Latest / The Alerting Authority / From 9/11 to FEMA IPAWS: Jen Meyers on Emergency Alerts, Alert Fatigue & Public Trust in Crisis

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From 9/11 to FEMA IPAWS: Jen Meyers on Emergency Alerts, Alert Fatigue & Public Trust in Crisis · The Alerting Authority

0:06
SPEAKER_01: Hi, I'm Jeanette Sutton.
0:08
SPEAKER_00: And I am Eddie Bertola.
0:10
SPEAKER_01: And we welcome you to another episode of the Alerting Authority.
0:14
SPEAKER_01: And as always, we encourage you to subscribe, follow, listen, and most importantly, participate in these podcasts.
0:20
SPEAKER_01: We want your questions, concerns, ideas, problems, pain points, and success stories so we as alerting authorities can better do our jobs and make our communities safer.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: Can I just throw in a this is where you guys would actually get in contact with us, give us those questions and things because the episodes that we make are really coming from all your suggestions and also what's that what's that subscribe and review thing we want them to do, Jeanette?
0:48
SPEAKER_01: Um I think you we want them to click sub sub subscribe and review and share with us what your thoughts are.
0:55
SPEAKER_01: I mean I have heard from I've heard from people from the United Kingdom, England, from Australia, um from Canada, people who are listening to our podcast all over the country, all over the world.
1:11
SPEAKER_01: And that's really exciting.
1:13
SPEAKER_01: I want to hear from you.
1:13
SPEAKER_01: Let us know where you're from, what are the issues that you're dealing with, because we would love to talk with you in the future.
1:20
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
1:21
SPEAKER_00: And for everybody who has commented on the goat videos and cat videos from that one podcast we've done, thank you.
1:29
SPEAKER_00: We are pet people, as you probably know, and it's just that kind of stuff that we really appreciate.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: I want to throw out a thank you again to our sponsors.
1:36
SPEAKER_00: We've we've had different ones, and today is no different.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: We have HQA system, HQE systems.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: HQE is an alert origination software company, and they focus on something that every alerting authority struggles with, which is bringing your systems together and making alerting easier to manage when it matters most.
1:54
SPEAKER_00: They're IPAUS approved, but it's a whole lot more than just IPAUS.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: They focus on simplification and streamlined operations.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: Because in an emergency, if it's not easy to use, it's not going to be used well.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: And we just have to be cognizant.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: For anybody who's experienced those, you know what I mean.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: HQE, they're platforms designed to unify your whole alerting ecosystem.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: Whether it's your outdoor warning sirens, uh, indoor notifications, mass notification software, the whole thing is integrated in and it will work with your cameras, access control, or any other pieces that you have.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: So instead of juggling your multiple platforms, go to a single user interface.
2:35
SPEAKER_00: The results are faster and it helps with the decision making and will help keep your community safer.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: So thank you to HQE.
2:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and now we get to talk about our guest today.
2:47
SPEAKER_01: Who do we have today, Eddie?
2:48
SPEAKER_01: I'm excited.
2:49
SPEAKER_00: All right.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: And it's funny, I did see a comment when someone said, Well, how do you guys not know who it is?
2:54
SPEAKER_00: They're on camera already.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, well, it's for everybody who's just listening, right?
3:01
SPEAKER_00: But I want to introduce someone who I consider a good friend and someone who knows the space of alerts and warnings really well.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: Many of you who are listening have probably already talked to her.
3:12
SPEAKER_00: If not, you've been involved in stuff that she has done, and you may not have known it because she's been behind the scenes.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: But we are joined by Jen Myers.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: She is a leader in emergency communications and public safety with more than 25 years of experience helping communities prepare and actually respond to crises.
3:29
SPEAKER_00: Jen's career spans the full spectrum of public safety, and whether that's starting and working as a 911 dispatcher to serving as a chief watch officer and later supporting the national efforts as a senior consultant within the Department of Homeland Security and CISA.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: One of the defining moments in her career was serving as a 9-11 first responder, an experience that, as she says, continues to shape her life and her commitment to this area.
3:57
SPEAKER_00: Most recently, she supported FEMA's IPAS Technical Support Services and Operations.
4:03
SPEAKER_00: As the training manager, she oversaw a 24-7 support center that helped more than 2,200 alerting authorities, including my own, my alerting authority.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: And she's helped train thousands of emergency communicators across the country.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: She does bring that rare frontline national level perspective on what it really takes to coordinate, communicate, and focus in on what matters most.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: So that is my intro to Jen.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: Is that accurate, Jen?
4:31
SPEAKER_02: It's pretty good, yeah.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: You're like it's always fun hearing those, but but really welcome to.
4:40
SPEAKER_01: I'm excited to hear this.
4:42
SPEAKER_01: And also, I mean, I spent some time at the iPods building um in National Harbor, but didn't actually get a lot of time to interact with a lot of the amazing people that staff and support the nation who work in that building.
5:01
SPEAKER_01: So, Jen, we we've run into each other several times, but we've not had this conversation before.
5:07
SPEAKER_01: So I'm actually super excited to learn from you and your expertise of having gone through this for it been part of the alerting system for 25 years.
5:19
SPEAKER_01: And so with this long career and public safety, you worked as a dispatcher supporting local alerting authorities and nationwide.
5:26
SPEAKER_01: Can you walk us through your journey?
5:29
SPEAKER_01: Tell us what it was like to be part of the 9-11 responders, how that shaped your way of thinking about communication and preparedness today, um, and just share with us your path and your story.
5:42
SPEAKER_01: I'm excited about that.
5:44
SPEAKER_02: Sure, sure.
5:45
SPEAKER_02: My path in public safety, uh, which actually started in college.
5:49
SPEAKER_02: I was a dispatcher for my college uh campus security.
5:53
SPEAKER_02: So it started there, and um, it's been shaped by being both on the front lines and the system side of emergency communication.
6:01
SPEAKER_02: Um, and each phase just built on the last ones, or the last ways that I could have that I weigh more than I could have ever predicted early on when I was starting out in college.
6:12
SPEAKER_02: That was where it's come from.
6:13
SPEAKER_02: I did, like Eddie and mentioned, I started as a call taker slash dispatcher for 911.
6:19
SPEAKER_02: And I truly I'm a big advocate.
6:21
SPEAKER_02: I believe this is one of the most intense and formative roles in public safety.
6:26
SPEAKER_02: You're really that first voice that people hear on what is often one of, if not the worst, days of their lives.
6:34
SPEAKER_02: So that experience teaches you really quickly that communication isn't just about accuracy.
6:40
SPEAKER_02: It's about the clarity under pressure.
6:42
SPEAKER_02: It's about the tone, it's about the timing, a lot and the empathy that has to go into that.
6:47
SPEAKER_02: Um, you learn how small misunderstandings can have big consequences and how critical it is to translate what I call chaos into actual information for our responders.
6:58
SPEAKER_02: Um, the found that foundation carried me into my work, my later work supporting alerting authorities at a national level.
7:05
SPEAKER_02: Instead of just handling one call at a time, I was helping shape how entire communities receive that life-saving information.
7:13
SPEAKER_02: It's a different scale, but the same core principle applies.
7:16
SPEAKER_02: And that's the message must receive the right people at the right time in a way that they can immediately understand and act on.
