Data Analyst - Fire & EMS

Major Duties and Responsibilities

The Data Analyst will work closely across divisions to transform raw information into actionable intelligence that improves operational efficiency, strategic planning, and community outcomes. This position directly supports leadership decision-making and enhances service delivery through evidence-based practices. The Data Analyst has the following primary core roles:

Analyze response times, turnout times, incident types, and unit availability to identify inefficiencies and recommend deployment adjustments.

Forecast call volume trends to support demand-based station siting, peak staffing needs, and fleet management.

Use spatial and historical data to identify high-risk populations, properties, and areas.

Evaluate the impact of CRR initiatives (i.e., Mobile Integrated Healthcare (MIH) programs).

Develop dashboards and heat maps for targeted prevention strategies.

Monitor patient care trends, high utilizers, transport times, and clinical metrics to support EMS QA/QI.

Analyze MIH program data to demonstrate ROI and impact on system load.

Build and maintain interactive dashboards, scorecards, and automated reports using tools like Power BI, Tableau, or ArcGIS.

Integrate data from CAD, RMS, EPCR, GIS, and HR systems for a comprehensive performance view.

Enhance situational awareness during large-scale events or special operations through real-time data feeds.

Justify funding requests with data-backed performance metrics and outcome projections.

Track and report on grant-funded initiatives, ensuring compliance and demonstrating success.

Support partnerships with partner agencies by sharing interoperable data.

Contribute to public transparency by providing clear, digestible visuals of department performance.

The following duties are some of the typical ones associated with the position of the Data Analyst:

Attend internal/external meetings – Attend and participate in a variety of meetings (staff meetings, accreditation consortium meetings, CCG meetings, stakeholder meetings) representing the interests of the Fire Department.

Routine interaction with other internal/external organizational members - Interact and work collaboratively with internal/external stakeholders to further the mission, vision, values, and initiatives of the department regularly.

Maintain and expand job knowledge, skills, and abilities – Consistently engage in proactive efforts to identify innovative and progressive ways to engage organizational challenges and opportunities.

Prepare and deliver written reports, correspondence, and other materials – Craft and deliver letters, memos, reports, and other correspondence to members of the department’s executive team, the CCG, or the public. Review and evaluate reports for accuracy and completeness.

Provide regular and consistent information to internal/external stakeholders about organizational initiatives.

Develop business intelligence on departmental programs – Identify, visualize, and monitor performance metrics for the different divisions of the Fire Department.

Accreditation management – Work closely with the organization’s accrediting entities and managers, ensuring compliance with annual reporting requirements as well as re-accreditation efforts.

Develop data reporting tools – Utilizes available technology to develop & maintain organizational dashboards to support program management, review, and modification. Ensures developed tools support executive staff efforts to maintain situational awareness of operational and organizational efforts in real-time.

Perform other related duties as assigned.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

Performance Standards:

Employees at all levels are expected to work together effectively to meet the needs of the community and the organization through work behaviors demonstrating the Department’s values. Employees are also expected to lead by example and demonstrate the highest level of ethics; carry out a continuous effort to improve operations, work processes, and work cooperatively and collaboratively to support a data-driven and customer-focused service.

Minimum Educational and Training Requirements

Education and Experience

Bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university with major course work in computer science, information systems, statistics, or a related field. Applicant must be either a U.S. citizen or a resident alien. Successful candidates must pass a drug screen and an extensive background check.

Preferred Qualifications:

Previous knowledge of/exposure to the fire service is beneficial to this position, but not required. Experience with fire service accreditation, demonstrated experience with Power BI application & ARC GIS (ESRI) products.

Special Qualifications

Two to four years of professional experience in data analysis, business intelligence, or performance analytics (preferably in a public safety environment). Demonstrated experience working with large datasets and/or real-time data (CAD, RMS, EMS/transport, etc.) Demonstrated experience performing complex planning and research projects. Excellent communication skills (verbal and written), and close attention to detail. Demonstrated high-level skills in using computer software related to data analysis/business intelligence, such as advanced Excel skills (pivot tables and reports, tables and formatting, charts and graphs, filtering, formula application, trend analysis, descriptive statistics, etc.), SQL, and Power BI. The applicant should have experience using Microsoft Office, including Word, PowerPoint, and basic skills in GIS (ESRI products).

Physical Requirements

Job Performance Requirements:

General – For qualification as a business analyst, the candidate shall meet the educational requirements and the job performance requirements (JPRs) outlined in Sections 1 through 5.

General Prerequisite Knowledge – familiarity with analyzing information; specifically identifying, processing, querying, and visualizing data to assist the department in providing information required to external & internal agencies and for analytical and decision-making purposes; a pursuit of data integrity and sustainable data management for reliable, efficient, and long-term use.

General Prerequisite Skills – the ability to demonstrate formal training or workplace experience using datasets and data sources, as well as understanding their respective properties; investigate, organize, and present data as a comprehensible analysis; and produce documentation regarding data considerations and analytical processes.

Identify, access, and extract data – this duty involves verifying data needs, parameters, and analytical limitations while establishing connections to one or more data sources and extracting the dataset.

Verify data needs, parameters, and analytical limitations, given a request for information, so that the scope, data requirements, and estimated level of effort required to perform the analysis are defined.

Requisite Knowledge – current data resources, the department’s data sharing policies, and analytical processes.

Requisite Skills – the ability to communicate clarifying questions.

Access one or more data sources, given a set of data parameters and appropriate access to data, so that the information can be assessed.

