Small-Town Recruits, Big Cities: Training Rookies for Large Agencies

When you closely examine the police recruitment and staffing process, there is always a glitch.  The anomaly of a young man or young woman from a rural, small town who is hired by a larger metropolitan department comes to mind. Their transition is sometimes a difficult one and usually an exciting one. Well to be honest with you, that was my transition.

When you examine the landscape of police opportunities, there are pockets of opportunity and wastelands as well.  There are young men and women seeking job opportunities close to home. Their local small-town departments and smaller county sheriff's offices have limited opportunities for employment. So even if the hometown departments hires them, they the pay will be less. Additionally, may well have few career opportunities that larger departments away from their home ground. The more rural, the job openings will be few and far between. So, what’s a young applicant to do? Most usually end up at a nearby larger department to begin their career. There seems to be chronic staffing issues nationwide within medium-sized and larger metropolitan departments. Most report constant turnovers due to a litany of reasons. So, now you have the young country kid showing up at the big city looking for employment, much like I did. The adjustments from a smaller rural area to a larger metropolitan area can be multifaceted at best. Whereas you have some local neighborhoods or precincts that are larger than the town that they came from can be overpowering. Just the traffic volume can be overwhelming for starts.  The general essence of a metropolitan area adds to the overload. This new town probably has more special public events in one month than that little hometown had in a year. Not to mention coming from a small town where the sidewalks are rolled up a dark verses a city that does not shut down until the wee hours of the morning.

So, let's talk about this some more. When I was a field training officer in Savannah, GA, I have various stories of young officers who were hired directly out of the military. They did not even know where to live. I have since then seen some larger agencies address this within their onboarding process. Some recruitment officers have connections to small efficiency apartments to get their feet on the ground. Trying to find a place in a safe area can be a task in a distant town. Academy staff must assist in their acclimation process as well. Sometimes you become the cruise director for your students. What can young recruits get into over the weekend — we all have stories. I would tell them not to show up in my office on a Monday morning, and your tale of woe occurred after midnight. Nothing good happens after midnight. Although, Human Resources’ heads would explode if they heard of “the beware of the badge bunnies, holster sniffers and mystical creatures of the night that ruin careers” speech. It may not be politically correct, but these nocturnal beings do not come with warning labels. 

When you hire a young man or woman to become a police officer, there will be an adjustment phase.  They must adapt to your department’s norms (rules and regulations). Some may be foreign to them, so reviewing them along with academy curriculum nets good results. I know I am painting the academy staff as a concierge to the city, but it not a bad idea. Sooner or later, the new officers are going to have yearnings to go home because the city is foreign to them. If the department’s staff is apathetic to them, they will soon leave. Often after gaining their certification at your budget’s expense. Like the old 60’s television western, "Have Gun - Will Travel," they now become Paladin: Have Certification- Will Travel.  The acclimation process may be aided by someone in recruiting, academy staff or Field Training Officer (FTO) to help them with their adjustments.  Yes, I am adding to their workload, but it could pay off with retention. I believe in the 8 x 24 theory of police supervision and development. We always concentrate on the 8 hours while on the job. But, the 24-hour day has 16 hours, which can lead them to leave. If they or their family is not happy and content for those 16 hours, you will soon lose them. Being a good boss is caring for the entire officer.

Larger agency workloads can be overwhelming to them as well. I can recall talking to some younger officers that we had hired from small or rural areas. The larger agency probably had more calls for service in a month than their whole county would have in a year.  This is not unusual for the volume of calls are created by a far larger population service base and adding in the perplexities of city life will create a mindboggling workload for them. Some could not handle the workload and may wait for another opportunity. They now have become a viable commodity with larger city experience or exposure. Within a few years in patrol, they would have probably responded to more Part 1 calls in progress than their small-town contemporaries may have responded to in a 10-year career. Does this make them better cops — no. Does this make them more efficient — no. But the experience makes them a prime candidate for when their hometown has a vacancy.

There's a lot of learning curve that goes on for the kid from the country who has come to the city. I totally recalled one very busy night; we had calls dropping out of the sky. Another call in progress down the street from us, the responding cars flew by with sirens wailing. A very wise old corporal looked at me and shook his head. He told me “don't get excited by hearing the sirens for that’s just the city crying.” What a profound analogy. He followed up with, “don't you ever relish in someone’s misery, just do your job and do it the best you know how.” I often look back at that old corporal's saga advice and when he told me this; I had made that transition of becoming a young man that is doing something of worth. It is not the excitement but the service delivery.

If you are a chief of a medium to large sized department, you will have some wide-eyed kids coming to you wanting a chance. They are eager and willing to learn. Learn to embrace them and retain them. The very second you don’t, it will be the time their hometown calls them. They have a lot of invested experience and willing to take a cut in salary just to be home. They will gladly take an easier job load as well. Granted, they all have glorious, riveting war stories to tell of all their rocking calls they handled in the city. The thing of it is they are a vital commodity in the police recruitment business. Then they become the ones who are taking the jobs from another young kid. The recruitment and retention cycles between large and small departments continues in a sometimes vicious cycle.