on the learning needs of the officers. Additionally, our

recommendations are not an exclusive list of possible ways to ensure a system of

continuous learning. The goal of our project was to provide possible ingredients for a

vision and recommendations that can contribute to that.

It is furthermore important to keep in mind that we took

the initial training based on the qualification profiles as

the starting point of our research. During our interviews,

it was mentioned that not all qualification profiles were

still up-to date. The qualification profiles will be updated

by the end of June 2015. It is thus recommendable to use

the input of the new qualification profiles for future

studies on competence of crisis management officers.

8.4 Valuable Insights Beyond the Scope of this Project

Our project concentrated on identifying strategies to maintain competences of

municipal crisis management officers. During our research, municipal officers shared

additional information that is valuable for ensuring high performance in crisis

management whatsoever. We would like to share these recurring topics as they can also

provide the basis for future project on municipal crisis management.

5. Evaluate the

recommendations in

terms of effectiveness

depending on the

diversity of learners.

6. Use input of the

updated qualification

profiles for further

studies on competence

maintenance.


71

Selection

One recurring topic was selecting the right people for crisis management roles. We

have incorporated this aspect in terms of selecting motivated individuals that are willing

to maintain their competences by engaging in learning activities. Nevertheless, several

municipal officers emphasized the need of selecting

dedicated and committed people that are willing to work in

crisis management and thus engage fully in this profession.

It was pointed out that crisis management is not just a role

that can be done besides a regular job but is a “job for

professionals”. We conclude from our interviews that it

would be worth investigating whether crisis management

should be separated from the daily job.

Cooperation

A second recurring topic was about the cooperation between different stakeholders

involved in crisis management. We have addressed that topic in terms of knowledge

exchange as a way to maintain competences. Nevertheless, various kinds of information

sources emphasized that getting to know each other and the corresponding role each

person is responsible for has an impact on the performance during crisis situation. The

network and knowledge of team dynamics will enable quick decision-making during an

actual crisis. That is also one of the reasons why multidisciplinary trainings are beneficial,

as people already have the opportunity to work together in the ‘cold phase’. We

conclude that it is worth investigating in how far cooperation can be facilitated to

ensure better performance during crisis situations as this should be the ultimate goal.

To conclude this report, we have seen that there is potential and the need for a vision to

maintain competences of municipal crisis management officers. We have provided

various insights from different information sources that can guide IFV in the

development in this vision. We wish IFV good luck with this undertaking and strongly

encourage them to consider our main takeaway: “Competence is not a state but a

continuous process”.

7. Investigate how

cooperation and

selection can improve

effective functioning in

crisis management.


72

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List of Figures

Figure 1: Temple Structure of the project report

Figure 2: Municipal Population Care according to Bevolkingszorg 2.0 op orde (2014)

Figure 3: Extract from Qualification profiles regarding core tasks and qualities of the

three roles

Figure 4: Architectural Model of Competence according to Roe (1999)

Figure 5: Continuous Learning Cycle according to Tannenbaum (1997)

Figure 6: Geographical Location of Selected Safety Regions, Map from Ministry of

Security and Justice (2010)

Figure 7: Summary of the Temple Structure

Figure 8: Distribution of Responsibility

List of Tables

Table 1: List of Interview Partners from the Rescue Services and Practice

Table 2: Detailed Argumentation for Selected Safety Regions

Table 3: Descriptives of Municipal Crisis Management Officers

Table 4: Topic List for Interviews

Table 5: Coding Scheme


78

Appendices

Appendix I

Table 1. List of Interview Partners from the Rescue Services and Practice

Organization Role Region

Police Team leader in Police Crisis Team, Environmental

Analyst

Hollands-Midden

IFV/ Academie voor

GHOR en Opgeschaalde

Zorg

Advisor OTO for GHOR and Opgeschaalde Zorg National

Municipality Municipality Secretary, Team leader of 10 GC’s Midden-en West

Brabant

Police Academy Manger of Education MMS (Meldkamer, Multi, SGBO) Midden-en West

Brabant

Fire Department Volunteer fire fighter, Responsible for Education in

the Region

Noord- en Oost-

Gelderland

V&R Academie Expert on the Development of Training National

Municipality Municipality Secretary, Former OoD Gelderland-Zuid

Municipality Press Agent, Responsible for Education in the safety

region

Drenthe

Extract 1. Example Agenda from Interviews

Interview Agenda for GHOR:

