It is easy to tell prospective recruits to make sure they eat healthy and get in shape before they come to the Academy, but what does that mean? If I do a google search for, "Eating Healthy" I get 4,700,000,000 results in 0.74 seconds. Not much help. If I simply type in, "How do I get in shape?" into a google search I get 1,640,000,000 results in 0.66 seconds. Not much help. If I search, "How do I get in shape for a police academy?" I get 41,600,000 results in 0.61 seconds. Not much help. Since they have never been through your academy, and may not know anyone else who has, … [Read more...]

The 21 Foot Rule and the 10,000 Hour Rule sound nice but they are soundbites created by someone who misunderstood the original information or research and as a result have created a lot of confusion, and pushback. Stress Inoculation is a valid concept when it is understood and applied properly. Stress Inoculation however, is also a term used by some trainers as inappropriate justification for screaming, yelling and physical punishment to stress the crap out of recruits. "For Officer Safety reasons." and "For their safety and mine." sound good, but are not valid legal justifications for … [Read more...]

In a recent Range Report newsletter David Epstein wrote about a concept from physicist, mathematician, and writer Freeman Dyson. David Epstein is the author of the great book Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World, which I read earlier this year and The Sports Gene, one of the books I am currently reading.  Below is an excerpt from that Range Report newsletter: In Range, I quote a speech Dyson gave in which he propounded the need for both focused frogs and visionary birds working together on complex problems. Frogs are down in the mud where they … [Read more...]

I continually hear law enforcement leaders, trainers and officers refer to law enforcement as a 'paramilitary' profession. We need to stop using this term as we are not a paramilitary profession. The definition of Paramilitray according to Webster's online dictionary is: Paramilitary adjective para·mil·i·tary \ˌpa-rə-ˈmi-lə-ˌter-ē\ Simple Definition of paramilitary of or relating to a group that is not an official army but, that operates and is organized like an army Full Definition of paramilitary of, relating to, being, or characteristic of a force formed on a military … [Read more...]

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the world for trainers, as it has for everyone. For full time Academy instructors you likely find yourself now working from home full time as most Academies have shut down. You may be tasked with quickly developing online training so you can deliver training to the recruits virtually. Or, you may be tasked with using this time to update lessons plans. You may have been redeployed back to the street if it is an agency run Academy. Or, you may have been laid off and are now at home hoping to collect unemployment insurance.  Those of you for whom … [Read more...]

I recently listened to an interview with Chip Conley about his book Wisdom @ Work: The Making of a Modern Elder (and subsequently read the book). In the interview he made a comment that resonated with me. He said that his role as a Modern Elder at Airbnb required him to shift his mindset from “Can Do It” to “Conduit”.  It struck me when he made that comment that when you become a trainer you need to shift your mindset and perspective from that of “Can Do It”, someone who has the skills and abilities to execute that task and do the job, to one of a “Conduit” where your mission is to … [Read more...]

“In most of psychology, researchers describe what is. Often they do this with great acumen and creativity. But knowing what is and knowing what can be are not the same thing. My interest, for as long as I can remember, is in what can be, and in learning what subtle changes might make that happen. My research has shown how using a different word, offering a small choice, or making a subtle change in the physical environment can improve our health and well-being. Small changes can make large differences, so we should open ourselves to the impossible and embrace the psychology of possibility. … [Read more...]

In a recent blog post by communication theorist and coach Nick Morgan he addressed the question, "What does happiness have to do with public speaking?". While there was some very interesting information in the post, two paragraphs near the end really caught my attention. "What does the pursuit of happiness have to do with public speakers? It’s a mistake to try to manage the happiness of your audience.  Your job is to tell them something interesting, to change their thinking perhaps, in order to change the world.  To do that, you may well have to make the … [Read more...]