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Establishing coordination in networks of public services:
A proper response to disasters
Master Thesis Supply Chain Management
University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business
August 12, 2018
Author: Stefanos Tampouras
Student Number: S3482405
E-mail: s.tampouras@student.rug.nl
Supervisor: Dr. Dirk Pieter van Donk
Co-assessor: Dr. Kirstin Scholten
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Table of Contents
Abstract 3 1. Introduction 4 2. Theoretical Background 6 2.1. Disasters 62.2. Need for coordination during disasters 7
2.3. Enablers of coordination in networks 8
2.4. Coordination mechanisms 9
2.5. Coordination in public sector 12
3. Methodology 14
3.1. Research design 14
3.2. Research setting 14
3.3. Case selection 15
3.4. Data Collection 16
3.5. Operationalization of the construct 18
3.6. Data analysis 19
4. Results 20
4.1. Within-case analyses 20
4.2. Cross-case analysis 32
5. Discussion 35
5.1. Findings regarding the conceptual framework 35 5.2. Findings beyond the conceptual framework 37
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Abstract
Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate which are the needed coordination mechanisms to facilitate coordination enablers in a network of public services; specifically police, fire and health services, in order coordination to be established during disaster response operations.
Design/Methodology/Approach: This research was conducted with the use of a multiple-case study approach. Moreover, it was based on the use of secondary, archival data, mainly on documents, reports and testimonies that were published by governmental bodies, each public service separately, or by independent authorities, in a time period after each terrorist attack.
Findings: The combination of different types of mechanisms has been found to be used by public services to facilitate coordination enablers. Public services seemed to rely mainly on mutual adjustment coordination mechanisms, which promoted collective actions among different command levels of services, in order to establish coordination in their networks, however planning mechanisms were also needed for the immediate response.
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1. Introduction
Disasters, both natural and man-made, have an increased frequency of occurrences the last years (Steelman & McCaffrey, 2013; Lemyre et al., 2006). These disruptions are unplanned events that entail high uncertainties and risks, both for the environment and for the human lives, and require immediate actions and resources to be used for their management. However, any prepared procedure and activity of each participant to deal with these events is considered to be ineffective due to the uncertainty and chaotic environment that reduce their performance (Abbasi et al., 2018). The establishment of coordination in networks of agencies and organizations poses necessary for distributing aid and security to affected communities (Ansell et al., 2010), although coordination of response operations for emergency disasters is a really complex task (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Holguín-Veras, 2012). Despite the fact that networks can enhance the adaptation, capacity and capability of responding organizations, it is difficult human and physical resources from different organizations and agencies to be coordinated due to different objectives and backgrounds (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Pettit & Beresford, 2009). Therefore, structures of information sharing and collaborative decision-making are prerequisite enablers of coordination among these networks (Granot, 1997).
5 were trapped in the collapsing towers (Birkland, 2009; National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, 2004; United States Congress, 2002).
Thus, the essential role of information sharing and decision-making becomes more apparent for the coordination of police, fire and health services. In order these structures to be facilitated, processes called coordination mechanisms should be used (Granot, 1997; Shen & Shaw, 2004). Studies have focused on the use of coordination mechanisms in contexts of health care (Gittell, 2002), commercial organizations (Van de Ven et al., 1976; Gittell & Weiss, 2004) and emergency disaster responses (Granot, 1997; Shen and Shaw, 2004). However, linkages of coordination mechanisms and their use in networks of public services for disaster responses are missing from the literature, despite the crucial role of both topics for protection of communities during the uncertain and chaotic environment of disasters. To fill this gap, the following research question would be answered:
What types of coordination mechanisms should be used in the network of police, fire and health services to establish coordination during disaster responses?
The research is conducted by a multiple-case study, and is qualitative in nature based on secondary, archival data about four major terrorist attacks in the United States of America and the United Kingdom. The focus of the study is to investigate what coordination mechanisms were used in the network of police, fire and medical services to facilitate coordination in disaster responses. It can be taken as a foundation on the types of coordination mechanisms that initialize coordination enablers in these networks to effectively manage the needed activities and resources. Hence, this paper will assist public administrators to implement the more suitable mechanisms for disaster response operations. Finally, insights can be derived about inappropriate mechanisms that failed to facilitate the coordination enablers among public services.
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2. Theoretical Background
2.1 Disasters
Disasters are serious disruptions of the functioning of society that are triggered either by nature or they can be man-made and may be characterized for having slow or sudden onset (Day et al., 2012; Wassenhove, 2006). They affect communities by threatening their goals and priorities, while the reactions of disaster management systems are tested; mainly the capacity of different actors to work together, that under normal circumstances would not have this incentive (Tomasini & Wassenhove, 2009; Wassenhove, 2006).
The science of logistics and supply chain management except for being important for private sector logisticians becomes even more crucial in disasters (Wassenhove, 2006). The joint work of different actors by shared processes or distribution channels requires higher vision than simple logistics of moving goods from one point to another. Participating actors are required to develop a supply chain management approach during disasters to effectively coordinate their performance, diminish redundancies and be more efficient (Tomasini & Wassenhove, 2009). This approach can also augment the storage of available data among different actors to enhance post-event learning (Thomas, 2004)
Disaster management can be approached with proactive and reactive strategies (Lin Moe & Pathranarakul, 2006). Proactive strategies can include activities of mitigation and preparedness that limit the negative impact of the disaster or measures that are taken in advance to ensure the effectiveness of the response to these disruptions (Holguin-Veras et al. 2012; Lin Moe & Pathranarakul, 2006). Such measures can be the strategic pre-positioning of relief supplies and resources in advance of disasters, the exercising of activities’ flow and sharing of resources among the members of a supply chain, in conjunction with planning of what information may be needed or how they can be accessed by these members (Balcik et al., 2010; Comfort & Kapucu, 2006).
