As a leader of a law enforcement organization, or a part of the leadership team, when was the last time you actually stopped and considered where the next generation of law enforcement leaders were going to come from? How are you going to develop those qualities of leadership in the personnel you currently have? Law enforcement has drastically changed in the early part of the 21st century, and the previous concepts and ideas of leading police organizations have changed as well. Long gone are the surly sergeants who would bark orders at the patrol officers or lieutenants and captains who are the only ones heading specialized groups and having little to no contact with the operations division. With the changing landscape of what is expected from a law enforcement agency, as well as the intense criticism of how an agency fulfills its community’s needs, leadership development and training has never been more important.
The expectations of leaders are constantly evolving, and current and future leaders in the law enforcement profession need to evolve as well. There are many different leadership theories, such as Greenleaf’s Servant Leadership, where the main goal of the leader is to serve, or Downton’s and MacGregor Burns’ Transformational Leadership, where the leader works to identify needed change within the organization and creates a vision to guide the change through inspiration, but these theories coupled with the desire to enhance the motivation, morale, and job performance of the organization’s members, are only a part of the overall equation to understanding and developing a good leader.1 As these leadership theories become more popular, one has to stop and evaluate what is actually being taught, as well as whether the information is presented in a manner that is meaningful and applicable to today’s law enforcement leaders.
There have been numerous research studies and articles written on the topic of leadership, but what does this concept really look like when taken from a theoretical perspective and applied to present-day law enforcement? While the common definition of leadership centers on person’s ability to lead or holding the position of a leader, this isn’t necessarily what leadership encompasses in law enforcement. Law enforcement, still based on August Vollmer’s 1909 paramilitary structure, still includes individuals who are recognized as “leaders” because of the positions they hold. However, holding a command position doesn’t necessarily make a person a leader by today’s definition. As Peter Senge, founder of the Society for Organizational Learning noted, leadership really resides in the ability to motivate an individual or group of people to act toward a common goal—and it’s this definition that needs to be applied to facilitate organizational change within the profession.2 This ability isn’t reserved only for those in a supervisory position. Leadership qualities such as honesty, integrity, accountability, and good communication skills can be found throughout an organization in almost everyone. Leadership is even more important in law enforcement due to the demands of the profession and the impact of each agency member’s responsibilities. The key to overall organizational effectiveness and success is providing the opportunity to develop these skills for those who want to become leaders. It’s also these qualities that modern leaders will need to develop to meet the needs of the profession moving forward.3
This driving need for leadership developing and training in law enforcement can be found in the Final Report of the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, which was published in 2015 and has been the first major U.S. federal study on law enforcement since President Lyndon B. Johnson’s 1967 Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice.4 While other studies have been conducted focusing on law enforcement, they really didn’t look critically at the entire profession and rarely offered any detailed suggestions in order to establish a high standard for the profession. The task force report specifically details and indicates six areas, “pillars,” the law enforcement profession needs to explore, embrace, and implement to fully transition into the 21st century. These pillars include (1) building trust and legitimacy; (2) policy and oversight; (3) technology and social media; (4) community policing and crime reduction; (5) training and education; and (6) officer wellness and safety. It’s these pillars that today’s leaders need to embrace, and the report can be viewed as the roadmap for developing tomorrow’s leaders today.4
The fifth pillar, training and education, is of special note to this discussion. It speaks directly to the implementation of leadership training, mentoring, and coaching within law enforcement. With regard to leadership training, the report spells this out quite succinctly, “Law enforcement agencies should provide leadership training to all personnel throughout their careers.”5 The corresponding action items makes these suggestions:
1. Recognizing that strong, capable leadership is required to create a cultural transformation, the U.S. Department of Justice should invest in developing learning goals and model curricula/training for each level of leadership.
2. The Federal Government should encourage and support partnerships between law enforcement and academic institutions to support a culture that values ongoing education and the integration of current research into the development of training, policies, and practices (as well as leadership).
3. The U.S. Department of Justice should support and encourage cross-discipline leadership training.6
Another recommendation in the report states,
The U.S. Department of Justice should develop, in partnership with institutions of higher education, a national postgraduate institute of policing for senior executives with a standardized curriculum preparing them to lead agencies in the 21st century.6
As a federal government report, it does take the position and role that the government should take the lead in the design of leadership development and training, but this is something that each state or agency can do with the help of other agencies or learning districts. However, the road to effective leadership is not only developing quality leadership training, but also understanding the different types of leadership; knowing what skills and traits make an effective leader; and the vision, the willingness, and the commitment of the command staff to do things that are in contrast to “the way we’ve always done it” perspective.7
The author’s discussions with chiefs, sheriffs, and law enforcement command staff around the United States make it clear that the approaches to identifying, applying, and developing leadership skills are varied. These conversations have indicated that several avenues exist to develop leadership training—partnerships with institutions of higher learning, continuing education within the state’s academy, or third-party providers such as the FBI’s National Academy or IACP’s Leadership in Police Organizations.
One leader who shared his view on leadership development is the City of Green Bay Chief of Police Andrew Smith. His experience reflects a perspective shaped largely by policing in large city such as Los Angeles, California, as well as in midsized cities such as Green Bay, Wisconsin. Chief Smith points out that it’s the aforementioned non-standardization of leadership development that adds to the problem, and his perspective echoes that of the task force report in that leadership needs to be developed as soon possible.
