The Importance Of Soft Skills In A Firefighter

The book defines soft skills as essential career attributes that include the ability to communicate, work well with others, solve problems, make ethical decisions, appreciate diversity, and display professionalism. As a firefighter that deals with managing crisis on a daily basis, we must demonstrate soft skills consistently especially at a fire scene. As an Incident Commander on scene, we must have the ability to communicate so we can have the appropriate quantity and type of resources en-route and on scene. We must work well with others since once person cannot put the fire out, there are many tasks on the fire ground that need to be accomplished simultaneously such as suppression, ventilation, rescue, overhaul, and salvage. We must
appreciate diversity because everyone that works on the department comes from different backgrounds which brings many different solutions to problems. Finally, we must display professionalism to the victims and bystanders at every scene. Although we may run these types of calls on a regular basis, for the victims, this is may be the most catastrophic event in their life.