The general competence maintenance for the medical assistance units and the

corresponding vision (formal vs. informal)

The process of the development of activities for maintaining competences

The way the medical assistance units distinguish between competences, skills and

knowledge. Where what information can be found.

How the cooperation between other regions and/or other services works.

Whether performance is evaluated on a regular basis and further activities are based

on these evaluations (learning from failure).

What is your vision on maintaining competences for the three roles (formal vs.

informal)?

What is your vision on training people for crisis situations?

Do you think the transfer is smaller because of high stress levels?

Do you think tools such as simulation are foolproof to ensure performance in

crisis situations?


79

Appendix II

Table 2. Detailed Argumentation for Selected Safety Regions

Safety Region Criteria for Selection6

Brabant-Noord

No listed GRIP 4 incident within the last ten years: possible indicator of

perception towards competence maintenance

Distinct types of risks: location of air base, transport of dangerous goods

through pipelines

Long tenure of crisis manager: possible indicator of experience level and

thus preparedness

Interviewee volunteered to become crisis manager

Gelderland-Zuid

Last GRIP 4 incident in 2011

Reported low incident frequency

Mostly urban region

Distinct types of risk: Natural disasters (floods and forest fires); Waal as the

most important water transport route in the Netherlands; BRZO7-

companies

Cooperation required with Germany and Europoort (different safety

structures)

Long tenure of crisis officer: possible indicator of experience level and thus

preparedness

Midden en West-Brabant

Distinct types of risks: transport of dangerous goods between harbors of

Antwerp and Rotterdam (adherence to external safety standards)

Short tenure of crisis officer: GC since 2015

Last GRIP 4 in 2011

Cooperation with different safety regions during GRIP 4

Region is known for its good reputation in safety issues

6 Sources: risicokaart.nl; websites of safety regions, for instance Brabant.nl (Midden en West-Brabant and

Noord-Brabant); vrgz.nl (Gelderland-Zuid); vru.nl (Utrecht), website of the Police.

7 BRZO = Besluit risico’s zware ongevallen. These companies contain a large amount of dangerous goods.


80

Utrecht Cooperation: Adjacent to and thus likely cooperation with safety region

Amsterdam-Amstelland where a likelihood of high “natural training rate” is

present due to high GRIP incident rate, distinct types of crises due to

location in adjacent region)

No GRIP 4 incident listed within the last ten years

Different participants for the same role to compare perception; participants

differ with regard to tenure (identify possibility of skill deterioration)

Zeeland Recent GRIP 4 incident in 2014. Possible indicator of perception towards

competence maintenance. Likely that interview partners participated in this

crisis and can provide us with insights in their role during this crisis situation.

Distinct type of crises and high risk profile: natural disaster (floods and forest

fires) but also risk due to nuclear power station in Borssele and the

Belgische Doel (4 stations) and ships

Potential coordination with Belgian municipalities and also multinational

cooperation on ships (different structures in crisis management)

Smallest region of the municipalities that we look at

Zuid-Holland Cooperation: due to location possible cooperation with Midden- en

Westbranbant and Rotterdam-Rijnmond

Distinct types of risk: floods (below sea level); transportation on water way

of dangerous goods; complex system of energy transport

Last GRIP 4 incident in 2011

Different officers from different roles to compare their insights and

validate statements on for instance learning needs, skill deterioration

Zuid-Limburg Very recent GRIP 3 incident in Heerlen (20. April 2015), incident that

requires long post processing. This also required high levels of

cooperation with different municipalities within the region (Brunssum and

Kerkrade)

Distinct types of crises: presence of chemical industry and risk toxic

accidents

Impact of crises would be catastrophic, but likelihood would be not very

high

Zuid-Limburg has a high level of organized crime. A multidisciplinary

taskforce was initiated.

