My Travels

In a posting a few days ago, I mentioned I was travelling to the state of WI to speak at a conference there. I also mentioned that I would maybe post a thought or two while travelling – especially if I had any mis-adventures. As I sit here at the Minneapolis – St. Paul Airport this morning, I am happy to say (knock on wood) that I have had no issues thus far. Of course I probably just jinxed myself!

Coming and going, I have a stopover at Chicago’s O’Hare airport. On the way through I saw something interesting that caught my eye. Here is the picture below.

It was a flu shot station sponsored by the University of Illinois. Just sitting there in the middle of the terminal. How cool is that? Who came up with that idea?
This prompted me to think: what could we as a fire service be doing that is out of the norm or our comfort zone to reach out to the community? I know there are some departments that do help with flu shots.

But what else could we be doing to get our assorted messages out? In these tight economic times, we really need to take a look at how we do business and what we can do to add value to what we already do. Value added service is something all of us should be looking at! In these tight times I would suggest that our best defense (against budget cuts) is a good offense (continue to move forward).