Overwhelm Archives - Page 2 of 6 - Situational Awareness Matters!™

Distractions and Interruptions – SAM 368

Leave a Comment / Attention Management, Checklists, Decision Making, Disoriented, Distractions and Interruptions, Expectations, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Interruptions, Judgment, Lost Focus, Mindfulness, Motion Induced Blindness, Neuroscience, Overload, Overwhelm, Personnel location, Preoccupation, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Management, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Situational awareness, Task Fixation, Technology, Vigilance / Rich Gasaway

In this episode, we preview the distractions and interruptions chapter from the book, How Smart Workers Use Situational Awareness to Improve Safety. Along a worker’s journey toward envisioning, developing, and implementing their plan to guide their (hopefully) successful outcome, they are likely to encounter two situational awareness barriers that can quickly derail their focus. Distractions […]

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Short-Term Memory – SAM 367

Leave a Comment / Checklists, Confusion, Decision Making, Defiance, Expectations, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Frustration, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Information overload, Judgment, Mindfulness, Multitasking, Neuroscience, Overload, Overwhelm, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Management, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Selective Listening, Short Term Memory, Simulation, Situational awareness, Size Up, Task Fixation, Task Saturation, Vigilance, Workload Management, Worksheets / Rich Gasaway

In this episode, we preview the short-term memory chapter from the book, How Smart Workers Use Situational Awareness to Improve Safety. Short-term memory can create a formidable challenge to situational awareness. Long-term memory is huge, some might argue it’s limitless. Short-term memory, not so much. The capacity of the average person’s short-term memory is about

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Information Overload – SAM 355

Leave a Comment / Assumptions, Attention Management, Communications, Decision Making, Disoriented, Expectations, Frustration, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Information overload, Judgment, Leadership, Long-Term Memory, Lost Focus, Mindfulness, Miscommunications, Multitasking, Neuroscience, Overload, Overwhelm, Preoccupation, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Management, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Selective Listening, Shared Mental Models, Situational awareness, Stress, Tacit Knowledge, Task Saturation, Vigilance / Rich Gasaway

This episode explores the capacity of the human brain to process sensory stimuli into short-term memory and the impact it can have on situational awareness. The San Francisco Fire Department conducted an internal review of the incident and issued a 156-page report on their findings. Many of the lessons relate to situational awareness and it

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The Myth of Multitasking – SAM 346

Leave a Comment / Assumptions, Attention Management, Automatic Action, Checklists, Cognitive Memory, Competency, Confusion, Decision Making, Disoriented, Distractions and Interruptions, Expectations, Frustration, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Information overload, Interruptions, Judgment, Long-Term Memory, Lost Focus, Mind Drift, Mindfulness, Multitasking, Neuroscience, Overload, Overwhelm, Pattern Matching, Perception, Perception Of Reality, Prediction, Preoccupation, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Management, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Selective Listening, Short Term Memory, Situational awareness, Task Fixation, Task Saturation, Vigilance, Worksheets / Rich Gasaway

This episode explores the challenges workers face while operating in dynamically changing conditions that require sharing attention to multiple, concurrent activities – a.k.a., multitasking. If you are the type of person who can work on your notebook, listen to music on your iPod, talk on your cell phone and text message at the same time,

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The Dave Martin Story – Flashback to Episode 45 – SAM 343

Leave a Comment / Accountability, Assumptions, Bravado, Communications, Competency, Complacency, Confusion, Crew Resource Management, Decision Making, Equipment, Expectations, Experience, Fear, Gut Feeling, Habits, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Intuition, Lost Focus, Mindfulness, Overwhelm, PAR, Perception, Perception Of Reality, Personal Protective Equipment, Personnel location, Prediction, Preoccupation, Pressure, Progress Reports, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Management, Routines, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Shared Mental Models, Situational awareness, Situational Readiness, Stress, Tacit Knowledge, Task Fixation, Teamwork, Training / Rich Gasaway