Requisite Knowledge – content of data sources, who to ask for additional data source access, records management systems (RMS) and computer-aided dispatch systems (CAD) software, and internal & external data sources.

Requisite Skills – The ability to request data from restricted data sources and review data from one or more sources using the data management software.

Extract data, given an established connection to data sources, so that a dataset is available for use independent of the system of origin.

Requisite Knowledge – database structure/schema, data relationship structures and types, conversion options, and RMS and CAD software.

Requisite Skills – the ability to generate formatted data in a readable, accessible format and prepare data for validation.

Validate Data Extraction Process and Output. This duty involves inspecting and evaluating datasets to ensure any issues that might affect the validity of the analysis are identified and documented.

Inspect the output dataset, given a dataset and data systems, so that potential issues are identified and documented.

Requisite Knowledge – common data output issues.

Requisite Skills – the ability to identify errors in data and issues in formatting.

Evaluate data quality issues, given appropriate data review tools and a dataset with known issues, so that the scope of the issues is determined and corrective actions are documented.

Requisite Knowledge – organizational standards and typical data results.

Requisite Skills – the ability to locate data quality issues in a dataset.

Resolve/Repair. This duty involves addressing data quality errors by transforming data, communicating data limitations and potential solutions, and verifying repairs.

Perform data wrangling, given a need to resolve anomalous and erroneous data, so that data analysis is valid and reliable.

Requisite Knowledge – the department’s guidelines, policies, or procedures for modifying data; dataset requirements and impact upon modification; and data wrangling techniques.

Requisite Skills – the ability to access and operate data platforms and applications, and transform data.

Communicate any limitations in the dataset, given anomalous and erroneous data, so that the causes and remedies are annotated and can be addressed by the owners of the data.

Requisite Knowledge – business, procedural, or operational processes that impact data quality; and understanding successful mitigation strategies.

Requisite Skills – the ability to access and operate data platforms and applications, and to communicate the pertinent attributes of the dataset that impact the accuracy of the final analysis.

Verify repairs to a dataset were successful, given a repaired database, so that inconsistencies in the data are addressed.

Requisite Knowledge – dataset’s impact upon modification, and common dataset anomalies and errors.

Requisite Skills – the ability to search for data in the database and transform data.

Organize the Data. – This duty involves standardizing the data type and format and structuring the data for analysis.

Standardize data type and format, given a dataset and agency data conventions, so that data is put into a compliant type and format per department requirements.

Requisite Knowledge – data typing and formatting, methods of storing data, and data elements.

Requisite Skills – the ability to format and type data in platforms and applications used by the department.

Structure data for analysis, given data from one or more sources, so that data from multiple sources can be used within the available analysis program.

Requisite Knowledge – database design and management and relating information across different database objects and datasets.

Requisite Skills – the ability to compile a dataset into a usable format for analysis.

Analyze Data. This duty involves analyzing nonspatial data through the determination of data analysis methods and techniques, performing the data analysis, and ensuring the analysis meets the requirements of the documented request according to the following JPRs.

Determine the analysis methods and techniques, given the available data and type of request, so that a systematic and objective approach is used and supports the project goals.

Requisite Knowledge – data analysis concepts and standards, and an understanding of commercially available or department-specific data analysis platforms/tools.

Requisite Skills – the ability to apply appropriate analytical techniques or methods, select the most efficient analytical tool, and identify any additional resources to meet the project objectives.

Perform data analysis, given a request, access to applicable datasets, and analysis tools, so that the result (s) and process(es) satisfy the request.

Requisite Knowledge – general statistical analysis methods.

Requisite Skills –the ability to use an analytical tool and apply analytical techniques.

Perform quality assurance (QA), given data analysis results, so that the results meet the objectives of the original request.

Requisite Knowledge – relevant data elements, data domain application, and AHJ QA procedures.

Requisite Skills – the ability to use QA techniques to identify areas of quality concern and recommend a course of corrective action.

Present Analysis. This duty involves developing the best method(s) to share an analysis and considering who will be consuming the information, in what environment, and through what type(s) of available media.

Design a method to communicate information, given presentation requirements and data artifacts from an analysis, so that the information is accessible and specific to the target audience.

Requisite Knowledge – characteristics of the audience, presentation opportunities and limitations, and presentation design and methodology.

Requisite Skills – the ability to conduct research and apply data visualization techniques for different print and electronic media.

Communicate the results, given the results of an analysis, presentation tools, and an audience, so that the original request is addressed, any additional relevant information is outlined, and questions are addressed.

Requisite Knowledge – presentation and visualization tools.

Requisite Skills – the ability to communicate orally, visually, and in writing the results of an analysis and related questions.

Documentation. This duty involves providing technical notes and process steps taken during the entire data staging and analysis process, and creating a document that allows for reproduction and transparency of the results.

Produce technical notes, given details about data access, repairs, and data reliability, so that data considerations are documented for future reference, repeatability, and continued analysis.

Requisite Knowledge – the department’s documentation guidelines; the data access, extraction, and validation process; and the original scope and the purpose of the data request.

Requisite Skills – the ability to communicate technical notes in writing.

Compile analysis instructions, given the original request and technical notes, so that the department has access to a transparent and reproducible record of the entire analysis process.

Requisite Knowledge – the department’s documentation guidelines and the data analysis process for the current project.

Requisite Skills – the ability to communicate analysis instructions in writing, including organizing information chronologically.