Due to geographical positioning close to Belgium and Germany, crossing-

border coordination is also likely to be necessary


81

Table 3. Descriptives of Municipal Crisis Management Officers

Table 4. Topic List for Interviews

Topic

Research Indicator Sample question

Job in General / / / Competences (in crisis situations)

Knowledge/skills/abilities and competences (Boselie, 2010) Qualification Profiles (Opleidingskader) Potential for informal learning (Marsick & Watkins, 2001)

List of relevant competences and KSAs Potential overlap that allows for regular informal training

Think of one example of a crisis (like a GRIP 4). Describe the skills/ competences you used during this crisis. If you think about the skills needed during a crisis situation and during your daily job. Do you think there is a certain overlap between them?

Cooperation

Informal learning through networking (Marsick & Watkins, 2001)

Knowledge exchange/communication

Do you communicate and coordinate with crisis management officers from other municipalities outside of crisis situations?

Preparedness

Quality of Training (Salas, Tannenbaum, Kraiger & Smith-Jentsch, 2012) Transfer of Learning (Haskell, 2001) Transfer of Training (Blume, Ford, Baldwin & Huang, 2010)

Fit between training design and practice needs Context differences/ similarities

You had initial training when becoming a GC, OD, EA.. Think about the crisis situation you described earlier - In what way did the initial training help you in feeling prepared for handling this situation correctly (not only during but also after)? Please describe the level of stress and pressure that you experience during a crisis situation.

Descriptives OoD (n=3) GC (n=5) EA (n=4)

Tenure

Gender

Range 4 – 6 years

2 male, 1 female

5months – 7 years

5 male

3 – 8 years

3 male, 1 female

Had crisis experience All All All

Had initial training 3 5 3


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Learning needs

Skills obsolescence (De Grip, 2002) Forgetting curve (Ebbinghaus, 1999)

Different levels of analysis (Buller & McEvoy, 2012) Importance of reflection, for e.g. the feeling of psychological safety (Edmondson, 1999) and/or learning from failure (Madsen & Desai, 2010) Feedback and challenges (Clark, 2005) and support for informal learning by the environment (Marsick & Watkins, 2003)

Potential for improvement Level of analysis Reflection Opportunity to give and receive feedback/ Supportive learning environment

Thinking about your preparedness for crises, where do you see gaps and potential for improvements on your competences? Do you feel that you need more training or guidance on an individual (knowledge, skills and competences) or team level (team working, communication and coordination)? Do you reflect on your performance and the cooperation in general with other municipality officers after a crisis situation? Do you feel supported by your municipality/safety region to develop and maintain your crisis competences?

General awareness

/ / /


83

Appendix III

Questionnaire for Municipal Crisis Management Officers

Start: Introduction

Good morning [Name Interviewee]. As was stated in the information sheet, we are a team of Master

students of Maastricht University. Our names are [Names Interviewer]. We study ‘Management of

Learning’ and are cooperating with the Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid on a project on maintaining the

competences of crisis municipality officers. We are examining three different roles, namely the

Algemeen Commandant, the Officier van Dienst and the Omgevingsanalyst. The input from the

interviews will support us in developing a strategy for maintaining competences of municipal crisis

management officers and eventually IFV in developing a vision on how municipalities can develop and

maintain competences over time, to not only get, but ‘stay prepared for the unpredictable‘.

The goal of this interview is to gain insight into your role during your daily job and crisis situations,

the extent to which you feel prepared for crisis situations and ways that you consider important to

maintain your crisis competences. The interview will take approximately 45 to 60 minutes. Again, we

want to thank you for participating in this research. Do you have any questions beforehand? (Check if

you received the consent form)

Job in general (daily job and role during crisis)

1. You work for [municipality]. Please describe your role in your regular job.

2. In crisis management, you are also a [GC, OD, EA]. How did you become a [GC, OD, EA]?

o Did you volunteer? Were you appointed?

