Positive Recognition in 911 Call Centers

In The Resilient 911 Professional, author Jim Marshall’s description of the profession’s rigors illuminates this point:

“Dispatchers are a proud yet humble group. But we are suffering.”

In a field full of unsung heroes, 911 dispatchers are often among the least recognized.

As essentially invisible support staff, they receive little public awareness or understanding of their job stressors compared with law enforcement and fire professionals. Even the agencies they serve may not fully understand just how tense and outright challenging the role can be.

Burnout, lack of work engagement, and mental health issues that follow employees home from work are just three flavors of the trouble 911 professionals can face. The lack of closure inherent in the job can be maddening and highly damaging to their morale.

But in many cases, a little positive recognition may be all it takes to counteract these issues, or at least take the edge off in a way that allows these essential professionals to continue their work with fewer adverse effects.

The power of positive recognition: Supervisors lead the charge

A legitimately kind word from a supervisor can go a long way toward improving job satisfaction. And the more effort the organization puts into communicating those kind words, the more meaningful they become.

Generally speaking, recognition can be broken down into two categories:

• Informal recognition, which is often delivered in person and follows moments that merit a thank you or expression of gratitude—for example, praising a new dispatcher for successfully handling their first monitored call.
• Formal recognition, which is documented and structured, and typically celebrates larger accomplishments—for example, sharing organization-wide recognition when that same employee demonstrates consistent performance across multiple calls.

Formalized practices—such as documenting recognition or sharing it across the organization—help reinforce a culture where employees feel seen, supported, and valued.

Training your supervisors for successful recognition

How can agencies ensure their dispatchers receive meaningful, authentic recognition? It starts with equipping supervisors with the right training and tools (https://www.vectorsolutions.com/industries/public-safety/911-ecc/).

While giving recognition may seem straightforward, delivering it in a way that is professional, meaningful, and genuine takes intention.

Tips and talking points here include:

• Understanding what type of recognition resonates most with each employee
• Avoiding overreliance on digital communication alone—after the first few, everyone starts scanning those recognition emails instead of clicking them, after all
• Aligning the level of recognition with the achievement being acknowledged

Building a culture of recognition

Another basic fact of a specialized workplace: Supervisors and the employees they manage often have substantially different roles, making it challenging to recognize the areas that need a little positive attention.

As a provider of training, workforce management, and performance solutions for public safety agencies, Vector Solutions has seen several approaches that help organizations build a stronger culture of recognition:

Create official channels for documenting praiseworthy behavior

Employees want to support one another, and they tend to support initiatives with dedicated tools and procedures in place.

Ideas here might include:

• A program that rewards employees for recognizing the good work of their peers and calling it out via an official form or email
• Gamification—systems that let employees “collect good deeds,” in effect, for the chance to win prizes

Establish informal “floor leaders” to collect positive information

Motivated, trustworthy employees are great allies here. Simply asking them to keep an eye on their colleagues in a positive way and call out good work to supervisors can be a great way to keep your finger on the pulse of your organization.

Include dispatchers in follow-ups

Including relevant dispatchers in a debriefing, particularly when they’ve been involved in a highly emotionally troubling case, can bring a sense of closure and contribute to overall well-being. It may also be considered a form of recognition, since those deeply involved in the case are the ones who receive a debriefing—a mark of organizational respect that can resonate with dispatchers.

Address obstacles

Many factors can detract from an organization’s ability to instill a culture of positive recognition. Poor management skills and negative traits—such as an inappropriate desire to be liked or too strong a tendency to overenforce rules—can make it difficult for dispatchers to feel genuinely recognized and worthy in the workplace. And on a more general level, disconnected systems and manual processes can also inhibit the proper flow of information. Leveraging integrated solutions—such as quality assurance and performance management tools—help reduce these gaps and support a more connected, engaged workforce. Addressing these issues in your efforts to improve positive recognition can have many other benefits. Don’t ignore them if you feel their presence in your dispatch organization/division.

Conclusion

Emergency responders are essential to saving lives, and dispatchers are essential to getting them there. That makes them as important as any link in the emergency services chain, and they are just as vulnerable to unique stressors as the ground-level employees responding to calls.

Take time to give them the recognition they deserve, in ways and formats they’ve indicated they like best, and everyone—employees, their supervisors, callers, and more—will be better off for it.

Looking for ways to strengthen engagement, training, and performance in your 911 center?

Explore Vector Solutions’ public safety solutions: https://www.vectorsolutions.com/industries/public-safety/911-ecc/