Taiwan’s Promotion System for Firefighters: The Case of Fire Bureau of Tainan City Government
Chun-Chieh Ma*, Jenn-Jaw Soong**, Pao-Yu Lin***
Abstract
The “Promotion Appraisal Scoring Form” is one of the important game rules in the operation procedures. However, the personnel appointment and removal of the firefighting bureaus are controlled by the head of a city or county government. Therefore, several critical issues arise. Relevant scientific literatures cited in this study include the articles regarding promotion system as well as performance appraisal. Furthermore, the semi-structured interview of firefighters at the Fire Bureau of Tainan City Government are conducted to collect the opinions of their own basic conditions, working performance, external factors and promotion satisfaction. Collected data are summarized and analyzed.
The research findings are summarized and concluded as follows: 1.The promotion of the grass-root firefighters is actually confined by the Clauses of the Central Police University. 2.Anyone with both excellent working performance and interpersonal skills is more likely to be promoted. 3.The rules for the “Promotion Appraisal Scoring Form” should not be changed for the sake of any specific individual. 4.The organizational chief with promotion discretions shall deal with the personnel promotion in a fair and objective way. And 5.The scoring results to promote and fill the vacancy of a team chief shall be publicized; the current practice of publicizing name lists only is inappropriate. Based on aforesaid research findings, some suggestions have been put forth.
Keywords: firefighters, promotion system, performance appraisal, fire bureau of Tainan city government
* Professor, Department of Public Administration and Management, National University of Tainan.
** Professor, Department of Political Science, National Cheng Kung University.
*** Master, Department of Political Science, National Cheng Kung University