Day in the Life: North Shore Regional 9-1-1
Zetron is honored to work with mission critical communications professionals across a wide array of applications and industries. Our daily interactions with these extraordinary individuals inspired us to launch our Day in the Life blog series. Learn more and read the full series. For this edition of Day in the Life, we had the pleasure of connecting with Katrina Shamshak and Robert Norton of North Shore Regional 9-1-1. After encountering some heartfelt submissions about telecommunicators and their centers during our Golden Headset Awards for National Public Safety Communicators Week, we found ourselves interested in hearing more about their agency and what they do. In this shared interview, we get a little insight into the day-to-day lives of North Shore Regional 9-1-1’s dispatchers, trainers, and quality assurance team. Read through to the end to get helpful tips for the general public when dealing with 9-1-1 and learn what our interviewees’ hope will change for the industry ten years from now. Katrina Shamshak Public Safety Dispatcher III Massachusetts, USA Robert Norton Public Safety Dispatcher I Massachusetts, USA What’s your name, your organization’s name, and location? Katrina: My name is Katrina Shamshak. I work at North Shore Regional 9-1-1, and it’s in Middleton, Massachusetts. Robert: Robert Norton, also North Shore Regional 9-1-1. Can you give a description of your agency in terms of size, jurisdiction etc.? Katrina: North Shore Regional is part of the Massachusetts State 9-1-1 department. We’re one of their operations centers, dispatch for six communities, and we’re still actively onboarding, so that number could increase. Currently, we have 44 employees. We handle all 9-1-1 calls as the public safety answering points (PSAPs), and we handle Emergency Medical Dispatch (EMD) responsibilities as well. Robert: We answer and fully process 9-1-1 calls for emergency assistance for six communities (Amesbury, Essex, Middleton, Topsfield, Wenham, and Manchester-by-the Sea Massachusetts). This includes radio dispatching units for police, fire, and EMS (emergency medical services) for these communities. We also receive, direct, and otherwise process related nonemergency calls for these communities. Members of administration and operations are staffed at North Shore Regional 9-1-1. Our administration is staffed by a Director, Deputy Director, and Operations Manager. Operations consist of Telecommunicators and Supervisors. All employees are extensively qualified, meeting and exceeding the standards set by APCO and the Massachusetts State 9-1-1 Department. All of our staff are required to undergo certification, as well as continuing education training. Can you both describe your roles there? Katrina: I am considered a Public Safety Dispatcher III. What that means is there’s Public Safety Dispatcher I – frontline dispatchers, Public Safety Dispatcher II – supervisors, and then I’m next. I am a trainer and handle quality assurance. I’m typically offline doing that, but I am still fully certified to work in the [dispatch] room [to take calls], and I do work in the room a lot. I still pick up overtime shifts, and I can work at the desk as a supervisor or a dispatcher. The reason I do that is to stay relevant with what I’m quality assuring, because I think you need to know how to do the job to be able to do that. So, I still work at the desk very often. Robert: Public Safety Dispatcher I, I am also a Communications Training Officer (CTO). Can you share a brief high-level description of your job? Robert: The workload is distributed between a fire and police pod. Both pods consist of two telecommunicators and split the workload equally between them. Our regional center currently serves six communities which translates to twelve police and fire departments to dispatch. Typically, the fire dispatchers are the primary call takers for 9-1-1 and all dispatchers rotate through taking business line calls. Every shift has a minimum of one supervisor to manage the shift and to help during incidents or to cover breaks. How long have you been in your current role, and how long have you been in the industry? Katrina: I’ve been in my current role for four years, and I’m going on my eleventh year of dispatch, and I’ve been at my agency for ten years. The agency opened ten years ago next month. Robert: I have been in the industry for ten years. I started my career in public safety in January of 2013 for the Security Department of Le Moyne College in Syracuse, NY working as a dispatcher and a shuttle driver. From there I started working as a police dispatcher at Boston College Police Department in Chestnut Hill, MA in March of 2019. I left Boston College and started my current position at North Shore Regional 9-1-1 in Middleton, MA in January of 2021. What made you get into this line of work? Katrina: So, I originally wanted to be a police officer— I was a criminal justice and sociology major. But I dislocated my knee while I was taking the police test, so I had to have surgery. At the time, I was working at my college police department as an intern, and they’re like, why don’t you just stay in dispatch for the summer so you have work, and you can put your leg up and it’d be fine. I ended up working dispatch and I loved it. It was just exciting, and it was challenging. I had no idea at all that that’s what dispatchers did before [working there], because my college dispatch department not only dispatched for the college, but a few surrounding towns, so I got to kind of get a feel of it. And once I was in, I thought it was awesome. I did end up becoming a reserve police officer later, so I still got the police officer bug out of me, but I ended up loving dispatch and how challenging it was. Robert: I have always been drawn to a career where I get to interact with and help people. Pursuing a career in public safety always seemed like a natural fit. I initially started working as a telecommunicator to prepare myself for a career in law enforcement. However, the longer I worked as a dispatcher the more I grew fond of the work and found that I truly enjoyed working in communications. Can you describe a typical day in the life of your role? Katrina: Typically, I come in and the first thing I do is call reviews. At our agency, we do call reviews for EMD calls, for call taking of police and fire calls, and then we also do QA calls for dispatch. In my role, I’ll either do the quality assurance myself or I’ll delegate them to supervisors. I’m also in charge of training, so I have to make sure everyone’s certifications are up to date. In my calendar I keep track of when someone’s certification is expiring. I also am part of a lot of associations, like APCO Atlantic. I’m the training committee chair, so sometimes day-to-day would involve doing things for them. I’m the training chair for the Massachusetts Communications Supervisor Association too, so I’ll also be doing stuff for them. I also do their newsletter. So, day to day really depends on what’s going on, but it’s a lot of balancing the QA, training and association stuff. And also, if the [dispatch] room is busy, they’ll call and ask me to come in and help them Robert: A typical day for me lasts 10-16 hours. Typically, I work a large amount of overtime and often work more than a usual eight-hour shift. My primary schedule is based upon evenings (16:00 to 00:00). This schedule follows a rotating 4-2 model. If I am assigned a trainee for the shift, I will be assigned to whatever discipline the trainee is currently working on. If I am not assigned a trainee, then my assignment for the shift will depend upon current activity and structure of the out-going shift. The goal is to rotate between police and fire positions every shift so that a dispatcher is not stuck on a certain discipline for too long. What do you like or enjoy most about your role? Katrina: I like that I still get to dispatch and do what I initially loved so much, but now it’s elevated. I get to feel like I’ve moved up the ladder, so to speak, and I also just really enjoy training. I love seeing when someone has that click moment, they’re not getting it, and then suddenly everything lines up and they’re able to perform the job or they have a realization of what’s going on. So, I really enjoy being able to teach people and harness the skill of dispatching. It’s a very specific group that can do it because of multitasking and the handling of crisis and everything. I like being able to welcome the next generation of dispatchers. Robert: What I enjoy most about my role is the chaos. I have always found myself able to perform well under pressure, with a timeline or amongst chaos. Constantly,