7 people after the onset of a disaster and their effectiveness can be affected by the activities of the proactive strategy (Lin Moe & Pathranarakul, 2006; Wassenhove, 2006), since it is regarded as the activation of plans and processes developed during this strategy (Jahre et al., 2016). The attempts of organizations to distribute valuable resources and diminish the impact by shared processes are included here. Recovery contains actions that are conducted after the disaster in order to restore or improve the living conditions of the affected community; non-governmental and other organizations work together to reduce disaster risk and reconstruct destroyed infrastructures (Lin Moe & Pathranarakul, 2006; Wassenhove, 2006; Holguin-Veras et al., 2012).
2.2 Need for coordination during disasters
The existing plans of each organization or agency to deal with problems are inefficient to respond to large-scale events; such as natural or man-made disasters, due to the unpredictable, unstable and chaotic environment they cause (Abbasi et al., 2018). Furthermore, in almost all of these events, human and physical resources, knowledge and solutions are separated in many different organizations and jurisdictions (Kettl, 2008). Therefore, the coordination among participating organizations becomes crucial for confronting disasters, since it can enhance their capacity, limited resources, responsiveness and adaptation in uncertain and demanding situations (Provan & Lemaire, 2012). The required sharing of leadership, authority and flow of resources among organizations cannot be achieved by uncoordinated or independently responding organizations (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Mandell & Keast, 2007).
8 2.3 Enablers of coordination in networks
Different approaches and systems can be used for the coordination of organizations (Ansell et al., 2010; Bouckaert et al., 2016); however, it has been found that low adaptable hierarchy systems and administrative approaches for coordination are unsuitable for these urgent and dynamic conditions (Birkland, 2009; Bouckaert et al., 2016; Kapucu & Garayev, 2011). In contrast, the use of network approaches is more appropriate for coordination during disaster, because it enables higher level of adaptation to internal and external threats (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Provan et al., 2007). These networks can be seen as supply chains where human, physical or informational resources may flow among participating organizations in order to provide aid to affected population (Glenn Richey Jr, 2009).
Network approach is a collaborative inter-organizational -also referred as inter-agency- system that depends greatly upon mutual cooptation and horizontal collaboration and integrates organizations in response operations (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006). To enable organizations’ coordination in such systems, two basic structures should be addressed among organizations; decision-making structure and information sharing (Granot, 1997). The importance of information sharing across the strategic, tactical and operational echelons of the organizations, and joint and decentralized decision-making structure based on horizontal interactions of actors at the same level in the network are required for establishing coordination in inter-organizational networks (Bouchaert et al., 2016; Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Granot, 1997; Janssen et al., 2010; Provan & Lemaire, 2012).
Information sharing
9 Information sharing in disaster response operations is particularly important, since information that contains data regarding the time of demand and the severity of the situation can establish coordination (Kapucu et al., 2010). Furthermore, through this structure situational awareness about the incident can flow among organizations and responders of the network. This facilitates the building of a common operational picture and the decision making processes, since decision makers can obtain valuable information about the conditions on the scene of the incident (Salmon et al., 2011). Furthermore, information about needs for activities and resources are shared among the organizations, which enhance the efficiency of coordination and increase resources’ capacity (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006; Salmon et al., 2011).
Collaborative decision-making
Disaster emergencies are characterized by complexity and uncertainty to be managed, so it is important for participating organizations to have a fast but effective decision-making process (Dynes & Quarantelli, 1976). Proper decisions about the activities that should be conducted during the response can reach the optimum goal of disaster management, which is the community protection and functionality restoration (Comfort, 1999). The need for network systems to respond to these events raised the issue for collaborative decision-making (Kapucu & Garayev, 2011; Kapucu, 2006). Hence, network systems are in need of appropriate structures that can achieve a collaborative decision-making result. Such results come through a process of aggregating the multiple understandings of participants and are significantly more valuable choices than what independent decision-makers would envision if organizations acted on their own (Owen, 2015). These decisions may deal with the strategic objectives and aims of the operations, or regard the fit and sharing of interdependent activities and resources of the network (Salmon et al., 2011; Shen and Shaw, 2004), in order they can efficiently distribute relief services.
2.4 Coordination mechanisms
10 processes or methods that build the framework for information sharing and decision-making structures, which manage the activities and resource dependencies among organizations (Shen & Shaw, 2004). Thus, crucial tasks that may vary from procurement and warehousing of goods to evacuation and safe and rescue activities will be coordinated in a network or relief supply chain of organizations (Balcik et al., 2010, Shen and Shaw, 2004).
Previous studies have found relevant coordination mechanisms that can be utilized to build these structures. Granot (1997) identified the mechanisms of boundary spanners and pre-planning for enabling decision-making and communications among organizations, Kapucu (2006) mentioned the importance of boundary spanners for information sharing in disaster, while Van De Ven et al. (1976) categorized the coordination mechanisms in programming or impersonal modes and feedback modes, which were divided further in personal and group mode. However, this study will be based on the mechanisms that Shen and Shaw (2004) suggested. In their paper, they studied the fit among technology attributes and the required coordination tasks for disasters, and identified three coordination mechanisms for coordination establishment in emergency disaster responses; planning or routines, boundary spanners and mutual adjustments.