7:24
SPEAKER_02: Technology plays a big role, but ultimately, and I think you guys can attest to this, it's it's still about the human behavior and how people interpret it, interpretate risk and decide what to do next.
7:36
SPEAKER_02: Serving as a responder, and I still put that in quotes because really there's you'll if you pay attention to the public safety field and anything like that, you know, we're still talking whether dispatchers and call takers are administrative or are they first responders.
7:52
SPEAKER_02: I believe in the sense that even though I say the word respond, we're responding by answering that call, the physical call versus actually going to the scene of something.
8:01
SPEAKER_02: So I do want to make sure that everybody understands that.
8:04
SPEAKER_02: I didn't, you know, respond out with the police and the fire department, things like that.
8:08
SPEAKER_02: Um, but we were that first, we always, the the thing is the first first responder.
8:12
SPEAKER_02: Um I truly believe that, um, like I said earlier, just answering that call.
8:17
SPEAKER_02: Um so um responding uh during September 11th attack um at the Pentagon was a defining moment for me.
8:26
SPEAKER_02: Um happened 10 years into my career on 911 as a on a county government level in Arlington, Virginia.
8:34
SPEAKER_02: Um, and it really reinforced in a very real way that systems can be overwhelmed, information can be fragmented, and assumptions can fail.
8:43
SPEAKER_02: What stood out most was how communication gaps, whether between agencies or to the public, can compound an already devastating situation.
8:52
SPEAKER_02: Then there wasn't even a I don't even remember, I I don't even think I had heard of IPAWs at that point or that way of messaging that we do now, I should say.
9:02
SPEAKER_02: It hadn't been around that long, but out of 9-11, I think a lot of these things came to fruition and understanding that the importance of it.
9:09
SPEAKER_02: The iPod system used to be very taboo, not in a not in a bad way, but you didn't use it, you didn't touch it.
9:16
SPEAKER_02: So now thinking back, I wonder how, how could we have used it on that day?
9:22
SPEAKER_02: Like it's so it just wasn't even an option then.
9:25
SPEAKER_02: Would it have been beneficial to even do anything?
9:27
SPEAKER_02: And we're still questioning that.
9:29
SPEAKER_02: Where do you use it?
9:30
SPEAKER_02: How do you use it?
9:31
SPEAKER_02: What are the thresholds to use it?
9:33
SPEAKER_02: And what would they be this day and age?
9:36
SPEAKER_02: Um, and a lot of that, I I think there's been talk of that, but I think there needs to be more discussion on that.
9:42
SPEAKER_02: Where did it evolve from?
9:43
SPEAKER_02: Where did it really come to the thing where you just used knock on the door, bullhorns, things like that?
9:48
SPEAKER_02: How did that messaging evolve?
9:51
SPEAKER_02: And we've I know we've spoken about it um before, Eddie, things like that.
9:54
SPEAKER_02: But where has this really gone to and where is it gonna go?
9:57
SPEAKER_02: Because there's so many things as we talk a little bit more, I'll I'll expand upon that, but just going back to me, I really think that experience fundamentally shaped how I think about preparedness today.
10:10
SPEAKER_02: Um, it's not enough to have the systems in place.
10:13
SPEAKER_02: Um, they may be resilient, redundant, and user-centered.
10:17
SPEAKER_02: Uh, you have to plan for the future, the failure points though, because they will happen.
10:23
SPEAKER_02: And that's always the thing, you know, some people say 9-11 won't have.
10:27
SPEAKER_02: No, it's really when or if 9-11 would or a 9-11 um uh scale event happened again, you know, how would it be differently today than it was then?
10:41
SPEAKER_02: So those are things that you must have to design that those communication strategies, that strategies.
10:47
SPEAKER_02: Sorry about that, that work, that work not just on a good day, but obviously on the worst day, those dark sky days that none of us want to think about, dwell on, but it's it's just a part, especially if you're in that field, the public safety, emergency management.
11:00
SPEAKER_02: Um, it it becomes more like you know when, you know that it's going to happen, or something to an extent that we don't want to face, but it's gonna happen again.
11:10
SPEAKER_02: It also really deepened my appreciation for coordination and that there's no single agency or tool that can manage a major incident alone.
11:18
SPEAKER_02: So effective alerting and public communication depend on interoperability, shared understanding, and trust against organizations.
11:25
SPEAKER_02: And I can't extend, I cannot focus on the word trust.
11:30
SPEAKER_02: And that is trust amongst agency, interagency, but then also trust with the public.
11:35
SPEAKER_02: Because if you don't have that trust with the public, your message, I I if it's the perfect, it's sometimes it's just not going to mean a lot.
11:44
SPEAKER_02: And you have to build that trust before things happen versus at the time of, because that's not the time that people are may or may not trust you there, especially if you're talking on the phone to them.
11:55
SPEAKER_02: So that's something I've tried to carry forward in every role: bridging gaps between technology, policy, and real world operations.
12:02
SPEAKER_02: I think that's huge.
12:03
SPEAKER_02: So it's not just one singular thing, it is truly the operational spectrum of that.
12:08
SPEAKER_02: And looking back through my career is this communication is not a support function in public safety.
12:15
SPEAKER_02: It really is the mission.
12:16
SPEAKER_02: Whether you're answering a 911 call or issuing an alert, the goal is the same to give people the information they need to stay safe and do it in a way that they can act on immediately.
12:27
SPEAKER_02: And I will tell you that it wasn't until I Joanne and I was supporting the IPOS Technical Support Center, really been there for the last five years.
12:37
SPEAKER_02: And what I did for the past 28, some years or whatever, it all really combined when I started working there and seeing and studying and researching these alerts and getting to talk to people, not in my just the national capital region, but nationwide, worldwide.
12:53
SPEAKER_02: You know, we had visitors that would come and it's just like, oh wow, you're experiencing the same thing.
12:59
SPEAKER_02: And that that commonality is really huge.
13:02
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
13:02
SPEAKER_01: I that's great.
13:03
SPEAKER_01: I love hearing about your background and your the things that really stand out to you as you think through those turning points in your career.
13:12
SPEAKER_01: And I'm sure a lot of our listeners can really relate to those those key points that you were pushing forward.
13:18
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
13:18
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
13:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and in your role, let's talk about what you've what you've done.
13:24
SPEAKER_00: And specifically in FEMA and IPOS, you were a part of a really good team.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: Right.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: And in that team, you were supporting over 2,000 different alerting authorities.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: And again, for those that are listening, I mean, the show is called the Alerting Authority, right?
13:39
SPEAKER_00: It it's it's a jurisdiction that have this ability to send out emergency communication with the public.
13:45
SPEAKER_00: So you got to support them in a 24-hour center in a way that people could really call in real time to to figure things out.
13:54
SPEAKER_00: Um and we'll get into some of those those things that they called about in just a little bit.
13:58
SPEAKER_00: But looking at this from again that that 50,000 foot level trends, uh was there anything that stood out to you with the way that alerts are being sent out today, whether it's a good trend or something that's like, I don't know why we keep doing this type thing.
14:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
14:16
SPEAKER_02: Um, I think well, I definitely know for a fact, and this is a good thing, that alerting those notifications, whatever, you know, referred to as um have have matured significantly.
14:30
SPEAKER_02: But what I do also know is that they haven't, they haven't matured evenly.
