The last 30 years have seen dramatic increases in the amount of research conducted on a wide variety of U.S. law enforcement issues and concerns. From the tumultuous times experienced during the 1960s to the fiscal constraints law enforcement faces today, police researchers and practitioners have sought methods and strategies to drive U.S. law enforcement toward more efficient and effective operations, both internally and externally. In this regard, great success has been achieved in working with law enforcement professionals throughout the United States and from all types of public safety agencies, including local, state, and federal jurisdictions.

Performance management and the effective directing and leading of valuable human resources toward the accomplishment of an organization’s identified mission and vision can, at the best of times, be considered an elusive goal. Law enforcement agencies put a great deal of effort into talent acquisition and providing adequate training for those selected, but once recruits enter the field on their own immediately after field training, something often goes amiss. Research reveals that, in a very short period of time, new officers can start to become disillusioned with the career they have chosen. But herein lies the surprise—many times is not the work itself, the danger associated the career, or even the very challenging people that officers are exposed to on a daily basis that leads to disillusionment; rather, it is their feelings of frustration internally with their agencies and, most of all, with their agencies’ leaders.¹

Recognizing the Problem

This disparity is easy to understand, but it is often difficult for police supervisors to believe. “How could someone working for me possibly be disheartened or feel disengaged, particularly because of my leadership style?” Law enforcement in the United States has changed a great deal during the last 150 years, but supervisory management and leadership beliefs, principles, and practices have not necessarily kept pace with other changes. In short, law enforcement agencies often still operate like the typical para-military bureaucracies they were in past decades. However, it appears that today’s employees—not just millennials—are looking for more forward-thinking, forward-leaning, forward-moving organizations that are capable of understanding their needs and changing with the times when necessary, particularly in the areas of supervisory management, leadership, and talent management practices.²

 Changing Law Enforcement Leadership

Even as law enforcement moves into the 21st century and all of its many challenges, many veteran police officers cannot understand why new police officers are not necessarily happy with their careers. However, as one studies the need for better leadership development in law enforcement and why these younger officers feel disenfranchised or disillusioned with their careers or departments, it is necessary to examine the criticality of individual high performance in obtaining and maintaining organizational high performance and how leadership drives this entire process. Simply put, police officers are working as public servants to fulfill a specific mission—ensuring public safety—but law enforcement can’t achieve this goal if it can’t achieve the high performance required for organizational mission accomplishment. This is where great leadership fits into the puzzle. Great leadership drives both individual and organizational high performance, allowing an organization to realize its vision.

As Jim Collins states in his 2001 bestseller Good to Great, one of the most important factors in becoming a high-performing and strong organization is getting the right people “on the bus” and then getting them “in the right seats.” If this principle is accepted, then perhaps law enforcement leaders should take a hard look at who they are getting on the bus and how to get them there—and then try to figure out how to get their people in the right seats.³ The discipline and poor performance issues being experienced in many law enforcement agencies, coupled with increasing rates of attrition, lead many researchers and practitioners to conclude that either the personal or professional needs of today’s police officers are not being addressed effectively. A lack of job satisfaction typically results in poor morale, and poor morale typically equates to low motivation to perform, which can manifest itself in the following negative results:⁴

• Low productivity
• Below-average service levels
• Poor quality control and assurance (including increased disciplinary problems)
• Failure to run lean and increased levels of waste of limited or valuable resources
• Failure to identify and mitigate risks to the organization

 Getting the right personnel on the team and then leading them effectively toward the accomplishment of the organization’s identified and agreed-upon mission and vision are paramount to success for every nonprofit, for-profit, and government-based entity. Good leadership involves identifying every individual team member’s specific personality traits, skills, knowledge, abilities, personal goals, and professional goals and figuring out what makes them perform at their best and have the self-discipline to maintain high performance—not only when supervisors are around, but also when noone is watching. This is the key: How do I as a leader convince people to want to voluntarily follow me, not because they have to, but because they realize that it is good for all the parties involved, including the organization and themselves? Answering this question is critical to a leader’s success.

