Injects! Injects! Injects! This week we explore exercise and training experiences with Jessica Kindig and Jeremy Swartz.
Jessica Kindig comes from Indiana’s Department of Homeland Security & Jeremy Swartz is the FEMA FIT lead assigned to Indiana. They work together as State and Federal partners to provide training.
In this episode, we talk about past exercises in Indiana, such as a long-term power outage caused by an EMP and talk about the need to include stakeholders in emergency management and coordination.
This Podcast has moved to the Readiness Lab.
Host: John Scardena (0s):
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Host: John Scardena (1m 41s):
Welcome back to the show everybody. I am so excited for this week. A couple of weeks ago, we were talking about inter-operability from that NATO conference so you should check out that episode, but really what we were talking about is pulling in stakeholders, people with different competencies, especially as they're moving forward in their selected sphere of influence within emergency management. Today, I'm very honored to talk with Jessica from the state of Indiana and Jeremy from FEMA, he's the fit, you can talk about what a fit is, the federal whatever. We will talk about that in a second. Yes, like I said, informal here. So we're going to have a good conversation talking about how those two pieces work. We have a state perspective, we have a federal perspective, we have to deal with general populations and how do we both train emergency managers and the general population in those exercises. A lot of things to discuss here, Jeremy and Jessica, welcome to the show. Well done. So, okay, Jeremy, what does fit stand for again?
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (2m 48s):
FEMA integration team.
Host: John Scardena (2m 48s):
Integration team, oh man.
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (2m 51s):
We're integrated right with the state emergency managers right in their state office and work with the state on a day-to-day basis.
Host: John Scardena (2m 58s):
Great and so you're at a FEMA region five, which I'm aware of it's in Chicago. So if you're integrated with the state there, when you say a team, how many members of the team are actually with Indiana?
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (3m 12s):
So my team currently has three personnel on it. Other states, you know, the makeup is different for each state, but Indiana has three folks for preparedness specialists, which I am recovery specialist and a grants manager.
Host: John Scardena (3m 26s):
So you got a small team there and then Jessica you're in charge of exercises and so just for the sake of our audience, can you give a perspective of what your scope of work is?
Guest: Jessica Kindig (3m 39s):
Yeah, sure. So for the state of Indiana, we are divided into regions. If you can think about our little state, we have the north, central, and south. In that we have divided that up into districts and so the way that we run our program is we do what we call a crawl, a walk, a run. We work with our planning team, we come up with a hazard and Jeremy and I will talk about how we do that later because Jeremy is involved in that, in assisting us with that. But we talk about hazard, we help write the plan, and then we will seminar. We will workshop that plan, fix it tabletop, or do a couple of games, fix it, go back, do a drill, do a functional fit, fix it. Then we full-scale that plan. So for us, an exercise, one exercise series lasts three years. First year, we're figuring out the plan, writing the plan second year, retraining the plan, right with our tabletop or discussion-based exercises. Then that third year is where we're going to get our hands dirty, get tactical, blow things up, or respond to it, figure out what we didn't know, fix the plan and just continue that cycle.
Host: John Scardena (4m 54s):
That's an awesome way to look at it. I like the three-year perspective on that. Often what I found it, and Jeremy could probably speak to this too, those FEMA days, it was like, hey, every single exercise was a no notice. It was like hurricane, no notice tornado, no notice an earthquake in California. Yeah, exactly I'm like, hey, we usually have 120 hours out for hurricanes. Usually see the tornado coming, but every time it was in the middle of the night, no training, just throw it right in there. I love the idea of well crawl, walk, run. I liked the idea of hazard base. That's really excellent and you said that Jeremy is gonna be talking about in a second, but in terms of historical, if you're on this three-year process that you're working through that, what hazards have you already addressed in Indiana? I'm guessing a flood and maybe tornado.