14:34
SPEAKER_02: So you see pockets of really advanced, thoughtful use right alongside practices that still introduce risk.
14:41
SPEAKER_02: Um and and that's you know, on the positive five side, a few trends are clear that be that there's been a real shift from alert, like I was talking about, alert as a last resort to alert as a part of a continuum.
14:55
SPEAKER_02: And again, that's why I was talking about the whole thing before, after, during, and things like that.
15:00
SPEAKER_02: I see agencies that are using tools like iPods, the WIA, and the EASs, not just for catastrophic events, but for evolving situations, severe weather updates, evacuation preparedness, or progressions, even protective actions during law enforcement incidents.
15:17
SPEAKER_02: And unfortunately, we've seen a growing use of it in those situations where there's been active assailants and things like that that have increased just tragically in our in our nation right now.
15:29
SPEAKER_02: So that's a big step forward because it treats communication as ongoing, not a single moment.
15:35
SPEAKER_02: We're also seeing more precision.
15:36
SPEAKER_02: Geo targeting has improved, message templates are more refined, thanks to tools like the MDD, the message design dashboard that we have there.
15:45
SPEAKER_02: So if you have no clue, at least you're starting to get tools that can give you some clues.
15:50
SPEAKER_02: Help me because I have nothing here.
15:51
SPEAKER_02: You know, I've been left a folder from uh Q or whatever from here, and that was 10 years ago.
15:58
SPEAKER_02: Well, okay, I don't even know a password.
16:00
SPEAKER_02: I or I have a password, but I don't know what system we even use.
16:04
SPEAKER_02: So there is that, that there is that awareness that and that use of templates, like thinking, oh, this might be good to have prior to an incident versus during it.
16:14
SPEAKER_02: There's a greater awareness of reaching access to function um to access and functional needs populations.
16:19
SPEAKER_02: Huge, huge kid of that as well.
16:21
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, the better agencies are thinking carefully about who actually needs this message and exactly um, exactly what exactly to do.
16:31
SPEAKER_02: Um they need that those protective actions.
16:34
SPEAKER_02: And it's rather than just, you know, blasting out an entire jurisdiction.
16:37
SPEAKER_02: You know, there's thought that's going behind this so much more than there ever has been before.
16:41
SPEAKER_02: I think another encouraging trend is operational into integration.
16:45
SPEAKER_02: Alerting isn't just sitting in a silo anymore.
16:48
SPEAKER_02: Um it's increasing, uh it's increasingly tied to incident command, emergency operations centers, and joint information systems.
16:56
SPEAKER_02: Um and that alignment uh reduces the conflicting messages and speeds up that decision making under pressure.
17:02
SPEAKER_02: You gotta train, you gotta get these message templates, um, even if they're not exact, it's better to get that.
17:08
SPEAKER_02: What do they do?
17:09
SPEAKER_02: What do people do?
17:09
SPEAKER_02: That's what they really want to know.
17:11
SPEAKER_02: If it's happening at so-and-so street and, you know, cross street this and cross street that, but what do I do?
17:16
SPEAKER_02: Why am I getting this message and then why do I do it with it?
17:20
SPEAKER_02: But you know, there's still some concerning patterns that show up repeatedly, repeatedly.
17:24
SPEAKER_02: One is over-alerting, which we all know about, or miss misaligned urgency.
17:29
SPEAKER_02: When everything is marked as urgent, nothing is.
17:32
SPEAKER_02: If the public receives too many alerts that don't match their perceived level of risk, you start to erode that trust.
17:38
SPEAKER_02: And that's why I kind of mentioned earlier about that trust being so vitally important.
17:42
SPEAKER_02: Um, and that and that's incredibly hard to build alone.
17:46
SPEAKER_02: And then if you have to rebuild it, that's that's I I that's a lot of work, let's put it that way.
17:53
SPEAKER_02: So get that work done prior and you don't have to worry about it as much.
17:56
SPEAKER_02: Alert fatigue, we know, is real.
17:58
SPEAKER_02: And once people start ignoring those messages, the system loses its effectiveness when it matters most.
18:06
SPEAKER_02: I think another issue is inconsistent message quality under stress.
18:10
SPEAKER_02: Again, kind of repetitive, but these things are like we really need to like get these across to people, to those using them, um, those putting them out.
18:18
SPEAKER_02: And those people in charge, those people who are part of the decision-making process, they've really got to understand this, that this has to be done before, not during, even with templates.
18:28
SPEAKER_02: Um, you can tell when an agency hasn't trained enough in a high pressure, in high pressure writing messages, become too long, too vague, or buried in jargon.
18:37
SPEAKER_02: And we know how that bad how bad that is.
18:39
SPEAKER_02: You know, not everyone's gonna know what a bolo is.
18:42
SPEAKER_02: Not everyone's gonna know LSW, last scene wearing.
18:45
SPEAKER_02: It's it's a different language, and we have to remember that.
18:48
SPEAKER_02: In those moments, seconds do matter.
18:50
SPEAKER_02: Um, and the clarity matters even more.
18:53
SPEAKER_02: So the best alerts are simple, direct, and action-oriented.
18:56
SPEAKER_02: Um, and there's also a gap in cross-jurisdictional coordination.
18:59
SPEAKER_02: I know that's a huge thing that a lot of jurisdiction or alerting authorities call about, wondering, what do I do?
19:06
SPEAKER_02: How do I have this communication?
19:08
SPEAKER_02: Um, and and the thing is, is incidents don't respect boundaries, but alerting permissions and practices often do.
19:15
SPEAKER_02: You'll see neighboring jurisdictions sending slightly different or even conflicting messages about the same event.
19:21
SPEAKER_02: And that goes back again to that trust.
19:23
SPEAKER_02: It's like, well, wait, so-and-so county just told their citizens to do this, but our county that's like border is going the different direction.
19:30
SPEAKER_00: Like there's no, you know, like she's bringing up different things.
19:34
SPEAKER_00: We we don't have research on 90 plus percent of the different things, right?
19:39
SPEAKER_00: We have research on specific things, and Jeanette will probably reference those.
19:43
SPEAKER_00: Everything else is really from that just the perspective of of what her team has encountered, right?
19:50
SPEAKER_00: Things that they're looking at.
19:52
SPEAKER_00: And if anything, talk about such an invitation to do research on these things so that that we can see it.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: Because you you mentioned bull, you mentioned different jargon that people use.
20:04
SPEAKER_00: And while there is some research on that, man, I would love.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: So if there's a someone with a lot of money listening, please reach out because the different things that Jen has talked about are things that need to be researched more.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know, can I throw that out to you, Jeanette?
20:22
SPEAKER_00: I mean, just putting plugs in because again, like Jen and I are gonna talk about our experience and the things that we relate to.
20:30
SPEAKER_00: And and we may like we'll make statements and be like, hey, look, this is what we've seen.
20:35
SPEAKER_00: And we're yearning for the actual study and the actual research to back it up.
20:41
SPEAKER_00: But Jeanette, give me your thoughts on that too.
20:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we've we have done a lot of research, um, but there's there's plenty of room for more.
20:52
SPEAKER_01: I think one of the things that we've we've spent, my colleague Michelle Wood and I spent, I don't know, almost two years working on learning more about how people think about, perceive, and respond to this this category that people call over alerting.
