The Fireman: Immaculate Manhood

Why resilience managers aren’t resilient, and what human resource management can do about it

“…One signifier of stigma being the experience of frequent mocking and jibes, as outlined in Table 1, and exemplified in the following excerpt: 'to require people to wear a mask all the day … there, I was really cursed [laugh] … you have to take it on … you have to endure the laughs … the gibes [laugh]' (fr). Specifically, we found that resilience workers were often constructed by colleagues as 'doomsayers' and 'wimps', which contradicted traditional workplace values of 'strength, robustness, boldness, stoutness, bravery, and not being womanish' (Cooper, 1995). Mocking behaviour was often accompanied by a lack of understanding of how resilience managers could choose to work in impossible, pointless and unpleasant roles.…”

“…This set of interventions therefore aims to build, and broaden, the 'social capital' (Lengnick-Hall et al, 2011) of resilience managers both inside and outside the organisation, and also to increase the organisational status, esteem and prominence of resilience managers. Reflecting the challenges encountered in the development of the health and safety function (Cooper, 1995), the HRM function can play a significant role in creating a 'resilience culture' in which resilience work is better understood, more widely engaged with and consequently less tainted. Thus, we propose: Proposition 4: The greater the extent of organizational level taint reduction tactics in an organization, the lower the level of conceptual taint associated with resilience managers.…”

Organizing Ambiguity: A Grounded Theory of Leadership and Sensemaking Within Dangerous Contexts

“…Nearmiss reports may also serve as an excellent narrative tool for the socialization of newcomers to the firefighting profession (Myers, 2005;Scott & Myers, 2005). Given that members of this occupation have historically resisted elaborate bureaucratic procedures that could be used to micromanage and constrain unnecessarily tactical incident management (Cooper, 1995;Kaprow, 1991), the process of studying and discussing internal and external near-miss reports may prove to be culturally acceptable form of continuous learning in the fire service.…”

Occupational Cultures and the Embodiment of Masculinity: Hairdressing, Estate Agency and Firefighting

“…Yet body management is integral to appearing authoritative and securing clients' trust as they negotiate housing market uncertainties in a competitive field. By contrast, firefighting appears a primarily physical job, embodying ideals of the ‘last working class hero’ (Baigent, 2001) and ‘immaculate manhood’ (Cooper, 1995). Yet as one firefighter said, tapping his temple, ‘it's not enough being macho and all muscle, you have to have it up here’.…”