Guest: Jessica Kindig (5m 47s):
Exactly that kind, so we get our data from our threat hazard identification, risk assessment, so our THIRA data and we hold a now it's called an integrated preparedness planning workshop, where we have private sector, healthcare, feds, state level agencies, the airport, and things like that. We all come together and we talk about what are our top five? So what's the thing your agency manager, local emergency manager, what is the top five things that keep you, you know, you got gaps, you know what happens every year? You need training or you need equipment. How can we almost prove that by taking this plan, let's exercise the plan. We find, oh yeah, if this fire department let's say had another aerial truck, life's life safety and incident stabilization taken care of. So it's a little bit of, of let's all get together, let's figure it out. We do it on that regional level, we do it on a state level and then a regional level, and then the district level. So there's myself, I'm central region, I've got a partner that's north, a partner that settled in the state exercise officer takes care of well, all of the babies and all of the state level stuff as a team, they do that all together.
So everything from damage assessments with severe weather because tornadoes, all of the time, we've done a lot of that. We are currently working towards communications, a communications outage, long-term power outage, and the cascading effects of that, which we're this little exercise we're working on. Now, we're going to stand up a logistical staging area and figure out how all that works. When you talk about whole community approach, you're going to have volunteers that are running the thing. You're going to have EMS that are in the EOC and IMAT team maybe, or 90 helping to do your daily ops, while there's an LSA staff going on. Then you have your commodity points of distribution. So all of the things and cyber, oh my gosh, cyber, cyber, cyber, cyber, cyber, cyber cyber. So we are doing workshops all over the state. We did them virtually through Microsoft teams and we're going to keep doing those, so that is sort of a side project. That was number one hazard on everyone's list was cyber course, then real-world pandemic. There's that part of it too, so those habits we touch on, yes.
Host: John Scardena (8m 37s):
So you hit so many different areas there, but, everybody's listening to this show, you know, probably has the same respect of your pandemic heads, it still has the cyber issues, pandemic edge, so the flooding issues. How does the pandemic, what I would call it now have a constant dual threat scenario or multithread scenario. Are you looking at that? I mean, you said you talked about a hazard before, but now your cascading events from a single issue now rolls into all these other issues. What does that look like in your exercise design?
Guest: Jessica Kindig (9m 15s):
I will tell you that it has somewhat supported the idea of, we don't want to, we have to find that that area between we're pushing, pushing, pushing, and it's not realistic. Right. But holy cow, if 2020, it didn't teach us that realistic is not one at a time we have a pandemic response, right? We have civil unrest response. We have power outages due to whatever in the summertime, all happening all at the same time. So back in the day, in the before times, what I call when I would say, I got a great idea for a scenario, now hear me out. It's something happening that's somewhat complex. That would never happen, Jess, that would never happen. I can tell you now I do not get that any more out of my scenarios. So we just tabled it, a tabletop for a long-term power outage during a heat wave. The power outage was due to a solar event, so space weather, I no longer get that will never happen. That's not a thing. I don't get that anymore. So I think that mentality has somewhat shifted that holy cow, we're in a world where we have to be ready, right. That ready state, but not ready for just that tornado, but that tornado and that cyber attack that happens at the same time and multi trying to multitask respond to with the resources that you have.
Host: John Scardena (10m 54s):
Yeah it's funny that you brought up a space. Whether I get like that topic is usually like very polarized, ironically, because it's dealing with the earth. I will say, though, for those, those naysayers who bring that up though, because inevitably I'm going to get people, emailing me or putting this on social media, real world all the time. We have to look at flights and moving cargo and impacted GPS, weirdly enough. There's a group in DC at an agency that tracks space weather and they have to inform people who own carrier pigeons, these hundred thousand dollars carrier pigeons, they’ve been spaced while there happens there's to the magnetic. Yeah. So people get really angry. They're like, hey, where did my carrier pigeon go? That might seem minor to some, but when you're talking about flights that fly over the pole, when you're talking about cargo ships are automated and growing across seas, and now all of a sudden they can't track it.
Guest: Jessica Kindig (12m 2s):
I don't know where they are, that is exactly right. Yes, it is, so I agree. There are going to be naysayers, but I have to say there would not be a space weather center if it wasn't a thing, you know, and, and a scale of how bad it can be and what that means for communications and the world that we live in, where we've got phones that are little computers every day. Like you were saying, you know, what happens if that trucker that's bringing my commodities into my logistical staging area to help save the lives of my people is running on a GPS with no map cause who uses maps anymore. You know, that everything's lost.
