CTI Corp member Training Institute

I want to again state that opinions are mine alone and not that of NCCC, CNCS or FEMA.

So CTI started this week due to a large snow storm many flights got cancelled and rescheduled to later days so a constant trickle of corp members form the airport has been the status qua for in processing. with one or two still left to arrive.

The culture changed overnight Sunday in a few ways. Sunday the Region Director Ken Goodson invited all the Team Leaders form both units councilors and unit leaders to his house for a small party like gathering to show his appreciation for the groups great work throughout TLT an example of something that he would never had had to do but did because he is that great a guy.

So Sunday night was all about are you ready for CTI and what are you worried about. All changing Monday morning as Team leaders start to meet the incredibly diverse group of individuals that make up the Corp. Now it is a time of action, rally the corp to get from training A to Training B figure out where they are when they are late and most importantly try and meet everyone in the group resisting the urge to only sit and chat with the tight knit Team Leader group.

The first shuffle team is filled with excited new corp members that are eager to get to know each others stories. other teams have been doing team builders and such while I like to focus on getting to know the common ground as we are not int eh final teams I don't want to force a team through the team building process to early considering today was their first full day and even then they are still jet lagged and starting to become symptomatic of altitude sickness as they acclimate to the dry high altitude

In the interest of keeping this short I'll leave it there but the week is still young.

TL training continued

I want to start by saying I m aiming for one of these on every other weekend. Might not lay out that way though.

the theme of the week is more training everything from how to write briefs to supervisory skills. 

Id say the team of Team leaders is meshing pretty well and everyone is getting to know each other. It really is a great group of people that all in all I'm happy to be a part of. It is a very accommodating group that even when faced with the difficult choice of our FQS roles. The FQS role is a role within FEMA basically what our team will be tasked with doing during a larger scale event.

Mountain Unit will have the following 

DSA Disaster survivor assistance

RTF Recovery Task Force (multiple FQS)

EA External Affairs 

FTF Field Task Force (multiple FQS)

IAA Individual Application assistance 

some teams will have multiple FQS roles for different corp members and some will be only trained in a single FQS as a whole team. 

Because I don't want to Sway people from one team to the other as this is prior to CTI or Corp member Training Institute starting next week I wont give away who's in charge of what team other than I have been tasked with the Field Task Force FQS team. This team didn't exist last year so there really isn't much that we know about the teams role or expected steady state projects.

Each of the TL's have been tasked with calling a group of the incoming corp members to make sure we are still on track to have them come and some general reminders. 

So one of the things I enjoy in the training is scenarios basically different situations we might encounter and running them through on what we have to do with different people playing the roles of team leader and either unfortunate or corp member with a really bad behavior. 

The other part of things is I am noticing more and more that the Team leader position is about delegation of tasks as well as managing and making sure our corp members are alive at the end of their service and adhere to the NCCC policies. 

Really the TL position is a catch all to make sure a team gets where they need to go, has food, lodging for travel, manages the gas cards for the vans, budgets for the teams expenses, ensures safety, records hours in the quest for the 1700, delegates work from FEMA to corp members, insures consistent policy, reports infractions of policy, initial discipline, promotes independent service projects, reports team updates to campus bi weekly or more, promotes team building, is the main point of contact to FEMA from the team, and seeks out additional work for the team if they complete their project early. in a nutshell that is most of it.

I'm pretty happy with how things are going despite getting sick and taking a day off due to a cold that ha been making its way around the staff and TL's. we ate out at a awesome breakfast place called breakfast on Broadway only a few minutes from campus and the weather was cooperating so it was 50 degrees and sunny so we ate outside... then again a couple nights ago it snowed about 4 or so inches so really the weather is all over the place. but its nice to be able to get outside here vs Wisconsin with the depressing sub zero temps constantly. 

Well Im looking forward to finishing TLT team leader Training and getting the Corp here it should be a good time.

TL Training Week One

I want to target some of the incoming people to the program and let you in on what the Team leaders are doing in the week prior to your arrival and let you in on how things work. as well as update some people back home on my time here in FEMA corps

Ok so I think its important to note there are returning team leaders and returning corp members that are taking on the new role of Team leaders. Then there are a few of us that are new to the program but all incredibly qualified to be here.

It's Sunday now and I haven't had a ton of time to really sit down and get an update on here til now. but a lot has happened. first and for most an understanding of what this position really is. So lets start structure wise. Below ill try and draw out the chain of command minus names as depending on unit and team they might change.

Regional Director
Assistant Regional Director
Unit leader
Team leader / Support Team leader
Corp member

That's the tasking order and I can tell you from the week I have with them so far they are all highly skilled and respectable people. but it is important to note who you need to talk with for what and why the chain of command exists.

In addition its important to note NCCC is a program of Americorps of which is a program of CNCS or the corporation of national and community service. CNCS is a Federal Agency despite the name and it reports directly to Congress and the President. By taking a position in it you effectively are the front line face of federal government.

The biggest thing to expect for the first couple of weeks is a lot of sitting and listening to presentations on different topics and areas of your job. that all boil down to if anything happens call your unit leader, and or B2 if its vehicle related. (B2 is a nickname for the fleet manager here in Denver also a great guy)

The summary of the training so far is TL positions are the front line management of teams. once in the field most decisions are theirs to make and maintaining government standards for what they are allowed to do with who is a huge amount of week one training. In other words we covered policy and the handbook a well as discipline and basic team management.

