What is command and control, why it is important and what skills and qualities do you need.

Skills

• Technical skills

• Specialist skills.

Technical skills

In this age of technical the uniformed public services have some of the world’s most advanced equipment, which helps in a command and control operation.

An example of this is a naval captain can create a strategy based on the information from an operations mechanic, who has tracked the enemy ships, aircraft and submarines.

Specialist skills

As well as having good technical skills, specialist skills are required in command and control for many different reasons.

In the royal marines, a landing craft officer must be skilled in seamanship, sea survival, boat handling, communication and management.

Leaders

Leaders are usually people who have been chosen because of their qualities they posses and for their ability to bring out the best in others. Commanders/leaders do not posses all specialist skills but it is important that they can deal with a situation by calling on the people with the skills needed. Good leaders can instil qualities such as;

• Trust

• Loyalty

• Discipline

• Morale

• Motivation

• Respect

In the public services, promotion to a certain rank is given for respect. It should be remembered that it is rank that is respected, not the person. It is sometimes natural not to want to respect someone but you must respect the authority of their rank.

Levels of command and control

• Strategic

• Tactical

• Operational

Strategic

A strategic commander is involved in formulating plans or strategies in order to decide on the best way to achieve an organisations objective. The strategies could include such as planning for war, combating terrorism, reducing crime or dealing with a major incident. Strategic is also known as Gold command this command is located well away from the incident that they are dealing with a situation.

Tactical

Tactical command is involved in implementing the plan made by the strategic/gold command. There may be several tactical/silver commanders, mainly when there is more than one service involved. Tactical commanders are responsible for ensuring that members of their service are aware of the strategy and how to put them into operation. Tactical/silver command is not the hands on people it is more to do with planning and co-ordinating role, in conflict situations it is important that tactical/silver command remains detached, they are normally located just a little bit away from the front line e.g. where the situations is happening.

Operational

In conflict situation, this would be the front line where operational/bronze commanders would deploy and control services. In the armed forces this would be the NCO’s and in the police this would be the SGT’s looking after the constables.

Effective control

The most effective way for a commander to control is by giving and receiving orders directly. This is not always possible. For example, where there is a breakdown in radio communication, a runner will be used to relay order if they are not written down by the time that the runner gets to his destination the orders could be misinterpreted or distorted. Noise, stress, hunger and lack of sleep can affect people’s perception, or message not be relayed properly, this could lead to ineffective command and control so the best way is for the commander to give orders directly.

Issue clear orders and command

C. CLEAR

L. LOUD

A. AS AN ORDER

P. PAUSES

The public services use this so that orders are given clearly and properly so that people understand and know what to do.

Briefing

A briefing is an instruction given for a task or operation, briefings in the uniformed service are very important, a briefing is very important it is used so that they commander can tell the people what they need to do also so if there are any questions that people need to ask so that they can complete the task can be asked and answers given.