Host: John Scardena (12m 48s):
So when you said long-term power outage, Jeremy, I'm going to get to you, I promise, this is the long-term power outage. Are you talking about a week to week? I mean, what does long-term mean to you? What turns your exercises a month?
Guest: Jessica Kindig (13m 2s):
I think it's funny that you asked, because that was actually a question that was given to me during the tabletop and the way that I approach that is, we are very much disasters in situations that begin and end locally. So a two week power outage could be nothing for my central Indiana folks because they've got the resources, but in two weeks, power outage down south or up north, and those real rural areas could be a big freaking deal. So in the scope of the space weather it was months where things were going to be bad for months. But I did sort of just leave it kind of, open-ended asking questions to that county specifically, it's a long term power outage for you Southern county, which like I said, could be different from other counties that have more resources handy, if that makes any sense.
Host: John Scardena (13m 59s):
Yeah. I would also push back on the two week thing, I mean, you look at the state of Texas, I think after a week of no power during the winter, I don't think any state would be like, heyy, a week of no power. I mean, that impacts everything. That could be due to several issues. I think of a couple, again real-world scenario of long-term power outages, obviously from a hurricane Katrina, one of my favorite stories of all time is when the governor of Louisiana, who she got up there on the national news, if I see any looting we're going to shoot onsite and she's she blasted this out to the media? Well, there was no power in Louisiana, Mississippi, or one other state of the time. So in the tri-state area, no power, nobody's watching this news conference and it was purely for like show. It just cracks me up of like, who's your audience here? You know? So it's really interesting to think about long-term power outages and impacts of critical infrastructure, which is definitely see I'm smoothly moving over to Jeremy here, the federal protective of critical infrastructure. We definitely have the, you're talking about cyber or, but honestly like just systems working at DHS critical infrastructure lists to ESF’s, those community lifelines. Jeremy, were you involved in that response or in that exercise? If you weren't, can you talk about in general, just like power outages and how FEMA approaches getting those systems back online?
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (15m 40s):
Yeah, definitely so I've actually been a part of the state of Indiana’s exercise process since I've been with the state. So during their IPPW, I provided briefings on community lifelines that way their county emergency managers had a better understanding of lifelines and how to incorporate lifelines into their planning efforts, as well as, you know, during a response. Then additionally, working through with them, partnering with Jess and her and the exercise staff Indiana, you know, working through their exercise with respect to what types of resources they might make might need, for example, generators especially with their logistics, staging area exercise, they just conducted to kind of taking a look at that. Maybe suggesting a ways of different ways of doing things with respect to, maybe focus on seed pods at the county level, because that's really the goal that we want to get the counties really up to speed on working seedpods and being able to support the community and then let the state work on the larger logistics, extras, or staging area to support the state overall. So that's pretty much been my role supporting the state with exercises, at least. Then at the larger scale, just looking at power outages in general, trying to identify the types of facilities that, that critical infrastructure within the state that might need a generator in the event, that power is out for an extended during a time. Obviously the Army Corps of engineers is able to do assessments on facilities, and hopefully the state will be able to be able to have the Army Corps come in potentially next year or in the future, we're gonna do a generator assessments on various infrastructure that they identify.
Host: John Scardena (17m 29s):
So, as you're talking and you’re thinking about, as I was seeing my critical infrastructure and human populations, heat waves, cold waves, cold snaps, that kind of stuff. As we look at that, me being from Ohio, so putting on my Midwest hat here for a second, the time of year and the time of day would dramatically impact how we deal with that power outage. If you have a power outage, for whatever reason, we don't need to go into the reason, but power outage happened during an Ohio state football game, mayhem, it would be absolute catastrophe, not just population, but like where did the game go? You'd have couches burning in the streets, you probably blame Michigan…. ran into you know a power station, by the way, if you're a Michigan fan, I'm sorry, you've lost now for 3,598 days, I believe it's the count the last time they won, yeah, hardcore, like I said. So it'd be a big problem during Ohio state game.
