Changing Face of Security Agencies

¶ … Changing environment and Communities It is the intention of the various agencies of the government to help their employees to be able to in an environment that is suitable for the optimum performance in order to offer the best service to the public. In an effort tom achieve this, the different organizations and agencies have prepared their employees in various ways that help them approach the contemporary society with the diverse population therein.

This paper will hence look at the various ways that the agencies prepare their employees to adapt to the fast changing environment in terms of technology and the workforce as well. Since the onset of globalization, one defining feature has been the rapid shift in technology and information technology.

The workforce has had to contend with the challenge of this fast changing technological advances, unfortunately there is no sign of the reliance on technology relenting hence it has been and will continue to be the duty of the employer to equip the employees with the requisite skills to cope with the changes in technology and exploit such changes to perform their duties better.

The fire department for instance has seen tremendous changes over the past 25 years in the apparatus and tools that offer fire protection and effectiveness in rescue services. With the contemporary changes, there are more formal and structured trainings to handle the new technology as compared to the predecessors who mainly needed physical strength and mechanical knowledge to qualify for fire fighter slot.

The shift in time and environment due to globalization has also meant new technologies in fire prevention, incident command systems developed, enhanced approaches to firefighters health and safety, response to domestic terrorism and infection control practices that have meant totally new trainings of the employees to be able to carry out these new duties effectively (Chesterfield MA Fire Department, 2015).

The use of computers, wireless telephone, cellular phones, FAX machines and even the GPS system are common equipment in fire departments of late hence straining staff to effectively use such in expediting their operations is prevalent of late. It is significant to note that the duty of the firefighters have over the years expanded beyond fire related incidences to involve medical emergencies, ice and swift waters rescues, hazardous material responses as well as vehicle accidents.

This has meant restructuring of the training in major ways that would make the employees able to handle the diverse incidences. The issue of workplace diversity has also been in the forefront since the workplace demographics have consistently changed over the years, making the various government agencies have a variety of employees, a fact that presents challenges in terms of harmonious coexistence.

Employees are constantly encouraged to concentrate the positives of diversity and instead of treating diversity as a negative thing, the employees have been trained to align the diversity to the mission of the agency or the department. This has helped the various public safety agencies to work in synchrony in achieving their goals of making the U.S. A secure place (U.S. Department of Commerce, n.d).

With the budgetary allocations getting ever tighter on several public security agencies, have had to upgrade their systems in such a manner that their employees will be able to still perform optimally through sourcing for information from a common pool of information and data. Hitherto, it was expensive for different agencies to exchange information and took manual transfer of copies of the information needed from one state to another or once center to another, hence delaying the work by the employees.

This has been handled by having networked information resources and training of the employees in order to ensure the staff members are able to accurately utilize the information available to safeguard the public and offer the needed services from their agencies (Homeland Security, 2014). The EMS staff also had a difficult time in retrieving information that were crucial to the rescue of patients but that is long overcome since the EMS employees are able to receive pertinent information from the electronic data depository or even through mailing from relatives.

The various government agencies have over the years shown significant adjustments in ensuring their staff members cope with the contemporary crimes and the ever changing face of rime. Most of the serious crimes are of late faceless and the law enforcement as well as the homeland security and its departments have strived to train sufficiently for the rampant cybercrimes that have been the trend over the last decade.

There are cybercrime units established in each department of the law enforcement agencies to ensure the employees are equipped with the requisite knowledge to handle the cyber threats whenever they come up.

Indiana Department of Homeland Security One public safety agency that has show the significance of change and aligning the training of the employees with the contemporary challenges is the Indiana Department of Homeland Security which has undertaken to ensure the employees are abreast with the safety precautions and the needed interventions in the event of any emergency or disaster. The agency has trainings for a wide range of audience ranging from the emergency managers to law enforcement, public health personnel, volunteer organizations and even the fire fighters.

There is a comprehensive calendar for this security agency that runs throughout the year and the focus of each of the trainings is clearly stipulated in the calendar such that any individual signing up for the training is aware of what to expect. To make the training more effective, the agency has posted the calendar and the application online which makes it easy for their employees as well as other organizations who would like to be trained to apply.

There are also manuals on safety and security awareness issues posted on their website (Indiana Department of.