What makes Olympic ski racing or NASCAR so exciting?
It is the same thing that made the Broncos-Seahawks SuperBowl game so boring: It is margin.
In skiing and NASCAR there�s little to no margin for error.
The slightest deviation can at best lose you the race and at worst cause a horrific wreck.
This makes the outcome highly uncertain.
For comparison, in a blowout like the last SuperBowl, the margin was so large by the
end of the game that the outcome was very certain.
So how is this useful to us?
To answer this we have to first talk about our operational environment; which is both
complex and dynamic.
Complex, in that it is made up of countless conditions.
Physical conditions such as the fuels, weather, topography and the fire itself.
These are the obvious ones, but there�s more.
It�s also made up of personal conditions, like your values and beliefs, your biases,
experience and emotional state.
There are group conditions, like crew cohesion, group dynamics and culture and organizational
and societal conditions.
If that wasn�t dizzying enough these conditions are interrelated and affect one another.
For example steep slopes with heavy fuel loading on a hot, dry day will favor rapid, high intensity
fire spread.
These same conditions slow line production rates and decrease the lifting capacity of
air resources.
Crews operating in this environment will require more water, which increases the logistical
demands on the organization.
Hot, dry weather and the presence of fire highlights the value that the community places
on watersheds to supply water, further increasing the pressure for the fire management organization
to protect those values.
Added to this complexity is the fact that our environment is also dynamic, constantly
changing.
We have tools and checklists in place to help us perceive and make sense of this dynamic
complexity.
In fact we are inundated with them: LCES, the 10 & 18, Downhill Checklists, Pocket Cards,
BI & ERCs, etc.
And while these are all useful tools, they can at times feel a bit overwhelming.
Margin is unique in that it is not a �tool� like these others; rather it is the overarching
framework in which these tools are applied.
Margin acknowledges the complexity and helps us envision the environment as a whole.
Simply put, margin is the collective state of the environment and our position in it.
How much �room� there is determines the extent of our margin.
Because the environment is dynamic it isn�t worth talking about it as a static �state�;
it is best to talk about it as a trend, where the margin is increasing or decreasing.
OK, but what does this look like to us in the field?
As margin decreases so does the room for error and/or uncertainty.
Options are limited.
It can be reduced to the point where an unintended/undesired outcome is inevitable.
We might recognize this as a near miss, injury or fatality, or simply not meeting objectives.
On the other hand, as margin increases more error and uncertainty is tolerated before
resulting in an unintended/undesirable outcome.
More options are available.
We all have the power to control margin.
Building margin can be a deliberate act (active); maintaining vehicles, training, establishing
LCES, hydrating, facilitating effective AARs, and so on.
On the other hand, margin can change independently from our actions (passive); the weather can
change, budgets can change, rocks can roll downhill.
Even when margin is passively decreasing, deliberate action can be taken to adapt to
these changes and once again increase margin.
For instance, we can choose to change the plan to take the �the best ridge, not the
next ridge,� choose whether or not to engage.
Likewise as conditions change and margin is increasing we can choose to take advantage
of the opportunities it presents.
�Let�s get to work.� The benefits of margin will be unique to the
context in which it is used, but generally it is helpful in the following ways:
1.
Margin acknowledges the environment is complex and dynamic and gives us simple language and
imagery to communicate and share our understanding.
It helps us to talk about and make sense of our environment.
2.
It gives language to that uneasy feeling when the environment is changing, but you can�t
quite put your finger on exactly what is changing.
3.
It unifies the stuff we are already doing, it ties together hiring, training, crew cohesion,
fire management plans, posting a lookout, etc. all of these things affect our margin.
4.
We can include margin into our definition of success, operating with razor thin margin
might be exciting to watch, but is it how we want to operate at work?
This introduction is exactly that, and introduction, the start of a conversation about how this
concept can be useful in helping us to successfully navigate the complex, dynamic wildland fire
environment.
Individual and organizational learning happens in the discussions had after seeing this video,
in the crew buggies or engine heading to a fire, while staging at drop point 6, and all
that time mopping-up.
We want your feedback, tell us about the conversations you are having around margin, send us an email,
a video of your discussion, post something on the Margin blog, or send a carrier pigeon.
Here is how to get a hold of us.
We look forward to hearing from you.