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (18m 45s):
Actually though, you know, there was a large power outage back in the Northeast, back several years ago that I actually went through when I lived in Ohio and it was out for at least four days. I think the entire part of the north part of the state, so it may happen in the future, hopefully not like it did then, but you have to be prepared for that.
Host: John Scardena (19m 7s):
Okay. Real talk about the Browns. That game went off, who cares? They suck like, okay. I was in California during a five day power outage due to heavy winds and 90% of our neighborhood was without power for five days, 10% had power. Now as an emergency manager who has a GIS background, so you're talking about a THIRA before that's a threat and hazard identification risk assessment, I like to do an analytically based hazard vulnerability assessment, not just for myself, but for the communities. I think that's really part of that THIRA, really a hazard mitigation, really part of a EOP as well. Anyways so in that has a vulnerability assessment for our house, a localized HVA. We looked at about 15 different things that just to be aware of our hazards. When we bought our house, there was one utility company who has been found liable for like 90% of the wildfires, all our outages. Then 10% of our neighborhood was with the other power company that had much more reliable systems, newer, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We moved into that 10% into our area in our neighborhood. That shows that you don't have to be doomsday preppy. I'm like super anti inducing doomsday preppy, but it's just knowing your local hazards and saying, hey, like I'd rather live on top of the Hills. Instead of at the bottom for the flood, I'd rather live at a utility company that's more reliable. It was like my life, but it was definitely impacted all my neighbors. Right. So you're talking a lot of now we're talking like in terms of an exercise design, social vulnerability, you're talking about the local level, man, I'm going off all the checklists off of my head of like how a power outage could impact. I'm sure, you know I'd actually ask people if you're listening to the show, if you have ideas of how a power outage impacts your area and what to do to mitigate that, that'd be excellent to get that on our social media feeds to hear back.
But in terms of a generalized exercise design, you presented Jessica, this three-year concept. Now with Jeremy providing you your background of like, hey, how you've integrated, what are the steps moving forward? I mean, you both already touched on like stakeholders and using them, but if you were going to give advice for emergency managers in the field, first responders, we have a lot of first responders actually listening to this show now, which is really cool. As they learn about and try to work with stakeholders, especially during the exercise design process. What do you think are like the top three priorities to working with them? And what are some gaps that you should be aware of when they're walking into that process? I'll probably start with you Jeremy, go from there.
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (22m 9s):
Well, I would say, they definitely want to take the opportunity to make friends with their counterparts during the exercise because they don't want to wait until the event actually happens to do that. So I think that's the biggest thing I would say is a benefit of exercising is to make those relationships during that process before an incident occurs. Secondly it's a great opportunity during exercises to identify their gaps. You know, as the exercise plays out, how they were able to respond to it and then what gaps do they need to improve? The one, do we need more equipment? Do they need more training? Do they need more personnel? That’s another opportunity that they can identify during an exercise and I think finally just, be willing and open to learn new things and try things in a different way. That's something that I think is beneficial. I've learned things in exercises from other people that I wasn't expecting to learn and, or, or want to do. Until I actually saw them do it, and I think it's a benefit to go through an exercise and be able to learn from other people. So it's, it's all things that are positive to come out of exercise.
Host: John Scardena (23m 25s):
Okay. I'm actually going to pump the brakes on my question because I have a side question, I guess, for Jessica. Yeah. Is, are you going in tangent? That's right. Yeah. If we're adding an inject to our exercise, you were talking about in a process identifying gas, Jeremy just brought it up again and that process of that through your process, you go through, see an issue. You clean, see an issue in clean, which by the way is amazing because I see far too often, those after actions come through and it's like, that's a lot of nice to knows, and nobody does anything about them. Right? It doesn't do anything about it. So if you're going through and you're cleaning that process, you're identifying gaps, maybe gaps in capabilities, maybe gaps in competency, maybe gaps in expectations. And you have the artificiality of, of an exercise, sometimes that doesn't provide the amount of stress that happens on people, the adrenaline that happens to people in a real time, when you identify those gaps with your stakeholders, how do you approach them? I have some experiences of working great with friends and then you, and then the other time you see like these issues, you're like, Ooh, like you really don't even understand your own role either you're new to your role or there's a capability issue. How do you walk through with them without eroding that relationship you just built?
