SES fit for task - final project report

In Australia, State Emergency Service (SES) organisations provide emergency help during and after declared disasters. The SES is also the primary or secondary agency for emergencies, such as storm damage, flood damage, building damage, traffic hazards and road crash rescue. More than 40,000 volunteers are deployed across the state and territory jurisdictions, fulfilling a range of roles.

Given the physically demanding nature of SES roles, there is a need to develop suitable occupational health and safety strategies, which amongst other things, optimises the health of all members. One such strategy is the physical screening of volunteers, matched against the demands of the role. The approach of mitigating injury risk, through physical screening practices, is colloquially referred to as ‘Fit for Task’.

The aim of the SES Fit for Task project was to objectively measure physical and physiological demands of a variety of SES roles, to establish physical screening measures, in the form of assessments, for SES personnel. The purpose of the assessments is for SES personnel to demonstrate they have the baseline physical competencies to meet the physical demands of SES tasks.

This report outlines the findings of the SES Fit for Task project, which included national buy-in from all Australian SES agencies, with support from the Australasian Fire and Emergency Service Authorities Council (AFAC), the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre and volunteer associations. Over several years, more than 3000 SES volunteers from across Australia, representing a diversity in age, experience, sex, and qualifications, participated in the research.

The project report has a number of appendices. Appendix C is a spreadsheet of data processing and results. The spreadsheet shows the detailed results from each of the stages during the job task analysis. Please read the ‘Start Here’ tab before viewing the subsequent tabs. Download Appendix C.

The SES Fit for Task project employed a robust scientific process, delivered by Human Performance Science. This process reflects gold-standard practices which first required identifying and measuring the physical demands of the various employment roles. This is referred to as a job task analysis. Following the job task analysis, a series of steps were taken to develop prototype physical assessments, before verification steps were utilised amongst subject matter experts from the incumbent population. The following diagram summarises the general phases of the research and the considerations at each stage.

From the early stages of the job task analysis, researchers identified 13 key SES responses that were carried forward for analysis. These responses, which were referred to as ‘skill sets’, which included (in alphabetical order): Air Search, Boat Operations, Chainsaw Operations, Firefighting Air Base Support, General Rescue, In-water Technician, Land Search & Rescue, Land-based Swiftwater, Off-road Driving, Road Crash Rescue, Storm Damage, Urban Search & Rescue, Vertical Rescue.

Each skill set contained a number of tasks identified through early discussions with subject matter experts. This resulted in a comprehensive task list, inclusive of 209 tasks. Through a series of filtering processes, quantitative and qualitative analyses and verification checkpoints, researchers identified 67 criterion tasks, which represent the tasks most physically demanding, frequently occurring and operationally important. From the criterion tasks, the research team could group tasks with similar characteristics to arrive at a representative battery of assessments that captured all movement types and physiological demands for all skill sets.

As a result of the research stages, nine new SES Fit for Task assessments have been developed. Each assessment represents an evidence-based screening measure modelled on the functional demands of SES roles. The nine assessments include seven land assessments (LIFT & SHIFT, LADDER CLIMB & LIFT, CARRY, HIKE, DRAG, HAUL, HOLD) and two water assessments (IN-WATER SAFETY, POWER SWIM & RESCUE). All SES Fit for Task assessments are sex and age neutral. That is, the same standard applies regardless of sex or age, rank or seniority. If an SES member undertakes operational activities, they would ordinarily be expected to be able to meet the minimum physical fitness levels required for that operational role.

The new assessments, which represent minimum physical standards, are designed to improve the health and safety of all volunteers, by demonstrating they can meet the inherent demands of the role. Not all volunteers need to complete all nine assessments. Volunteers will only need to complete a subset of the nine assessments, based on which skill sets they currently hold. Similarly, the performance level to which volunteers will need to complete the assessment is matched to the skills sets they hold.

Due to the effect of COVID-19, the later stages of the research, validation and reliability testing, saw fewer than desirable participant numbers. Though SES agencies can remain confident that the assessments represent scientific and functional representations of SES tasks, it is recommended that additional data is collected during ‘soft implementation’ efforts, to provide additional confidence on the performance standards of assessments which include a time-to-completion standard.

Through successful implementation efforts, SES agencies can be confident in a program that identifies injury risk and prevents hazards or injuries before they occur. A volunteer workforce that is more functionally fit, that is, more capable of meeting the physical demands of roles, is beneficial to the individual, the organisation, and the community.

This research was completed initially through the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC and then Natural Hazards Research Australia.