FRIDAY FORUM: Experience DOES Matter

I recently saw somewhere, “Time on the Job doesn’t matter, time INTO the job is what matters.”

While I understand this may be directed at the 25 year guy who doesn’t leave his recliner, this statement is misguided at best and dangerous at worst.  

The fact is, experience DOES matter.  Being into the job is fantastic.  Training is vitally important to the development of a firefighter, and obviously the more the better.  But no matter how many reps you get, or how realistic and stressful you make it, you still know deep down inside that you’re going to grab a gatorade and go to dinner afterwards. No training environment can match the human factors of a fireground where neither of those things is a given.  The training environment can never match the uncertainty of the fireground, and it is from overcoming that uncertainty that experience is gained.

I once heard Jeremy from @nationalfireradio make a brilliant statement in a podcast interview: “Training is a form of experience, but it is not the fireground experience.”  If the bulk of your experience is from the training ground, that’s not your fault.  Acknowledge it and have the humility to recognize the experiences you haven’t had.  Overconfidence as a result, however, you can control.  

I used to say there are two types of fireman, those who have been humbled and those who are about to be.  Unfortunately, with the lack of fire duty in many places, there may be a third group: those who never will be.  Be careful with this one.  Even more so if you aspire to teach others.  As it says in James 3:1, “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.” Are you drawing from your training experience or real world experience?

Be into the job.  Train hard.  But recognize the reality of where your experience does or does not come from, and act accordingly. www.andersonrescue.com

Photo: The ever humble and experienced Lt Mickey Conboy, FDNY R3, leads his men on a potential dive job