21:09
SPEAKER_01: What is over-alerting and how do we define it?
21:12
SPEAKER_01: And at what point do people choose to say, I've had enough?
21:17
SPEAKER_01: And what does it mean to tune out versus opt out versus persist?
21:22
SPEAKER_01: We know a lot more about those things, but I think that as a researcher, for me, the precision of our words becomes so important when thinking about these different categories because we know that there is a huge concern about over alerting, but we don't know at what point does that feeling of being over alerted actually turn into this decision to say, I'm not paying attention anymore.
21:48
SPEAKER_01: And there's that rub right there of wanting to make sure that people are choosing our most powerful tools for the conditions where.
22:00
SPEAKER_01: It is the most important and the actions really need to be taken.
22:03
SPEAKER_01: And at the same time, recognizing that we don't know where those tipping points are yet, of people saying, I'm done.
22:12
SPEAKER_01: Because I remember, you know, in those early days of IPOS and of WIA, of the importance of trying to get more people to become alerting authorities.
22:22
SPEAKER_01: And so when we talk about over-alerting as this phantom thing that's happening, like, don't send a message because people are going to get tired of it.
22:32
SPEAKER_01: Like there is a balance because we do want more people to be to use the tools to learn how to use them correctly.
22:40
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I think that that's part of the rub there of figuring out where is that balance?
22:48
SPEAKER_01: Where is it related to being more targeted?
22:52
SPEAKER_01: Is it related to the the specific conditions that are really relevant to that individual population?
22:59
SPEAKER_01: Is it about the message quality and all of those different aspects that we could take into consideration as we think about improving messaging?
23:08
SPEAKER_01: That you asked me where where are the needs for research?
23:11
SPEAKER_01: Well, I think part of our need is we need more research, but I think also part of it is that getting the research into the hands of the practitioners is also a gap.
23:20
SPEAKER_01: And that's one of the things that we've been trying to do with the Alerting Authority and also with the Warren Room of trying to get that information out so it can inform the way that we're thinking about these different topics and thinking about them with precision.
23:35
SPEAKER_01: Because that precision is gonna make a difference in the way that we make decisions about how to move forward.
23:41
SPEAKER_01: But you know, yeah, gosh, I'd love to have more research.
23:46
SPEAKER_00: Go ahead.
23:47
SPEAKER_01: I I can tell you.
23:49
SPEAKER_01: Um, this morning we Michelle and I had been waiting for six months to find out if USGS was gonna release the money for us to do our follow-up study.
23:58
SPEAKER_01: And today we got the notice that they are, and we are one of 12 funded projects out of more than 200 that USGS is gonna fund.
24:08
SPEAKER_01: So we're starting our research up again this summer, and we're going to get those dimensions of over-alerting that can to build a model to see where that tipping point really is.
24:21
SPEAKER_01: But more research, gosh, more research is so desperately needed.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: And again, you'll hear me say it on different times, and Jen, I'm sure we've shared this too, is as we get, or Jeanette talked about the gap, because let's say research exists.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: If it's not in the hands of practitioners of those that are doing the work or writing the policy, it's it doesn't matter if we have the research or not because it's not being put to any good use.
24:45
SPEAKER_00: And so getting it into the hands, so I will often say, well, especially when we're talking about topics that I'm still very much a student in, is well, my policy is about to change now.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: Like I need to adapt my policy and policies were related to alerts and warnings based on this information.
25:03
SPEAKER_00: So there has to be an action item tagged to your learning.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: Because you you getting it, that's great.
25:09
SPEAKER_00: But you have to adjust how you're doing things based on it and really put that research to the test.
25:15
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, I know we totally diverted there.
25:18
SPEAKER_00: So welcome to the show, folks.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: We do it often.
25:22
SPEAKER_01: That was a great segue though, because I think like Jen, you you have seen all these national trends, but you've also seen and you c spoke about some of these issues around message quality.
25:33
SPEAKER_01: And I want to know more about what you've seen during real incidents and the state of message quality.
25:41
SPEAKER_01: You mentioned the use of acronyms like BOLO and LSW.
25:45
SPEAKER_01: And we see messages that have a lot of that dispatch abbreviations.
25:51
SPEAKER_01: But I've personally seen some improvements as I look at PBS Warren.
25:56
SPEAKER_01: I I'm starting to see some good things starting to come out.
26:00
SPEAKER_01: What are you seeing?
26:01
SPEAKER_01: Where is the research actually starting to take inform the practices that people are using?
26:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I think, and I was gonna kind of uh close up with the other and what we were talking before, but it segues right into this is, you know, I think to sum it up in the question pri previously was, you know, I think the field has really moved from can we send the alert to are we sending the right alert?
26:26
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's exactly what we just some some you know ended with.
26:30
SPEAKER_02: And it's because, you know, if you strip away the technology and let you strip away the technology and just look at the words people receive, the message quality today is way better than it used to be, but still uneven when it when it matters most.
26:45
SPEAKER_02: The gap isn't really about the access to tools now.
26:48
SPEAKER_02: And that's when we were talking about uh when you, Jeanette, said, like, you know, before we were trying to sign people up to be a learning authorities, trying to, you know, gain that trust and and this is something good for your community.
26:59
SPEAKER_02: So we're we still have more to go, or I should say iPod still has more to go.
27:03
SPEAKER_02: But what do they do with that is so important, you know, that and now that they have it, what are they doing with this?
27:11
SPEAKER_02: How are they looking at um where is that reach research gonna matter to those who are actually the decision makers?
27:17
SPEAKER_02: Because oftentimes those affectionaters aren't the decision makers.
27:23
SPEAKER_02: And that's the weirdest thing, right?
27:25
SPEAKER_02: They have this big pressure on their backs to push that button and to trust that you know what they send out to their communities is gonna be effective.
27:33
SPEAKER_02: Yet they're not always deciding that whether it goes out or not, or how it's gonna go out, or the words used even.
27:39
SPEAKER_02: But I think it's the access, it's really about not the access of the tools, but it's sorry, how well the agencies translate that urgency to the clear, usable instructions and again under that pressure.
27:51
SPEAKER_02: So when we when you ask that, like what are they getting right?
27:54
SPEAKER_02: I think the strongest messages uh share a few consistent traits.
27:58
SPEAKER_02: They're immediately actionable.
28:00
SPEAKER_02: The best alerts lead with a clear directive.
28:02
SPEAKER_02: And I know, like I said, I'm speeching, um, speaking to the choir just many people, but I think it just can't be said enough until we get it more right.
28:10
SPEAKER_02: You know, evacuate now, stay inside, avoid this area before anything else to get those clear directives out.
28:18
SPEAKER_02: Agencies uh train for this, this tend to resist that urge to overexplain and instead focus on what the public needs to do in those first, in those first one to five minutes of whatever is going around, uh, what's going on, or if they need to take an action there.
28:33
SPEAKER_02: They're structured for how um how people actually read alerts.
28:37
SPEAKER_02: Systems like the Wii Us, people are often seeing messages on, we get, we don't even think sometimes you don't even think about this on a locked phone screen.
28:45
SPEAKER_02: And that's stressful.
28:46
SPEAKER_02: Am I missing part of the message?
28:48
SPEAKER_02: You know, am I not scrolling down?
