✍Lesson #1: In essence, leadership is the making of decisions.

At the risk of simplifying the myriad challenges confronting law enforcement leaders, the reality is that a primary role of a leader is making difficult decisions. Certainly, there are attendant expectations—a leader should arrive at his or her decisions by a thoughtful process, and, once a decision has been made, a leader should be able to inspire others to implement the decision by explaining his or her vision. Despite the many responsibilities leaders carry, leadership can be defined as an ability to consistently make difficult decisions.

✍Lesson #2: A leader’s decisions must be reasoned and dispassionate.

People who are considered good leaders do not usually display impulsivity. Knee-jerk reactions and “flying off the handle” imply a lack of thoughtfulness and an inability to manage stressful situations. True leaders project a sense of calm and reason during adversity.

Employees thrive when their leaders employ a decision-making process that involves the inclusion of contrary ideas and devil’s advocacy. Leaders should employ a “team of rivals” approach in which they encourage their staff to express views different from the leader’s own and should stress that all potential avenues for action will be considered in reaching a decision. When a decision is made, leaders should explain the reasons for the decision to their teams, because employees who understand the thought process behind a decision are more likely to support its implementation. Law enforcement commanders sometimes struggle with the idea of explaining their decision-making to those they oversee because the traditional, quasi-militaristic structure of a police department encourages a “because I ordered you to” mentality; however, this mind-set will lead to resentment and a lack of team support for policy.

Above all else, leaders should strive for consistency in their decision-making process. Employees want a fair system of rewards and punishment, and they thrive in an environment in which their leaders make decisions without fear of personal consequences or favor to any person or faction.

✍Lesson #3: Leaders must have thick skin.

As a law enforcement leader is promoted throughout his or her career, the individual obviously takes on the supervision of more and more people.
A sergeant supervises a squad; a lieutenant, a shift; and a captain, a bureau. As the number of supervisees grows, so does the number of people who may be unhappy with the supervisor’s decisions. Those who make decisions based on pleasing the greatest number of people will never be accepted as true leaders.

Instead, leaders accept that their decisions will not make all employees happy. Instead, they apply a thoughtful process, make the best decisions they can in light of the data they collect, explain their decisions to their teams, and understand that each decision has likely displeased someone. Leaders must even learn to accept a certain level of grumbling by the troops, without allowing insubordination or disrespect to fester. A true leader is never reluctant to make a difficult decision for fear of displeasing people.

Even the best leader is going to make bad decisions from time to time, and every human being has areas on which he or she needs to work. Imperfection is a hallmark of human existence. A true test of leadership is the ability to accept constructive criticism and to admit one’s mistakes. As a wise philosopher once said, those who are unwilling to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.

✍Lesson #4: Leadership is a skill.

Leadership ability is not an attribute that people either possess or lack. Instead it is a skill—or more accurately, an interconnected set of skills—that successful leaders are constantly improving upon and honing. Granted, some people are innately gifted in ways that serve them well in a leadership role. However, everyone can improve their leadership ability by emulating other successful leaders, by attending leadership training classes, or by simply increasing their level of leadership experience.

Whether a patrol officer considering putting in for the next promotional process or a seasoned deputy chief applying for an open position as a chief, those individuals seeking to lead should always actively strive to increase their leadership capability. Leadership classes, such as those provided by FBI-LEEDA, the IACP, and other programs, combine practical suggestions about leadership skills with an opportunity to share in the collective experience of other law enforcement leaders.

✍Lesson #5: Leaders excel at social intelligence.

The quality known as social intelligence is hard to define, but rough synonyms would be “tact” or “street smarts.” One of the most challenging aspects of leadership is dealing with the people the leader supervises on the employees’ terms, respecting their idiosyncrasies and individual personalities. An employee’s reaction to his or her leaders can run the gamut of emotions, and most of the people a leader comes into contact with will not react to a situation the same way the leader might. A socially intelligent leader displays a
host of important traits; the most important of these include an understanding of the motivations of other people, outstanding listening skills, conversational capability, and the ability to see the other side of an issue.

✍Lesson #6: People matter.

Here is an easy question. How quickly do you return voice-mail messages? As soon as you receive them? Within 24 hours? Never? The easiest way to signal to someone that they do not matter is to simply ignore them. Leaders should strive to institute a culture in which the people who compose the organization really matter. This culture can be expressed many ways, and one way to show people that they matter is to expeditiously respond to them when they reach out via phone or email.

This leadership lesson applies to potential employees as well as current ones. While it’s not reasonable for applicants to receive daily updates, in a world where outstanding recruits are frequently difficult to cultivate, it makes sense to provide them with updates about the general timeline of the hiring process. In addition to simply being the decent thing to do, this kind of personal attention might convince a qualified applicant to choose the communicative agency over another contender.

The “people matter” mantra can also be applied to internal assignments. Many law enforcement agencies and leaders take the approach of “any sergeant can supervise any unit.” In many cases, no thought is given to the employee’s preference of assignment or even to where the employee’s skill set will be best utilized. However, this one-size-fits-all approach to job assignments ignores an immutable fact about human beings—each person has his or her own aptitudes and deficiencies. A law enforcement agency functions more smoothly when it puts the right people in the right jobs, and this approach brings the additional benefit of more happy and motivated employees. While it is obviously impossible to put everyone in a position they desire, a system of making internal assignments that considers aptitude and allows employees a chance at input can improve performance, operations, and morale.

