“If anyone can refute me - show me I'm making a mistake or looking at things from the wrong perspective - I'll gladly change. It's the truth I'm after, and the truth never harmed anyone.” Marcus Aurelius The above quote from Marcus Aurelius should be the mantra for all trainers. We should all be constantly seeking the “truth” as shown by the evidence and research.  If the evidence and research show that the language you are using, like muscle memory, is not accurate then you need to change your language and explain things in a manner consistent with the evidence. If the … [Read more...]

“When you know what to think you are ready to compete. When you know how to think you are ready to win.” Tim Grover “Train your people for Critical Thinking, not just compliance.” David Marquet Are you teaching your people what to think, or how to think?  Are you training your people to compete, or to win?  Are you training your people for critical thinking, or compliance?  Are you training your people for decision making and problem solving, or to do what they are told?  Is your physical skills training technique focused, or are you teaching … [Read more...]

In a recent post on LinkedIn, Dr. John Black, DBA shared the following quote from Fritof Capra: “When it comes to our social and political situation we see that most of the problems that we have in the world today come from the fact that we see things in a fragmented way, that we are unable to focus on the relationships among things…. We have to learn to shift from a perception of objects to a perception of relationships and also a perception of processes.” The fragmented way we see things is contributing to the friction between law enforcement and the community is some areas. … [Read more...]

In a recent blog post Seth Godin wrote about The expertise gap. As part of that post, he wrote: The one thing that everyone is the world’s expert on is their own feelings. In just about every other area that we value, though, there are people with proven expertise, who can show their work, understand the state of the art and produce testable and measurable results.“Experts” are part of the problem. An expert is someone who has expertise, but sometimes, they forget that past expertise doesn’t mean that they’re always right. When someone with expertise blindly supports a status quo and fails … [Read more...]

One of the common frustrations I hear from trainers is that their people won’t train on their own. The officers complain that they don’t get enough training, but then they only train when they get sent to training. Why? There are a lot of reasons. Here are my thoughts on a few of them Most agencies don’t have a culture of training and learning. Training is done occasionally, sometimes poorly, and too often it is simply “check the box” training or done to appease politicians and / or special interest groups. When budgets are tight training is one of the first things to get cut. Officers … [Read more...]

Last week I wrote about learning from the apprenticeship model and the importance of providing ongoing professional development training throughout people’s careers. I realize that training comes with a cost and tight budgets are a reality for many agencies. So what can you do? Get creative. Expand your Tribe of Trainers by putting your frontline supervisors and FTOs through the Excellence in Training course or similar program. This makes it easier to continually be micro dosing training by delivering it in small chunks throughout the year and throughout people’s … [Read more...]

One of the things I consistently hear from people in law enforcement is that it takes three to four years for a new officer to develop into a solid street cop. If that is true, which I believe it is, the question then becomes, “What are you doing to in that first four years to ensure they develop into the solid officer you expect?” Are you intentional about scheduling people for professional development training in those first four years? I am not talking about the mandatory in-service training they will attend along with everyone else; I am talking about professional development training. … [Read more...]

I have heard from good trainers who are frustrated by the way the regional academy they send their recruits to is being run. The question they have is, “What do we do when we have no control over how the academy is being run?” The obvious answer is, “Find another academy.” but that is often not an option and so it is unhelpful advice.  Starting your own academy is an option, but that is not logistically feasible for many agencies that just do not have the facilities and resources and may not have the number of recruits every year to justify it.  Whenever possible have your … [Read more...]

Why do we continue to run “Stress Academies” where trainers scream and yell at recruits and punish them with physical exercise? Why do we still run academies where the prevailing mentality is, “Shut your mouth and do what you are told.”? Why are we still crushing recruits with PT in academies to the point where people end up injured and occasionally hospitalized? Why do we continue to teach in ways that are contrary to what the evidence and research says about learning and retention? There are two issues I would like to address: Training is not seen as a specialty unit requiring … [Read more...]

Last week I wrote a post on the concept that stress is not the key to effective training, context is king. That post generated a lot of discussion and sharing of stories of inappropriate training being delivered under the guise of “stress inoculation training”. The question is how do we fix the issues with training? There are multiple elements to this and over the next couple of weeks I will share some of my thoughts on the topic. I certainly do not have all the answers, but I do have lots of questions as well as some thoughts and opinions on the topic.  First we need to … [Read more...]