3. How long are you in this position as a crisis officer already?

4. Please describe your role as a [GC, OD, EA].

5. Do you have experience in an actual crisis situation?

o Use an example to illustrate your role as a crisis management officer during a crisis

situation

6. Think of a crisis situation. Do you think it is more important to have a specific knowledge or

is it more about how to behave in a certain way? (identify whether he needs knowledge or

skills maintenance)

7. Thinking about this crisis situation, which skills and knowledge do you consider most

important for effective functioning?

8. If you think about the skills needed during a crisis situation and during your daily job. Do you

think there is a certain overlap between them?

In what way does it differ?


84

o If needed, refer to qualification profiles and use an example e.g. ’leadership skills’ or

‘decision-making skills’

Preparedness

9. How often do incidents happen in your municipality? (identify whether regular practice)

10. Before and during crisis situations, do you know where to get the information you need?

11. You had initial training when becoming a GC, OD, EA. Think about the crisis situation you

described earlier (at question 5).How did you experience the initial training?

o What were the most important takeaways from the training?

(Try to differ between competences, skills and knowledge)

o Think about the crisis situation you described earlier. In what way did the initial

training help you in feeling prepared for handling this situation correctly?

If you feel like it did not help you to prepare for a crisis, what could have

been done to support you in feeling prepared?

12. When you were in a crisis role, how did u experience the stress level?

o Did you feel that training adequately prepared you for the added dimension of

stress?

13. How much time passed between the initial training and today?

o How confident did you feel right after the training compared to now?

If there is a difference: why do you think there is?

14. If you experienced a crisis, how did you feel that influenced your competence level?

Learning needs

15. After the completion of the initial training to become a [GC, OD, EA], what activities do you

undertake to maintain competences for crisis management?

o How much time does this take you? (try to differentiate between activities to maintain

knowledge and activities to maintain skills)

16. Thinking about your preparedness for crises, where do you see gaps and potential for

improvements?

o Optional: picture yourself in a crisis situation, what are your main struggles/what do

you feel most unsure about?

17. If there were additional activities offered for maintaining your crisis management

competences. On which level would you like to develop?

o Individual (training for skills, knowledge)

o Team level (team work, communication and coordination)


85

18. How much time would you be willing to invest in participating in additional activities for

maintain crisis management competences?

19. After a crisis is over. Do you reflect on your performance and the cooperation in general with

other municipality officers?

o How did you feel about this? (helpful / waste of time?)

o If helpful, in what way did this help you?

o If no reflection, how did you feel about this? Would you have liked to reflect?

20. Do you feel supported by your municipality/safety region to develop and maintain your

crisis competences?

o If not, what kind of support from your municipality do you think would be valuable

to feel supported (summarize the possible gaps interviewee named at Q16)?

21. What kind of activities do you suggest your organization is able to offer which can support

you in feeling prepared for a crisis situation?

22. Who should monitor/who do you think is responsible for the maintenance of your

competences; you, IFV or your organization (Safety Region)? (discover a sense of

responsibility)

23. Explain informal learning in the workplace, e.g. use the 70/20/10 model. Distinguish between

workplace learning (70%) and learning through collaboration (20%). Do you engage in

informal learning within your municipality that helps you to develop your crisis management

competences? (learned during initial training and necessary for effective functioning in crisis

situation)

24. Do you think informal learning may support you in feeling prepared for crisis situations?

o If yes, do you have suggestions of how informal learning may be facilitated in your

role/municipality/region?

o If not, why not?

25. Do you share knowledge with other municipality or other crisis officers internal or external

outside of crisis situations? In what way?

26. Do you practice together with other municipality officers or other assistance units? And if

not, do you think it would be useful?

Conclusion

We are now at the end of our interview. Quickly summarize the core themes, use the topics e.g.

