Changing the Rotterdam-Rijnmond regional fire service: A multi-dimensional approach for analysing strategies of change

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify critical success factors for the management of complex change processes in fire service organizations and to apply these in a case study of the Rotterdam-Rijnmond fire service. Design/methodology/approach: The paper provides review of literature on organizational change, case study of the Rotterdam-Rijnmond fire service supported by the analysis of policy documents and 30 semi-structured interviews with key persons. Findings: Combining different theoretical approaches helps to get a more complete picture of important issues and dilemma’s in the management of change processes – which is a first step in the successful implementation of changes – whereas other approaches tend to emphasize only some and overlook others. Applied in a case study, this approach revealed serious weaknesses in the management of change within the Rotterdam-Rijnmond fire service and offered practical guides for solutions. Originality/value: This paper combines insights from different theoretical approaches into a more integrated perspective that aims to be helpful as a practical tool for designing and implementing complex changes in fire service organizations

To Frame or Reframe: Where Might Design Thinking Research Go Next?

Design thinking is gaining widespread attention in the practitioner and academic literature. Successful implementation has been documented, and its value shown in empirical studies. There is little examination, however, of how design thinking practices fit with other approaches from which firms might choose to frame and solve problems such as agile, lean startup, scientific method, Six Sigma, critical thinking, and systems thinking. By digging into the basic capabilities underlying design thinking, academic researchers might better understand problem framing and solving in general and provide insight for practitioners as to where alternative approaches might be applied

A global outlook on increasing wildfire risk:current policy situation and future pathways

International audienc

Current Wildland Fire Patterns and Challenges in Europe : A Synthesis of National Perspectives

Changes in climate, land use, and land management impact the occurrence and severity of wildland fires in many parts of the world. This is particularly evident in Europe, where ongoing changes in land use have strongly modified fire patterns over the last decades. Although satellite data by the European Forest Fire Information System provide large-scale wildland fire statistics across European countries, there is still a crucial need to collect and summarize in-depth local analysis and understanding of the wildland fire condition and associated challenges across Europe. This article aims to provide a general overview of the current wildland fire patterns and challenges as perceived by national representatives, supplemented by national fire statistics (2009-2018) across Europe. For each of the 31 countries included, we present a perspective authored by scientists or practitioners from each respective country, representing a wide range of disciplines and cultural backgrounds. The authors were selected from members of the COST Action "Fire and the Earth System: Science & Society" funded by the European Commission with the aim to share knowledge and improve communication about wildland fire. Where relevant, a brief overview of key studies, particular wildland fire challenges a country is facing, and an overview of notable recent fire events are also presented. Key perceived challenges included (1) the lack of consistent and detailed records for wildland fire events, within and across countries, (2) an increase in wildland fires that pose a risk to properties and human life due to high population densities and sprawl into forested regions, and (3) the view that, irrespective of changes in management, climate change is likely to increase the frequency and impact of wildland fires in the coming decades. Addressing challenge (1) will not only be valuable in advancing national and pan-European wildland fire management strategies, but also in evaluating perceptions (2) and (3) against more robust quantitative evidence.Peer reviewe

MOSAIC vision and scenarios for mobile collaborative work related to health and wellbeing

The main objective of the MOSAIC project is to accelerate innovation in Mobile Worker Support Environments by shaping future research and innovation activities in Europe. The modus operandi of MOSAIC is to develop visions and illustrative scenarios for future collaborative workspaces involving mobile and location-aware working. Analysis of the scenarios is input to the process of road mapping with the purpose of developing strategies for R&D leading to deployment of innovative mobile work technologies and applications across different domains. This paper relates to one specific domain, that of Health and Wellbeing. The focus is therefore is on mobile working environments which enable mobile collaborative working related to the domain of healthcare and wellbeing services for citizens. This paper reports the work of MOSAIC T2.2 on the vision and scenarios for mobile collaborative work related to this domain. This work was also an input to the activity of developing the MOSAIC roadmap for future research and development targeted at realization of the future Health and Wellbeing vision. The MOSAIC validation process for the Health and Wellbeing scenarios is described and one scenario – the Major Incident Scenario - is presented in detail

