Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 1 of 6 Credible Leadership Development White Paper The Future of Police, Justice, and Public Safety Leadership Development By: Terry D. Anderson, PhD., Mitch Javidi, PhD., Anthony Normore, PhD., and Chief Sam Spiegel, Ret., MS 1.1 Executive Summary This paper is intended to help decision-makers to decide if the Every Officer is a Leader (EOIAL) and Every Fire-Rescue Professional is a Leader (EFRPIAL) books and the Credible Leadership Program, that are now available for justice and public safety personnel, offer viable competency-based leadership opportunities for their organizations. What makes these resources unique and different from others is that other programs that purport to be competency-based describe overarching competency clusters without articulating or training people in the skills that are truly necessary to perform those general competencies. This White Paper is written for Police and Fire Chiefs, Sheriffs, Federal and State Public Safety Executives, Security Organization Executives, Corrections Executives and Training Managers who make decisions about leadership training. For an overview of all of our courses, books, workshops, consulting and coaching go to CommandCollege.org. 1.2 Why Isn’t Every Officer a Leader? In this White Paper we will outline the history and development of the Big Five Skills Set that is a part of, Every Officer is a Leader and Credible Leadership course series currently offered in the USA and Canada. We will demonstrate how these skills, combined with competency-based skills training, have been the missing foundation that is necessary to bring leaders to competence in law, justice, and public safety, and specifically to policing. Leadership isn’t simple. It is complex and requires validated training and coaching protocols. Readers will learn about how to implement an affordable and credible leadership program from this White Paper.
Credible Leadership Development White Paper Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 2 of 6 1.2.1 Why Aren’t All Leadership Programs Skills-Based? Historically, the study of leadership has largely been an academic affair with leadership theories being in focus. Since the 1960’s, two streams of learning at the university level where the skills have been trained, are social work programs and counselling programs. Competence, however, is usually verified only if a professional master’s level degree has been attained and certification standards are passed. To earn a master’s degree in counseling or social work there is usually a required Field Practice assignment where the skills are verified. Skills verification is generally necessary since, similar to medicine, dentistry, and nursing programs, this advanced degree may allow certification that includes the right to legally practice in the jurisdiction where you might want to live. To the best of our knowledge, the one exception to this is in the Criminal Justice Program in British Columbia at the University of the Fraser Valley. Since 1976, this Canadian university has housed competencybased courses and two field practice assignments that verify competence in specific skills. This competence is required for a two-year Diploma in Criminal Justice, in addition to a 4-year degree. Students who enrol in the MA program are expected to have these skills well-developed. 1.2.2 But These Skills Are Life-Skills that Everyone Needs – Why Aren’t These Skills Taught in High School, Universities, Colleges or in other Support Organizations? Teachers can’t teach what they haven’t learned. Because teachers are not taught these skills in their teacher training, the school curriculum assumes that these life skills (e.g., self-management, communication and problem-solving) should be learned at home or on the playground or on the job, by trial and error. Most curriculum decision-makers assume these skills are “personal” skills that don’t belong in the public curriculum. 1.3 A New Paradigm Emerges for Police Education 1.3.1 What Leadership Skills Do Learners Have Before Training? 1.3.1.1 Historical Background In the late 1970’s, when Dr. Anderson taught the communication and problem-solving skills in a leadership night class, we observed the following: 1. Over 85% of the students (including many police officers) who did a video of them trying to assist someone to solve a problem for 15 minutes: a. did not engage in active listening, b. demonstrated little to no accurate empathy, and/or c. gave premature advice to help solve a problem which was never specified (i.e. “have you tried this, or that?”). For the first few years, we did a pre-post video to make sure that it was 15% of the people who performed well. By the end of the course, we were able to coach the 85% who didn’t do well in their initial video. At the end of the course, we personally reviewed all of the videos to determine if the skill acquisition had occurred compared to the videos that were recorded at the beginning of the course. We were able to verify that over 95% of the people who completed the full 45 hours of instruction and practice were able to acquire and demonstrate all 12 of the communication skills and all 12 problem-solving skills, at least at the level they could continue to develop it after the course was completed.