On August 11, 2007, Captain Martin and his partner were over run by a fast-moving wildland fire. On retreat, his partner became entangled on a barbed wire fence. Captain Martin used a utility knife to cut away his partner’s ensnarled clothing and they both narrowly escaped death. Description Dave Martin’s crew was assigned

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Mental Health Near-Miss: The Scott Gieselhart Story – Part 2 (Episode 334)

Accountability, Anger, Attitude, Close Call, Cognitive Memory, Communications, Decision Making, Denial, Emotions, Expectations, Experience, Fear, Frustration, Human Behavior, Illness, Mindfulness, Miscommunications, Near Miss, Neuroscience, Overwhelm, Perception, Perception Of Reality, Pressure, Risk Assessment, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Situational awareness / Rich Gasaway

Scott Gieselhart served 24 years as a firefighter in Frazee, Minnesota. Along the way, several incidents contributed to Scott developing a Post Traumatic Stress Injury that resulted in him becoming a meth addict and attempting suicide. Then Scott found help and through a treatment known as EMDR, his PTSI was healed and how he serves

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Mental Health Near-Miss: The Scott Gieselhart Story – Part 1 (Episode 333)

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The 360 Degree Size-up (Episode 329)

Accountability, Assumptions, Automatic Action, Automatic Action, Building Construction, Competency, Complacency, Culture, Decision Making, Expectations, Habits, Mayday, Mayday and RIT, Mental Models, Mindfulness, Multitasking, Muscle Memory, Near Miss, Optimism, Over Confident, Overload, Overwhelm, Perception Of Reality, Progress Reports, Routines, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Shared Mental Models, Situational awareness, Size Up, Standard Operating Procedures/Guidelines, Stress, Task Fixation / Rich Gasaway

You might think that by now the importance of completing a 360-degree size-up would be second nature for firefighters. But it’s not. In fact, failing to complete a proper size-up remains one of the most often cited contributing factors in NIOSH Line-of-Duty death reports. There are lots of reasons why proper size-ups are not completed.

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The Impact of Understaffing (Episode 328)

Accountability, Anger, Assumptions, Building Construction, Command Support, Communications, Crew Resource Management, Culture, Decision Making, Denial, Expectations, Experience, Human Error, Human Factors, Leadership, Mission, Multitasking, Overload, Overwhelm, Personnel location, Pressure, Progress Reports, Response Time Delays, Risk, Risk Assessment, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Staffing, Stress, Teamwork, understaffing / Rich Gasaway

The pandemic has been tough on everyone, especially first responders who have stepped up to the task. But for many first response agencies, the worst is yet to come as the economic fallout will likely create budget shortfalls that will, in turn, cause fire departments to reduce staffing and services. This show looks at the

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Situational Awareness Best Practices for Incident Commanders (Episode 326)

Accountability, Assumptions, Attention Management, Benchmarks, Biases, Building Construction, Checklists, Close Call, Cognitive Memory, Command Location, Command Presence, Command Support, Communications, Competency, Crew Resource Management, Culture, Decision Making, Distractions and Interruptions, Equipment, Expectations, Explicit Knowledge, Goals, Human Behavior, Human Error, Human Factors, Information overload, Interruptions, Intuition, Long-Term Memory, Mental Models, Mindfulness, Miscommunications, Mission, Multitasking, Over Confident, Over Staffing, Overload, Overwhelm, Pattern Matching, Perception, Preoccupation, Pressure, Radios, Repetition, Risk, Risk Assessment, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Shared Mental Models, Short Term Memory, Situational awareness, Situational Readiness, Size Up, Staffing, Standard Operating Procedures/Guidelines, Stress, Tacit Knowledge, Task Fixation, Teamwork, Time Distortion, understaffing, Workload Management, Worksheets / Rich Gasaway

There are three component parts to situational awareness – perception, understanding and prediction. There are barriers that can impact awareness on all three levels. The application of best practices can help incident commanders reduce the impact of barriers. Length: 35 minutes Click the YouTube icon to watch the full video. __________________________________________________ All of our

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