If you are like me I look for ways to crunch it all down. and figure out what the keys are and summarize things. first and foremost the biggest note is to stay in lane. what this is referring to is basically stick with your level on the list above when considering fraternization and so on but even then be careful as relationships might not go well in the long term and you are on the same team for the whole term. That being said there are a lot of different rules surrounding this topic that are incredibly obscure yet necessary when you look at them. I don't know that I would suggest being more than friends with your fellow team members and for that matter as a TL the option is off the table as per policy to avoid favoritism. So don't expect any post about that down the line.

The next important note is federal law trumps state law, Supremacy clause. Colorado Weed is legal, as per federal law it is not. So don't get any ideas. Yes they drug test it shouldn't be a surprise.

I'm going to drift away from policies because there are a lot of them and talk about who our team leaders are. with respect to them I won't name names but I can say that they are a great group of people with incredibly diverse backgrounds. Most if not all are college graduates with degrees in everything from Political science to archaeology. They originate form Florida to California and a lot of places in between. As I mentioned before some are returning for a second year in the program and some are new to the program. As far as personality types everyone here is a leader by nature and are incredibly supportive.

There are currently 16 of us. 8 in each unit and the Units being Alpine and Mountain of which depending on the corp size (total number of corp members) that show up for duty will determine the number of STL positions. Important to note STL is not a step up but a step to the side they have a significant amount to do with training and coordination of field teams as well as some projects from FEMA. So the jist of this is that we are unsure how many teams we will have until CTI or Corp member Training institute starts.

In a previous post I put down that I plan to loose some weight. 20 pounds. I have set up an agreement with B2 the fleet manager that whoever loses the most weight by the end of round 1 will have to cook for the other. if he looses he cooks my whole team a meal and he even sweeten the deal up by saying if I loose then I don't owe him squat. needless to say this deal has spread around and the other TL's are supporting the effort.

A couple of outings so far to see some of the sights the first was a team building lunch out at the red rocks amphitheater that was built by the original CCC Community Conservation Corps. The second was a semi planned event this Saturday to go out and climb one of the foothills near Boulder, CO. I can say I am out of shape and making it to the top of that mountain was a huge high point for my week. especially with the support of the other TL's of which at this point I think its safe to say we are all getting to be good friends and great coworkers.

So the low for the week. Oddly had nothing to do with the program. On my flight in of which I can't believe was only Monday this last week I flew in from central Wisconsin to Chicago then to Denver on the second flight the 20 something male next to me got incredibly sick. So much so that the flight attendant asked for any medical professionals onboard to hit their call buttons. and then assist them with the man next to me. needless to say sitting for 2 hours next to a guy that is violently vomiting is not my ideal way to spend a flight.... not to mention the seats are build for people about 100 or so pounds lighter and at least a foot shorter...

The food is actually quite good considering we are the ones to cook it after the first couple of days. (first couple days we had food catered in for our meals) We are on a budget so remember that. per day the US government gives us 4 dollars per person. but lets put that in perspective there are 16 team leaders and 7 days a week. so (16x4)x7 = 448 per week for food for the lot of us. now obviously this means we have to cook for the team not just individuals and we don't have the cash to eat out all the time. but with 448 per week we can have some good choices when we are out shopping for food. It is important to note that this is a team thing and program participants range from 18 to 27 being the oldest of the Team leaders. I cant speak for corp members yet but the TL's that have cooked so far have made some rather good tasting meals.

If anyone has any questions I have been trying to help out on the facebook page or comment below here and I'll see what i can do about helping to get answers. Otherwise Contact Staff.

Night before the flight

I haven't had much to write til now. A few weeks ago I received the welcome packet and about a week ago I received my itinerary for flying out of central Wisconsin for Denver.

I think its important to note it is currently 12:45 am and I need to leave for my flight before 5 AM. I spent the last 3 hours rolling around but no sleep would come. I am not nervous for what is to come I am excited. I know over the next year I'll make friends and touch the lives of a lot of people. which matters to me. Yet tomorrow ... Today I will be practically useless due to a lack of sleep of which I'm hoping I'll catch a couple hours on the plane. 

When the team leaders introduced themselves over email there was a common trend. to set a goal. something realistic with meaningful impact to our lives. I want to publicly put out a couple of goals here so that I'm accountable to the 20 or so views the statistics page shows.

The first of these goals is a quantifiable number I currently weigh 296.3 Pounds I am overweight but not dramatically obese as this number would lead you to believe. I would like to aim to loose 20 pounds this year so aiming for a number in the 270s would be ideal. 

I am looking forward to physical training though the altitude for Denver might make that more interesting then doing it here in Wisconsin. Give it a week and I will likely change my tune on the like part but regardless I am looking forward to it. 

The second goal is something that I was inspired by a movie to do. 110% do everything to the best of my ability then try and get better in the process. Eventually I plan on expecting this from my team members in the field. First things first I need to excel at the training over the next few weeks so that they can get the 110% from me from the start.

And the last goal Come out of this with a job. FEMA corps lasts til november and I like knowing what lies ahead as far as what my plans are for long term. For right now this is on the back burner but I will try and update on this whenever possible.

I will have details on what happens over the next few days up in my next posts.