We sought to benchmark High Reliability Organizing (HRO) in US federal wildland fire management, and to investigate relationships among and between components of HRO and other related group behaviors (organizational learning, respectful interaction, leadership direction, etc). Through a telephone survey we listened to a broad range of permanent fire managers - Agency administrators, Fire Management Officers, dispatch and ground operations - responsible for the full range of wildland fire events - from prescribed fire to suppression, from the smallest to the largest, longest events. Previous exploratory principal component analysis (PCA) indicated five main components underlying respondents' experiences of recent fire events, corresponding to: HRO practices, Leadership, Group Culture, Learning Orientation, and Mission Clarity. More detailed analysis also indicated that different sub-groups (bottom-rung ground forces, mid-level incident maangement team positions, and upper management) prioritize and rate their performance on each of these components quite differently.

In this presentation, we report on efforts to describe and understand relationships between these components using structural equation models (SEM). For instance, we seek to understand whether a strong group culture must exist before a group engages in HRO practices consistently; and how specific leadership behaviors influence HRO practices and group culture. Initial results clarify and reframe our original interpretation of the emergent components, revealing the HRO practices as fundamental to cross-hierarchical coordinating communications, and direct relationships between our measures of HRO practices, inter-group culture (Group Culture), and reflective practices (Learning Orientation), but indirect relationship between Group Culture and leadership behaviors to encourage raising, sharing and integrating diverse perspectives (Leadership). We will report on both a population-wide SEM as well as separate SEMs developed for each distinct sub-group.

Results are likely to have direct, specific and immediate application for teams, managers and trainers seeking to improve safety and reliability.