Addressing Recruitment & Retention Issues in Today's Law Enforcement Agencies

 By Sgt. / Watch Commander Stephen Witnik, Franklin Park (IL) Police Dept.
NUCPS Ambassador, SPSC Class #499 Graduate

Introduction

To successfully fulfill its mission statement and commitments to its community, a police agency must recruit and retain the best of available candidates -- ones who will be responsive to the needs of their community, from maintaining public safety and protecting lives to maintaining the quality of life that the public wants, needs, deserves. In 2011, the U.S. law enforcement community reached a peak employment of 768,278 sworn officers, or 2.47 sworn officers per 1,000 U.S. residents. (Banks) Since then, various factors have converged to impact recruiting and retention efforts significantly and negatively in organizations of all sizes and locations throughout the U.S. Data in an April 1, 2023 Police Executive Research Forum article “New PERF Survey Shows Police Agencies Are Losing Officers Faster than They Can Hire New Ones” shows that retirement and resignation trends continue to outnumber staffing increases from recruitment efforts. Tulsa, Oklahoma, Mayor G.T. Bynum believes that "the national dialogue that demonizes police officers has made police department staffing significantly more difficult for every major city in America.” (Duret) Other factors that impede agency recruiting include: evolving career interests such as IT and health care; officer-involved shootings; instant reporting containing bias, spin, and/or errors; media coverage of procedural justice reform; lack of interest in shift work; and even generational distaste for agency rules on tattoos.  What can police department leaders do to recruit and retain the best talent for the benefit of the community?

Recruiting a New Generation

Police agencies should be actively interacting with nearby community colleges and university administrators of criminal justice programs and their students. With the cooperation of college departments, recruiting pipelines could be created to fill non-sworn positions with current students. Students could fill intern positions for college credit, working in records departments, being community service officers, auxiliary officers, or even intern as dispatchers. Exposing students to these roles before becoming officers will help them learn about the workings of a police agency. 

Agencies should advertise more than is legally required for testing opportunities. On-going relationships with community colleges and area universities also help police agencies more effectively advertise employment opportunities. There are several well-known employment and professional websites on which to advertise job testing and openings, including LinkedIn, ZipRecruiter, Indeed, International Association of Chiefs of Police Career Center, www.theblueline.com, and www.policejobfinder.com. Lean on younger officers to inform their friends, former classmates, and military colleagues about available opportunities. Police officers can be trained and assigned to a Recruiting Unit to attend local job fairs where they can speak to potential candidates and disseminate information about salary, benefits, and opportunities.

Hiring standards may need adjusting for candidates entering the workforce. Generally, qualified candidates are between the ages of 21 and 35 years old. Those ages encompass the Generation Z and Millennial age groups. A November 22, 2021 article in Police1 notes that "Some departments still disqualify candidates for visible tattoos." (Mellen) A recent survey reveals that 41% of Millennials, 23% of the young Generation Z, and even 32% of Gen X have at least one tattoo. (Statistica) Policies that disqualify candidates based on visible tattoos is potentially decreasing the pool of candidates. Instead of disqualifying candidates based on visible tattoos, adjust the policy to mandate that officers conceal or hide tattoos while working or representing the police department. Candidates disclosing having tattoos can be asked about their meanings in the post-offer background investigation, so that it can be learned if these tattoos portray or promote discrimination; gang, supremacist, or extremist group affiliation; or, depict or promote drug use, sexual acts, or other obscene material.

Lateral Recruitments

The onset of the Covid pandemic had an effect on police academy start dates and the number of attendees who could attend. This created a bottleneck for entry into the academy and hiring. Some police departments started to use a quicker lateral hiring process of experienced police officers. A lateral process can allow for year-round testing and hiring, instead of statutory required testing processes. For example, Arlington Heights (IL) and Aurora (IL) Police Departments have processes for lateral hiring. The cost of the background process doesn’t change, but the cost of salary and attendance at the police academy isn't a factor on the police department. Experienced candidates also become working manpower quicker after the same or accelerated FTO program.

Most departments are competing for the same pool of candidates. A police agency should be monitoring and comparing its salaries, opportunities, benefits, and terms of employment to those other agencies. By measuring itself against other departments, an agency can learn if any adjustments need to be negotiated or made to its compensation packages.

Retaining Staff

After hiring new officers into an agency, the next challenge is retention. A February 2022 Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police survey about retirements and resignations found that "resignations and retirements increased by 29% in 2021 from 2020. Breaking that down, resignations increased by 65% in 2021 from 2020 and retirements increased by 7% in 2021. Agencies reported an anticipated 846 retirements and resignations in 2022, a figure that will continue the trend from the past couple of years."(Wojcicki)

In addition to retirements, losing officers to lateral moves or new careers is a continuous threat. However, this could be an opportunity to create a hiring and/or retention strategy that features an increase in salary as a continuous-employment bonus. This may be a contractual obligation to incentivize continued employment for a specific number of years, with a bonus for fulfilling that term. This may be an agreement made in the hiring process or to incentivize police officers from retiring early. Salaries should be examined and adjusted accordingly against comparable agencies.

If residency is not a requirement, look to incentivize police officers to live within the community with reduced rates on tax or utility bills, vehicle stickers, or take-home vehicles. Many communities require their first responders to live in a predetermined geographical area. Police officers and other first responders are traditionally active members of their communities, participating in various civic organizations, youth coaching, and more. The positive interaction between police officers and their communities can result in community policing at a personal level. People feel comfortable asking an off-duty officer at a community event about trends, incidents in the media, issues happening in neighborhoods, and other matters related to policing. These specific interactions can increase the support of the police in general. However, for many reasons, the residency requirement may result in the loss of an experienced officer. To better retain officers, if residency within the municipality is a job requirement, look to expand it. 

Concepts and research are available to help agencies develop officer retention strategies. Job enrichment, job enlargement, and job rotation can be instituted for retaining, training, and increasing the police officer skills. Job enrichment helps make one’s work more meaningful. Job enlargement adds more responsibilities to the same position. Job rotation temporarily changes one’s assignment. In "One More Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?" Frederick Herzberg demonstrated that the top five factors that led to extreme job satisfaction were achievement, recognition, the work itself, responsibility, and advancement. Law enforcement leaders should allow employees to take on more responsibility when they know officers can handle the work, allow employees to be creative in the work that they are expected to complete, recognize the good work they perform, and create opportunities for advancement. These concepts can create a well-trained and productive police officer who will be responsive to the needs of the community.

Conclusion

While the challenges to recruiting and retaining highest quality officers possible are many, and the possible solutions may take ingenuity and creative problem solving, the public safety responsibilities that police officers have to the community are critical and encompass highly set ethical standards, as they should be. No matter what challenges law enforcement leaders encounter in recruiting and retaining police officers, a decision should never be made that sacrifices the quality of an employee to quantity.

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