What is Required to Build a Competency-Based Leadership Development Program? Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 3 of 6 In the early 1980’s Dr. Anderson was contracted by the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) to develop a training program for Living Unit Officers (who helped inmates to develop many of these skills). The CSC asked Dr. Anderson to train a cadre of 10 national trainers who adopted and adapted this training program to fit their needs for future staff training. This was the first time a government agency used the skills training approach to prepare officers to work more effectively with inmates. A few years later, the CSC asked Dr. Anderson and Dr. Darryl Plecas to develop a Skills for Living Program for inmates that contained many of the same competency-based skills. What professions have taught the 1st three skills sets (36 Skills) of self-management, interpersonal communication and problem-solving? Social Work, Counselling and Psychotherapy and some Graduate Leadership Programs (Leadership Challenge) have graduate programs that teach many of these skills. Carkhuff, Egan and Ivey have all developed competency-based skills training books and programs for counsellors and organization development at the graduate level and have laid a strong foundation for all of us to build upon. The Outline of the Skills in the Credible Leadership Program can be reviewed here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cl229dle7ouojns/The%20Meaning%20of%20Credible%20Leadership%20Certification.pdf?dl=0 1.4 What is Required to Build a Competency-Based Leadership Development Program? We have learned there are three necessary components to building a competency-based leadership development program. First, we must agree on what effective performance targets are to be able to demonstrate leadership competence (think of physical fitness or weapons training). We know from research what these BIG Five Skill Sets are – and – no one has said to us that we should forget these parts of the job of policing: 1. Self-Management 2. Interpersonal Communication and Conflict Management 3. Problem-Solving 4. Team Leadership 5. Organizational and Community Leadership Secondly, competency-based training must occur. Learning about theory doesn’t transfer to becoming competent in the leadership skills. Teaching theory is important and valuable to learn how to think ABOUT leadership but, in our view, the ideal scenario would be that officers receive training in their academies, and that training would be followed up with on-the-job coaching (think about Field Training Officers performing and evaluating recruit performance based on the Big Five Skills Sets). How? 1. Start with end in mind! If our goal is to have every officer demonstrating leadership skills on an ongoing basis, initiate skills training from the beginning and build on it throughout one’s career. 2. Each trainee agrees on 2-3 skills at a time to work on developing. 3. Coach the trainee (who has already been introduced to the skills in their initial training) to better perform those skills for a few weeks at a time. 4. Move on to the mastery of 2-3 more skills the next week or two.
Credible Leadership Development White Paper Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 4 of 6 Third, the program has been tested so that there is Proof of Concept in the real world. The following tests have been done on the, Every Officer is a Leader and Credible Leadership in real agencies: 1. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and local Municipal Departments informed Dr. Anderson of their needs and they collaborated with the Canadian Police Knowledge Network to build the program that was also based upon the successful university leadership course at the University of the Fraser Valley: https://www.cpkn.ca/en/canadian-credible-leadership-series/. 2. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) pilot-tested the program by collaborating to build it and test it with 25 of their best leaders – see the 7 minute video by Deputy Chief (Personnel and Training), Mark Perez at this link: https://commandcollege.org/services/education-and-training/emergingleadership-ace-2/. This course is available to any officers now and has 6 units of university transfer to over 1700 universities. 3. Sheriff Champagne (Past President of the National Sheriffs Association) validated the program’s outcomes by training ALL of his staff and reported these results after he implemented the program over a period of 5 years: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ycdxzqlrsodh3zm/Sheriff%20Greg%20Champagne%2C%20St.%20Charles%20Parish%20Sheriff%27s%20Office%20%281%29.mp4?dl=0. 4. The Canadian Police Knowledge Network, the RCMP and Municipal Police collaborated with Dr. Anderson and National Command and Staff College1 to produce and pilot studies published and available online now by the Canadian Police Knowledge Network: https://www.cpkn.ca/en/canadian-credibleleadership-series-skills/. 5. The Department of Justice (DOJ) funded a pilot to test the efficacy of the Every Officer is a Leader Workshop; the program was evaluated and recommended by the DOJ. 6. The conceptual framework and skills are research-based and the textbook has been used by major universities such as Capella University, Ball State University in the US and Dalhousie University in Canada (see the letter from Professor Jeff Green who was the Chief of Leadership Training for the FBI): https:// www.consultingcoach.com/images/full/jeff-green.jpg. 7. Certified by 36 Peace Officers Standards and Training (POSTs) agencies and the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training (IADLEST), and they published the results in the IADLEST newsletter on Page 37: https://www.dropbox.com/s/udubj8s6dxdoytz/ IADLEST%20Every%20Officer%20is%20a%20Leader%20Report%20from%20DOJ%20and%20IADLEST%20copy.pdf?dl=0. 8. The American Council on Education has reviewed the entire curriculum and approved it for 6 units of undergraduate credits that transfer to over 1,700 universities: https://acememberdirectory.azurewebsites.net. 1.5 Implementing a Successful Competency-based Leadership Development Program 1.5.1 Leadership Competence Must be Part of the Organization’s Culture Until leadership becomes an organization-wide coached practice, it will remain a program that is introduced, and for the most part not ingrained. This is because leadership isn’t easy or simple. It requires a significant amount of coaching and practice to become proficient and effective in performing the skills that get measurable results. The skills must be coached over a period of time, so that the benefits can be realized by all involved. Remember, culture defines your organization. 1. CommandCollege.org
