Emergency Management Women Refuse to Respond

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1. Use the cursor to highlight the figure number and caption where they appear in the narrative chapters. (Figure 1. Figure caption.)

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1. Place your cursor on the List of Figures page in the TOC.

1. Open the References tab.

1. Left click Insert Tables of Figures.

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1. Go to Options. Remove check from “style” box. Put a check in the “Table entry fields” box. Put A in the Table identifier box. Click OK. Click OK again on initial Table of Figures box.

1. The figures will appear on the List of Figures page. You may have to reformat the spacing and font. If the captions themselves change in the narrative, this whole process must be repeated. If only the page numbers change, do this:

1. Left click to place the cursor anywhere on the figures mentioned on the List of Figures page.

1. Right click “Update field.”

1. Place bullet in circle for option to update page numbers only.

1. Left click OK.

1. The page numbers will update automatically.

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Background

The need to respond during disasters is often quick, unscheduled, and unplanned for. The need to find care for family members at home will often be hard to find if the planned solution is themselves attempting to deal with the event. Often times, there is an organization policy that determines who in the company is required to respond to those emergencies. It is those policies that women often cannot take a role in these positions because they are contradictory to what is required of them at home. New challenges are brought in by industry’s changes and the varying degrees of emergent situation requirements.

There have not been quality research studies that provide sufficient knowledge to address the challenges that women emergency responders may adopt to improve the level of their urgent job calls when they have families to care. This research aims to bridge the knowledge gap and provide information for effective decision making for women who may be required to respond to emergent work conditions even when they have no one else to take care of their families and offer solutions to employers to minimize the conflict.

The family make-up and dynamic has changed significantly over the past two decades, and more women are serving as the primary earner in the household. Medved (2016, p. 236) notes 40% of U.S women, a 30% increase from 1960, are primary breadwinners in families with children (as cited in Wang, Parker & Taylor, 2013). Additionally, more women are in occupations previously dominated by males such as Emergency Medical Services (EMS), firefighting, and the police force. Defined as occupations with less than 25% women, men dominated careers include Emergency Medical Services (EMS), firefighting, and the police force (Du Plessus, O’Sullivan & Rentschler, 2014). While this shift brings along certain obvious challenges such as discrimination and sexual harassment, Dresden (2018) thought the problems facing women are more pronounced when it comes to work-life conflict (as cited in Helfgott, Gunnison, Murtagh, & Navejar, 2018, p. 240).

This research will be a qualitative study as it aims in gaining a better understanding of the familial challenges for women serving in emergency response roles. Hopefully, the study is used to make informed recommendations that will show women in this profession a balance between family and work life is possible. The appropriate methodology for this study will be the use of structured, but relaxed interviews (Gubrium et at., 2012, p. 197). The rationale for discussions is to draw in-depth analysis and information on the opinions, feelings, and perceptions women responders with regards to the challenges in the work environment and their family balance. In a previous study investigating willingness of first responders to work during disasters, focus groups and interviews were used (Smith, 2015, p. 3). The reason given for the use of their methodology was to promote relaxation and build a relationship. The information gathered will be collected from a group of women whom share the same challenges. Because of the shared experiences the interviewed women have experienced, this study is phenomenological. The focus will be on how the experience is described. The challenge will be to eliminate personal involvement (Patton, 2015, p. 575). The need to remove own prejudices and viewpoints is crucial for an objective study.

1. What are the perceived underlying causes of work-life conflict for women serving in emergency response roles?

2. How can these underlying causes of work-life conflict for women serving in emergency response roles be eliminated or minimized?

3. What are the experienced challenges that women first responders have realized in the need to respond to urgent work calls when they have no one else to look after their families?

The study aims to address the challenges that women face when they are needed to respond to disasters but have no one else to tend to their families while they are deployed. The research will explore the areas in which women responders have found key challenges when they are the only viable option to tend to their families in times of disasters, and at the same time, attempt to still maintain their time to the work requirements especially during a disaster when most organizations want all of their critical personnel on deck. Attempts that the women have tried to excel both in their families and at their career have met significant resistances based on logistical requirements especially if there are no other people to help the mothers to take care of families.