Guest: Jessica Kindig (24m 58s):
I think that is just a super question. So for me to tell.
Host: John Scardena (25m 5s):
One quick question, Jack.
Guest: Jessica Kindig (25m 10s):
That is a good inject. Very good for me. The thing that I have found is that there is a respect thing that's going on here when I'm taking an organization or a jurisdiction, whoever that is through an exercise series, we know up front, we're going to find something somewhere for me, it's very easy to hear or see, oh, so technically they know what to do. They just don't have it written down anywhere. They don't have a plan that judge, depending on who my individuals are that may or may not be how I approach it. It could just be me saying, you guys got this civil unrest thing. You know what to do, it's clear because if I ask you at a tabletop, tactical, operational questions, there's no hesitation. You tell me, boom, boom, boom, boom. We do this and I call him and I do all of the things. But then when I ask you questions that revolve around the planning piece, what does your plan say about this? But if I ask the same question of, well, what happens if this happens? And there's an answer here, but not here then I know. That's how I can say, we need to work on your plan and let me help you with that. But I'm also going to hold them responsible too. So in state, we also have a corrective action program. So as you were saying, the after action reports, the improvement matrix are like, Ooh, okay. Then we've put it up on the shelf and say, we did this exercise and that's all that it is. But what we're trying to do is a corrective action program to say, this is when it's going to be addressed. This plan is going to be, and this is by who, by when, and then we'll tabletop it again. So there's a plan there to make sure that we talk about, we've got to write this plan down because I hate to say it, the guys and gals that have been doing this for as long as I've been alive, aren't going to be doing it forever. There's going to be people coming in, like you said, that are new, that need to be able to pull a plan because they don't know to call the sheriff over here if something in this area goes awry. So the way that I'm speaking to you nine times out of 10 and Jeremy, Jeremy knows, cause I'm dragging him all over the state. This is the way that I am with my, with my folks, because I have found that honesty and respect and saying, this is, you guys are awesome, here's the thing. You guys are great, but you could be better here and I can help you with that and that's my role. That's next level, as far as I'm concerned, doing that corrective action program together, helping. I'm from the state, I'm not here to take over. I'm a resource for you guys and I drag FEMA everywhere. Even if Jeremy's not there, I throw his name out there because I'm like then Jeremy Short’s at FEMA.gov can help.
Host: John Scardena (28m 19s):
It sounds like a party, I'll just give it in the back of the back of the truck if I can and just tag along. So you're talking about honesty, you're talking about respect, you're talking about just calling it out for what it is, Jeremy, I'm going to piggyback off of that. We're going on a full inject here. Right? So we're all like I would say 90% of this field is a type personalities, right? We all think we're the alpha. We all think we're the top dog, the head honcho, the big cheese numerator now. Right? Historically the field, again, I've been addressing this quite a bit on the show and most of the conferences I've been going to. Before DHS, before these college programs, you know, the field is definitely changing, but historically it field is led by retired fire and police who come from a command and control an emergency management's all about collaborate and cooperate, which is what Jessica is talking about. So as you're approaching people and you're saying, hey, you're awesome, but. I love the thought by Jessica actually, hey, let me be, let me be a support and a value added and not just tell you your problem, but also provide a solution, which is I'm a big fan of. As you're dealing with these different personality types, do inherently walk away saying, okay, they, their pride level is pretty high here, I'm going to need to have a contingency plan because they can't recognize their gap. Or if, for whatever reason that relationship as you're talking to them, you're able to see that they're putting up those walls again. How do you as a fed, by the way, going down to the golf big FEMA on my shirt, not very popular. How do you overcome maybe initially at the exercise or as you're having to approach capabilities again, piggy backing up for Jessica said, oh, how are you as the federal guy in the room overcoming, hey, I'm big brother.