Why Good Performance Matters

Accomplishing the goals and objectives of an organization is what leadership is all about, and this is best accomplished if everyone is successfully performing their assigned tasks. Putting all leadership theory, concepts, principles, and models aside, good leadership comes down to influencing others in a positive manner to get the very best efforts, actions, and behaviors they have to offer. Most motivational experts and industrial psychologist agree that increasing an employee’s satisfaction, fulfillment, and opportunity for growth usually equates to increased morale, which, in turn, generates increased motivation to perform well.⁵ Many leaders recognize that each employee and team member in any organization might require a customized, if not personalized, career development plan, with commensurate strategies on how to best accomplish both their personal and professional goals. New police officers, particularly millennials, are no longer willing to join an organization and work hard for years, all the while enduring the challenges that today’s street-level police officer experiences, in the hope that maybe, one day, if they are duly recognized for their performance or potential, they might receive a requested transfer or desired promotion.

The Myth of Rational Leadership

The power of emotion in the workplace cannot be underestimated, hence the reason for the adage of “the myth of rational leadership.” If leadership and the act of leading was in fact a rational process, then a formula would exist for effectively leading others in various situations and under a multitude of circumstances, similar to the protocols used by paramedics in the field. However, leading people, who by their very nature are complicated and emotionally driven, poses challenges for law enforcement supervisors and agency administrators, especially when coupled with the fact that many law enforcement officers, like many people in the military, have very strong personalities. It is for this reason that the leadership model proposed herein is designed for developing followership in others. It is based upon the principle leaders have to understand those they lead, and that understanding cannot be developed without regular, positive communication. In fact, negative communications and interactions can hamper a leader’s ability to identify how to motivate an individual employee.⁶

The Solution

Veteran police officers and those in various leadership positions need to be willing to admit that they might require additional and or ongoing training and education on how to best lead their organization’s human resources and talent toward successful mission accomplishment. This suggestion. Paired with the following recommendations can help law enforcement leaders succeed in the 21st century:⁷

• Develop a comprehensive strategic plan.
• Engage in leadership training early and at every level within the department.
• Encourage everyone, including veterans and those already in leadership positions, to continue to hone their leadership skills through ongoing training and education.
• Continue to poll, survey, and ask what each employee’s career goals and aspirations are in an effort to develop an effective career development plan for each.
• Understand the power of emotion and the impact that leaders have on employees’ motivation to perform highly.
• Understand the complexities of the law enforcement organization and recognize that everything must work in unison as a well-orchestrated set of systems and subsystems.
• Set high standards throughout the organization with high performance not only expected but required of all personnel while on duty.

If leaders communicate effectively with their employees, then they will get to know those employees as individuals. Once leaders know their employees, they will be able to identify what is really important to each employee, personally and professionally. This allows the opportunity of understanding each team member and being able to provide all of them with the support they need to feel empowered and in control of their own destinies while at work and within their respective agency or organization.

Some leaders want to lead, but can’t, and others can, but won’t. All leaders should realize by now the tremendous impact leadership style has on their fellow team members and what types of results a leadership style either produces—or fails to produce—in them. Short-term results with absolutely no employee allegiance to either a leader or the organization and no long-term motivation to perform is not going to help an organization get to where it needs to be. A very direct correlation exists between one’s leadership style and ability and the performance that leader is capable of cultivating in his or her organization. Leaders need to ask themselves two very important questions. Do you understand your leadership skills, knowledge, and abilities and can you control and direct them enough to be an effective leader within your organization? How does your law enforcement organization’s leadership and performance measure up to the needs of your community and 21st-century law enforcement?

 Notes:

¹ R. J. Barry and Clyde Cronkite, “Managing Police Agencies Under Stress: Coping with the Aftermath of the Rodney G. King Incident,” Western City (July 1991): 21–24.

² Charles R. Swanson, Leonard J. Territo, and Robert W. Taylor, Police Administration: Structures, Processes, and Behavior, 5th ed. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001).

³ Jim Collins, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap … And Others Don’t (New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2001).

⁴ Gregory Warren, unpublished paper, 2015.

⁵ Gregory Warren, Leadership-Followership formula, 2011.

⁶ Herbert J. Chruden and Arthur W. Sherman, Managing Human Resources, 7th ed. (Cincinnati, OH: South-Western Publishing Company, 1984).

⁷ Larry Donnithorne, The West Point Way of Leadership (New York, NY: Currency, Doubleday, 1993).