Book Image

Flow-based Leadership: What the Best Firefighters can Teach You about Leadership and Making Hard Decisions

By : Judith L. Glick-Smith Ph.D
Book Image

Flow-based Leadership: What the Best Firefighters can Teach You about Leadership and Making Hard Decisions

By: Judith L. Glick-Smith Ph.D

Overview of this book

There comes a day when we have to make a tough decision under stress. That decision might change the course of our life. Flow-Based Leadership helps you improve your decision-making skills through the use of some great real-life stories of firefighters. The book first introduces the feeling called ‘flow’—teaching by example its importance in decision-making. Next, you’ll explore various techniques to initiate flow in critical situations and how to respond when flow doesn’t occur as expected. You will learn how to implement flow-based decision making and flow based-leadership within personal and professional circumstances. You will next encounter an extreme, experiential training program called Georgia Smoke Diver (GSD), and how it helps special military forces like Navy Seals and Army Rangers to maintain a calm focus in chaotic situations. Towards the end, the book uses the GSD program to describe the flow-based organizational framework and how it can be integrated into your life and workplace to achieve better decision-making skills. By the end of this book, you’ll be able to use flow-based leadership in your personal and professional life maintain clarity and confidence under duress.
Table of Contents (11 chapters)

Smoke Daddy Designation

The term Smoke Daddy refers to the leader of the Georgia Smoke Diver program. GSD members, those who have completed the class, elect the Smoke Daddy. There have only been five members selected to serve as Smoke Daddy since the program’s inception:

  • Smoke Daddy #1: Cortez Lawrence, GSD #1, 1978–1981 (Currently with U.S. Department of Homeland Security.)
  • Smoke Daddy #2: Rob Fowler, GSD #10, 1981–1983 (retired as the fire chief of the LaGrange, Georgia Fire Department.)
  • Smoke Daddy #3: John McLaughlin, GSD #9, 1983–1984 (retired as chief of operations for the Cobb County, Georgia, Fire Department.)
  • Smoke Daddy #4: Scott Millsap, GSD #25, 1985–1994 (retired as training captain from the City of Dalton Fire Department. Died September 23, 2002.)
  • Smoke Daddy #5: David Rhodes, GSD #339, 1995–present (Currently serving as battalion chief for the City of Atlanta Fire Rescue Department.)

Smoke Daddy...