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (30m 27s):
Yeah. So it's actually a great question. I've been with the state now, I've been in Indiana here now for going on to a two point plus years here in the state of Indiana. So initially, I met those robot blocks. I've come across those barriers and I had challenges dealing with the individuals at the state and local level, but throughout my time, unfortunately with COVID that allowed me to build and foster my relationship here with the state, you know, it wasn't something that was going to happen overnight. But through the course of the last two years, I've built relationships at the state level. I've been able to get out to the county level and build relationships at the county level that, they do have that feeling that I'm from the fed and I'm here to help that, we don't want that help from the federal government, but truly I'm here in a supportive role and be able to explain that to them in a way that helps them understand that I'm just here to offer suggestions, waste on, make improvements, reduce your gaps and increase your resiliency. I think through time it has helped to build relationships throughout the state at the county level and at the state level. I just want to say with my other federal agencies that are in the area too because they have a dog in the fight as well. So bringing all those players together, other federal agencies, the private sector and the local level, that whole community approach to training, exercise, planning, preparedness, it's something that just doesn't happen overnight. It's a work in progress and it will continue to be a work in progress for years to come. Unfortunately. But, as long as people are willing to be supportive, make change, identify their ways to improve, I think that everybody will eventually be successful.
Host: John Scardena (32m 23s):
Yeah. So what you're both talking about is this Axiom. So Rodney Melsick, like I call him the godfather of planning because he's still secretly like influencing all the planners around the country, even though retired, he's definitely the godfather there, but he has an Axiom that says the process is more important than the product. I have taken that for myself, seeing as a business owner and saying like, hey, your outcome is important. So what I say from my Axiom is the process is just as important as the outcome, still have to have good outcomes. While you're really both talking about is that process and trying to get to win as in win, and really like, you know, basically trying to take on the Ohio state football team methodology of just content winning, right. Improvement and winning. Until you get to a ball game, we're not to talk about that. That hurts, the reality here is just putting in my 2 cents. I'm one of those guys who always provides my opinion. Yeah. Dealing with a bunch of personality types, dealing with a bunch of different competency levels and experience, exercised. The more you can work with people time, you say resiliency, Jeremy, I say Disaster Tough, like this is how you build disaster tough communities. I don't want to have to bounce back, that's like my end state. I want to not have to have a disaster and really the best way to do that is everybody coming to the table. You already know them by first name and Jessica, Jeremy and John, get in a car and get to go meet everybody because you guys sound super cool. I'm in St. Louis, I'm not too far away. No. Yeah. Great. Yeah. So, but like seriously, that's how it is. I also think it's really important that emergency managers, sometimes emergency managers think they have a monopoly on different skillsets. Really you can take it a project manager and throw them into emergency management and they'd probably be very effective. You could take someone who has an economics background, like our chief operations person here, Doberman, Franzie, she's very good at understanding analytics of a disaster. So walking through that and just understanding different skill sets and how they apply, we could probably better as emergency managers or at least the best emergency managers are truly the best coordinators and building relationships.
Guest: Jessica Kindig (35m 3s):
It’s so funny if I may. It's so funny, Jeremy, I'm flashing back to this very similar conversation in which we've been focusing, so we worked together on the FEMA region five youth preparedness council. Last year we were talking about how you don't have to have a degree in Homeland security to make a difference in emergency management. You can have a computer background, you can have a writing background, you can have all these different backgrounds and there's a place for everybody somewhere so long as your point, John, we open our minds, we have the same end goal. We get to the table and we talk and that's exactly right.
Host: John Scardena (35m 41s):
Yeah, I agree with that and I agree that diverse backgrounds. I'm not a person who usually brings up diversity because I think the more you focus on that, the more divisive it actually becomes just by looking at like the social vulnerability index. There's a really good book called social vulnerability that talks about that, but a diverse, just understanding that you should have a diverse backgrounds and opinions and cultures does help, but focusing on is totally different thing. But understanding then the benefit that it has is incredibly important. I will say that our emergency managers of the future, like the degrees that are starting to be produced, and the outcome is a guy who has two degrees in emergency management. I am a fan of that. I think emergency management in terms of an academic perspective has to deal with the stress of making big decisions from afar. It's very different than your first responder. You're pulling people directly out of the mud, you have to be able to see a dot on the map and say, that's a person. From a guy who works 16, 20 hour days for weeks on end during responses, you have to be able to handle that stress and understanding the laws and the policies. There's a lot of Stafford act, all that stuff that specifically applies. So yes. Bring your background, bring your knowledge, be a value added. Also get more training from Doberman, from the government, from the state. Good calls out. Good call out. Well, as we wrap up here, I just want to give both Jessica first, you, and then Jeremy, your final thoughts on how you can or what the field can take from both your perspectives because again, background and perspectives, different perspectives, and really what you would hope to see in the field moving forward, Jessica?
