Decision making can be particularly challenging for incident management teams (IMTs) facing an emergency.
Not only does the nature of an incident influence decision making – a number of human factors contribute to the effectiveness of operating procedures. Agency and team norms, interpersonal relationships, levels of expertise, biases, stress, fatigue and situational awareness all affect the quality and timeliness of decision making.
Drawing on a range of Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre and emergency sector research, this skills clinic examines the decision-making process relevant to incident management, including:
- the decision-making challenges for incident management personnel
- the various decision-making models used in incident management
- the prerequisites for sound decision making in teams
- factors that can undermine decision making
- techniques that can assist decision making.
Participants will develop their understanding of the dynamics of team decision making and gain insight into to the way they think and the biases at play in their own decision making. Participants will also identify how team dynamics and factors of organisational culture influence decision making.
Audience
- Practitioners involved in emergency decision making in either a single or multi-agency context.
- Practitioners working on an incident ground; team or crew leaders responsible for others; and those working in
- Incident or emergency management teams.
- Anyone who needs to respond to pressure or is responsible for high-consequence decisions.