Talent management in wildland fire response: Why a proactive approach is necessary to recruit and retain wildland firefighters

What are the steps to take?

Organizational leaders need to actively address these challenges to recruit and retain to help protect your communities during fire season. A proactive strategy toward recruitment, retention, and talent management can help your organization overcome obstacles and improve recruitment and retention.

These practical tips can help you get started:

Invest more in workforce planning

Investing more in workforce planning may include creating a specific role within your HR team to focus on recruitment and retention strategies throughout the year. If you are not able to create a dedicated position, consider allocating specific organizational resources toward strategic workforce planning. This helps ensure you have at least one individual within your organization assessing and refining your workforce planning strategy throughout the year — even during busy fire season.

Reposition the job experience

Wildland firefighters work in remote locations and engage in challenging and frequently dangerous labour. While this may drive some people away from this career path, there are many others who desire exactly this type of meaningful work experience.

Evaluate how you promote wildland firefighting positions to appeal to potential applicants — especially the younger generation. Promoting the outdoor experience, self-sufficiency, and essential work that wildland firefighters do to protect our communities can help reposition the job experience to appeal to more applicants.

Create a clear communication strategy

More applicants are prioritizing growth opportunities and a supportive work environment when they consider a prospective offer. Evaluate how you can clearly communicate opportunities to grow and the potential to transition into different positions within your organization to your employees.

Additionally, it is important to make information about what your organization is and what it stands for readily available — especially to frontline staff such as wildland firefighters. Frontline workers frequently feel disconnected from the overall organization due to not working in an office environment. A clear communication strategy can help foster a greater sense of connection to your organization.

Provide continuity for employees

The seasonal nature of wildland firefighting positions in one of the key challenges organizations face in retaining valuable experience year after year. Additionally, more employees are prioritizing job stability in an uncertain economic environment — and seasonal positions may not meet their needs in today’s world.

Ask yourself how your organization can move past a seasonal employment model to retain staff throughout the year and provide them with a full career path. There may be opportunities to redeploy wildland firefighters to other areas of government after fire season ends and recall them to their positions when it begins again — improving retention.

Talent management strategy in wildland firefighting

MNP has worked with multiple wildland firefighting organizations to review their recruitment and retention strategies. The story below highlights many of the recruitment and retention challenges that wildland firefighting organizations are facing today. It also shares some practical steps your organization can take to overcome these challenges and ensure you have enough wildland firefighters to protect our communities.

Example: How to implement an effective talent management strategy

Wildland firefighting organizations across Canada are receiving fewer applicants for wildland firefighting positions and struggling with short hiring and training deadlines. Imagine an organization facing these challenges — as well as strategic and operational silos within the larger organization that it operated within.

Similar to many wildland firefighting organizations, this organization did not have access to a dedicated HR branch because of these silos. Therefore, it brought an external advisor on board to help guide its recruitment and retention strategies.

The advisor reviewed the current recruitment, retention, and training areas within the organization. They also walked through each step of the application process to identify areas where the organization could integrate new technology to streamline the process for applicants.

Additionally, the advisor reviewed the organization’s current state and mapped out its existing recruitment, retention, and training models. After this assessment, the advisor made recommendations to help break down organizational silos, align departments, and create a cohesive experience for employees.

Applications for wildland firefighting positions increased after the organization integrated new technology to simplify the process. The organization also updated its programs to streamline the onboarding and training process for new wildland firefighters when hiring season begins in January. While it may take awhile to see the full benefits of this strategy, taking these steps helped the organization achieve promising early results.

Take the next steps

It is vital for wildland firefighting organizations to take a proactive approach toward workforce planning to ensure you have enough resources in place to keep Canada’s communities safe. For more information, contact a member of MNP’s Consulting team. Our advisors have the experience to help you create workforce plans, develop recruitment and retention strategies, and adopt a proactive approach toward your organization’s future.