The city of Jasper has conducted a job analysis of its firefighters. The job being analyzed is a fire apparatus operator/driver (FAOD). In addition to conducting regular firefighting activities, FAODs also drive the fire equipment and apparatus to the fire incident. They also have a deep knowledge about operating the equipment.
Jasper has collected data from 35 FAODs and 10 of their supervisors, all of whom served as subject matter experts (SMEs). These 45 SMEs then completed a survey where they rated how critical (important) each KSAO is for the job on a scale of 1 to 5. The following table lists the means and standard deviations of the KSAO criticality ratings in terms of importance. The goal is to identify the KSAOs that are (1) critical (important) and that (2) most SMEs agree are critical, that is, those KSAOs that have a high mean and low standard deviation.

Questions

1. Based on your review of the mean criticality (importance) ratings for each KSAO, which KSAOs would you consider dropping from the job analysis? Explain why.
2. You know that a key role of this job is driving fire equipment (e.g., fire trucks) to the fire scene. But KSAO D has a fairly low mean and a high standard deviation. Why might this be? Rather than tossing out this KSAO, do you see any problem with the way that the KSAO is currently written and how it might be rewritten?
3. You learn that the city of Jasper collected most of the data for this job analysis from SMEs who are located in urban areas of the city rather than in the more suburban areas. Knowing this, would it affect any of your decisions about which KSAOs to remove from the job analysis? How might the city approach future data collections like this differently?

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MEANS AND STANDARD DEVIATIONS FOR THE CRITICALITY (IMPORTANCE) RATINGS OF EACH KSAO FIRE APPARATUS OPERATOR/DRIVER (FAOD) KSAOS A. Ability to work within a team B. Mechanical ability C. Upper body strength D. Ability to read maps (both paper and online) and to memorize all city streets E.Knowledge of fire equipment functions and capacity F. Ability to supervise crew G. Knowledge of fire suppression principles related to residential buildings H. Knowledge of fire suppression principles related to commercial/high- rise buildings 1.Critical thinking/decision making MEAN (1-5 SCALE) 4.9 4.8 4.5 3.1 4.8 3.2 3.6 4.8 4.7 STANDARD DEVIATION 0.2 0.3 0.3 1.7 0.1 1.6 1.5 .3 .2