What now? Our annual conference and new training events

Booking venues, contacting speakers, persuading sponsors - three things that national committee members would have been doing, right about now, in order to bring everyone's favourite conference to life in November.

Not this year, sadly. 

Assuming you've already read the Chair's opening piece, you will be well aware that this year's FirePRO Conference won't be going ahead in November. 

The event was understandably high on the agenda at our most recent (virtual) meeting as, whilst it's still early days in terms of lockdown, we can't plan anything effectively without a solid date in mind.

That's why we've taken the difficult decision to postpone until we can set that date. Emphasis, there, on the word postpone. The event will return, we just don't know when.

In the meantime we've been looking at what we can do this year to support fire service communicators.

Just because we can't physically come together doesn't mean we can't keep up with our professional development. Arguably, it's never been more important to do so.

So, in the absence of the conference, we'll be running some smaller, virtual training events this year - covering topics raised in the sector wide survey we did recently.

We'll publish more information about these sessions soon - watch this space! 

And, last but not least, something else discussed during our latest meet was the development of sector-wide standards - specifically for fire service communication. 

The committee is starting to think about what good looks like for us when it comes to things like strategy, campaigns, learning and internal communication. 

Again, watch this space! 

Jack Grasby
FirePRO Committee Vice Chair
Campaigns Manager at South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue