Assuming Command with Bob Horton Bob Horton

This month, Bob spoke with Daniel Haight from Darkhorse Emergency, a data visualization and analytics company focused on software to aid fire and ambulance operations.  They discuss the importance of the availability of ground-truth, trusted data that can be used to aid in decision making for fire chiefs, especially in the face of competing priorities (if you haven’t listened to S3E2 on Managing Expectations, go back and catch it). They also discuss the important, but often unrecognized and unmeasured, work of risk reduction.      


Read Daniels article, Racing Against Rising Demand by Prioritizing Prevention, published in the Washington Fire Commissioners Association 1st Quarter 2024 Newsletter to learn more about how data can be used and accessed.


Connect with Daniel on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/danhaight/. 


For more information on Darkhorse Emergency, visit their website: https://darkhorseemergency.com/.


Thank you for listening and let us know what you thought of this episode or what you'd like to hear in the future at impact@upstreamabi.com.

Expectations for a Fire Chief come from numerous sources and
stakeholders, and the Fire Chief must assess those expectations, determine which are reasonable and feasible, and act on them accordingly.  This month’s episode is focused on Bob’s take on the Fire Chief’s challenge of managing competing expectations.

Thank you for listening and let us know what you thought of this episode or what you'd like to hear in the future at impact@upstreamabi.com.

Assuming Command has been reimagined for 2024 and has joined the Western Fire Chiefs media network.  Discussions in season 3 will explore the intersection of leadership and management, specifically in the space of fire administration. 

To kick off season 3, Andrew Holter is back.  Andrew is the principal of FR Strategies and is an industrial organizations psychologist working in emergency services.  Bob and Andrew discuss what psychological safety in the fire service is and how leaders can foster it in their organization.  

You can find Andrew at www.fr-strategies.com and on LinkedIn.  He can assist with team assessments, team building, and organizational assessments for your organization.   

Thank you for listening and let us know what you thought of this episode or what you'd like to hear in the future at impact@upstreamabi.com.

Welcome to the kickoff of Season 3. We're starting this season by playing the year in review episode of Fire Headlines, a Western Fire Chiefs Association podcast co-hosted by Bob. We hope you enjoy the episode and look forward to getting back into the swing in 2024.

With the West entering wildfire season, we’re continuing the discussion this month with Kate Lighthall, the Western Region Coordinator for the Wildland Fire Leadership Council.  The Council leads the implementation of the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy. 



Kate has extensive experience as a structure and wildland firefighter and fire inspector, as well as working towards mitigation, resiliency, and community education.  She dives into community level considerations around receiving, responding to, and recovering from wildfire.  There’s a
wealth of good information in this episode and we hope you enjoy the conversation as much as we did.   



You can connect with Kate at coordinator@wildfireinthewest.org
or 541-408-3048.  To learn more about the work being done by the Wildland Fire Leadership Council, visit them at www.wildfireinthewest.org.



Thank you for listening and let us know what you thought of this episode or what you'd like to hear in the future at impact@upstreamabi.com.

As we enter wildfire season here in the west, we’re continuing our series on wildfire and wildfire preparedness.  Eden McCall is a journalism and spatial data science student at the University of Oregon.  Bob got connected with Eden as a result of the 2020 Almeda fire in southern Oregon.  Eden had been working on the Fire Story podcast with the university and reached out to Bob to discuss causes and potential solutions for situations like the Almeda fire, which was an urban wildfire.  Join Bob and Eden as they discuss risk communications and how journalism can be used differently than it is now to promote risk mitigation related to wildfires. 

You can listen to the Fire Story Season 2 at https://scr.uoregon.edu/education-and-engagement/the-fire-story-season-2/.  Connect with Eden through her website, https://edenimccall.com/, or email her directly at edenmccall@gmail.com.


Thank you for listening and let us know what you thought of this episode or what you'd like to hear in the future at impact@upstreamabi.com.