✍Lesson #7: Emails are not the best vehicle for difficult conversations.

It’s the rare individual who has not crafted an angry email and then hesitated with his or her finger above the “send” button. An email, once sent, cannot be retrieved and, instead, becomes an eternal record of the author’s thoughts. As anyone who uses email regularly knows, messages sent that way are often misinterpreted. Without the usual vocal signals or body language inherent in a two-way conversation, context is lost in an email and the recipient may derive an entirely different message from that which was intended. Finally, email is impersonal. This quality frees senders to be sharper with their comments than they would be in a personal conversation. It can also cause recipients to feel as though the sender did not believe they deserved the courtesy of an in-person meeting, thus detracting from the vision that “people matter” in the organization.

If a difficult conversation is necessary, an email should be used to set up an in-person meeting in which that conversation can take place, not as a substitute for the actual conversation. Lastly, emails are immediate, but patience sometimes obviates the need for the difficult conversation—problems often work out on their own, and a day spent in reflection on how to respond to a difficulty might allow the difficulty to disappear altogether.

✍Lesson #8: Leaders look at the big picture, always considering the worst-case scenario.

Human beings are instinctively self-centered. While altruism may, on occasion, arise in unexpected places, the reality is that most people will adopt the course of action that they believe will benefit them personally. Leaders are expected to set aside these self-serving instincts and make decisions that are to their organization’s benefit. This requires the ability to take a step back and ponder the future implications of various courses of action.

When making a policy or personnel decision, a law enforcement leader has to consider the “big picture.” A mental checklist is useful: how would this policy affect the unit? The bureau? The department? But the big picture requires the leader to consider external effects as well: how would the decision affect other agencies in the city or county? Will it impact the general public? If so, in what ways? If a leader has the luxury of time, he or she should strive to consider the potential fallout from his or her decisions. Leaders should also communicate with others who may be affected by the decision and seek their input. This tactic also has the obvious benefit of making it more likely that the big picture is truly being seen.

✍Lesson #9: Leaders inspire people to be better at their jobs.

To inspire high levels of performance, leaders need to be able to define the organization’s core mission and communicate it to employees, and they need to lead by example. In a law enforcement agency, the core mission could be expressed as “public service to all citizens and the protection of the community through professional criminal investigations.” After distilling this mission down to a digestible sentence or two, such mantras should be repeated and spread so that all officers have it instilled in their minds.

As mentioned, leaders also need to lead by example. For example, a chief could occasionally show up to midnight roll calls, thereby showing the officers of the graveyard shift that they matter to the leadership of the department. Leaders might even work a patrol shift occasionally, or at least back up other officers. Leaders should be aware that they reasonably expect young officers to abide by rules and regulations the leader might have been unwilling to follow when starting out. And, perhaps obviously, leaders need to understand that they must hold themselves to the highest levels of ethics in both their personal and professional lives as a model for their employees.

One sure way of inspiring people—and one area in which many law enforcement agencies have room for improvement—is praising outstanding performance. While officers and detectives often say: “I don’t do this job for a pat on the back,” the fact remains that law enforcement officers are people, and people always respond well when their superiors recognize a job well done. Recognition can be as simple as a member of the command staff telling an officer that his or her work was appreciated or as formal as a lengthy press conference for actions far beyond the call of duty. In either scenario, the idea is to let employees know that their hard work has been noticed and appreciated. By this method, leaders can create an ethos where good work is rewarded—and rewarding good work often has the salutary benefit of spontaneously creating good work in other employees.

✍Lesson #10: When all ELSE fails, leaders need to follow their intuition.

Most leaders do not attain their leadership role by happenstance. Instead, they sought a promotion and their leadership skill set was acknowledged by their superiors—people who likely appreciated the individual’s decision-making ability. Leaders, therefore, have a natural aptitude for leadership—and trust that the skills that got them to their current position will likely serve them well. This doesn’t mean that leaders’ decisions should be impulsive or driven by emotion; simply that reason balanced with knowledge and intuition can be a successful approach.

Most of the lessons outlined herein work well when there is ample time to deliberate. For example, when drafting a new policy, leaders have time to consider alternate viewpoints before its promulgation. When restructuring the agency’s chain of command, a leader has the luxury of at least being able to ask employees what assignments they prefer before sending out the new organizational chart.

However, law enforcement leaders sometimes must make difficult decisions in short time frames and under immense stress. For example, an incident commander during a hostage or barricade situation may be forced to make a split-second decision about the use of deadly force. It can be argued that if leaders strive to incorporate these lessons into their regular work life, they will soon become part of their “leadership DNA” and inform the difficult decisions that must sometimes be made under pressure. In intense situations that lack the luxury of time, a leader’s instinct may be the only tool at his or her disposal.

Conclusion

Every chief or sheriff should strive to find excellent leaders in their organizations: good people, with good judgment and social intelligence, who are not afraid to make difficult decisions. Identifying and rewarding these individuals strengthens the organization and will have important effects even after the chief has left for retirement or another opportunity. Great leaders aren’t born; instead, they are created through the crucible of experience—and they must always strive to hone their leadership skills. d