from the conferences organized by TANGER Ltd.
Public safety network is a dynamic and flexible configuration of organisations which goal is to ensuring the safety of all entities on a given administrative area. It is characterised by the uniqueness and variability of operations, as well as constant adaptation to the actual conditions and emerging requirements. In this network, the competencies of individual entities are mutually complemented and actions are carried out based on legal, organisational and situational conditions, and also on a daily practice. From this perspective public safety networks are focused on inter-organisational collaboration, with communication processes as their foundation. These processes are realised mostly in the form of consultation and information exchange. But not always they are managed in the way sufficiently fulfilling the needs and expectations of entities being part of the public safety network. Additionally, the literature published in this matter often emphasizes the insufficiency of empiric study in the field of inter-organisational communication. This paper is an attempt to fulfill this research gap and its main goal is to evaluation of frequency and quality of communication in public safety network. The goal was achieved on the base of survey study carried out in 2015 with 480 entities involved in public safety, and direct structured interviews completed in 2016 with 83 public safety experts. The research was conducted as part of a project titled "Coordination, communication and a trust as factors driving effective inter-organisational collaboration in the system of public safety management", financed by the National Science Centre, based on decision no. DEC-2012/07/D/HS4/00537.
Keywords: communication, public management, public safety, network, complexity.© This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.