28:49
SPEAKER_02: Am I not getting anything?
28:50
SPEAKER_02: You know, so I think high-performing agencies, they front load the most critical information and use that plain language without burring the lead.
28:58
SPEAKER_02: I think another thing that where they're they are getting it right is they reflect pre-planning and muscle memory.
29:05
SPEAKER_02: And you can tell when an agency is exercised, alerts are concise, uh concise, formatted well, and don't uh don't read like they were written uh in a scratch, in a in a panic, you know, and and you can tell.
29:18
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, people say that text messaging and things like that shouldn't be written to some people, especially like if you're in an argument or things like that.
29:25
SPEAKER_02: But you have to think about that when you're, you know, you're ready, you're writing these um incredibly important messages, and you don't want to uh exercise that that state of panic that you might be in or might not be in uh to your community.
29:39
SPEAKER_02: I do feel where we still fall short, though, um consistently is trying to say too much too fast.
29:45
SPEAKER_02: Under stress, the people default into getting every detail they can into a message.
29:51
SPEAKER_02: You know, I need to tell them everything right now.
29:53
SPEAKER_02: And I I don't understand that maybe I send them this message that's very concise and clear and accurate, and then I I opdate with another one.
30:03
SPEAKER_02: Um, so it's not you have to push out all that information in the first, you know, two minutes or anything like that.
30:10
SPEAKER_02: You can stop and see how the incident is progressing.
30:13
SPEAKER_02: You know, you've got a technically accurate but functionally ineffective message at that point.
30:18
SPEAKER_02: And if someone has to reread an alert to understand it, it's already lost valuable time there.
30:24
SPEAKER_02: Um, so if you're sitting there like, I don't know what I'm supposed to do, I don't know what this even says, I can't understand the language, then you've you've lost, you possibly have lost somebody or more than one person in that, and that's horrible.
30:37
SPEAKER_02: Um again, I think we've talked about a recurring problem of unclear or missing protective actions, you know, police activity, ghastly, severe storm, but that doesn't clearly tell people what to do.
30:48
SPEAKER_02: So that protective action is hugely important.
30:51
SPEAKER_02: Um, it kind of forces uh the public to interpret risk on their own, and which which, you know, if they don't do the right thing, obviously that can result in bad decisions.
31:02
SPEAKER_02: And so we want to avoid those.
31:04
SPEAKER_02: Talked about the jargon.
31:05
SPEAKER_02: I still think there's a lot of that used where it shouldn't be.
31:09
SPEAKER_02: And is it easy?
31:10
SPEAKER_02: And do I know I can now this is gonna tell how long I've been around because they don't do this, especially after 9-11, but plain language.
31:18
SPEAKER_02: I could use, we could have conversations in 10 codes.
31:21
SPEAKER_02: If anybody back in the day knows, you could have an entire conversation, right, Eddie?
31:25
SPEAKER_02: Like we could have an entire conversation in 10 codes, and it was like one of the hardest habits for me to break because I would even do it at home.
31:33
SPEAKER_02: It's like, you know, I you say temporarily.
31:35
SPEAKER_02: People are just like, why do you keep saying that?
31:37
SPEAKER_02: That sounds so stupid.
31:38
SPEAKER_02: You're not on the radio or anything like that.
31:39
SPEAKER_02: It's like it's just ingrained in your brain.
31:42
SPEAKER_02: And that's almost what you kind of want not everyone to understand that, but you have to make it so they understand it.
31:47
SPEAKER_02: And there's where that's where that um sometimes it's hard because if you're so committed to learning that jargon, and now you're supposed to change it up for it, it it takes a it takes some finessing to do.
32:02
SPEAKER_02: I think also we see inconsistency in tone and urgency.
32:06
SPEAKER_02: Some alerts come across just overly alarmist, um, and then others underplay.
32:13
SPEAKER_02: So it's this, it's again, it's this balancing act on this map, this mismatch.
32:18
SPEAKER_02: When you have that alarmists are underplaying it, the credibility then is just is is starts to crumble.
32:25
SPEAKER_02: And people learn at that point, consciously or not, how seriously to take the message based on those past experiences, if that's what they've gotten from that.
32:33
SPEAKER_02: And then again, I we talked a bit about the jurisdictional, cross-jurisdictional.
32:37
SPEAKER_02: And that's more and more prevalent now.
32:39
SPEAKER_02: And it's actually really, really important.
32:41
SPEAKER_02: But who decides what?
32:43
SPEAKER_02: So you, you know, you get into those political and those who's in charge type situations there.
32:48
SPEAKER_02: But I I think the bottom line for this for me is that message quality isn't failing because people don't care.
32:55
SPEAKER_02: I know it's really failing where training, practice, and discipline haven't caught up to the speed of the tools.
33:00
SPEAKER_02: The agencies that excel treating alert as perishable skill, they drill it, they refine it.
33:07
SPEAKER_02: And then big, big point is they evaluate it after the real world use.
33:12
SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think Eddie, uh Jeanette, you both could go and say, go back to any of all the trainings that you've done and ask how many have actually then, once they've sent something out, did you evaluate it?
33:26
SPEAKER_02: Did you do kind of an after action on every one of those or incident?
33:31
SPEAKER_02: And sadly, I just don't think I I don't see them done enough when talking to people.
33:35
SPEAKER_02: You know, they're just like, we gotta move on to the next thing, don't have time.
33:38
SPEAKER_02: It's it's hugely important.
33:39
SPEAKER_02: How how much has I just seen in the last five years people it was checklists, you know, on a full-scale exercise, eyeballs or alert notifications, media front?
33:52
SPEAKER_02: It would just be a check mark.
33:53
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah, we thought of it.
33:54
SPEAKER_02: Yep, yep.
33:55
SPEAKER_02: Okay, so we don't we don't need to practice that.
33:57
SPEAKER_02: We we thought of it.
33:58
SPEAKER_02: It's a checklist.
33:59
SPEAKER_02: Yes, you do, and that's that's what I love and really would love to see more integration of.
34:03
SPEAKER_02: Now use that, actually send a message.
34:06
SPEAKER_02: And I think we've been putting that out there.
34:08
SPEAKER_02: And I know the training that I've done is that's the thing, is do it now.
34:14
SPEAKER_02: Get it done beforehand, get those templates written, think of these things beforehand.
34:18
SPEAKER_02: So then it's not just a checklist.
34:20
SPEAKER_02: It's like, hey, I actually did that, and I'm not perfect at it, but I'm more comfortable with it.
34:26
SPEAKER_02: That fear is exceptionally difficult.
34:28
SPEAKER_00: What you're talking about, I think, is is really good, but there are times when we experience pain points and something happens that interrupts even the best intentions.
34:38
SPEAKER_00: And and that's one of the things.
34:40
SPEAKER_00: So I guess a little plug first, you finished your time, correct, with working on the team with FEMA iPAUS, right, as a contractor.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: Is that correct?
34:49
SPEAKER_00: I have.
34:50
SPEAKER_00: And so for those that are looking or anybody else saying, hey, we're in need of someone to help run our program, you are accepting phone calls, right?
35:00
SPEAKER_00: And applications.
35:01
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
35:11
SPEAKER_00: There there are people out there that that are in need as well.
35:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
35:16
SPEAKER_00: Especially as we're talking about pain points.
