Former Forest Service official claims leadership training lacking

A career Forest Service employee and former staffer at the Flathead National Forest claims the training afforded those in leadership positions is sorely lacking.

Christine Frisbee recently retired from the Forest Service after working for decades at the agency, including as the Recreation, Heritage, Engineering, Administrative, Lands, Minerals, and Information Systems staff officer position at the Flathead National Forest.

She started her career as a botanist; has been a deputy district ranger, a district ranger on the Deschutes National Forest in Central Oregon and a deputy Forest Supervisor on the Klamath National Forest. She has also worked in the Washington, D.C. offices of the agency as the assistant director, Range.

In short, she’s seen the inner workings of the Forest Service on a variety of levels, she said in a recent interview.

And in her estimation, the agency comes up far short on leadership training.

“We do not train people to be leaders in the agency,” she said.

She noted that the Forest Service does an excellent job of training people in their line of expertise, but then the leaders aren’t necessarily listening to the experts in their fields, she claimed.

“We don’t train leaders to set aside personal issues and recognize expertise,” she said.

Frisbee, during her two-year tenure with the Flathead, worked with former Forest Supervisor Kurt Steele and Spotted Bear District Ranger Scott Snelson. Steele in the spring of 2023 had Snelson removed from his post and he ended up in the position that Frisbee once held.

The relationship between Steele and Snelson frazzled during a dispute over an outfitter who Snelson maintained was violating the rules in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, but by then, Frisbee had left the Flathead. 

She left in 2021.

But that aside, many Forest Service officials aren’t properly trained, in her estimation, to deal with the public. She admits she had struggles as well during her career, particularly as a district ranger in Oregon, where she had to learn to set her own views aside while working with the public.

“You have to be one of those neutral kind of people,” she said. “You have to value people’s opinions and expertise.”

Having said that, there are obviously good people in the Forest Service. She noted former Flathead Supervisor Chip Weber was an excellent supervisor and communicator and was excellent at working with the public.

Over the years Frisbee said she’s helped coach others in leadership positions to be better at their jobs, including offering advice to Steele.

But Northern Region Forest Service spokesman Dan Hottle disputed Frisbee’s claims the agency isn’t providing good leadership training. He pointed to leadership programs offered by the Forest Service for employees at the lowest grades all the way up to the highest, such as the “National Emerging Leader Program” and its “Senior Leader” program. 

“The National Senior Leader Program is a competency-based training program for employees who have an interest in enhancing their leadership behaviors and who have demonstrated the ability to progress into a senior leader role,” the agency notes.

“The USDA Forest Service invests in developing influential leaders who are values-based, purpose-driven and relationship-focused, which is crucial to the agency’s success in delivering its mission,” Hottle said in an emailed statement.