Three Tips on Leadership From the Street

Someone is in trouble and the clock is ticking. That’s why they called you. You don’t know what’s going on yet, but you know that people are counting on you to make things better. Sirens wail, lights are swirling around you, and the crack of the dispatcher’s voice from the radio say:

“Roger Medic One. En-route. 1056.”

“Easy on the gas, John.”

Your voice is both authoritative and reassuring. The young man driving is still pretty new. He’s been on the street for about five months. You notice his knuckles are white on the steering wheel. You know his adrenaline is pumping, and that your voice is one of the few things that can keep him out of “the tunnel.” A cool phrase you coined for tunnel vision.
You remember a little tuft of gray hair – the back of an old lady’s head – the glare of brake lights, and the swerving maneuver you had to execute a few years back. You almost took traffic head on that night because an old lady panicked and hit the brakes in front of you. She probably didn’t hear the sirens until you were on top of her. You were probably driving a little too fast.
You check your charts, clip a new “run sheet” to the outside of your clipboard, fill in some basic information, and wonder about what kind of situation you might be driving into. It could be a nose bleed, a slip and fall, a heart attack, an ectopic pregnancy, or a bullet in the chest. You take out your pocket reference and flip through a protocol or two as a refresher for some of the more complex ones.
You notice a crowd ahead and lights flashing. Good, you think, police are already here. You glance down at your clip board and key the microphone.

“Dispatch, Medic One on scene.”

You keep your message short and to the point.

“Roger, Medic One. On scene. 1103.”

Faces turn in your direction and the crowd parts as you jot down the time and survey the scene from your truck. You make make mental notes of the wind direction, power lines overhead, that soccer field you passed one block away. No major threats yet and you have a place in mind for the helicopter if you need it. You know which way you’re going to move this crowd if hazardous materials are a factor. There is no visible smoke and the ground is dry.
Faces convey unspoken concern for the situation and relief that you’re there. The number of people and their energy level tells you this scene has been in play for about 20-25 minutes. You take a quick look at your partner. He’s okay and he knows what to do. It’s show time.

Whether you’re running the streets or navigating danger-filled hallways of a government bureaucracy, leadership has it’s challenges. Many times, your preparedness and soft skills often have more bearing on the outcome than technical skills. The ability to tune in, respond to, and influence the energy of the people you’re working with, the people watching, and the people you’re there to help can make all the difference.
Here are a few tips I learned from the street:

1. Be Prepared. Two of the most well known components of being prepared include training and experience. I’d like to add a third component of being prepared: networking.

• Training is talked about a lot and is pretty important. I won’t belabor this point except to say that that training should include more than the technical stuff. Any position that involves relationships with other people has an emotional component to it. Knowing what to do makes little difference if our emotions keep us from doing what we know.
• • In a street example, putting the pedal to the metal to save someone’s life can cause tunnel vision or even cause someone to “lock up” – making it impossible for them to function. The excitement of what’s going on around them is overwhelming. I’ve seen out of control emotion cripple good people more than once.
  • In an office example, confronting a challenge issued from a subordinate may trigger anger or fear. Even with good technical training, a manager who responds through anger or fear may do exactly the opposite of what their technical training taught them. They may act defensively and make a bad situation worse.
  • It is possible to expose yourself to emotional training. In my experience, a good mentor or an on-the-job training program can help with this. In the absence of a good mentor, personal experience coupled with retrospection and self discipline can do the trick. Just be kind to yourself in the latter situation and allow for mistakes.

• Experience is critical. It helps us to read between the lines and see things that other people don’t see. On the street, I check the wind direction, look for potential landing zones and read the crowd. While someone might write these bullet points in a training manual, it doesn’t really become part of you until you have a cloud of hazardous materials floating towards a crowd, have to land a helicopter, or have to deal with a psycho with a gun and a death wish. What people don’t always consider is the fact that experience doesn’t have to come entirely from ourselves.

• • Having someone on your team who has the experience may be all you need. Make it a habit to connect with people who have more experience than you do in whatever environment you want to learn to deal with. Take them out for coffee. Establish a relationship and find a way to bring them value. You want to be able to call on them when you’re going into a situation you’re not experienced with. Invite them to share their wisdom. Their wisdom is a great asset for you & gives you a quick jump up the learning curve.
• Networking. As with the experience discussion above, your network can mean the difference between success and failure. Connect with important resources before a crisis happens. Find out what they need and how to activate their support.
• • On the street, I was always aware of my backup options. I had engines and ladder trucks for resources, other ambulance crews, a helicopter, police, power company, gas company, and escalation procedures. In the thick of things was no time to be flipping through the yellow pages. If I thought I might need a medivac, I needed to give the helicopter crews time to get geared up, get the bird fired up, and plot their course. Networking with these important resources ahead of time gave me (and everyone else involved) a huge advantage.
  • As leaders in the office, we often need backup from human resources, political leadership, the training department, financial resources, other project managers, and from the people we’re serving. The middle of a crisis is not the best time to start connecting with these important resources. When you do find yourself in a real crisis, your response will be much more powerful if you already have these relationships built.

2. Tune In. Most human communication is non-verbal. If you’re tuned in to people on your team, people watching, and people you’re trying to help, you can gather a huge amount of information as if right out of the air.

3. Manage the Energy Around You. On the street, we had a saying “Take your own pulse before taking the pulse of your patient.” Managing energy starts with managing yourself. Doubt me? Try taking someone’s pulse if you’re freaking out vs taking someone’s pulse when you’re nice an calm and you’ll see what I mean. The energy we bring into an environment has a direct effect on others around us.

Dave Dejewski worked on the streets for more than 12 years as first responder, a fireman, an EMT, and the military equivalent of a civilian paramedic. He taught hundreds of students, trained dozens of new responders, and currently volunteers through organizations like the Boy Scouts of America and FEMA’s Community Emergency Response Teams.