Implementing a Successful Competency-based Leadership Development Program Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 5 of 6 1.5.2 What Do We Believe is the Ideal Training Paradigm for Leadership Skills Training? The desired end state is that everyone in the organization has been provided the tools to help build a positive culture of competence and caring. It is like weapons training, self-defence training, or any other developmental system where constant repetition of a task helps develop refinement of skills and a form of “muscle memory” that enables the individual to perform the tasks skillfully, even in times of stress, adrenalin surge, and/or dangerous circumstances. Leadership skills training is as necessary and important as other core training in developing the competencies of the individual officer in fulfilling their current and future responsibilities and roles in the organization. In a perfect world, if policing recruits were to take dedicated leadership skills training during their recruit training program, and Field Training Officers were trained to coach these new recruits in further development of those skills during their initial field indoctrination to policing, that would be ideal. This would require that the Field Training Officers were also trained to a competency level in these skills prior to taking on the mentorship role with the recruits. This leadership skills training would also be of benefit to all non-sworn professional staff in the organization, so including it in their developmental training would also be relevant and important. 1.5.3 Research Foundations of Credible Leadership 40 Tasks + 60 Skills = 100% Leadership Performance The first research that we conducted was with San Diego PD, Vancouver PD, the RCMP, and many others were studied by our graduate students. These studies revealed 40 Tasks and Responsibilities of Effective Police Leadership that more than 6000 police leaders have agreed constitute effective police leadership performance: Click here to self-assess these 40 tasks: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ f4wwu0ae58zo71d/Research%20Based%20List%20of%20Leadership%20Tasks%20and%20Responsibilities%20Short%20Form%20v2%20Final.pdf?dl=0. 1.5.4 The Big 5 Skill Sets Drive the Performance of the 40 Tasks The 5 Skill Sets and the 5 Practices of Exemplary Leaders intersect and conceptually cross-validate one another into a larger, even more comprehensive, and integrated model that includes the monumental research of Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner (made popular in their book, The Leadership Challenge). It is our expectation that future research will likely validate that this integrated model is a breakthrough in clarity of understanding about how the complexity of leadership based upon our field studies and classroom environment results. https://www.dropbox.com/s/6zvvobuc95icdgw/NEW%20MATRIX%20OF%20SKILLS.pdf?dl=0. 1.5.5 Credible Leadership has a Solid Research Foundation The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership can be found at this link: https://tinyurl.com/yckmts9u. Their research is more thoroughly validated than any theory of leadership. Jim Kouzes’ comment to Dr. Anderson in an email he sent to him about our work is quoted as follows: Terry, as you indicate, your work and ours are very compatible, and that’s something we’ve communicated about for over 20 years. Also, your work on the more micro behaviors is extremely useful to leaders in guiding their day-to-day applications. I am delighted that your work is getting the acceptance that it deserves in law enforcement. We wish you the very best with this. As you note in your email, unless participants get coaching after they learn the concepts and get ongoing feedback, the chances are that they won’t apply their knowledge. We agree completely, and this is why our training partners offer coaching as part of our more extensive programs. Jim Kouzes
Credible Leadership Development White Paper Copyright © 2023-2024. Every Officer Is A Leader. All Rights Reserved. Page: 6 of 6 In addition to the above, a new and more practical focus on Coaching a Leadership and Learning Organization has been added to the, Every Officer is a Leader (4th Edition) book to help learn how organizations can build teams and enhance their organizational performance and accountability. This focus reveals how leaders can implement the 60 Transforming Leadership skills and Continuous Improvement processes in their own teams to get leveraged results of building a better place to work that makes communities safer. 1.5.5.1 Where has this worked before? Real world reports on how the Credible Leadership approach has been implemented have been added, including lessons learned about obstacles to successful implementation of Transforming Leadership skills, principles, and practices. You can also read about the previous leadership and organization development work that Dr. Anderson has done by clicking here: https://www.consultingcoach.com/testimonials. 1.5.5.2 How can your agency implement credible leadership? Several consultants and coaches are Certified by the National Command and Staff College. Many are retired police Chiefs and training executives who want to support their colleagues to move into 21st Century police training practices that get results. You can see their backgrounds by clicking here: https://commandcollege.org/services/education-and-training/emerging-leadership-ace-2/. 1.5.5.3 Become a Certified Credible Leadership Organization (CLO): This initiative addresses our vision of the Professionalization of Leadership in justice and public safety. Becoming a CLO has clear but simple requirements and leads to the organization integrating best business and team leadership practices into their agencies so that they enjoy the benefits of 21st Century innovations and efficiencies that enhance performance, morale, and public trust. You can watch a 15minute video by Dr. Anderson who explains how this certification is achieved. Click here: https://tinyurl.com/2p937s2a. 1.5.5.4 Who can you contact if you want to explore ways that our Faculty, Coaches, Consultants, courses and workshops can help you achieve your goals? Chief Sam Spiegel, Ret., Chief Operating Officer National Command & Staff College, Consulting, Training and Contracting https://commandcollege.org/services/consulting/. Terry D. Anderson, PhD., Chief Leadership Officer National Command & Staff College https://commandcollege.org/services/education-and-training/every-officer-is-a-leader-workshop/..
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