The main question, then, is does this disparate approach to leadership training hinder the overall effectiveness of leadership development within law enforcement? If the profession is to follow the spirit and intent of the president’s task force report, these challenges need to be addressed or at least minimized. If agencies want to develop effective and professional leaders, they will have to seriously consider implementing the report’s suggestions of partnerships and standardized training. By partnering with institutions of higher learning for leadership development, law enforcement can move forward and be seen as a serious profession—while overcoming negative public perceptions. A benefit of partnering with institutions of higher learning is their experience with the development of solid, competency-based learning objectives and outcomes. This approach also provides the ability to bring a level of uniformity to those outcomes, as well as maintaining a level of professional rigor that validates the profession. Finally, those leadership courses that are connected with higher education have access to instructors and resources that an agency might not have internally, which benefits law enforcement organizations.
So, why should law enforcement organizations spend the limited resources of an agency on what some would call “non-essential” training? The answer is both simple and complicated—law enforcement needs to spend resources on leadership training because the profession needs to develop better leaders and employees. With a shrinking pool of qualified new entry and senior candidates, law enforcement needs to have effective, formalized professional development for those individuals who want to advance in the profession. This can be accomplished through continuing education. Also, a byproduct of formal, ongoing leadership development is improved critical thinking and decision-making skills, which will pay dividends in repairing and advancing community-police relations. Edgar Schein, the foremost leader in organizational development and leadership, noted, the investment in the future of an organization starts with the most valuable asset—it’s personnel.7 The law enforcement community needs to take that step from a vocation to a serious profession, and to do this, it needs to invest in structured education and training outside of the typical mandatory tactical training in driving, self-defense, weapons, first-aid, and so forth.
While many agencies dispense trainings on a seniority basis, leadership training needs to be looked at differently. Earning a level of seniority doesn’t necessarily equate to becoming an effective leader. Those at the command level have to recognize that sending personnel to leadership training solely based on longevity is not in the best interest of the organization. If the organization has limited funds and cannot provide leadership training for all, it’s those individuals who are invested in advancing the profession or who have demonstrated leadership potential through their actions who should be sent. For the law enforcement profession to join other professions that are held in high esteem, like the medical field, it must look at what makes those other professions highly respected—continuing leadership training and education in the field is certainly one element that can have an impact. While resources are limited for many agencies, law enforcement needs to start investing in personnel for the long run or it will have to deal with a revolving door of low-quality candidates, with the highly qualified ones leaving for elsewhere.
The second challenge that needs to be addressed is how to find tailored leadership training outside of those programs designed for command staff. For those career officers who are looking to move into the command ranks, many of the highly touted leadership programs are specifically designed in training the next chief or sheriff, not for those who are front-line supervisors or relatively new to the profession. These programs are designed to encompass all of the areas that a command staff member would be responsibility for or specialize in; they include terrorism, law, and other areas. These specific areas don’t necessarily focus on leadership, although they do explore this topic. Some of these respected training programs, like the FBI National Academy, involve a selection or nomination process due largely to limited space in the annual class. Then, there’s the underlying financial and time commitments of sending agency members to trainings that can take a year or more to complete; something that most agencies wouldn’t want to do (and cannot afford to do) for every officer. The IACP offers the Leadership in Police Organizations (LPO) and First-Line Leadership training programs, which are more in line with the type of leadership training mentioned by the task force, but these courses are limited in availability.
As mentioned, the task force report discusses the need for agencies to form partnerships with local institutions of higher learning that would be able to fill this gap with more localized training. But what kind of training? Where does one send newer officers as well as those more seasoned officers? Leadership training isn’t something that one can run through and immediately be ready for whatever comes up; it’s a process that needs to be experienced over time so individuals can develop their own particular style and strengths. For this reason, specific course construction by those who are experienced in both leadership and public safety is advised to fit the role of the newer officer. By implementing this approach, a more dedicated course that addresses specific areas could be developed. While it’s true that each agency, county, and state dictates its own policies and procedures regarding what type of training is allowed, as well as where that training needs to take place, it’s up to the profession to collectively decide that this type of training is needed. As the task force report detailed and researchers have found, having a balanced, comprehensive approach to leadership is needed to effectively ensure an overall positive outcome.8 Senior command staff need to be proactive in their approach to leadership development within their organizations. By engaging in an open, honest conversation between institutions of higher learning and law enforcement organizations, effective, ongoing partnerships can be developed though which continuing education and training for future police leaders can occur.
When looking at the challenges, limitations, and rewards that leadership training brings, the important benefits that this training can yield cannot be overstated. The President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, consisting of law enforcement commanders, educational professionals, and justice executives, cited the glaring need for leadership training and the benefits that it will bring to both the organizations and the communities they serve. Engaging in specific and uniform leadership training, identifying and encouraging the next wave of leaders in the profession, and seeing this type of training as an investment rather than just as something to get the required training hours for the year, will have a positive and prolonged effect on agencies and communities. The concept of leadership has and will continue to change; law enforcement needs to adapt to those changes and actively offer effective leadership training so agencies can serve communities through the 21st century and well into the future.
 Michael P. Schneider, PhD, is a visiting lecturer of Leadership Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay; a former lieutenant of operations for Bonduel Police Department, Wisconsin; an organizational development consultant with the Center for Leadership, Policy, and Politics; and an independent consultant with the International Association of the Chiefs of Police (IACP). |
Notes:
1 Robert K. Greenleaf, The Servant as Leader, rev. ed. (South Orange, NJ: Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership, 2015); James MacGregor Burns, Leadership (HarperCollins, 1978).
2 Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization (New York, NY: Currency Doubleday, 1994).
3 Joan V. Gallos, ed., Organization Development: A Jossey-Bass Reader (San Francisco, CA; Jossey-Bass, 2006).
4 Final Report of the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing (Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, 2015).
5 Final Report of the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, 54–55.
6 Final Report of the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, 55.
7 Edgar H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 4th ed. (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons, 2010).
8 David V. Day, Michelle M. Harrison, and Stanley M. Halpin, An Integrative Approach to Leader Development (New York, NY: Psychology Press, 2009).
