As a young specialist in the U.S. Army in 1994, I had a desire to lead, so I applied to participate in the Sergeant’s Board. This involved a very intimidating process that required me to sit in front of several senior enlisted members of my battalion and answer their questions. Upon passing the Sergeant’s Board, I was sent to a month-long course called the Primary Leadership Development Course (PLDC). Several hundred of us entered as soldiers and left as leaders. We learned basic leadership principles like how to lead from the front, how to lead by example, what a leader must be, what a leader must know, and what a leader must do. We learned how to motivate people and how to make them want to accomplish a mission. We were fully prepared to be promoted to sergeant and take on whatever leadership tasks our respective units assigned us.

I left the Army in 1996 and joined the Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Police Department in 1997. I witnessed my first round of promotions in 1998 and watched a good friend be promoted to sergeant. He was a fellow Army veteran, and I asked him what training we as police officers needed to attend to be promoted. He laughed and told me there was no PLDC for law enforcement.

Throughout my career, I have continued to notice this lack of formal agency leadership training for newly promoted sergeants. There are a few state courses offered, such as First-Line Supervision, and several management courses for lieutenants and above. These courses offer basic leadership and management skills. However, none of these courses prepare leaders for what their specific agencies require of them.

I think many of my fellow officers will agree that law enforcement is sergeant driven. Sergeants are the first line of review. They are on the ground directing crime scenes and other large-scale events while looking after the well-being of their personnel. Once I became a sergeant, it became evident that police agencies rely heavily on sergeants to perform many leadership roles—but without providing adequate leadership training. This caused me to focus on the reasons behind the lack of training. Was it cost? Personnel? Lack of available training courses? The only answer I could seem to find to these questions was, “We have always talked about doing that.” Nonetheless, it hadn’t been done.

Lieutenant John Morris was promoted to sergeant in 2008, and by 2015, he was a senior patrol sergeant with experience in teaching and developing courses. He approached a colleague—a patrol lieutenant—and asked him if he was interested in developing a training class for new sergeants. Lt. Morris’s colleague responded with an emphatic “Yes!” Once development of the class began, the two officers quickly realized that they had a huge task in front of them, but also a great opportunity to grow and develop new leaders.

To start the process, Lt. Morris wrote a proposal to be presented to the Winston-Salem Police Department’s command staff. The proposal included the need for a diverse list of instructors with strong patrol and legal backgrounds—the final list of instructors included the public safety attorney, two patrol lieutenants, and a sergeant from Internal Affairs who happily volunteered to be a part of this much-needed and long-awaited training.

The planning team met as a group and agreed that the initial presentation to the command staff should include the training objectives for the proposed course. The objectives of the training were determined to be the following:

• Provide newly promoted sergeants with an overview of the tasks and skills required for their position.

• Provide in-depth instruction on internal and administrative investigations.

• Provide instruction on leadership styles and employee management.

• Discuss management of unusual occurrences.

• Provide a comprehensive review of legal issues that a leader can face.

• Explain the importance of squad management, leadership ethics, and impartial leadership.

• Become familiar with the most current patrol staffing policies.

• Explain and demonstrate how to complete an internal investigation.

• Explain the difference between administrative and internal investigations.

The command staff was very receptive to the idea and immediately gave the team approval to move forward with the development and deployment of the course, while also providing their expert leadership advice by suggesting additional topics to be added to the course. These topics included city specific training from human resources and leadership skills not specific to police, such as emotional intelligence, personality types, and generational differences. The introduction of these additional topics necessitated adding another instructor from a local community college with corporate leadership training expertise.

Subject Overview

After the instructors were chosen, it was time to decide what departmental-specific topics would be included in the course. Authorization had been given for a five-day course, so the decisions of what to include had to be very deliberate. For a room full of newly promoted sergeants, Lt. Morris and his team also knew they had to keep it interesting. That being the case, it was decided that each block should have some sort of practical exercise.

The first subject, Patrol Leadership, was an easy selection. This is a block comprised of many aspects of leadership. It starts with a review of procedural justice which emphasizes that leaders have a responsibility to ensure that officers are neutral and community members are treated with respect.

Patrol Leadership also addressed how to move forward to the new reality of the supervisory position and how to handle not “being one of the guys.” Other subjects discussed in this block are leadership styles, qualities of effective leaders, and supervisory mistakes. The discussion of supervisory mistakes includes agency-specific examples of where and why leadership failed.

The next subject combines Unusual Occurrence and Planning. This section is straightforward. The instructor outreaches Winston-Salem’s departmental models for handling large-scale operations. However, instead of just regurgitating the Unusual Occurrence Manual to the class, the instructor researched the “why” and was able to give realistic examples of why the model works and, conversely, why it has failed on occasion, proving that the successes and failures can be based on leadership. The planning aspect is a comprehensive look at the types of planning methods used in day-to-day patrol operations. Another subject addressed in this block is decision-making: decision-making factors, sequences, and problems.

Case and Scene Management is next on the agenda. This topic is departmental specific and discusses policies on case closure, resources, and approval of case reports. This block is popular since many new sergeants have no idea what criteria to use when closing cases. This block also discusses the utilization of departmental resources. For example, when to call Traffic Enforcement and the Detective Division, when to expect them to arrive, and what they will need upon arrival at the scene. This is also a very well-received and popular block of instruction since it helps new sergeants avoid frustration and embarrassment.

The course employed a tabletop exercise that combined the lessons of Patrol Leadership, Unusual Occurrence and Planning, and Case and Scene Management. Class participants are divided into three groups and given a real-life patrol scenario. The purpose of the tabletop exercise is two-fold. First, it teaches the groups how to work through a difficult patrol scenario systematically while working as a team. Second, the tabletop exercise allows the instructors to compare the different resolutions to a scenario and assess the differences for possible revisions to departmental manuals.