Planning/routines
11 The logic behind the planning mechanisms is to integrate lessons from previous experiences. Hence, best practices can be replicated into action plans without reinventing the wheel (Levitt & March, 1986). Furthermore, routines facilitate the connection among participants by building shared understandings of where each organizations’ and responders’ task fit in the general workflow (Gittell, 2002) However, they are characterized by low bandwidth and information-processing capacity (Gittell, 2002), with reduced need for communication among participants. For this reason it was found to work best in low-uncertainty settings (Shen & Shaw, 2004; Gittell 2002), while they are anticipated to be decreasingly effective under uncertain conditions (Tushman & Nadler, 1978; Galbraith 1973).
Boundary Spanners
The mechanism of boundary spanners, known also as cross-functional liaisons, is based on the use of organizational members who link their organization with other organizations (Burt, 1992; Williams, 2002) and their main task is the sharing and exchange of valuable information. This mechanism has a high information-processing capability, and is used to facilitate interactions among responding agencies, hence it is regarded as an important asset for effective communications in emergency and crisis management. (Gittell, 2002; Kapucu, 2006)
By enhancing the exchange of information, boundary spanners can help in the allocation of resources among responding agencies, since they facilitate vertical communications and can transmit decisions made at the top level (Shen & Shaw, 2004). It is expected to be more effective when cross-organizational coordination is highly needed and boundaries among organizations are very divisive, hindering the coordination (Galbraith, 1994). It is also proposed to have an enhanced effectiveness when uncertainty increases (Gittell, 2002), as happens in responses to disasters.
Mutual adjustments
12 and can be vested in scheduled or unscheduled meetings of organizations’ representatives (Gittell & Weiss, 2004; Van De Ven et al., 1976). It is considered as a typical coordination process for organizations and services, which allow them to coordinate directly and interactively their tasks with one another and align their goals and objectives, by enabling communications between the representatives of different organizations (Shen & Shaw, 2004; Gittell & Weiss, 2004).
Shen and Shaw (2004) characterized mutual adjustments as the least rigid coordination mechanism. Furthermore, they stated that coordination can be more relied on this mechanism when variability and unpredictability of the situation is increased, while they were found to have high information processing capability, as it was also found for boundary spanners’ mechanism (Gittell, 2002). In organization design theory it is supported that team meetings enhance the performance of interdependent tasks (Galbraith 1973, Tushman and Nadler 1978), thanks to the facilitations of interactions. This fact poses mutual adjustments more suitable coordination mechanism for uncertain environments, compared to planning mechanism (Gittell, 2002).
2.5 Coordination in public sector
Coordination proved to be an essential capstone to diminish the impact in life and economy, and adequate help to be provided to affected entities (Kettl, 2008). Although many of the activities carried out in the onset of a disaster occurrence include the endeavours of governments, voluntary and private organizations and services, all these activities are centred at departments of governments and governmental and public services (Lin Moe & Pathranarakul, 2006).
13 them; such activities usually are evacuation processes, emergency medical care, incident management, search and rescue, damage assessment, public safety, disaster assistance and public information (McEntire, 2002)
Lack of coordination can lead to fatal consequences as it was seen in the introduction and the case of the World Trade Center, where response activities were not executed properly by police, fire and health services. Therefore, this study aims to investigate how coordination mechanisms of planning, boundary spanners and mutual adjustments are used by the abovementioned services to build the structures for information sharing and collaborative decision-making, which can enable the coordination of activities and resources among the services/organizations of a network.
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3. Methodology
3.1 Research design
This research was conducted with the use of a multiple-case study, which according to Yin (1994), and Voss et al. (2002) is the most appropriate method to answer research questions of how and what. Meanwhile this kind of study helps to understand complex real-life activities (Noor, 2008; Stuart et al., 2002).rendering it more suitable to give an answer to the research question of the study about the type of mechanisms used by public services for establishment of coordination in the complex environment of disasters. In addition, the use of archival, secondary data poses the implementation of a multiple-case study the most suitable method –compared to other methods-, because it is grounded in a variety of empirical evidence and is more robust (Eisenhardt & Graebner, 2007). Finally, a multiple-case study leads generally in more robust results than a single case-study, increasing their external validity (Blumberg et al., 2008; Voss et al., 2002)
3.2 Research setting
15 confidence on institutions, due to the overwhelming terror and “destruction” of safety sense that these attacks create (Ursano et al.,2003)
Since countries of the Western World are becoming more and more vulnerable to the threat of terrorism (Barnato, 2015), the United States of America and the United Kingdom, that have faced several times terrorist attacks, were selected for this research. The U.S.A. faced 10 terrorist attacks since 2000 (Jacobs, 2017; CNN Library, 2018), while in the U.K. more than 10 attacks occurred in the same period (Bowcott, 2017). This fact makes these countries more suitable for our research since they have invested more in improving the responses of their public services, enabling more insights for the study to be gained; more than 900 billion dollars were spent for homeland security against terrorism in the U.S.A. (Mehta, 2018) while the Security and Counter Terrorism office of the U.K. was budgeted with more than 1.5 billion in last two years (Barej, 2017).
3.3 Case selection
The unit of analysis for this study is the response of public services to terrorist attacks. Initially, four cases were selected to comply with the recommendation of Eisenhardt (1989), that four to ten cases are needed for theory building and for a solid base for justification. Furthermore, the incidents should belong in the same category of terrorist attacks, because it will provide the research with similar conditions to be studied, since identical resources ought to have been mobilized. The federal government of the U.S.A. has grouped terrorist attacks in five categories (these categories are chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive attacks, known as CBRNE), with explosive attacks being the most common type (Frykberg, 2004), hence the selected cases should belong in this category, with commonality of the attacks leading in more generalized findings.