Guest: Jessica Kindig (37m 43s):
Yeah. Well, first of all, thank you for allowing me to chit chat with you about this topic. I think for me, it's really kind of what we've already talked about is just breaking down this wall of yes, I'm from the state, I'm not here to take over. I think that, we get lost in semantics of oh yeah, the whole community approach, but there is something to that because disasters begin and end locally in that community before maybe I at the state or, or Jeremy, you know, we even know that something's going on. So I think if we can just collaborate and, and see me as a resource, I'm not threat. I'm not, I hang my ego up it's and let's just be open and be honest, let's get ready. Let's be disaster tough for that thing that's coming that we don't maybe know yay that we don't maybe know is coming, but we can be ready for it if we just sit down, we talk about these things, we go through these exercises, we train and we plan together. We're already on the team before the game even starts and we're already hooked up. We've got those relationships and we're good to go. That's, what's going to stabilize that incident. That's, what's going to save lives and that's what we're here for. Emergency management is hard, so why not bring more people to the game.
Host: John Scardena (39m 3s):
Yeah. One team, one fight. I love that idea. Alright, perfect. Jeremy,
Guest: Jeremy Swartz (39m 9s):
I just think as the profession, emergency managements going to continue to be refined and increase its foothold in, in society in the years to come. With the changing of disasters, constantly impacting the country, our territories, etc. We're seeing hurricanes, wildfires, everything that's going on right now, we're going to be looking for that collaborative individual that wants to take on a role, at that 30,000 foot. It has division of a 30,000 foot person who can see the whole picture, and be able to go out or respond to an incident in ways that support those first responders on the ground to increase their response and then the recovery aspect of being able to recover better from that incident when it happened. So emergency management suspect continue to be a field that I think if you're coming into it now you're going to really, yeah, have a brighter better future going forward.
Host: John Scardena (40m 19s):
I love that. I love the both of those perspectives there. Talk about like throwing LOBs to each other, knocking out of the park, kind of it shows that both of you from the state and from the federal perspective are looking at this both from your different angles, but you're able to build off each other. That's really what you're talking about here and that's really the message of both emergency management and this episode. We're probably going to have to come up with a clever name because we hit on several different topics, whether it's from a power outages to a house taping. Amazing. I love that. You both agree with that. Yeah. Go buckeyes. Yeah. Michigan sucks. I think that's the whole phrase. Yeah. So we covered a lot of topics and you're talking really about big picture stuff.
You're talking about 30,000 foot level, Jeremy, and then you both just gave a powerful examples of collaborating with other people at that 30,000 foot level. Being able to see all the stakeholders that you'll be involved with, those exercises that you do really help identify who your key stakeholders are, the contingency plans, the gaps to be able to refine, refine, refine. I'm a big fan of that. So congratulations to you both for doing well. I'll probably see on the road, jump in the back of your SUV here. So definitely going to have you get both back on the show sometime because we talk about exercises and a lot, and I think there's a lot more to be said about that.
So thank you so much for coming on the show. If you liked the show which you should have, this is my shameless plug. You need to give us a five-star rating, you need to subscribe, you need to ask us a question. If you're on social media, whether it's LinkedIn or Instagram, Facebook, whatever, for the Disaster Podcasts, or you have a question about our work or the Doberman Emergency Management, reach out to us, ask a question. If you have a follow-up, you can always send us an email. We get lots of emails from info@dobermanemg.com, but please ask the question on social media and let Jessica or Jeremy answer directly. We'll see you next week.