35:18
SPEAKER_00: Again, the best plans are great until something happens and the plan is no longer, it doesn't address it.
35:25
SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that contacting the 24-7 Center has is that they work you through different um breakdowns.
35:33
SPEAKER_00: And again, we we don't have an official employee here or any official representative for FEMA iPods on today, but I will say it's the 1-800 IPOS lab you can call and and talk to somebody.
35:46
SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to get your opinion on this.
35:49
SPEAKER_00: When we talk about common breakdowns, what do you see as being this is these are some of the things that you know commonly happen or not?
35:58
SPEAKER_00: And it can be technical, procedural, or decision making.
36:02
SPEAKER_00: So if I had to go to those three, is it my which we always hear, my software has an issue?
36:08
SPEAKER_00: And I'm using quotations for those not watching the show and I'm doing it a thousand times because that one bugs the crud out of me because people blame software.
36:17
SPEAKER_00: Um when in reality is probably a different thing.
36:19
SPEAKER_00: But what do you see out of technical, procedural, or decision making?
36:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and that's exactly it.
36:28
SPEAKER_02: And I and I, you know, usually it's not because they're calling in because there's necessarily a single failure, especially when during an incident or the middle of an incident, because then it's it can be multiple, just everything you mentioned, those multiple small breakdowns are compounded into one and they're stacking up.
36:46
SPEAKER_02: You know, we don't ever want those calls.
36:47
SPEAKER_02: We'd rather you call, or they'd rather you call when um, you know, when prior to the incident, hey, I'm practicing this, or I'm we're doing a drill, or we just did an exercise, or we had a training, and actually you guys came out a few months ago, and now we've we've totally forgotten everything you said, and that's okay.
37:06
SPEAKER_02: And that's why it's 24-7, and that's why they're there at that number to answer.
37:11
SPEAKER_02: The analysts are amazing.
37:12
SPEAKER_02: And I I think um the most, you know, there's that, there's that all of the above is what you said, and there's the decision paralysis, and that's when you know you have those unclear thresholds.
37:25
SPEAKER_02: Get those thresholds done beforehand too.
37:27
SPEAKER_02: That's a whole nother process in itself.
37:29
SPEAKER_02: Um, and you know, hey, Eddie, thanks for the plug.
37:32
SPEAKER_02: But you know, more than happy to help with that um because every area, every jurisdiction is gonna be different on that.
37:38
SPEAKER_02: Thresholds are gonna be different.
37:39
SPEAKER_02: Now, when you're talking about that cross-jurisdictional, again, have those conversations where it's very important.
37:45
SPEAKER_02: How are you?
37:46
SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm I'm in the DC area.
37:48
SPEAKER_02: So, you know, Arlington, how are you gonna be with Alexandria?
37:51
SPEAKER_02: Things like this.
37:52
SPEAKER_02: Let's talk, you know, get those conversations going.
37:55
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes it's selling, but those thresholds and unclear ones are just uh essential to have that beforehand, you know, and then there's the approval changes I've already approval chain chains that I've already mentioned.
38:08
SPEAKER_02: As far as the technical, it can be it's trouble logging in or accessing the systems.
38:12
SPEAKER_02: Often it's that's permission related.
38:14
SPEAKER_02: So that's stuff that that can be helped.
38:16
SPEAKER_02: You just give that you know number a call.
38:18
SPEAKER_02: There's the uncertainty about geotargeting.
38:21
SPEAKER_02: That's a huge one.
38:22
SPEAKER_02: It it's it's scary because each tool that you have, it depends on what tool you have.
38:27
SPEAKER_02: Some are more commonplace than others, and we all know what you know which ones are most used and not used, but they can have different settings on their geotargeting.
38:35
SPEAKER_02: And so you you do have to understand your tool before you can just go use it.
38:39
SPEAKER_02: And then and there's also some confusion about which type of alert to use.
38:42
SPEAKER_02: And that's important to kind of know again about your approval processes and your policies and your procedures and your governance.
38:50
SPEAKER_02: You know, what type should already be written out?
38:52
SPEAKER_02: Like that should already be decided on beforehand of an incident than during an incident.
38:56
SPEAKER_02: It just causes so many issues that can come about with that and building that muscle memory.
39:02
SPEAKER_02: It sounds funny.
39:04
SPEAKER_02: And I I actually used to think those like muscle, but I mentioned something earlier is muscle memory, like 10 codes.
39:09
SPEAKER_02: That's a muscle memory.
39:11
SPEAKER_02: They just instinctually came out.
39:13
SPEAKER_02: Like I just would know that.
39:14
SPEAKER_02: And that's where you need to kind of get if you're going to be sending these messages out.
39:18
SPEAKER_02: And that includes not just iPods, that again, I'm I'm talking mass notifications that you know, the opt-in or the you know, the systems that are not opt-in.
39:28
SPEAKER_02: You need to know all those things.
39:29
SPEAKER_02: I think there's when I talk about jurisdictional confusion, another one that comes in and people don't think again, you know, who owns the alert?
39:38
SPEAKER_02: So who's gonna update it?
39:39
SPEAKER_02: Who's gonna end it or, you know, cancel it and things like that?
39:42
SPEAKER_02: Aligning those message cross boundaries are so important.
39:46
SPEAKER_02: So we gotta have those plans.
39:48
SPEAKER_02: We've got to have the tools available.
39:50
SPEAKER_02: The authority has to be assigned, coordination is huge.
39:54
SPEAKER_02: Um, I can't express enough to train, to train and not just again checklist it.
40:01
SPEAKER_02: You know, that's a checklist item.
40:02
SPEAKER_02: It's actually getting in there.
40:04
SPEAKER_02: People can come out and assist you with training.
40:07
SPEAKER_02: So it's not as scary.
40:09
SPEAKER_02: I know that's one of the biggest things that I've always been a proponent of, is consistently, and this is throughout the career.
40:15
SPEAKER_02: This is not, we're not talking about new people.
40:17
SPEAKER_02: This is people who have been in for 20 years.
40:20
SPEAKER_02: They like to call it a refresher.
40:22
SPEAKER_02: So if that makes it easier, just call it getting a refresher then instead of you know into actual training because you don't need training.
40:28
SPEAKER_02: You do, but you can call it whatever you want it.
40:30
SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think those those things, when you get those questions about who pushes the button, when do we push it, and what do we say, that's that's going to execute the proper communication techniques, especially in in emergencies.
40:43
SPEAKER_02: So I would agree.
40:44
SPEAKER_00: And I deal with that too.
40:46
SPEAKER_00: And if I again, I think I've listed like 20 pet peeves on the show over time.
40:52
SPEAKER_00: And and maybe they're all this way, but it's all with alerting.
40:55
SPEAKER_00: But like for the love, people, stop blaming software.
40:59
SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's usually a person issue.
41:03
SPEAKER_00: I I get this, and I'm not saying software can't have a breakdown, it absolutely can.
41:08
SPEAKER_00: But the vast majority that I've experienced that I've seen that I've been contacted in are people related.
41:14
SPEAKER_00: I had somebody who blames software because they couldn't get into it because they forgot their password.
41:20
SPEAKER_00: That is not a software issue, that's a you issue, right?
41:24
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, like I think that's what you've highlighted, super important.