16 replication logic will establish external validity through the cross-case analysis (Karlsson, 2016).
Taking into consideration the above criteria, the first two cases to be selected from the U.S.A. were the Pentagon Terrorist Attack, in 2001, and the Boston Marathon Bombings, in 2013, which were based on hierarchical and network approaches, respectively (Ansell et al., 2010; Hu et al., 2014). From the U.K., the London bombings attacks, in 2005, and the Manchester Arena attack (Salmon et al., 2011), in 2017, were selected. The first was considered as a more administrative approach, while the second was based on a network approach. All these four attacks were characterized as major events that mobilized resources from police, fire and medical services, while many secondary data are available due to the impact and publicity of these incidents.
Table 3.1: Selection criteria for the cases
Pentagon Attack
Boston Bombings
London Bombings Manchester Arena Attack
Country U.S.A. U.S.A. U.K. U.K.
Type of attack Explosive Explosive Explosive Explosive Approach Hierarchical Network Administrative Network Accessibility to
archival data
3.4 Data Collection
17 The structure of the archival data research was based on specific elements. After considering the type of data that were going to be researched, the second step was to define the terrorist attacks that would be investigated and afterwards the public services, for which the data should be related. Hence, the collection of data was targeted for reports, after-action reports, documentaries and testimonies that were published after the relevant cases by governmental bodies or public services. Furthermore, preparedness documents were to be researched for additional information regarding the preparedness phase of these services, while a google research was held, for additional reports from independent research organizations.
Table 3.2: List of documents and reports included in the study
Case Document name Type of document Year Pages used 1 1. The 9/11 commission report: Final report of the national
commission on terrorist attacks upon the United States
Official Report 2004 58 of 585
1 2. After-action Report on the Response to the September 11 Terrorist Attack on the Pentagon
After-action Report 2002 106 of 215
2 3. Lessons learned from the Boston marathon bombings: Preparing for and responding to the attack
Testimonies 2013 80 of 107
2 4. After Action Report for the Response to the 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings
After-action Report 2014 67 of 130
2 5. Boston Marathon Bombings: The Positive Effect of Planning and Preparation on Response
Summary 2013 4 of 7
3 6. Looking Back, Moving Forward: The Multi-agency Debrief : Lessons Identified and Progress Since the Terrorist Events of 7 July 2005
Report 2006 24 of 62
3 7. Major Incident Procedure Manual, 6th Edition Planning Manual 2004 21 of 84
3 8. Report of the 7 July Review Committee Official Report 2006 93 of 157
3 9. Report of the 7 July Review Committee
Volume 2: Views and information from organizations
Official report including testimonies
2006 141 of 291
4 10. The Kerslake Report: An independent review into the preparedness for, and emergency response to, the Manchester Arena attack on 22nd May 2017
Official independent Report
2018 138 of 226
18 B.1 of Appendix B). These reports have been published by governmental bodies, by the public services separately or by independent research organizations, and are non-peer-reviewed archival data sources which can enhance the robustness and contextuality of a research endeavor (Das et al., 2018).
Only English language publications were included and they were published from 2002 until today. The publications relate specifically to the selected cases (except for one publication regarding London Bombings, where a preparedness manual was also included in order more insights to be obtained) and have been published by official governmental organizations or designated independent research organizations or panels (the online availability for each document is provided at the table B.2 of Appendix B, while the parts that were chosen to be analyzed in each document can be found in the table B.3).
3.5 Operationalization of the construct
The main aim of this study is to search and identify the types of coordination mechanisms used by law enforcement, fire and medical services to facilitate the required structures for coordination during the response to the selected cases. Coordination mechanisms are the processes that facilitate the building of information sharing and decision-making structures. Shen and Shaw (2004) proposed three types that can be used for emergency disaster responses; planning, boundary spanners and mutual adjustments.
19 Meanwhile, the structures that enable coordination and should be facilitated by these mechanisms are the information sharing; which allow the distribution of information and situational awareness among participating organizations to coordinate their activities and resources (Salmon et al., 2011), and collaborative decision-making; where all participating members have the opportunity to get involved in decisions taken by aggregating their understandings (Owen, 2015).
3.6 Data analysis
The documents that were investigated during the research were analyzed qualitatively, using Excel as tool for analysis. The analysis of the data was based on the coding scheme proposed by Gioia et al. (2013). In the first step, labelled parts and quotes of the documents, which were relevant to the study and described a specific concept/mechanism, were taken as 1st order terms. The second step included the organization of these 1st order terms into 2nd order themes that were based on the theory about coordination mechanisms and the enablers of coordination. The aggregate dimension were theoretical dimensions that included the three types of the coordination mechanisms; planning mechanisms, mutual adjustments and boundary spanners, and the two enablers for coordination that should be initialized; information sharing and decision-making structures. The scheme of the coding trees can be found in the Appendix C.
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4. Results
4.1 Within-case analyses
4.1.1 Pentagon Attack, 2001The 11th of September 2001 was one of the worst days in American history. Multiple terrorist attacks occurred the same day in different regions of the country, stressing out public safety services and departments, and testing their preparedness plans. That day a hijacked airplane of American Airlines crashed into the Pentagon taking the lives of 64 passengers and crew, killing another 125 occupants of the Pentagon. In addition, the immediate responders from fire and medical services provided medical treatment to more than one hundred injured people, who survived the attack (Moynihan, 2007).
