Making collaboration work – developing boundary work and boundary awareness in emergency exercises

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to investigate how boundary work is carried out at the incident site during exercises with police, ambulance and rescue services, and how boundary awareness is developed based on this boundary work. Collaboration in emergency work is challenging on many levels. The unforeseen and temporary nature of incidents presents basic challenges. Another important challenge is boundaries between specialised and autonomous emergency service organisations. Knowledge on how exercises are performed to increase the individuals' and organisations' preparedness for future joint-response work is relatively limited. Design/methodology/approach Empirically, full-scale exercises involving police, ambulance and rescue services and with repetition of practical scenarios and joint-reflection seminars are studied. Interview data with 26 exercise participants were analysed using thematic analysis. The analytic focus is on how boundaries are identified, negotiated and managed in the participants’ work. Findings Much of the work in the exercises was performed within distinct areas of expertise, in accordance with concrete routines, skills and responsibilities. Boundary work was often organised in the form of distribution of labour or creating chains of actions. The exercises shed light on challenges related to other aspects of emergency response, such as a lack of resources, diverging primary responsibilities, time-criticality and hazardous environments. The design allowed participants to explicate boundaries, to test and discuss alternative solutions and to visualise the effects of different solutions, as the scenarios were repeated. Originality/value The study found that the boundaries that were identified were often of institutional character, and were also related to the specific scenarios and to the actions taken in the activities. By integrating real-life experiences of collaborative work in the exercise, the exercise gained a certain meaning that was essential for the participants to develop boundary awareness.

Policing in pandemics: A systematic review and best practices for police response to COVID-19

“…However, in their study of collaborative work during training exercises, Andersson and Lindström [ 61 ] find that most practitioners only operated within their field of expertise and that boundaries were to a large extent drawn along institutional lines. The work stresses the importance of collaborative elements in training to enhance exchange and allow for a better preparation for real emergencies [ 61 ]. However, it also serves as a reminder that in many instances truly collaborative work that transcends institutional boundaries is not possible or feasible.…”

Expansive Learning Process of Exercise Organizers: The Case of Major Fire Incident Exercises in Underground Mines

“…The results showed that the exercise organizers were influenced to identify collaboration challenges within the current response during the collaboration meetings. In line with what other authors [22] report, the exercise organizers in the present study had to be interested in understanding the other organizations' tasks and responsibilities during rescue operations. The collaboration meetings improved the participants' understanding of the complex situation, allowing them to discuss challenges and find solutions as also described by others [1,22].…”

“…In line with what other authors [22] report, the exercise organizers in the present study had to be interested in understanding the other organizations' tasks and responsibilities during rescue operations. The collaboration meetings improved the participants' understanding of the complex situation, allowing them to discuss challenges and find solutions as also described by others [1,22]. Thus, including collaboration meetings between the full-scale exercises can motivate the exercise organizers to consider full-scale exercises from the other organizations' perspectives.…”

“…The results also indicated that the collaboration meetings in combination with the full-scale exercises also were helpful for the exercise organizers to practically examine the tools and practices they had developed. This can be compared with the implementation of collaborative elements into exercises, such as the reflection seminars, to facilitate learning as recommended by other authors [22]. In this study, the combination of collaboration meetings and practical exercises influenced the exercise organizers to identify needs and challenges of various activities, as well as possibilities to develop and test new tools to support collaboration and the development of new knowledge of how to conduct rescue operations in underground mines.…”

“…Full-scale exercises can even be said to be inadequate tools for learning [19,20] and contribute to building intra-organizational skills rather than inter-organizational collaboration [21]. If the organizations lack knowledge about each other's roles, responsibilities, and tactics, this might negatively affect the efficacy and outcome of the rescue operation [22,23]. Still, full-scale exercises may also contribute to organizational learning because the participants build informal relationships with each other and thus learn the other organizations' languages which can be useful for the inter-organizational collaboration during real emergencies [24].…”