Legal Issues for Supervisors was the next topic selected. This is a two-hour block taught by the agency’s public safety attorney. This is a diverse legal block, and subjects range from the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) to property interest as an employee. The public safety attorney constructed binders for all the new sergeants. Each binder contains documented answers to the common legal problems in patrol, including topics such as trespass versus eviction, what to do with unclaimed deceased persons, child custody questions, and HIPAA rules for law enforcement. These binders have now become quite a popular resource for members of patrol.

The agency’s Internal Affairs sergeant taught the Personnel and Administrative Investigations subject. This block was originally scheduled for two hours, but during the delivery, it was realized that it needs a minimum of four hours to be appropriately addressed. This section fosters the most questions and conversation. The instructor covers how to complete department-specific internal investigations and, most important, the mistakes that can be made with these investigations. An in-depth discussion on how to handle citizen complaints is helpful for the class, as well. This block concludes with the new sergeants conducting mock interviews on an employee using a scripted administrative investigation.

At Winston-Salem media relations is primarily the responsibility of a lieutenant assigned to the task, but the instruction staff thought it would be beneficial to add a Media Relations block to the curriculum. A patrol lieutenant who has several hours of specialized media relations training teaches this block. The most beneficial part of this block is the practical exercise: employees from City Marketing are brought in to act as reporters, and they conduct interviews that are recorded and played back for the students to critique.

As the schedule was being finalized and presentations were being developed, Lt. Morris received a call from a district captain who had been discussing the training with the agency’s Patrol Division senior officer assistant. The office assistant stated that she would love the opportunity to speak to the group since she often helps new supervisors find answers to several common questions. These questions include everything from work time codes to where certain supplies are kept, and time was added into the class schedule for her.

Training Delivery

Once the topics were clearly defined with instructors to teach them, the attendees for the inaugural class had to be determined, as well as who would attend subsequent classes. It was decided that the first class should be attended by all sergeants promoted within the last two years, which ended up being approximately 20 students. Offering the subsequent classes to corporals in the sergeant’s process was considered, but decided against since there was not a way to predict how soon a corporal would be promoted. The inaugural course was scheduled with minimal impact on patrol staffing by purposefully choosing a week when both patrol rotations were working.

The five days of content were laid out systematically to begin with general information and work up to complicated leadership problems. The first two days of classes are dedicated to the corporate leadership trainer’s instruction blocks. She is an amazing instructor who has experience teaching law enforcement and engages the class from the start. She has sergeants complete a very detailed personality assessment, which is particularly engaging since most class participants have never participated in a personality assessment. The sergeants often find that their assessments are accurate and quite revealing. The instructor then reinforces learning about personality types by separating each type of personality into groups and giving them problems to solve.

The third day of instruction was dedicated to information from the city’s human resources instructor. The new sergeants are introduced to all city policies as they relate to personnel matters. As previously mentioned, a training specialist from the Human Resources Department presented this block.

Day four starts with the department-specific information, with Patrol Leadership in the morning followed by Unusual Occurrence and Planning and Case and Scene Management. After a lunch break, the sergeants return for the tabletop exercise and the day is completed with the Legal instruction block.

The final day starts with the Internal Investigations topics, directly followed by the mock interviews. After a lunch break, the Media Relations information is presented, directly followed by the practical exercise. The Patrol Administration block is the final class topic.

Benefits and Lesson Learned

Understanding that it’s not possible to create a handbook for every situation, the instruction staff aims this training at best practices, shared experiences, and lessons learned. At the end of the first class, the course received many accolades from the participants, ranging from “best training ever” to “not too bad.” The team also made sure to aggressively solicit suggestions as what could be improved, as well as what information could be revised or added. The main suggestion was to create a one-day course for new corporals. That suggestion was taken into consideration and then put into practice the following year. However, the resounding compliment was that instructors are able to take basic leadership principles and apply them directly to the agency’s policies and procedures. The sergeants also appreciated veteran supervisors’ offering insight and expertise, affording them the best opportunity to flourish in their new role.

The instructors made a few adjustments before the second course. First, the City Human Resources section was eliminated, since a new city policy requires all new supervisors to attend this training off site. The corporate leadership’s training time was pared down to one day, which helped streamline her block and make it more concise. The majority of the negative comments from participants related to the Media Relations topic. Therefore, it was eliminated to make more time for the Internal Investigations information. The instructors realized that they will have to be willing to adapt and revise the course’s content based on the needs of the agency’s new leaders.

Conclusion

In law enforcement, far too often new sergeants are pushed into new roles without having the proper framework in place to succeed. Winston-Salem’s ultimate goal of this training is to provide its sergeants with the tools and shared personal experiences to help them thrive in their new role. Outside leadership and management training is valuable since it helps agencies to thrive, learn, and share new ideas. However, for new sergeants, initial leadership training should be internal and related to their specific agency’s policies, procedures, and best practices. This initial leadership training sets new sergeants up for success as new leaders before they move on to more advanced outside training. Lt. Morris personally considered the training a success when a sergeant approached him after the training and said she gave the personality assessment to each of her squad members so she could better lead her group.

While there might not be a PLDC at the Winston-Salem Police Department, the leaders and staff are doing their part to set the agency’s new sergeants up to best serve their officers, the agency, and ultimately the citizens of Winston-Salem. d

Please cite as

John D. Morris, “Taking the Lead: The Implementation of Agency-Specific Leadership Training,” Police Chief online, January 30, 2019.