The purpose of this study is to improve the understanding of the familial challenges facing women employed as emergency response personnel. Women employees are many across different sectors, and their numbers keep increasing. However, in career fields that require response action, women are not as well represented. Women in these roles find more challenges than their male counterparts because most males that have families also have someone else available to tend to their families if they have to respond to a disaster. Almost every year, with the new introduction of policies regulating work and with changes in the work structures, there is always a reason for increased research and knowledge that can advise the women employees in the best direction to take to improve their job response time with family considerations. This is the reason why a study like the current one is vital in helping in boosting the available knowledge on how women employees can manage to make quick responses to duty calls and still know that their families will be safe while they are gone.

The most logical trajectory for this study would be phenomenological research, offering an explanation to concerns affecting women that work in emergency response roles while acting as head of their household. The aim for participants is women who share difficulties and experiences within their family role and their employment (Patton, 2015, p. 118). As the information gathered evolves, the issues will change and the true factors that are leading to work-life conflict will become obvious (Gubrium, Holstein, Marvasti, and McKinney, 2012, p. 86). Patton (2015) presumed this method will best find that shared experience and how they each process that shared experience. Because the responses to the interview questions are expected to be similar, that shared problem should also result in a post research experience that can be shared with others (p. 115). The shared experience, or essence of the shared experience, must exist in a phenomenological approach in order for it to be understood within the group (Patton, 2015, p. 116). If the experience is not similar, then how participants perceive the interview questions differ.

Beaty and Davis (2012) studied the reasons why women were venturing away from city manager positions. One of those reasons was noted to be lack of set scheduling and childcare. With the absence of overnight or odd hour childcare, needing to be on location for an emergency during off hours is virtually impossible. Whereas Wang, Parker, and Taylor (2013) note that more women are becoming the breadwinners in the family. They studied a growing trend that more women were becoming the main or sole financial provider of the home and the public is conflicted (Wang et al., 2013).

The general framework will identify the underlying factors for some challenges and their consequences. The framework will strengthen the need for and ways of reducing or altogether eliminating the challenge of being a woman, head of her household that works in a job, requiring her to be on scene as a responder of natural disasters. All these will be guided by the end goal of increasing the quality of output for female employees as well as their morale. As an additional benefit, the findings and recommendations of the study hope to improve the population of women in this profession as the working environment will be made conducive for them. The research framework will be based on the causes of work-life conflict challenges for women serving in emergency response roles, their effects and measure, and policies to put in place that will motivate women in this profession and increase the quality of their output.

First Responder - Homeland Security Presidential Directive / HSPD-8 defines the term “first responder” as “individuals who in the early stages of an incident are responsible for the protection and preservation of life, property, evidence, and the environment, including emergency response providers as defined in section 2 of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 101), as well as emergency management, public health, clinical care, public works, and other skilled support personnel (such as equipment operators) that provide immediate support services during prevention, response, and recovery operations” (Department of Homeland Security, 2003).

Shelter-in-place - FEMA defines sheltering-in-place when conditions require that you seek immediate protection in your home, place of employment, school or other location when disaster strikes.

The study will be limited by the number of cases that can be analyzed without missing the purpose of anazlyzing the data. The research may be limited with time available and allocated. The study, following that it will touch on the individual person may have data sensitivity issues that may also limit the level of success in data availability and analysis. However, with proper planning, it is always possible to provide the best possible solutions to the data collection problems. It is assumed that participant responses will be honest and forthcoming. It is up to the interviewer to establish a trust and rapport with each interviewee. A final assumption is that the data received will not be used or shared with employers and family members. It will be up to the interviewer to ensure that the interviewee understands that all information will be confidential and coded to ensure animomity.