Proactive phase
The attack to the Pentagon was one of the first terrorist attacks of high scale on the U.S.A. soil. However, mechanisms to enhance coordination among public services had been developed during the preparedness phase. One of these mechanisms was the Incident Command System (ICS); a schedule of management structure for emergency response, which was established in Washington, several months before the attack, by the National Inter-agency Incident Management System (NIIMS). ICS was a hierarchical-type mechanism for coordination that defined a single Incident Commander of the whole response according to the nature of response needed (Document 2).
21 In addition, Arlington County implemented the Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan (CEMP), which is the basis for local emergency operations. It established an Emergency Management Team (EMT), consisting of local services’ representatives, that was responsible for the preparedness and response of these local services. During an emergency, a mutual adjustment mechanism could be activated, where meetings of these representatives were taking place at the Emergency Operations Center (EOC), in order information to be shared among services (Document 2).
Reactive phase
During the response to Pentagon attack, the ICS was immediately initialized with a chief of Arlington’s County Fire Department (ACFD) being declared as Incident Commander (Document 1). Thus, he was responsible for the coordination of resource and activities on the scene (Document 1 & 2). The Incident Command Post (ICP); where the Operational Command was taking place, served additionally as an information sharing point. Valuable information were shared to and obtained by the dispatch center and the other services. It was the place where the Incident Commander and the liaison personnel from other public services could share important information to succeed shared situational awareness among services. Some of this important information – shared through a boundary spanner mechanism- regarded the need for evacuation of the scene: “The first of the three full site-clearing evacuations was based on valid threat information originating from the FBI WFO Command Center and based on real-time FAA data. The FBI representative at the Incident Command provided the information directly to Chief Schwartz” (Document 2).
22 Other affecting factors
Apart from the mechanisms used, communication systems as well as previous training and exercises, had a significant effect on the coordination of services. Saturated and lacking of interoperability radio communications, in conjunction with non-functional mobile phone networks, hampered the communication among the first responders, the Incident Commander and the respective command chain. However, previous exercises and training proved invaluable during the response. First responders were familiar with their roles and responsibilities, in addition to the cultivation of relationships among them and among commanders of responding agencies. Relationships empowered the sense of trust to one another and contributed to the success of the response as stated in Document 1; “response to the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon was mainly a success for three reasons: first, the strong professional relationships and trust established among emergency responders”.
Table 4.1: Summary of Pentagon case
Coordination Mechanisms Labels of used mechanisms Structures facilitated
Routine/Planning Incident Command
System
Decision-making process Information sharing
Communication System Information Sharing
Mutual adjustments Unified Command Collaborative
decision-making process
Emergency Operations Center
Information Sharing
Boundary Spanner Liaison officers from ACPD and FBI to ACFD’s ICS
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4.1.2 Boston Bombings
On the 15th of April 2013, the United States became once again victim of terrorism. During the event of 117th Boston Marathon, people witnessed the first terrorist attack in the country, after the fateful attacks of September 2001 at World Trade Center and the Pentagon. At 2:49pm everything changed. It was the time when two homemade Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) were detonated close to the finish line of the run. These two explosions caused the death of three young spectators, injuring above 250 more spectators and initiating a week-long response of public health and safety agencies. The response ended with the apprehension of one suspect and the death of the second (Document 4).
Proactive phase
As introduced in the case of Pentagon attack, the first mechanism to enable a coordinated response among public services, in the U.S.A. was the ICS. It was a planning coordination mechanism that provided a scheduled management approach for the “integration of facilities, equipment, personnel, procedures and communication in a common organizational structure” (Document 3). With the activation of ICS, every key responding service should declare an Incident Commander responsible for the operational part, the initialization of communication and the coordination of the resources and activities of each independent service. After their declaration, Incident Commanders should gather to form the mutual adjustment mechanism of UC at the Unified Command Center (UCC) (Document 4). From there, they would share information with face-to-face communications, while more collaborative decisions could be made for a holistic coordination of resources and activities.
24 Reactive phase
The fact that the bombings happened during the important athletic event of Boston’s Marathon, had as a result the MACC to be already activated before the attack, while services declared immediately their Incident Commander. Senior law enforcement and emergency management officials from Boston Police Department (BPD), Boston Fire Department (BFD) and EMS formed the UC, with a UCC being established as an Incident Command Post away from the incident (Document 4).
The UC enabled the direct communication and a collaborative decision-making process among commissioners; hence the coordination of the activities was more effective. Furthermore, the constant communications between on-scene responders and the MACC bolstered the almost real-time situational awareness of the participants at that meeting (Document 5). Available information was immediately shared among services and within the respective chain of command, while MACC, according to Document 4, had crucial effect on the coordination of resources, taking decisions that could provide UC with valuable asset; “The MACC was able to play an integral role in coordinating with the Unified Command Center (UCC) to obtain assets in support of the response to the bombings”.
Other affecting factors
Besides, exceptional function of the communication systems had as a result the successful implementation of the aforementioned mechanisms. The Statewide Communications Interoperability Plan addressed radio interoperability issues among police, fire and medical services, letting information flow uninterruptedly among services and levels of command. Exercises and training not only solved information sharing problems, but also facilitated the coordination of activities of first responders and the decision-making processes of agencies’ leaders.
25 contributed to leadership knowing where to obtain resources, whom to task with missions, how to mobilize mutual aid, how to coordinate communications, and effectively make bold decisions”.
