The effectiveness of an Organisations' Equal Opportunities Policy for the Role and Training of Women, Particularly in the Fire Service

Abstract

This research analyses the ethical issues of equal opportunities in the context or organisational culture, with special reference to women firefighters in the British Fire Service. It identifies the central issue as being that the effectiveness of an organisation's equal opportunities policy is better evaluated by testing a range of external and internal indicators rather than leaving it just to outside social forces, such as legislation. To assist in this process, the researcher develops a framework and model through which the effectiveness of an organisation’s equal opportunities policy may be evaluated with regard to the role and training of women and tests it against the research sample. The sequential sampling procedure was used to undertake the empirical random study. A starting sample of 5 UK Fire Brigades out of a total of 63 was selected. The sample was drawn randomly from Brigades in the North and South of Great Britain, both urban and rural. There is a tradition for the full-time Fire Service to be concentrated within centres of large population and the part-time or retained service to be located in more rural areas. The researcher decided to include retained part time personnel on the assumption, that it is this section where females might find it easier to join the progress within the Service as firefighters.