´feeling prepared, willingness to maintain competences, learning needs´. Keep in mind to start and

end your summary broad. Do you have any additional remarks?

On behalf of Maastricht University and the Instituut Fysieke Veiligheid, we would like to thank you

very much for participating in this interview.


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Appendix IV

Table 5. Coding Scheme

Name:

Region and Municipality:

Daily occupation:

Role in Crisis:

(add if it was voluntarily or appointed and if he/she also has other (former) roles)

Tenure:

Had initial training: yes/no

Incidents experienced:

Core Theme Label Summary Quotes Job in general

Skills/knowledge needed in crisis [Q4,5,6, 7]

Working with hierarchy, political skills, low stress level. People with hands-on mentality. Mainly about behavior. He doesn’t know everything, but he knows where to get the people who possess the right specific knowledge

‘It’s all about behaving in a certain way. If I am becoming stressed, it will not only influence the effectiveness of my functioning, but also of my team. If a leader panics, he cannot give clear direction and people will panic’ ‘A communication advisor is way better than me in writing a catchy, strong communication piece concerning the crisis on internet for example. Why would I want to do that? I don’t need that specific knowledge; I do need to know how to get the knowledge I need to behave properly.’

Overlap skills [Q8] Giving people space and direction is something which is applicable in both situations daily job and crisis role Being used to working with people in hierarchy Political skills

‘I work via two principles. First, giving people the space they need to do the job which they are good at and second, giving them a general direction of where they need to go. Via observing, thinking and anticipating you can guide the professionals in a way so the right people are at the right spot’. ‘People who work in suits with stars and stripes do not take you seriously if you are working in the archive in your daily job in the municipality. You have


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to already be in a high managing position if you want to give them some ‘tegenwicht?’

Preparedness General feeling of preparedness [Q10]

Feeling well prepared I have had the training, I followed the exams. Now I should be able to do this!

Training [Q11] Excellent training, but he believes it starts with good selection. This way you already have ‘the right people at the right spot’

Excellent training with even an exam.

Crisis experience [Q9, 14]

Maybe 1 incident per 2 months, and there are quit some people who are on call. So it could be that you never get called.

Yesterday I had an GRIP 2 incident!

Stress level experience [Q12]

- Being stressed is not in his character - Relaxed atmosphere during crisis: ‘Welcome, do you want coffee?’ - Already experiences stress during daily job from time to time - Excellent training from V&R Academie

‘I am not a person who gets stressed easily. I like action and I need it from time to time. My normal job is not boring certainly not, but the adrenaline of a crisis situation is something different.’

Skill deterioration [Q13]

On call since Jan 1 but only once experienced a crisis. He still feels competent, but afraid that his skills will deteriorate if there is no follow-up training.

Learning Needs Current maintenance activities [Q15, 26]

Trainings to upkeep competences, discussing cases which is not obligatory. 1 or 2 follow-up trainings per year

I have more need for follow-up trainings and official exams. This can be obligatory in my opinion. This way people feel more pressure to upkeep their competences if they have to pass official tests.

Dream: Vision on maintenance [Q16, 17, 21]

Follow-up trainings with official exams, more people who have piquet and take up their responsibility.

That you have more people who have piquet so you can switch a bit, but it is still important to have a small, well managed pool of people who take up their own responsibility.

Reflection [Q19] Technical reflection, no emotional reflection.

Informal learning [Q23, 24]

Learning from each other.

Cooperation [Q25] General perspective on maintaining

Time [Q18] Two/three times a year Responsibility [Q22] He feels it is his

responsibility. A lot of I feel there is not a lot of solidarity. Having piquet is


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people say they have too little time or are too busy.

quit some commitment. A lot of people state that people need to do the job, but they never do it themselves. So that’s why I stepped up.

Support municipality [Q20]

Feels partly supported by municipalities

There is some understanding, but still a lot of my colleagues do not know what I do and they have me rather working my daily job.

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