Productivity

Service improvement is one of the 6 Strategic Goals within the CRMP and will remain as such throughout the lifecycle of the next plan from 2025 – 2028. Whilst this goal is applicable to all parts of the organisation, from a response perspective in terms of the time wholetime firefighters spend on the defined ‘productive’ work within the Home Office guidance on Fire Productivity and Efficiency Plans, there are specific and measurable targets to assure the Service that the national Spending Review target of a 3% improvement in productivity is achieved.

In order to measure productivity, the Service uses a number of internally derived performance metrics for wholetime crews. These are:

Number of Safe and Well Visits (SWVs)
Number of Business Safety Checks (BSCs)
Number of SWVs delivered at Data-led Community Engagement Events
Number of engagements under the Community Befriending Scheme
Completion rates of Core Competencies
Completion rates of Monthly Theoretical Training Planner
Attendance at operational exercises
Maintenance of Site-Specific Risk Information

These metrics are displayed as part of each stations’ Plan on a Page and are reported electronically to enable managers at any level to see up to date performance levels against each metric. The quarterly evaluation and assurance review meeting, chaired by the response Area Manager oversees the performance of each station, addresses any areas of concern, and recognises good practice to local teams and managers. An important part of this meeting is the focus on the quality of the reported metrics through the ongoing evaluation of each activity. NFRS recognises that simply increasing the numbers of any activity is only part of any effective productivity increase; the quality of that interaction and/or activity must be of a high standard to deliver the best value to our communities.

In 2018/19 the Service completed 4,461 SWVs. Since then, there has been a sustained focus on increasing productivity in this area year-on-year. In 2023/24 over 15,600 SWVs were completed. This represents a 15% increase on 2022/23 and 1,600 more than the target set in the CRMP. The majority of SWVs (close to 12,000 in 2023/24) are delivered by wholetime crews. In addition, wholetime crews have delivered over 1,500 additional hours of fire, road and water safety education activities compared to 2022/23.

In 2021/22 the Service introduced the delivery of BSCs by operational crews. In line with the target set in the CRMP, in 2023/24 over 1,000 BSCs were delivered. This was a 100% increase on 2022/23, with 95% being delivered by wholetime crews.

In 2023/24 all wholetime crews were tasked with the new activity of ‘befriending’ a community group whose membership was predominantly from those with a protected characteristic. The objectives of this scheme were to raise the profile of NFRS; improve awareness and understanding of the services delivered; raise awareness of career opportunities; remove any fear of uniformed services; and to engage with hard-to-reach groups. During the year 172 different activities totalling 506 hours have been undertaken.

In 2024/25 WDS crews will again be working hard to achieve the targets of the CRMP. These include a 7% increase in SWVs and a 50% increase in BSCs when compared to 2023/24 targets. In addition, the productivity metric for Community Befriending has been changed to focus on 6-hours of engagement per quarter by each WDS crew. This will lead to over 1,100 hours of activity being delivered which is over a 100% increase on that achieved in 2023/24.

Wholetime firefighter productivity is planned through the Working Day Procedure, which has been reviewed in 23/24 and in 24/25 will deliver an increase of time spent per working tour of:

4.2% for operational training
2.1% for community safety activities (including safe and well visits and station visits)

This tangible increase in the time crews will spend on these activities will be monitored in conjunction with the increased annual targets discussed above for 24/25.

The system used by operational personnel to record the outcomes of safe and well visits is being upgraded as part of a project under the Futures 25 workstream which will deliver an entirely new way of recording outcomes electronically; this will save time per visit, prevent duplication of work and instantly communicate with the data warehouse. The project is on schedule to deliver this work for the end of 24/25 ready for 25/26, where it will enable firefighters to complete visits and the associated administration of these more quickly without compromising on the quality of the visit or the input. This will free their time to undertake additional productive activities.