Blazing the trail: Social innovation supporting wildfire-resilient territories in Catalonia (Spain)

Mediterranean territories have co-evolved and been shaped by fire throughout history. However, global environmental change conditions are increasing the size, intensity and severity of wildfires, which have gone from a regular natural disturbance to a serious threat for civil protection, surpassing firefighting capacities. Therefore, building resilience in fire-prone territories is an increasingly relevant policy and management objective. However, the notion of resilience has been criticized for paying insufficient attention to key social issues such as socio-political dynamics, power imbalances and societal change. At the same time, social science contributions to wildfire research are still rather limited. In this paper, we bridge social innovation theory to resilience theory in order to create a territorially embedded and socially sensitive framework for assessing socio-ecological resilience. From this perspective, we then examine how Forest Defence Groups (ADFs, by their Catalan acronym) have evolved from grassroots, bottom-up initiatives to well-established bottom-linked institutions and we evaluate their contributions to socio-ecological resilience in the territories where they operate. Our results show that ADFs contribute in several aspects to socio-ecological resilience and that the pave the way for opening up spaces of dialogue and collaboration through which local communities can engage with the issues that directly affect them, such as wildfires.This research received funding from the SIMRA project, funded by European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 677622. During the writing phase it also received funding from the Pyrolife project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme MSCA-ITN2019 – Innovative Training Networks, under grant agreement No 860787

Forest Fires in Europe, Middle East and North Africa 2018

This is the 19th issue of the EFFIS annual report on forest fires for the year 2018. This report is consolidated as highly appreciated documentation of the previous year's forest fires in Europe, Middle East and North Africa. In its different sections, the report includes information on the evolution of fire danger in the European and Mediterranean regions, the damage caused by fires and detailed description of the fire conditions during the 2017 fire campaign in the majority of countries in the EFFIS network. The chapter on national reporting gives an overview of the efforts undertaken at national and regional levels, and provides inspiration for countries exposed to forest fire risk.JRC.E.1-Disaster Risk Managemen

Application of the socio-ecological system framework to forest fire risk management: A systematic literature review

Although increasing concern about climate change has raised awareness of the fundamental role of forest ecosystems, forests are threatened by human-induced impacts worldwide. Among them, wildfire risk is clearly the result of the interaction between human activities, ecological domains, and climate. However, a clear understanding of these interactions is still needed both at the global and local levels. Numerous studies have proven the validity of the socioecological system (SES) approach in addressing this kind of interdisciplinary issue. Therefore, a systematic review of the existing literature on the application of SES frameworks to forest ecosystems is carried out, with a specific focus on wildfire risk management. The results demonstrate the existence of different methodological approaches that can be grouped into seven main categories, which range from qualitative analysis to quantitative spatially explicit investigations. The strengths and limitations of the approaches are discussed, with a specific reference to the geographical setting of the works. The research suggests the importance of local community involvement and local knowledge consideration in wildfire risk management. This review provides a starting point for future research on forest SES and a supporting tool for the development of a sustainable wildfire risk adaptation and mitigation strategy

Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Systematic Innovation - ICSI 2016

It is our pleasure to welcome you at the 7th International Conference on Systematic Innovation. It is our objective to provide a forum for the discussion and dissemination of recent advances in the field of TRIZ Methodology, Knowledge-Based and Systematic Innovation. The goal is to enable practitioners, researchers and scientists to exchange ideas on the these topics and to provide an international forum for exchanging new ideas and recent achievements by the TRIZ community and enabling further advances and collaboration with the industrial community. We wish to express our sincere gratitude to the members of the organizing, scientific and technical committees. The reviewers of the papers had a very important job, contributing significantly to the success of the conference. We also wish to express our thanks to our invited speakers. Very special thanks to our students, sponsors and to all who helped us with logistics, conference website, and publications. Welcome to Portugal and Lisbon. We hope you all have a very happy and rewarding meeting.publishersversionpublishe