Critical loyalty and active bystanders are key to changing culture and restoring confidence in policing

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, its time to pause and reflect

Mark Twain

To address current issues in policing the profession must develop individuals not clones.  Let me explain.

In the early 2000’s I spent three wonderful years teaching new recruits joining policing in Scotland.  I often say these were one of the highlights of my 30 years as a police officer.  I remember the first week of a new intake and how we spent days drilling values into these new officers.  At the time I never really thought much about this and how it might be impacting negatively on policing.  It appeared the right thing to do in a disciplined service.  It was also something that had always been done.  I remembered when I went through this myself as a new officer.

These last years have been truly horrible for UK policing.  Not a week has gone by without their being a news piece highlighting harmful behaviours from serving officers across the UK.  At times I’ve felt ashamed to identify myself as a former police officer.  I was told in my first week that as a police officer, you are the face of the service.  To this day I believe that is true. 

In recent weeks I remembered a recent photograph of new police officers sitting together being spoken to, in their first days, by their Chief Constable.  I was struck by the conformity in the room.  Arms outstretched, emotionless faces.  An army of clones I thought to myself.  Now I understand the need for discipline in policing.  It’s important, I get that, however in these last years I’ve seen the negative outcomes of such conformity. 

This past week the findings of the inquiry led by Lady Elish Angiolini confirmed that the killer of Sarah Everard, at the time a serving police officer, should never have been in the profession when he kidnapped and murdered Sarah.  If I can be honest, I’ve felt a lot of anger and frustration this past week.  I’ve managed to hold onto this anger as I feel there are people out there with way more entitlement to show that anger than me.  I aim to direct my anger into action. Policing must now come together to address, what for me is a culture issue, not simply an individual one.

Much of the media this week has focused either on recruitment failures or the issue of indecent exposure as a gateway to further offending.  Whilst both require focus, I won’t be doing so in this piece.   More, I will focus on the culture in policing that often gives permission to harm doers like Wayne Couzens and what can be done to create a culture where those within, feel able to either speak to colleagues about their behaviour or to report direct to supervisors.

The conformity I discuss above can be translated into a form of loyalty.  As we know loyalty in the likes of policing and other emergency services is clear and, in my opinion, it is a core strength. It’s needed.  When I ask officers what you do when a colleague needs help, the response is “we help”.  Does it matter their age, gender, length of service or rank?  No, it doesn’t.  We go.

At this time, we need officers to stand out, not to simply conform.  We need critical loyalty not blind loyalty.  By the way critical loyalty is when you tell a colleague what they need to hear, not what they want to hear.  My view is that you are being a better colleague, a better friend when you are honest to a friend and such action can save careers as well as helping others to do the same.

I’m a passionate advocate of the science of active bystandership.  I was introduced to this during my latter years in policing and now in retirement see its potential to support a profession that I remain loyal to.  Active bystandership, simply put is about reducing harm to individuals, communities, and organisations.  Over five decades of research suggests that it can be trained and become a muscle memory.  It’s an approach that isn’t simply about teaching officers to intervene only when they see poor behaviours.  It’s an approach that helps to reduce and prevent harm from mistakes and as well as harm that results from poor wellbeing.  It’s an approach that changes a culture.  If you don’t believe me, check out how the likes of aviation, medicine and in US policing where it has led to much success in transforming cultures that despite being high risk were highly resistant to change.  In all of these settings it has led to less harm and has helped with the rebuilding of trust and confidence, something which is so lacking in UK policing at this time.

The response from many police leaders is in my view wholly inadequate.  Many simply rely on a code ethics to force officers to report their colleagues.  I often think many leaders forget they once had a ‘day one’ in the profession and faced the same challenges that officers have in reporting colleagues.  Some put a reliance on basic e-learning training to develop culture.  The current approach and appears to focus on behaviours that meet a misconduct threshold.  Surely that’s too late.  In my work earliest is way better.  Policing can’t keep playing whack a mole.  It needs to reduce the moles that need whacked.

 All the evidence suggests such e-learning will make little or no difference.  It might be a quick and cheaper option but in the long term it will cost more.  Do we ever consider the cost when an officer is suspended or removed from front line duties?  Also, how much compensation has been paid out over recent years?  I don’t need to tell where this money could be getting spent.

Today I read a piece on how the UK Labour party will introduce training on violence against women (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/mar/02/labour-police-training-officers-combat-violence-women) to all police forces in England and Wales.  Whilst I understand the sentiment, again research suggests that the dropping in of another diversity programme won’t cut it. More is needed, way more.

Active bystandership alongside awareness type training as described in the above piece will help.  As a culture change approach, active bystandership begins to harness the pro-social norms that do exist in the likes of policing.  My work with police both in the US and UK tells me that a majority in the profession care deeply about how policing is being portrayed currently and are upset when colleagues behave in ways that are harmful.  The problem is that they don’t really know how others around them feel.  They often feel alone in their views when the reality is the opposite.

In 2018 researchers with the Harvard Business Review suggested that professions such as policing must help correct the misperceptions that exist in these settings.  To this day speaking up against a colleague is still seen my many as being disloyal.  The reality is in my opinion totally different.  Policing should listen to the evidence and work hard to correct these misperceptions.  Traditional approaches to behaviour change often involves an outsider coming in, and warning you of the dire consequences of your behaviour and tells you what to do differently. That often just makes people defensive.  Active bystandership training done correctly (in person) uses a social norms approach which tells people what other people are doing, not what they should be doing.  Remember the biggest influencer on a person’s behaviour is those around that individual.

I often use the phrase ‘Moral Rebels’ to describe those individuals who already speak up.  They exist across society and research suggests that they have learned to stand out, not conform.  They are sure of who they are, their values, their beliefs, and their sense of right and wrong is driven by this self-awareness.  It’s something they have learned from their parents.  The good news is that research says we can train people to become moral rebels.

We currently recruit some wonderful people into the profession.  Do we get it wrong sometimes?  Of course, we do, however we must believe that in the main the people who join, are committed to policing and simply want to help others.  We must also get better at helping them to do just that.  In those first days of an officer’s career, we must get better at bringing their own personal values to life and help them align their already held values with those we possess in policing.  By doing so and with the skills delivered by Active bystandership training we can help restore trust both within and outside the profession.

Many of the answers to current problems lie within the profession.  We often hear how staff are the biggest asset in an organisation.  In policing they are currently an untapped resource. With support, the right skills, strategies and with the right motivation they will help policing restore public confidence.  Time, effort, and money is needed to create a police service that we can all be proud of.