Table 4.2: Summary of Boston case
Type of Coordination Mechanism
Labels of used mechanisms
Structures facilitated
Routine/Planning Incident Command
System
Information Sharing
Communication System Information Sharing
Mutual adjustments Unified Command Information Sharing
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4.1.3 London Attack
The 7th of July 2005 will not be forgotten by Londoners and many civilians around the world. The center of London’s public transport system had been struck by multiple terrorist attacks. The target of the terrorists was three trains of the London subway, which were impacted almost simultaneously at that morning. After about an hour a fourth attack hit a double-deck bus, also near the city center. These attacks resulted in the death of fifty two innocent people, hundreds of injured people and a big mobilization of emergency responders’ resources to confront the impact (Great Britain, 2006)
Proactive phase
The main concept in which responses had been built at the United Kingdom was based on delivering multi-agency Integrated Emergency Management by establishment of communication and coordination among the responding agencies (Document 6). Every region in the U.K. had its own Local Resilience Forum, which was a statutory process to enable interactions among responders. As defined by an act of the Parliament of the U.K. responding services were divided into Category 1; law enforcement, fire and medical services are included here, and Category 2 responders (Great Britain, 2005).
Every time an emergency would occur, First Alert Protocol was activated. This was a planning mechanism with a scheduled procedure to share the information about the emergency among all the key services and achieve the same awareness level among them (Document 6 & 8). Additionally, the founded in 1973 London Emergency Services Liaison Panel (LESLP) facilitated the establishment of collaboration among public safety services providing an action plan called Major Incident Procedure Manual for situations like terrorist attacks (Document 7). Thus, this Manual provided guidance for coordinated activities of first responders by providing structure for decision-making procedures; a scheduled 3-tier structure of command for the key participating services that included Gold, Silver and Bronze Commanders (Document 6).
27 formed after the declaration of a major incident. Gold commanders from key services would participate in collaborative decision-making process for general strategic aims and objectives that would afterwards been delegated to the Silver and Bronze Commanders of each service (Document 8).
Reactive phase
After the occurrence of the attack, the First Alert system was used to inform all agencies for the escalation of an emergency event; “That was activated by us at 9.12am, and is called the First Alert System. Through that we arrange a fairly speedy conference call with all the players to make sure everyone is at the same level of information” as was said by Fedorcio D., Director at Metropolitan Police Service (Document 9). After that, a Major Incident was declared by each service separately. However, this information has not passed to the control rooms of the other agencies, due to communication problems. Thus, the scheduled coordinated working framework had been initialized independently by each service (Document 8).
The Command and Control Protocol had been initialized, to form the 3-tier structure of commanders, which handled the response of their agencies. The Gold coordinating group was also shaped, but it was not really effective; although it was decided to be established early. The first Strategic Coordination Center could not provide to the Gold commanders all the necessary system to communicate and share information among the control rooms and lower commanders of their agencies (Document 8).
The responsibility for information sharing was then on boundary spanner mechanism. London Fire Brigade (LFB) mobilized an inter-agency liaison officer at incident scenes, to enhance communications and information exchange between emergency services and fire services (Document 8). Additionally, Silver and Bronze Commanders, acted as on-scene liaisons to other services, when it was needed to exchange information and increase their situational awareness, in order to command the activities and resources of their services (Document 9).
Other affecting factors
28 while the phone network was overloaded- hampered the information sharing processes. The scene of the incident hindered furthermore the function of radio systems; “The Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair told us that he regards the inability of the emergency services to communicate underground as ‘a significant problem for London’’ (Document 8).
However, the decision-making processes, despite the communication problems, were facilitated thanks to the multi-agency training. It was a fact that common exercises enhanced the sense of trust and confidence among Gold Commanders, which was stated by many commanders of police, fire and medical services that participated in the response. Chris Allison -Commander at Metropolitan Police Service- admitted that in his testimony: “I think the importance, certainly for me as one of the individuals who has been publicly quoted on this before – the multi-agency training, where we all knew each other, so it was friends in the room – the value of that so that we all knew the plan and knew each other and had trust and confidence, I do think can be underestimated” (Document 9).
Table 4.3: Summary of London case
Coordination Mechanisms Labels of used mechanisms Structures facilitated
Routine/Planning First Alert Protocol Information Sharing
Major Incident Procedure Manual
Decision-making process
Communication system Information Sharing
Mutual adjustments Gold Coordinating Group Information Sharing Collaborative decision-making process
Boundary Spanners Use of liaison officer by LFB
Information Sharing
Silver and Bronze could act as on-scene liaisons
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4.1.4 Manchester Attack
On Monday 22nd of May 2017, a terrorist attack occurred outside the Manchester Arena Stadium, when an IED was detonated by a suicide bomber near the end of a music concert. This fatal terrorist attack killed twenty-two people out of about 14000 attendees, many of whom were children. In the interim, above one hundred people were physically injured and even more suffered from psychological or emotional trauma (Document 10).
Proactive phase
The communication and coordination of the responding services were still based on the Integrated Emergency Management concept and the 2 categories of responders. In the case of Manchester Attack, these services interacted through the statutory process of the Greater Manchester Resilience Forum (GMRF), while the mechanisms established by the Forum were used for multi-agency responses.
In particular, Joint Emergency Services Interoperability Principles (JESIP) was used for multi-agency responses. Five specific principles were promoted; co-location, communication, coordination, Joint Understanding of Risk and Shared Situational Awareness. To succeed in those principles, both planning and mutual adjustment coordination mechanisms were included (Document 10).
