Our Philosophy
We do not believe in teaching our Fire Captain, Fire Lieutenant, or Battalion Chief members how to beat the exam, nor do we believe there is a way to beat it. We believe in preparing members for two things: the predictabilities of the exam itself (this will help you do well in the testing process) and we prepare members for the Fire Captain, Fire Lieutenant, or Battalion Chief position. Utilizing our methods, you will be completely prepared on test day and, once you achieve your promotion, prepared to assume the role of a fire officer and demonstrate your competency daily.
Like most testing situations, it is possible to practice for a fire department assessment center and to become comfortable during the testing process. The more relaxed and confident you are the more you will be able to demonstrate confidence and command presence. This will instill in the rater’s confidence in your ability to assume the role of a Fire Captain, Fire Lieutenant, or Battalion Chief and result in higher scores during your exam.
Membership Privileges
Members of AspiringFireOfficers.com receive full access to over 70 videos. All of the videos have been developed and produced by our staff of fire service professionals. These videos cover a wide variety of topics including: managing emergency scene simulations, conducting employee counseling sessions, strategies for completing an in-basket exercise, mastering the oral interview, and how to successfully complete a writing assignment. All of our custom videos are produced with the goal of helping you prepare for your assessment center and maximizing your score.
We have created 78 videos for our members. Our videos are not just “How To” videos that tell you what to do or say, but also include scenario-based personnel and emergency scene videos where members can see real examples of the methods we describe in action. Members get to watch over 24 different emergency scene simulations from start to finish and get to “sit in” on nine different employee counseling sessions.
In addition to the videos, there are 5 individual in-basket and 30 writing assignments available for members to use to hone their newly learned skills. All of the assignments include an answer key that the member can use to compare to their completed assignment to learn where they can make improvements.
Review Our Site
We encourage you to review the samples we have posted on our site so you can see for yourself the quality of our work. We know that the fire service values credibility. We believe that our program is the real deal and has the credibility that you value. We have heard if from our peers and, just as important, from our members that have been very successful using our program.
Credibility
Our experience in participating in fire department promotional exams, as well as developing and proctoring them, has shown us that the tests are predictable. We have developed, proctored and/or seen dozens of fire department promotional exams. They are developed and rated by our peers in the fire service. Since we know what’s important to them in selecting their future officers (the same things that are important to us!), it’s easy to predict what many of the tested dimensions will be in an exam.
We are confident that our members will have access to relevant, high quality training materials that will help them to properly prepared for the predictable events within their assessment center. After all, isn’t preparation what we pride ourselves in as firefighters? How is the promotional exam any different? It isn’t! The promotion is awarded to the candidate who is the best prepared among his peers. We do not believe in “having a bad day” on exam day. We believe that a candidate that has a “bad day” was not prepared, and it was identified during their assessment center.
We are familiar with all of the pitfalls that you may encounter during your Captain/Lieutenant and Battalion Chief promotional exam, and where you can score valuable points that will help set you apart from the competition. Once you have developed a solid foundation utilizing the material available from AspiringFireOfficers.com, you can approach all of the components of your assessment center with confidence.
My Fire Department is Unique
We understand that your department is unique and may do things differently. However, the reality is that fire departments are much more alike than different. We have had great success working with candidates who are actively preparing for Captain/Lieutenant and Battalion Chief promotional exams from all over the country. The basic job requirements, knowledge and skills of a fire officer are the same whether you are on the east or west coast.
We have worked with dozens of candidates for their assessment center. The candidates come from large departments such as San Francisco, Los Angeles City, San Diego, Savannah, Washington DC, Austin, Kansas City, Manassas, Denver, San Antonio, Charlotte, and Columbus, as well as smaller departments from all over the county. They range from departments with engines staffed with four firefighters to those with two firefighters assigned to each engine.
Why Us?
The reason we can successfully assist candidates from across the country is simple; the California Fire Service developed the Incident Command System (ICS) in the 1970’s. The need arose out of the large brush fires that occur annually on the west coast, where it’s not uncommon to have 500 engine companies committed to an incident. Oftentimes there are dozens of major fires burning within a state. The Federal government took what we call ICS and gave it their own name – National Incident Management System (NIMS). They then required that all incidents requesting federal reimbursement use NIMS.
We grew up in the fire services using the Incident Command System (ICS). We teach the California State Fire Company and Chief Officer Courses. We were tested on in for our promotions to Fire Captain, Battalion Chief, and to Division Chief. We now develop fire department promotional exams and fire department assessment centers that challenge the aspiring Fire Lieutenant and Fire Captain to demonstrate their knowledge of all-risk scenarios that will include fire simulations, personnel issues, promotional interview questions, and in-basket exercises (as well as a host of other topics).
Experience
It has been our experience that talent and preparation shows during the fire department assessment center. We can honestly say that those who put forth the effort are usually successful. No one assisting a candidate can guarantee that the candidate will get promoted, however, our students have had a very high success rate (feel free to contact any of the people who have written testimonials on our web page) during their promotional assessment center and oftentimes return to us when they are ready to seek their next promotion.
We are confident that the members of AspiringFireOfficers.com will have an advantage over their competition. Our main goal is to get you prepared for your fire department assessment center.
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