Scope and Delimitations

The study aims to address that under most normal conditions for women first responders is the limited time allocated for the family can be interrupted by work. Attempts that women have tried to excel both in their families and at the places of employment have met significant resistances based on logistical requirements especially if there are no other people to help women to take care of their families. This study will explore the different approaches that have worked for some women, and those that have been attempted and failed. The final area of focus the study will touch is to devise the solutions that women employees can adopt to improve the success to which they can respond to urgent work duties with families requiring their attention. Women working in first responder roles, are the heads of their household or have a different familial challenge will be the focus of this study.

Significance of the Study

In an attempt to be equally represented in the labor market as their counterparts, today women are venturing in fields that have still not been made favorable for them to work in (Knörr, H., 2011, p. 101). Existing work policies fall short in recognizing that women will experience challenges while employed as emergency response personnel and if familial concerns exist as well. The emergency response roles come with challenges that affect both male and female employees. Unfortunately, the weight of female problems outweighs those of the males (Messing and Östlin, 2006).

These differences and difficulties create a work environment that automatically decreases the quality of output of the women employees. Women want to work in these roles responding to emergencies or disasters but the uncertainty of work schedules or the negative attitude from employers deters them into a different career (Beaty and Davis, 2012, p. 624). Policy makers and administrators, however, are not aware of this issue as they prefer to address the work-life balance of employees in general as opposed to focusing on those that address the type and nature of a female emergency responding personnel.

This study will support professional practice, contributing to a field of research where little is known, focusing on familial challenges of women in emergency response jobs. The aim of addressing challenges unique to this profession that over the years has seen female employees leave the career fields that they wanted to be in. The findings of this study will hopefully highlight areas administrators and policymakers should focus on in increasing performance of the female employees in this profession. The goal of the study results is to show an area where further contributions can be made for change to see women employed in emergency response roles to not choose between their obligated duties to the public and their families.

Place your text here; when placing your cursor on this text, you will see in the style menu that this paragraph is tagged “Body Text.” That means it will automatically appear double-spaced with the first line indented, per Walden style. The sixth edition of the APA manual advises two character spaces between sentences. Walden accepts either one or two spaces; either is acceptable, just be consistent. The text in this template has one character space between sentences.

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To apply this template’s formatting to the text of your paper, simply highlight the paragraph(s) or heading you want to format, and choose the appropriate tag from the style menu. The list of style tags includes all levels of headings, block quotes, table number and title, APA references, and body text.

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[place figure here]

Figure 1. This is a sample of a figure caption.

Note that the figure number is set in italics and followed by a period. The figure caption follows on the same line and in sentence case, ending with a period.

Follow these instructions to allow figure number and caption to update in the List of Figures.

1. Use the cursor to highlight the figure number and caption. (Figure 1. Text.)

2. Press Shift + Alt + the letter o). In the Mark Table of Contents Entry that comes up, you will see the figure information that you highlighted in the Entry box. Put A in the Table Identifier box. Put 1 in the Level box. Do not close the Mark Table of Contents Entry box. Work can be done while it is open.

3. Continue to follow this protocol for all figures. You will see parenthetical entry field coding beside each figure caption.

4. Close Mark Table of Contents Entry box.

5. Place your cursor on the List of Figures page in the TOC.

6. Open the References tab.

7. Left-click Insert Tables of Figures.

8. In the Table of Figures box that comes up, put a check in the “Show page numbers” and “Right align page numbers boxes.” Remove the check from the hyperlink box. Put dot leaders in the Tab leader box. Under General, format is “from template.” Caption label is “Figure.” Put a check in the “Include label and number” box.

9. Go to Options. Remove check from “style” box. Put a check in the “Table entry fields” box. Put A in the Table identifier box. Click OK. Click OK again on initial Table of Figures box.

10. The figures will appear on the List of Tables page. You may have to reformat the spacing and font. If the captions themselves change, this whole process must be repeated. If only the page numbers change, do this:

a. Left click to place the cursor anywhere on the figures mentioned on the List of Figures page.

b.  Right click “Update field.”

c. Place bullet in circle for option to update page numbers only.

d. Left click OK.

e. The page numbers will update automatically.

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