41:29
SPEAKER_00: It's up to us really to get our our ducks in a row so that we can use and leverage the tool successfully.
41:36
SPEAKER_00: All right, I'll throw it back to Jeanette.
41:38
SPEAKER_00: I know.
41:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm just interrupting like crazy.
41:41
SPEAKER_01: I think one of the things you talked about earlier, Jen, was how there's been improvements in our ability to communicate with people who have access and functional needs.
41:51
SPEAKER_01: And I know we've we've spoken with some really key leaders in the United States in that space who have been really advocating for better communication, early communication, using the right channels to reach people at the right time, um, and how important that is for safety and survival.
42:10
SPEAKER_01: So tell me a little bit about what are you seeing with the agencies that are trying to figure out how do we do that better?
42:18
SPEAKER_01: How do we reach those vulnerable populations and make sure that those messages get to them in a timely and actionable way?
42:25
unknown: Yeah.
42:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
42:26
SPEAKER_02: And it comes up, it comes up during every training that I've ever done.
42:31
SPEAKER_02: And they are thinking about these things, but it's again, the question is how, you know, I and I and it does come with that preparedness.
42:38
SPEAKER_02: And I know I harp on that.
42:39
SPEAKER_02: That's one of my harp things is a preparedness.
42:42
SPEAKER_02: But getting out to your communities, don't, you know, many agencies still think one message fits all.
42:47
SPEAKER_02: And we'd like to think that.
42:49
SPEAKER_02: And, but, you know, it doesn't always, it's not always the case.
42:52
SPEAKER_02: It just isn't.
42:54
SPEAKER_02: And and I don't know if we've gotten a necessarily the best solution there yet.
42:58
SPEAKER_02: Um, but you can't assume that it's gonna work for everybody when you put it out there.
43:01
SPEAKER_02: I know I have I have a 96-year-old father, and he is going to, trust me, he will receive whether he's reading the same thing that you or I am reading, he's gonna read it differently.
43:11
SPEAKER_02: It's just a guarantee.
43:13
SPEAKER_02: And that just comes with a whole lot of what's left of his muscle memory, you know.
43:18
SPEAKER_02: So you have to think of, which is very near and dear to my heart, just for that reason, but I've always loved working with those access and functional need populations.
43:26
SPEAKER_02: That's like a big, big thing for me.
43:28
SPEAKER_02: I know we did one on cross-cur um cross-cultural communications on when I was with the IPAUS program.
43:34
SPEAKER_02: And it was one of the most enlightening things that I've ever experienced in my career to understand how someone from another culture is perceiving the same alert that someone from another culture or here at our is getting that information.
43:47
SPEAKER_02: So now we're up in, you know, forget just even the proactive actions and how people are doing those.
43:53
SPEAKER_02: There's so much, there's so many layers to these onion, to this onion that you can go back to.
43:58
SPEAKER_02: And it's a huge thing.
43:59
SPEAKER_02: You know, how What is a person with a disability, any type of disability?
44:03
SPEAKER_02: How are how are they gonna um how are they gonna conduct that protect protective action?
44:09
SPEAKER_02: Very differently, probably than someone who's more able-bodied in some way.
44:13
SPEAKER_02: So those are things that, again, it's a responsibility, in my opinion, that those emergency personnel really have to understand and talk about prior to something happening.
44:23
SPEAKER_02: It's a huge thing with the, you know, we're working, and I know for a fact we're working on American Sign Language and other and you know, and non-English speakers.
44:33
SPEAKER_02: There's advancements coming in that area, you know, but we do have to think of transient uh people, homeless people coming through area.
44:42
SPEAKER_02: It again, there's so many.
44:44
SPEAKER_02: I can I could talk all afternoon on just this, but I'm trying to keep my you know thoughts all together and kind of just saying that we we do need to think about those communities and not treat these populations as afterthoughts because everyone, everyone deserves to be able to one receive a message and then understand what they need to do with that message.
45:04
SPEAKER_02: So again, we're losing seconds and seconds matter.
45:08
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes that sounds corny, and and people in if I don't think if necessarily in the public safety realm always get that, that seconds, I mean minutes matter, seconds actually can matter.
45:19
SPEAKER_02: And and that is something else.
45:21
SPEAKER_02: I obviously learned that in doing 911.
45:25
SPEAKER_02: It it couldn't be a matter of, you know, if I if we could reach somebody, a medic unit could reach somebody in four four minutes, or it's gonna take them 15 minutes and lives change in those seconds, you know, and it's it's it's crazy to think about it.
45:40
SPEAKER_02: And sometimes I look back at, you know, everything, my career, and I'm just like, wow, you you start understanding in different layers and how much it's grown and how important these messages are.
45:52
SPEAKER_02: I don't think I necessarily understood how important it was for messaging effectively was until I started to do a little PIO work and then did the watch desk where we were actually putting those alerts out.
46:06
SPEAKER_02: So if you're not actually doing it, it's something you just kind of take for granted.
46:10
SPEAKER_02: Like someone's gonna get it right, you know, I guess.
46:12
SPEAKER_02: But you don't think about it unless you're on the other end or actually the one having to push that button.
46:17
SPEAKER_02: So I think all those things are important to understand.
46:21
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, you have to understand your uh whoever is creating these messages, you have to understand your local geography.
46:29
SPEAKER_02: And people are like, why would they need if you don't know what area you are?
46:33
SPEAKER_02: I've I've actually seen it and I've heard it, and it was actually not great as someone from a state agency did not know their counties and we're just kind of willy-nilly.
46:44
SPEAKER_02: I just I'm gonna pick these three counties.
46:47
SPEAKER_02: It's like, yeah, you know, and we were limited sometimes as far as we say, but it's you know, have you thought of this?
46:54
SPEAKER_02: Have you thought of that?
46:55
SPEAKER_02: But you know, you need it again.
46:56
SPEAKER_02: I it's just I keep going back to the same thing.
46:58
SPEAKER_02: I know it's probably old by now, but you you have to think of these things prior.
47:03
SPEAKER_02: And there's so many ways and tools for you to get help to understand that.
47:07
SPEAKER_02: Get out and and have your communities trust you.
47:11
SPEAKER_02: There's huge gaps in in that aspect of it.
47:14
SPEAKER_02: And and Jeanette, I'm sorry, I probably got off your uh your question a little bit.
47:17
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm just preaching what I but you know, understand I was gonna say it goes for my thing, and because we're gonna do like essentially one minute each here as a closing, and I'm gonna have you go first, Jen, I'll go, and then Jeanette can close us out.
47:32
SPEAKER_00: Is if you had 60 seconds, right?
47:35
SPEAKER_00: And I all follow the same rule, what would be your final push?
47:39
SPEAKER_00: I mean, from someone who's seen it at the level that you've seen it and the different levels, what's your final push for for those alerting authorities at different levels, right?
47:49
SPEAKER_00: Different ends of the spectrum.
47:50
SPEAKER_00: You got 60 seconds to ask them or invite them to do anything you want, go for it.
47:57
SPEAKER_02: Oh, wow.
47:58
SPEAKER_02: Um, reach out for training if if you well, I should say if you don't have it internally, find it externally.
48:04
SPEAKER_02: Um, there's many, many resources and tools for you.
48:07
SPEAKER_02: Get to know your communities.
