Alright, let’s be real for a second. Most of us have been in that spot. You know, the one where you get “volunteered” (yeah, right) to take on the role of the workplace warden. No extra pay, no shiny badge—just a few hours of training. Sounds like a cakewalk, right? Well, if you’ve been to any of those typical warden training sessions, you know it’s usually a death march through PowerPoint slides.
I’ve seen firsthand what happens when warden training misses the mark. People walk away with little more than a headache and a vague sense of “Wait, what am I supposed to do if there’s an actual fire?” A year later, they’ve either forgotten everything and they have likely come to you to quit being a warden with a laundry list of excuses.
Here’s the thing though—it doesn’t have to be that way. Having spent years in operational training across multiple emergency services, I’ve seen what works and what falls flat. I’ve sat through the mind-numbing sessions, and I’ve led training that actually got people to perk up and learn something.
So, what’s the secret sauce? Let me break it down for you—these three ingredients can take your warden training from snooze-fest to something that people actually want to participate in.
One – Make the Warden Training Relevant to Your Team
Here’s the deal: If you bring in a company to run your warden training, you’re probably getting someone who has a solid background in emergency protocols. They’ll go over the basics—the roles, the responsibilities, the theoretical side of things. And that’s fine, it’s important, but it’s also cookie-cutter stuff that they repeat for every workplace. They roll in, talk about generic hazards, and roll out. There’s no depth, no context.
Now, what if they took the time to get to know your business? What if they asked about your specific risks, your layout, your past incidents? What if they understood that your building has a weirdly confusing back staircase that nobody knows how to navigate in an emergency? That’s the difference. When training is personalised, people tune in.
For example, let’s say your office had a small electrical fire a few years ago. Instead of talking about generic fire safety, the training should focus on that fire—who did what, what went right, and how you could handle it better next time. When the training mirrors real-life situations that could actually happen, or have actually occurred, it stops feeling like a lecture and starts feeling like something that might save lives one day.
Those staff who are in the room are then engaged, and they think – what would I do? They’re not just going through the motions—they’re mentally prepping for something that could happen in their workspace tomorrow. That kind of engagement? Priceless.
Two – Get your new wardens to work and Make It Hands-On
You know how the best way to learn to ride a bike is to get on a bike? Yeah, same thing applies to fire extinguishers. And walkie-talkies. And emergency evacuations. If you’re just sitting around, listening to someone talk about procedures, it’s in one ear and out the other. The only way to really “get it” is to do it.
When I’ve led warden training sessions, we never just sat there talking about what we would do if the building caught on fire. Nope, we grabbed some fire extinguishers and put out some (controlled) flames. We didn’t just discuss evacuation procedures, we practised them. There’s something about physically moving through the motions that solidifies the information in your brain. It’s like your body remembers it for you. So when you’re stressed out in a real-life situation, your muscle memory kicks in.
Now, here’s where a lot of trainers miss the mark. They either make the hands-on stuff too easy or too hard. You’ve got to hit that sweet spot where people feel challenged but not overwhelmed. For instance, don’t just have them run through a basic drill once and call it a day. Mix it up. Make them use your actual communication system—whether it’s walkie-talkies, phone trees, or whatever. Maybe throw in a curveball like a blocked exit or a malfunctioning alarm. Keep it realistic, but manageable.
For example, if you are running a simulated fire on the second floor, you might make the team figure out how to handle it when their usual exit route was blocked. This pushes them, but just enough. They will still understand what the primary route to exit the building is, but just having this short discussion and solving the problem will speed up the process if it does occur. More importantly, it will prepare your staff taking on the warden role to know that your emergency procedures need to be adapted when the situation calls for it.
Three – Ensure Your Warden Training Is Challenging
Here’s where things usually go sideways. A lot of warden training programs are so focused on making sure everyone passes that they forget to make the training effective. You know, teach your staff something. They speed through the content, give everyone a pat on the back, and send them on their way. Congratulations, you’re a certified warden! Except, nobody learned anything beyond the bare minimum, and if an actual emergency happens, they’re not any more prepared than before. In fact, they’re probably less prepared because they have a false sense of security.
Training should be challenging enough that people have to stretch their brains a little. Now, I’m not saying you need to throw them into some kind of disaster movie scenario where everything’s on fire and nobody knows what to do. That’s just going to scare people off. But you should push them just enough that they’re engaged and thinking critically.
Let’s say you’re running a discussion-based exercise where the team has to talk through how they’d handle an emergency. If everyone’s new to the role, start with something straightforward—a small fire, an alarm going off, that kind of thing. But if you’ve got a team with more experience, don’t be afraid to dial up the difficulty. Throw in some tough questions: What if your chief warden is away? What if someone panics and refuses to evacuate? How do you deal with multiple emergencies at once? The goal is to make people think on their feet, without overwhelming them.
The balance is tricky, but it’s worth it. If training is too easy, people tune out and you lose them. If it’s too hard, they feel defeated and shut down. But when you get it just right? That’s when the magic happens. People walk away feeling like they actually learned something, and, more importantly, they feel confident they can handle an emergency if it ever comes to that.
So, there you have it—three key ingredients that can make all the difference in warden training: relevance, hands-on experience, and a healthy dose of challenge. Trust me, I’ve been through enough bad training sessions to know that when you get these things right, people will not only pay attention—they’ll actually learn something. And in an emergency, that could be the difference between chaos and calm.
At the end of the day, it’s all about giving people the tools they need to feel confident in their role. Because when the fire alarms go off, you don’t want your wardens to freeze up—you want them to act, and act fast. And that only happens if the training was good to begin with.
