General Manager/fire Chief

About Our Organization:
When you join the City of Guelph, you join a team of 2,000 full and part-time employees who deliver services the community relies on every day. Together, Guelph’s employees bring to life a vision of an inclusive, connected, and prosperous city where employees and citizens look after each other and their environment. As a regional top employer, the City of Guelph values its employees and offers competitive salaries, excellent benefit packages, opportunities for professional development, a healthy work-life balance, and many roles with flexible work options. Guelph’s corporate values are integrity, service, inclusion, wellness, and learning. Guelph is consistently ranked as one of the best places in Canada to live, work, and play—all good reasons to consider a career in this beautiful city.

Job Summary:
Reporting to the Deputy Chief Administrative Officer, Public Services, the
**General Manager/Fire Chief** will establish a clear vision for Guelph Fire Service while contributing as a member of the corporate management team to ensure safe, effective, prompt service delivery to the residents and businesses of Guelph. The General Manager/Fire Chief will lead two (2) Deputy Chiefs and 174 Fire Services staff operating from six stations with oversight of a $30 Million operating budget ($2.7M capital), staying committed to organizational excellence, guided by the goals and objectives of the City of Guelph Strategic Plan and adhering to the City’s values of integrity, service, inclusion, wellness and learning and aiding in the achievement of Guelph’s vision - an inclusive, connected, prosperous city.

**Role**
- Provide visible and positive strategic leadership for all administration and operations, consistent with the commitments of the City’s Leadership Charter, developing and nurturing a work environment that is inclusive, respectful and motivating for staff. Develop and recommend the long-term direction and strategic orientation for the fire service that is consistent with the mission, core values, goals, and strategies of the City, working collaboratively with other departments to achieve efficient and cost-effective workflows and business processes
- Set a visible, positive leadership example to promote the empowerment of employees through coaching, mentoring, effective communications, and delegation of decision-making; taking the necessary steps to anticipate the impact of changes and identify and remove barriers to empowerment.
- Provide leadership in the ongoing identification of best practices and the latest technology in fire prevention/protection and emergency response; make recommendations for continuous improvement efforts to position the service at the leading edge of fire prevention/protection and emergency response.
- Lead change management efforts involving the transition of the Fire Department from a traditional approach to a new way of thinking and execution, including fully integrating public education efforts with community development.
- Ensure efficient work scheduling for all staff, ensuring proper recruitment, orientation, training, performance feedback, and career development.
- Prepare annual work plans and budgets with recommendations, establishing procedures to monitor the performance against budget and identifying/correcting variances.
- Provide oversight for all tenders and procurement of facilities, fleet, equipment and contracted services.
- Represent the fire service before Council and Committee meetings of the city and with other stakeholder organizations. Develop and maintain positive working relationships with all stakeholders.
- Be available to be on call and provide after-hours response on a rotating schedule.

**Qualifications & Experience**
- Extensive leadership experience in firefighting, emergency response, health & safety and labour relations developed through progressive responsibility and experience within a unionized municipal fire service. Very strong ability to develop and manage union relationships, interpret collective agreements and work collaboratively and productively with union leaders to improve employee experience, service delivery and overall system performance.
- Demonstrated analytical, problem solving and decision-making skills and extensive experience with incident command systems within an emergency operations centre.
- Experience with modern multi-jurisdictional dispatch operations, budgeting and accreditation processes and in-depth knowledge and understanding of legislation and regulations related to fire prevention/protection and emergency response.
- Excellent interpersonal and communication skills with the ability to communicate with all levels of staff, stakeholders and the general public. Proven ability to deliver public presentations and to communicate with confidence and clarity to diverse audiences and the ability to manage change, conflict, and influence others.
- The ability to meet the requirements of