48:09
SPEAKER_02: Um to, you know, go to those leaders in the community.
48:13
SPEAKER_02: You can find out who they are.
48:14
SPEAKER_02: Who's who's a um church leader?
48:18
SPEAKER_02: Who runs the assisted living facility?
48:21
SPEAKER_02: What county fairs are coming up?
48:22
SPEAKER_02: What anything is coming up where I can just get out.
48:25
SPEAKER_02: And if people don't even, even for your, you know, if you're not, educate also your community on these tools that you're gonna use.
48:33
SPEAKER_02: What happens when I get that obnoxious?
48:35
SPEAKER_02: What is what are the areas, policies and procedures for that horrible, horrible noise so that I get on my phone and I don't want to be bothered with?
48:43
SPEAKER_02: Why should I opt in to a mass notification system?
48:47
SPEAKER_02: Is that you know, let them know that it's not no one's gonna be following them around because they've opted in and given information.
48:52
SPEAKER_02: The communities have to understand what these things are they're getting on their phone.
48:56
SPEAKER_02: It's also not fair for those that are learning not to be trained, not to be giving.
49:01
SPEAKER_02: And I know there's understaffing and underfunding everywhere, but there are free tools, there's free resources out there, and you just have to be able to reach out.
49:11
SPEAKER_02: You know, I I just think that getting this practice in there, and you can call IPAUS TSS.
49:18
SPEAKER_02: They're there to help you out, practice with you if you need it.
49:21
SPEAKER_02: I know that all of them are more than willing to assist with that.
49:24
SPEAKER_02: Um, but there's other resources too.
49:26
SPEAKER_02: So I hope you I hope whomever is listening to this, you know, calls and gets that training, um, thinks about it, thinks about these things in a preparedness mode.
49:36
SPEAKER_02: So that would be my 60-second plug.
49:38
SPEAKER_00: I'll turn it over to that and she'll wave what if when I'm hitting 59, because it's like, don't go over.
49:44
SPEAKER_00: Here's my here's my plug.
49:46
SPEAKER_00: Your role, if everybody who's listening, if you're involved in this space, is not only important, it is vital.
49:54
SPEAKER_00: And you need to understand that.
49:55
SPEAKER_00: You need the community to understand that, the people you work with to understand it.
50:00
SPEAKER_00: If we fail to get communication out, we fail.
50:04
SPEAKER_00: It needs to be done.
50:06
SPEAKER_00: It is not a point and click type function.
50:09
SPEAKER_00: You need training, you need to actually have knowledge with this.
50:14
SPEAKER_00: There's so many roles that exist where we can hand somebody a binder and a checklist and say, go do it.
50:19
SPEAKER_00: This is not one of those.
50:21
SPEAKER_00: And we have countless examples of it being treated as such.
50:25
SPEAKER_00: And I mean, after action, they're like, Well, you know, I don't have much experience, so here, I just did what I could do.
50:32
SPEAKER_00: You need experience.
50:33
SPEAKER_00: Um, this field is growing in that way, which I appreciate.
50:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, I mentioned you need internal and external education.
50:41
SPEAKER_00: The people within need to understand what it is.
50:45
SPEAKER_00: And and I know as Jeanette and I go out and teach, it's interesting.
50:48
SPEAKER_00: We bring up if you guys, meaning the group we're talking to, don't have a full understanding, how can you expect the public to have a full understanding of what you're doing?
50:58
SPEAKER_00: And so both of those need to go.
51:00
SPEAKER_00: My last one is the same thing that you talked about, Jen, is the public and private partnerships for emergency communication.
51:09
SPEAKER_00: And whether you're the largest retail company in the world, whether you're the smallest mom and pop shop, you want to make sure that your people have the same level of protection and it needs to be done in coordination with the public side, with your county, local, whoever it may be.
51:25
SPEAKER_00: Um, that's where communication needs to be.
51:28
SPEAKER_00: It it is it is holistic.
51:30
SPEAKER_00: Um, and that's my one minute, and I'll pass it to you, Jeanette.
51:35
SPEAKER_01: Cool.
51:36
SPEAKER_01: Um so I think for me, my one minute is gonna be about research.
51:43
SPEAKER_01: Surprise.
51:46
SPEAKER_01: Um we have more than 70 years of research on human behavior in response to alerts and warnings.
51:55
SPEAKER_01: Some of it is super easy to access.
51:58
SPEAKER_01: Some of the places that you would go to get those free resources are places like the Disaster Research Center at the University of Delaware, the Natural Hazard Center.
52:08
SPEAKER_01: Person who has written an article and you want to read their article, if you find them, I can guarantee you that they are gonna be super ecstatic to send that article to you and maybe even get on a call and talk with you about it.
52:21
SPEAKER_01: Because so many researchers sit behind their desks all day long and just hope that somebody finds what they've done and are trying to contribute to society.
52:33
SPEAKER_01: So, on the flip side of that, for practitioners, like finding that research is really important.
52:38
SPEAKER_01: But for researchers, I know that there are students that listen to this podcast, and it is so important for you, once you've finished your research, to translate it into something that is accessible and practical for practitioners so that they can implement this good work that you've been doing.
52:59
SPEAKER_01: We have this incredible opportunity to help to shape the future by doing research that matters, that can be implemented in the field where we can truly see the impact as it is changing the way that practitioners do their work and it's helping them to save lives.
53:21
SPEAKER_01: There's no better calling for a researcher than to see their work implemented in this way.
53:27
SPEAKER_01: But it cannot be used if you don't do the work of translating it for the practitioner and then marketing it, getting it out there, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, and being visible.
53:40
SPEAKER_01: And so those that's my 60 seconds because you know, I am so grateful that practitioners are reading the things that I've been doing, but I need to do more.
53:52
SPEAKER_01: And I want to make sure that if there's stuff that the practitioners that you want to learn more about, like let me know because I want to make sure that I get that out there too.
54:01
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm gonna take this last few minutes to talk a little bit more about what we do at the alerting authority and at the Warren Room.
54:10
SPEAKER_01: We provide training where we work directly with counties, cities, universities, organizations that need assistance on their alerting.
54:18
SPEAKER_01: We look at your policies, we look at your procedures, we can review your templates, we can help you to make your templates so that you have that ready to go when it's time to act and you have this incredible confidence because you've done the work ahead of time that shows that you are competent.
54:35
SPEAKER_01: And we are preparing to launch our second boot camp.
54:39
SPEAKER_01: The warning boot camp will be held July 20th through 24th.
54:43
SPEAKER_01: And that is for organizations that are ready to get their templates written with the help of experts in the field.
54:51
SPEAKER_01: We walk you through it two days, two days, sorry, two hours each day for five days, and you will get your most critical templates done and ready to go.
55:00
SPEAKER_01: So please uh reach out to us at thewarnroom.com for more information about boot camp.
55:07
SPEAKER_01: And be sure to check out the alerting authority for additional ways that we can come and help your organization to get that critical training that you need.
55:16
SPEAKER_00: So, as always, thank you for listening.
55:18
SPEAKER_00: We hope that you enjoyed it.
55:19
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55:21
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55:24
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55:26
SPEAKER_00: We know here that every second has a story, and we're grateful to be here to help share yours.
55:30
SPEAKER_00: So, thank you for being here.