Your online HEAT training wasn’t HEAT training…

The fragile period between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the attack on the Twin Towers in September 2001 meant that journalists sent to cover the ‘War on Terror’ may have had little or no direct experience of working for extended periods in either ‘hostile’ or ‘fragile’ environments.

Vietnam had been the first televised war^[1]; Now, in the internet age and with satellite connectivity, by the time of the US led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the public expected 24-hour coverage of events taking place across the globe. General Charles Krulak’s seminal article on the ‘Strategic Corporal’^[2] led to military planners realising the importance (and dangers) of having journalists embedded with units^[3] as part of information and influence operations.

‘Hostile environment awareness training’ (HEAT) or ‘hostile environment and first aid training’ (HEFAT) has existed since the early 1990’s, developed in response to a changing threat environment and the need for journalists to receive training to cover the conflict in the former Yugoslavia.

By the end of 2003, HEAT training had become an essential part of pre-deployment training for news teams being sent to dangerous regions, and to cover conflict. Even two decades ago, the BBC took hostile environment training seriously and journalists being sent to cover events in “far from peaceful” places were sent on a six-day intensive training course^[4]. When the reconstruction work began in earnest in Iraq the demand for training rose, with firms – and insurers - demanding contractors prove their ability to work safely in the country.

Suddenly, HEAT training was big business.

Twenty years later there is a burgeoning market for online, fast-track, HEAT training which provides the necessary tick in the box for contractors deploying overseas. BBC High Risk guidance stipulates that staff working in countries designated as ‘hostile’ attend a HEAT or HEFAT course, or refresher, every three years.^[5]

Professor Steve Peters wrote in ‘The Chimp Paradox’^[6] that our brain contains a ‘computer’, an area which keeps safe all our experiences, and which our brain refers to whenever we experience an event. In that computer we store how to react to situations, to the extent where the action to take becomes a reaction instead of a considered response. When we are faced with a situation that we have never experienced the ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ response takes place, though in the face of human aggression, some people may also ‘fawn’ to an aggressor.

Fight; Flight; Fawn; Freeze.

If your ‘computer’ is empty, you simply freeze – and some folks need a Control-Alt-Delete to reset.

It’s not bad, it’s just a response, but we need to conduct practical training to change that response.

HEAT training is filling that computer with relevant experiences which can be drawn upon. No legitimate awarding body for training allows for a First Aid at Work course conducted wholly online. Learning cardio-pulmonary resuscitation is a practical skill. Practical HEAT training is essential to place experiences in that computer. No matter how immersive your training provider’s online platform is, there is no substitute for learning from the experience of trying to effectively place a tourniquet on a simulated casualty, with your hands shaking, covered in simulated blood, surrounded by simulated pandemonium.

The training received should also incorporate understanding how to trust our in-built instinct for survival.

As we discussed in our Pride blog, even the most seemingly innocuous destination comes with the risk of being profiled by a criminal, or in some cases state security services. We are born with an unconscious ability to sense danger, but it is the conscious mind which regularly overrides the unconscious, and we subsequently place ourselves in harm’s way.

Did you hear the story about the woman who didn’t trust her builder? She had a feeling that he was overcharging her on materials, or labour, but her conscious overrode her subconscious and she tried to ignore her feelings. Her dog disliked the man and would bark and snarl at him – and so she decided to get a different company to build her extension.

Dogs know nothing about the cost of materials, the rate at which brickwork should be completed, or the process of invoicing clients, and yet the opinion of the dog was what validated her concerns. Perhaps her dog picked up on her subconscious acts based on her own concerns, and reacted in the only way it knew how.

Odd that people place such confidence in their pets, but not in their own decision making. Learning to trust your own instincts, and having confidence in them, is part of HEAT training.

Another aspect which cannot be delivered remotely is having confidence in those deployed to afford protection, the ‘close protection’ team (CP team) or ‘personal protection officer’ (PPO). Understanding how to work with a CP team, or a PPO, is a practical skill which protects both the traveller, and their protection team, from harm; CP teams need to train with those they protect so the traveller understands all the drills that the team are likely to use to protect their client, and whilst the team conducting training are unlikely to be the team deployed, the drills will be similar.

HEAT teaches teamwork; HEAT should illicit an emotional response; HEAT training needs to be as visceral as the environment which it is training for.

Online HEAT training is just personal safety training - it is not hostile environment training – fully understand the training you need, and make sure you get the training that will keep you safe.