First planning mechanism was the METHANE reporting protocol, used to share specific, commonly understandable information among services. Secondly, the Joint Decision Model provided the on-scene responders a structured schedule to assess risk and make decisions on common. In addition to these mechanisms, an action plan for terrorist attacks, known as Operations PLATO, was part of the Joint Operating Principles. It provided information regarding the sequence of activities for an agreed response to Marauding Terrorist Firearms Attacks (MTFA) (Document 10).
30 the strategic framework that lower command levels should follow. Tactical Coordination Group involved the convening of Silver Commanders that would share information and make tactical decisions, following the strategic decisions, in order to coordinate the resources needed on the scene of response (Document 10).
Both Strategic and Tactical meetings would be held at the Force Command Module to facilitate face-to-face communications and decision-making processes. Moreover, Bronze Commanders could conduct operational level “scrums”, which were meetings and discussions at a Forward Control Point near the scene, to achieve shared situational awareness and make more informed decisions about the coordination of on-scene responders’ activities.
Reactive phase
The response to Manchester Arena’s terrorist attack was delivered as a collaborative multi-agency effort, although Great Manchester Fire and Rescue Services (GMFRS) were absent from this effort for the first 2 hours. Great Manchester Police (GMP) declared Operation PLATO, however it was never shared to the other responders, which would initialize the response of the absent GMFRS and might change the flow of the coordinated activities of the first responders (Document 10).
Force Duty Officer of GMP activated the Force Command Module for formation of Strategic and Tactical Coordinating Groups that enhanced the shared situational awareness. This had as a result decisions to be taken on common about the strategic framework that should be followed by lower level commanders. In the same time, Tactical Group was responsible for the decisions regarding the coordination of the resources.
31 Other affecting factors
Conversely to the planned structure of command, fire services used inter-agency liaison officers, who were responsible for information sharing with other agencies. The reason for the failure was the lack of situational awareness and valuable information. Neither the Operations PLATO nor a METHANE message was transferred to the GMFRS control room. The radio communication systems didn’t include Inter-Agency radio link channels, while the Joint Emergency Service Airwave Channel, established to transmit important messages to control rooms of each service, remained silent hindering crucial information to be shared (Document 10). Furthermore, the hierarchical culture of GMFRS played an important role to this failure, as supported in Document 10; “The negative effect of a hierarchical culture was also illustrated by the Chief Fire Officer effectively taking command of the incident from the Command Support Room and away from the National Inter-Agency Liaison Officer in charge”.
Table 4.4: Summary of Manchester case
Coordination Mechanisms Labels of used mechanisms Structures facilitated
Routine/Planning METHANE reporting
protocol
Information Sharing
Joint Decision Model Collaborative decision-making process
Joint Operating Principles Information Sharing
Communication System Information Sharing Mutual adjustments Strategic Coordination
Group Information Sharing Collaborative decision-making process Tactical Coordination Group Collaborative decision-making process Information Sharing
Operational level “scrums” Information sharing Collaborative decision-making process Boundary Spanners Use of inter-agency liaison
agents by GMFRS
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4.2 Cross-case analysis
A cross-case analysis was executed to reveal similarities and differences among the cases. As it was stated in the case selection, different approaches for connection among police, fire and medical services were chosen. Therefore, different results are expected regarding the use of coordination mechanisms. This enabled a pattern to be distinguished on selection of mechanisms that facilitate the structures needed for coordination among a network of public services.
Initially, as it can be seen in the table 4.5, in every case a combination of the available types of coordination mechanisms were used, thus not any single case was composed by only one type of mechanisms. More specifically, in cases 1, 3 and 4 every type of coordination mechanisms for emergency responses were used, while in the case of Boston boundary spanners were absent from the response operations to the terrorist attack.
Furthermore, it was found that in all cases planning mechanisms played a role in facilitating the sharing of information among the services. Communication systems that are included in this category had been used in all the cases, while in every case an additional planning mechanism provided the schedule for exchange of information among the participants. However, in hierarchical approaches (cases 1 and 3) planning mechanism had the extra role to enable the structure of decision-making procedures. This was achieved mainly by action-plans that were designed for these responses and framed the command structure and the responsibilities for decision-making. In the case of Manchester attack, it was found that a planning mechanism was used to facilitate collaborative decision-making; however, it could be used only by the on-scene responders to judge and act on specific conditions.
33 the joint decision-making among higher level commanders to align their general aims and objectives about the response. In contrast to these practices, mutual adjustment played a major role in network approaches (cases 2 and 4). Different mutual adjustment mechanisms were used to initialize horizontal interaction among different levels of officials of police, fire and health services. That facilitated the direct information sharing and collaborative decision-making structures, which in turn enabled coordination in the network approach that had been adopted by these services.
Concerning the use of boundary spanners they were found to be crucial during the response in cases 1 and 3. Although information sharing was based on planning mechanisms and preplanned structures, on the scene of response boundary spanners enabled a more direct information sharing structure among participants from different services to exchange timely valid and accurate information. Contrary, boundary spanners were not to be used in the other two cases were mutual adjustments had solved this issue. An exception was found in the case of Manchester attack, where the fire services functioned under a hierarchical administration and did not follow same practices with other services. Hence, they used boundary spanners to enable information sharing with other services, since they failed to participate in the mutual adjustments during the immediate response.
