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Prepared’s latest webinar brought together three 911 leaders at the forefront of solving quality assurance challenges: Brad Flanagan, former telecommunicator and agency leader, Moriah Olschansky, Product Manager at Prepared, and Debby Gunn, Executive Director of Porter County Central Communications in Indiana.
Together, they explored how Prepared’s AI-powered Automated QA and the Prepared Trainer are helping dispatch centers improve performance, reduce burnout, and retain top talent…
Director’s View: “Revolutionary for Our Industry”
For Debby, the shift to Automated QA has already transformed operations at Porter County Central Communications. Her 32-person center once reviewed just 5–10% of calls. Now, AI enables comprehensive review across the board.
“With this product, there’s absolutely no subjectivity, it’s 100% of calls, 100% of the time,” she said, “Our biggest challenge now is just learning all the new ways to use it. That’s a wonderful problem to have.”
The impact, she explained, goes beyond accuracy.
“Before, staff had to wait for access to their recordings or for someone to review them manually. Now, everything is instantaneous. Supervisors and call-takers can see the same data, side by side.”
Her team is also using the system to refine and customize protocols incrementally, adding specificity where it matters most.
“It’s truly the one-stop shop for QA and training we’ve needed for years,” Gunn said, “Revolutionary is not an overstatement.”
The Retention Problem: A Confidence Gap in the First Three Years
“Over a third of people leaving this industry say they didn’t feel prepared for the job,” Brad shared, “If we can help them feel confident earlier, we can change that.”
Turnover in 911 remains among the highest in public safety, with many agencies seeing annual rates between 17% and 29%. Most departures happen within an employee’s first three years, often due to stress, lack of support, or limited feedback.
Traditional QA and training workflows haven’t kept pace with the demands of the job. Reviewing a single five-minute call can take double that time once audio, CAD data, and reports are located. Supervisors may only review 2–3% of total calls, often focusing on major incidents. That means routine calls, where skills are built and reinforced, go unseen.
“The delay in feedback was the biggest issue,” Brad said, “By the time someone got notes on a call, it could be six weeks later. They barely remembered it.”
Real-Time QA: Instant Feedback, Improved Performance
Prepared’s Automated QA is reshaping that process. By analyzing 100% of calls in real time, the system automatically identifies incident types, runs scoring protocols, and generates immediate, transparent feedback.
“For supervisors, it’s a completely different experience,” said Moriah, “Within two minutes of a call ending, you’ll have the audio, transcript, incident type, and scoring — all right there.”
Supervisors can filter for top-performing calls to celebrate wins or dive into lower-scoring interactions to coach specific behaviors. Each score includes detailed reasoning, so teams understand why something was marked correct or incorrect, not just a pass/fail mark.
The result? Faster feedback, consistent evaluation, and actionable insight.
“Data is the foundation of good decision-making in a 911 center,” Brad noted, “Now we can finally see the full picture instead of guessing.”
Turning Data Into Real-World Practice with Prepared Trainer
The webinar’s live demo showcased Prepared’s AI-powered training simulations that allow call-takers to practice real scenarios in a dynamic, conversational environment.
Using the same incident protocols used in Automated QA, supervisors can assign simulations that mirror emergencies and watch trainees interact naturally with a realistic, voice-driven caller.
“These aren’t scripted recordings,” Moriah explained, “They’re powered by language models that respond to whatever the trainee says. Each scenario is scored using the same QA criteria as a real call.”
For trainers, this consistency is a breakthrough.
“We used to do ring-ring drills,” Brad recalled, “Someone pretending to be a caller would make up wild details just to keep things interesting. Now, trainees can practice real scenarios repeatedly, track progress, and focus on exactly where they need improvement.”
Every completed simulation automatically feeds into the same analytics dashboards as live calls, creating a closed loop between training, evaluation, and performance.
Data That Drives Coaching
Behind the scenes, Prepared’s analytics dashboard provides a comprehensive view of every call, shift, and dispatcher. Supervisors can track incident types, call duration, QA trends, and performance by individual.
To make insights even more accessible, Prepared has developed a chat-based analytics assistant, currently in testing.
Leaders can simply type questions like, “Which incident types scored lowest this week?” or “Who handled the most calls today?” and get immediate answers drawn directly from their center’s data.
“It’s like having an analyst on your team,” Moriah said, “You can explore your performance data conversationally without digging through reports or spreadsheets.”
Building Confidence and Culture for the Future
For all three speakers, the most exciting benefit of automation isn’t speed, it’s confidence. Immediate, data-driven feedback empowers call takers to grow faster and feel supported, while supervisors reclaim time for coaching and leadership.
“This gives bandwidth and focus back to the people who deserve it most — the call takers and dispatchers,” Brad said. “When your QA process reinforces success instead of just pointing out mistakes, it changes your culture.”
Debby agreed: “This is the most powerful augmentation tool I’ve ever seen in my career. It’s not replacing anyone — it’s elevating everyone.”
As the session closed, the speakers reflected on what this evolution means for the profession.
“Our mission is to support the perfect response,” said Moriah. “By understanding how calls are handled and learning from that data, we can help define what great looks like — and make it achievable.”
Debby added, “We’re a unique group of people in this field. It’s exciting to finally see technology that meets the level of dedication our teams bring every day.
“The 911 center is already the information hub of public safety. Now, it’s becoming the technological hub too — where data isn’t just stored, but actively used to improve outcomes.”
Brad summed it up simply: “Imagine what’s possible when we stop doing things the way we’ve always done them.”
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