A systematic review of the potential hurdles of interoperability to the emergency services in major incidents: recommendations for solutions and alternatives

2016

J Occupat & Organ Psyc

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When operating in multiteam settings, it is important that goals are cohesive between team members, especially in high‐stakes, risky, and uncertain environments. This study explored goal consistency during a multiteam emergency response simulation. A total of n = 50 commanders from the UK Police Services, Fire and Rescue Services, and Ambulance Services took part in a simulated terrorism exercise, who were split into n = 13 teams. Each team responded to the same simulated terrorist event, which was based on a ‘Marauding Terrorist Firearms Attack’ (MTFA) at a city centre train station. Data were collected using electronically time‐stamped ‘decision logs’ and post‐incident questionnaires that measured team members’ self‐reported goals. Goals that were ‘attack’ focussed (e.g., ‘treat patients’) were coded as ‘approach’ (i.e., focussed on achieving positive outcomes) and goals that were ‘defence’ focussed (e.g., protect emergency responders) were coded as ‘avoid’ (i.e., focussed on avoiding negative outcomes). It emerged that different agencies prioritized different goal types; Fire commanders initially prioritized avoid goals but then increased approach orientations, Ambulance commanders were consistently approach oriented, and Police commanders showed goal conflict (tensions between adopting approach and avoid goals). Despite goal differences, participants rated that their interagency goals were consistent in a post‐scenario questionnaire, suggesting that commanders were unaware of the nuanced differences between their agency‐specific objectives. At the multiteam level, teams who predominantly held attack/approach goals were significantly faster at decision logging early in the incident, yet defend/avoid teams were faster at decision logging later into the incident. Implications for multiteam coordination are discussed. Practitioner points The ‘save life’ goal in multiteam emergency response settings is vague and open to interpretation. This can impede coordination when agencies assume that they are working towards the same ‘save life’ goal, but are actually focussed on different and role‐specific objectives with regard to how they will achieve it. A joint decision model that helps to clarify agency‐specific tactical priorities may be more useful in multiteam contexts than one that uses ambiguous and abstract (i.e., ‘save life’) interagency goals. A focus on achieving positive outcomes (attack/approach goal; e.g., ‘treat patients’) can speed up decision‐making during the early stages of an incident, but when the situation becomes more complex and dynamic, then a focus on avoiding negative outcomes (defend/avoid goal; e.g., protect emergency responders from harm) might lead to faster action. When responding to complex emergencies, practitioners should focus on satisficing to achieve ‘least‐worst’ outcomes rather trying to maximize gains.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Offence or defence? Approach and avoid goals in the multi‐agency emergency response to a simulated terrorism attack

Power

2016

J Occupat & Organ Psyc

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“…Using NDM to research macrocognition in a multiagency emergency team responding to a simulated sudden impact major disaster Emergency service workers must operate in highly dynamic, uncertain, and complex decision-making environments where interoperable team coordination is essential to facilitate action (House, Power, & Alison, 2014). These decision-making environments are highly unstable, rapid-changing, and unpredictable (van den Heuvel et al, 2014), and thus, effective team processing requires that 'members' interdependent acts convert inputs to outcomes through cognitive, verbal, and behavioural activities directed towards organizing task work to achieve collective goals' (Marks, Mathieu, & Zaccaro, 2001, p. 357).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Decision inertia: Deciding between least worst outcomes in emergency responses to disasters

Power

Heuvel

et al. 2015

J Occupat & Organ Psyc

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This study demonstrates how naturalistic decision-making (NDM) can be usefully applied to study 'decision inertia'-Namely the cognitive process associated with failures to execute action when a decision-maker struggles to choose between equally perceived aversive outcomes. Data assessed the response and recovery from a sudden impact disaster during a 2-day immersive simulated emergency response. Fourteen agencies (including police, fire, ambulance, and military) and 194 participants were involved in the exercise. By assessing the frequency, type, audience, and content of communications, and by reference to five subject matter experts' slow time analyses of critical turning points during the incident, three barriers were identified as reducing multiagency information sharing and the macrocognitive understanding of the incident. When the decision problem was non-time-bounded, involved multiple agencies, and identification of superordinate goals was lacking, the communication between agencies decreased and agencies focused on within-agency information sharing. These barriers distracted teams from timely and efficient discussions on decisions and action execution with seeking redundant information, which resulted in decision inertia. Our study illustrates how naturalistic environments are conducive to examining relatively understudied concepts of decision inertia, failures to act, and shared situational macrocognition in situations involving large distributed teams. Practitioner points Researchers can use NDM to explore the cognitive processing associated with failures to act/decision inertia. Complexities in the decision-making environment of a multiteam system (e.g., non-time-bounded choice, large team size, and lack of strategic goals) are associated with decision-making failures. Barriers cause decision inertia as teams focus on redundant intra-agency information seeking rather than cooperative interagency communications. Strategic direction is especially important for shifting multiteam system communication towards interagency discussions on action execution. If the behavioural implementation of making a decision is the execution of action (Lipshitz, Klein, Orasanu, & Salas, 2001; Yates, 2003), then failing to make a decision (e.g., making an executive choice) is when action execution fails. Traditional decision-making

“…The SAFE-T model, developed by van den Heuvel, Alison and Crego (2012a), is based on an extensive evaluation of strategic decision-making literature and detailed analyses of practitioners making decisions in naturalistic environments (Alison et al, 2013). The model proposes that an optimal process-driven decision-making model involves four key phases that facilitate accurate and updated assessments of the situation, and are focused on concurrent learning (van den Heuvel, Alison, & Power, 2012b).…”

Section: Between a Rock And A Hard Place Of Geopolitically Sensitive mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…During the Plan Execution phase, plans are turned into action, resources are deployed and, crucially, containment measures can be activated to prevent escalation of the incident (van den Heuvel et al, 2012a;ACPO, 2009). Throughout decision making processes, decision makers must continually reflect on and revise assessments (Eraut, 2000), adapting responses to fit demands of the evolving dynamic and volatile situation, which, in conjunction with feedback from team members (House, Power & Alison, 2013), facilitates Team Learning (van den Heuvel et al, 2012b).…”

Section: Between a Rock And A Hard Place Of Geopolitically Sensitive mentioning

confidence: 99%

Between a rock and a hard place of geopolitically sensitive threats – critical incidents and decision inertia

Behavioral Sciences of Terrorism and Political Aggression

Palasinski

Waring

et al. 2017

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Between a rock and a hard place of geopolitically sensitive threats -critical incidents and decision inertia http://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/7193/ Article LJMU has developed LJMU Research Online for users to access the research output of the University more effectively. AbstractThis paper analyses the management of high-profile geopolitically sensitive threats (verifying potential terrorist identity, hostage rescue and national/international security). Defining features of such cases include decision makers' ability to prospectively model competing binary (e.g., do/do not use lethal force), categorical (i.e., choosing between options -e.g., ground forces or unmanned weapons system) or ordinal (e.g., level of acceptable collateral damage) future scenarios in which they must select between options and where every outcome looks aversive and high risk (i.e., 'damned if you do or damned if you don't decisions'). A frequent consequence of such prospective calculations is 'decision inertia' (i.e., a failure to execute an important, irrevocable decision resulting in non-optimal consequences), or 'implementation failure' (i.e., a failure to make a choice). This paper provides a theoretical platform from which to view, understand and, most importantly, minimize decision inertia and failures to act. By combining the benefit of the theoretical framework and hindsight knowledge of the analyzed critical incidents, the paper also helps identify past decisional mistakes, areas of improvement, in order to inform live assessment and management of similar geopolitical threats in the future.