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Table 4.5: Cross-case analysis
Coordination Mechanisms
Structures facilitated Remarks
Pentagon Boston London Manchester
Routine/ Planning
2 mechanisms for information sharing
and 1 for decision-making structures 2 mechanisms for information sharing structure 2 mechanisms for information sharing
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5. Discussion
By investigating the responses of police, fire and health services to four terrorist attacks in the U.S.A. and the U.K., where counter-terrorism is considered high priority, this study attempted to answer the question regarding the coordination mechanisms that should be used in a network of public services to establish coordination during disasters. The types of mechanisms that were used during the responses can be seen in table 4.5 and are analytically described in the “Results” section. It stands out that coordination mechanisms were needed in every case to initialize and facilitate both information sharing and decision-making procedure. Additionally, different combinations of mechanisms were found to be used in network approaches (cases 2 and 4), compared to hierarchical or administrative approaches (case 1 and 3), while a single coordination mechanism is not adequate for this complex and uncertain environment (Abbasi et al., 2018)
5.1 Findings regarding the conceptual framework
Coordination Mechanisms
36 planning mechanisms (Levitt & March, 1986). Planning mechanisms’ characteristic to reduce the need for communications (Gittell, 2002) had an ideal fit for decision-making structures in hierarchical approaches. From these findings it stands out that they should be used by network approaches to initialize the information sharing structure.
Mutual adjustments were found to be used on great extent in network approaches (cases 2 and 4), while the findings regarding their characteristics totally agree with what it is supported in the literature. As it is stated they are extremely effectively in uncertain conditions (Shen & Shaw, 2004), fact that was verified through the investigation of cases 2 and 4. Their high information-processing capability in conjunction with the facilitation of horizontal communications through representatives’ meetings (Gittell & Weiss, 2004; Van De Ven et al., 1976) had evidently bolstered the sharing of information in the abovementioned cases. Meanwhile, the enhancement of performance of interdependent activities and resources (Tushman and Nadler 1978) was achieved since mutual adjustments initialized interactive decision-making procedures with representatives from all the participating services, which helped them to align their operations. It is remarkable that more than one mutual adjustment mechanism was used in these cases, fact that enabled interactions in different levels of command and decentralized decision-making, which are prerequisites for successful establishment of coordination in networks of organizations (Janssen et al., 2010).
Finally, boundary spanners were used for information sharing structures in cases 1, 3 and 4. The use of boundary spanners has also a high information-processing capacity and is met mainly in hierarchical approaches (Gittell, 2002), which completely agree with the findings presented in the previous part. Specifically, they were found to be used in the first and third case when the planning mechanisms started failing, and by the hierarchically structured GMFRS, which failed to participate in the meetings with the other services. Hence, they don’t play any major role on facilitation of coordination enablers in network approaches.
Other influencing factors
37 while they affect the coordination of actions and activities among different public agencies and jurisdictions (Comfort & Kapucu, 2006) during disaster responses. In this study a more precise linkage between coordination and personal relationships was identified. Specifically it was found that personal relationships facilitated the coordination’s enabling structures, in addition to the used coordination mechanisms. In cases 1, 2 and 3 trust enhanced the exchange of information among participants, while confidence of officials on the other’s abilities bolstered the joint decision-making procedure in the second case.
5.1 Findings beyond the conceptual framework
In line with the evidence from the literature (Provan et al., 2007; Bouckaert et al., 2016; Kapucu & Garayev, 2011) it was found that responses which comprised network approaches were more effective. Both in case 2 and 4 the flow and fit of activities and sharing of resources were efficiently managed among the agencies that participated in the network. London approach that comprised an administrative approach achieved an elementary coordination of activities because the information sharing structure was not well “built” while the joint decision-making procedure was conducted only at the highest level and dealt with general objectives of the response.
38
6. Conclusion
This paper examined the usage of coordination mechanisms to facilitate the establishment of coordination in a network of public services. Therefore, this part is scheduled to provide an answer to the research question:
What types of coordination mechanisms should be used in the network of police, fire and health services to establish coordination during disaster responses?
The research has found that the most appropriate way to facilitate the coordination enablers in the network of these services is a combination of two types of coordination mechanisms. It was found that planning mechanisms have an important role on the initial information sharing procedure, because they are immediately available after the onset of the disaster. Thus, planning mechanisms such as reporting protocols should be used for the initialization of information-sharing structure. Additionally, the need for exchange of information across different levels of command, and the joint and decentralized decision-making structure (based on horizontal interactions) imply that the rest of the response should be relied on mutual adjustment mechanisms both for information sharing and decision-making structures, in order to achieve an effective coordination among services.
Theoretical implications
39 Managerial implications
From the practical perspective, insights can be given to practitioners and public administrators on the types of coordination mechanisms that can be used for appropriate disaster responses. This paper provides guidance on the selection of the proper mechanisms that can facilitate coordination among public services during disasters. It is proposed that boundary spanners and planning mechanisms as main mechanism are not suitable to be used in these networks. Thus, practitioners are advised to consider that responses should be based on mutual adjustment mechanisms that offer higher adaptation and interactive management in the rapidly changing environment of disasters. Additionally, planning mechanism should be used for the initial reaction, in order situational awareness to be shared.
Limitation and future research
Although secondary data provided the study with adequate information about the main issue of the research (use of coordination mechanisms), it was found that personal relationships affected both information sharing and decision-making structures and were applicable to all levels of command. The retrospective nature of the research and the difficulty to get in contact with people that participated in these cases rendered it impossible interviews to be conducted. Hence, the limitation of this study; collection of primary data from officials or first responders, restricted the research’s insights regarding the effect of personal relationships on coordination enablers.
40
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