Royal Ambulance has been named a best place to work in EMS, landing at #6 overall on the 2026 Inspiring Workplaces Top 100 in North America. It's our fifth consecutive year on the list and its highest-ever ranking, recognizing Royal Ambulance among the organizations that most consistently put people first. In addition to the overall ranking, Royal Ambulance received Special Recognition in three categories for the first time: Culture, Employee Voice, and Employee Experience. T

Mass casualty incident training doesn't begin when the scenario starts. For Royal Ambulance crews who recently participated in a large-scale MCI drill alongside military personnel, state EMS agencies, and public safety partners, the preparation started long before anyone arrived on site. The first thing I noticed was how quickly everyone got to work. There was no dramatic briefing. No long explanation of what was about to happen. No time spent standing around waiting for inst

A field-tested guide for new EMTs, from a Royal Ambulance training officer who's now a Licensed Vocational Nurse. EMT school gives you the protocols, the anatomy, and the skills checklist. It does not give you the hundred small things you only learn in the back of an ambulance: the cues, the shortcuts, and the people skills that turn a nervous new hire into someone a patient trusts. We sat down with Malik Thomas, who started at Royal Ambulance as an 18-year-old fresh out of h

Four years ago, Royal Ambulance joined the Corporate Work Study Program at Cristo Rey De La Salle East Bay High School in Oakland. The program places high school students at partner companies one day a week, and the wages they earn go directly toward their private school tuition. It also has a provision from the U.S. Department of Labor that allows students as young as fourteen to work in professional office settings. Which is how a freshman ended up in our billing department

Ten years is a long time to run toward hard things. Samantha Barakat joined Royal Ambulance in 2016 as an EMT working out of our San Leandro station. She didn't stay in one lane for long. Field Training Officer. Operations Supervisor. Talent Development Manager. Director of Operations. Each role was a version of the same pattern: master it, then ask what else needs doing. As Director of Operations, Sam touches every part of how this organization runs: the partnerships we hold

Tim Jordan has trained so many EMTs at Royal Ambulance that he stopped counting years ago. He has been here for sixteen years. He started before most of the people he now trains were old enough to drive. Somewhere in the middle of that stretch, the math got away from him. A name will come back to him out of nowhere, and he'll think, oh man, I trained that person too. "Almost every single one of them has gone on to do bigger and better things," he says. Tomorrow is his last da

Amelia arrived at college as a pre-med student, then quietly walked away. Four and a half years as an EMT at Royal Ambulance changed her mind. The story of how the job she took to step away from medicine became the one that brought her back to it.

California's inter-facility ambulance system is at a breaking point. A bill in the legislature could change that. Assembly Bill 1328, from Assemblymember Michelle Rodriguez, is moving through the legislature now. If it passes, it will be the first real update to Medi-Cal rates for non-emergency ambulance transport in almost 30 years.

I never expected to find myself giving a presentation on grassroots advocacy in emergency medical services. But last week that's exactly what happened. I stood in front of national EMS leadership at the American Ambulance Association's annual conference in Las Vegas and made the case that our industry needs community organizers as much as it needs clinicians and lobbyists. I'm still kind of amazed I was there. How I Got Here Hi, my name is Marshall Woodmansee. My journey in