The need may be on the increase, but the number is probably decreasing as they become fed up with being bad-mouthed by politicians as lazy government workers, and they see their rights and benefits eroded year after year. You don’t keep good people when you treat them like crap.

Jack would know for sure, but I think they used to called incident commanders, and known as “fire bosses”. McNamara started the move to calling everyone “manager”, even in the military, and the emphasis was put on “management”, rather than leadership.

Update: I decided to change it to my first choice of title, Incident Commander, because Fire Manager sounds like he’s telling the fire what to do, or giving it “goals”.

There is some irony in living in an age in which even disasters have managers. Somehow I have a feeling that the demand for those managers is about to increase without limit.