How to Motivate Employees in the Chicago Police Department - Coursework Example

How to motivate employees within the Chicago police department Introduction Police is undoubtedly one of the most challenging professions. Police agencies have to deal with multiple and indeed, some of the most complicated challenges simultaneously. Police agencies not only have to handle the worst of the worst of all problems in the society but also face the challenge of keeping a dedicated and highly motivated force of police officers. The work of police officers is substantially different in nature from the work of employees belonging to other careers since police officers have to perform on daily basis and have to carry much more responsibility and stress than employees in other career do. The standard of work in the police department is exceptionally high and so is the work load for the police officers. In a majority of the police stations around the world and those in the developing and the underdeveloped countries, the conditioning as well as conditions of the police officers belonging to the lower ranks are poor unconscionably. Police officers commonly work in continuous shifts of 24 hours without any rest and often are required to remain in the sub-standard barracks. Deficient training in the examination of crime scene and other investigative techniques exacerbate their inadequate conditions. In addition to that, police officers seriously lack resources. Those at the police stations do not have the basic necessities that people in other careers have. In the underdeveloped and the developing countries, conditions are even worse; many complaints of the public remain unregistered because of the shortage of paper since it frequently goes out of stock, there are either no vehicles or when there are some, there is no petrol. In addition to that, irrational provisioning results in the cases where essential peripherals, training for their use, and the contracts of maintenance are not available even if such hardware as computers, forensic devices, radio sets, and mobile equipment is made available to the police officers (Hossain, 2011, p. 5). It is quite understandable that the lower rank officers working in these circumstances are discontented, unmotivated, and surly. Unmotivated police officers can be easily distinguished from the motivated police officers because of their attitude. Unmotivated police officers come to work with either a bad attitude or without any attitude. They tend to coast doing the bar minimum if not lesser. Unmotivated police officers tend to be indifferent to everything related to police or get hostile when they are required to do something. Different police officers have different reasons to be unmotivated. Reasons for which police officers become unmotivated include but are not limited to being under internal investigation, having medical problems, not being granted a higher position that they think they deserved, or being fed up of the routinely procedures of the police department. Sometimes, the reactions of the unmotivated police officers appear daunting when observed. Supervisors assume immense responsibility to create control in the organization. Although there is an extent to which the supervisors can motivate the officers, yet much needs to be done on the part of the police officers personally to keep themselves motivated so that they are able to show performance up to the agency’s standards. There exists a relationship between the ability of police officials to develop an environment of motivation among the police officers and the level of control wanted by the police organization (Rivera, 2006). In order to perform the stressful tasks on daily basis, police officers need to learn the skill of self-motivation. How different police departments motivate police officers Most companies refer to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory to address the needs of their employees to get them motivated. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory is one of the most prominent and widely employed theories of motivation (Lindner, 1998). According to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory, every human being has a certain set of needs that can be staged one upon the other in the order of priority to form a pyramid. In this pyramid, the most fundamental as well as important needs form the base and as one moves toward the top of the pyramid, needs become lesser important and more optional. The pyramid of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory consists of five stages of needs. The needs in the order from bottom to top include physiological needs, safety needs, love and belongingness needs, self-esteem needs, and need to self-actualize. The physiological needs include air, food, and water etcetera which cannot be lived without. Once these needs are fulfilled, an individual wants to be safe first before feeling the importance of the higher needs (Perez, 2011). The fundamental assumption on which Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory is based is that one cannot feel a higher level need unless all lower level needs have been satisfied. Employees are motivated when they feel the need to self-actualize because self-actualization induces motivation in the employees to improve their performance. Therefore, in order to motivate the employees to the level where they feel the need to improve their performance, it is imperative that all of their lower level needs are satisfied. One reason behind the popularity of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory is the fact that it provides the employers with the order in which the needs should be addressed. For example, providing employees with job security is more important and should be done first before considering granting them more off days from work. Raus, Haita, and Lazar (2012) carried out a research to study the hierarchy of needs and the preferred styles of leadership in a police educational institution. As a result of the research, it was found that the needs of police officers appeared to be interconnected to one another to a greater extent as compared to the needs of the civilians or the constables. Raus, Haita, and Lazar (2012) found that the physiological needs of the “officers” had a positive correlation with the need for esteem and the sense of belongingness. Numerous studies to date have been carried out on both the financial and non-financial motivations. Lindahl (1949 cited in Grimme and Grimme, 2009) carried out a series of researches in which the employees consistently ranked a number of items as more important for them as compared to the traditional incentives. These items included but were not limited to ““feelings on things”, “full appreciation for work done”, and “interesting work”” (Grimme and Grimme, 2009, p. 7). Kovach (1980 cited in Lameck, 2011) conducted research in which the industrial employees were required to rank ten factors of motivational rewards on the basis of their personal preferences. It was found that appreciation of work done was the motivational reward factor that was the most preferred by the research participants whereas the rest were the least preferred by them. The factors were ranked like this; “(i) full appreciation of work done (ii) feeling of being (iii) sympathetic help with personal problems (iv) job security (v) Good wages and salaries (vi) interesting work (vii) promotion & Growth (viii) employees loyalty (ix) Good working conditions (x) tactful discipline” (Lameck, 2011, p. 58). According to Hossain (2011, p. 69), reasonably low and unrealistic salary is one of the main root causes of corruption in the police department. The salary package is often the same for all strata of government officials. There is plentiful evidence in the literature that employees can be motivated using the non-monetary motivational factors which contradicts the concept that to inculcate motivation in the organizational personnel, spending money is inevitable. One such study is the research conducted by Keller (1965 cited in Lameck, 2011) in which eight factors were found to be the job factors deemed important by the employees none of which had any close relation with the monetary motivation. The factors were pride in the organization, satisfaction with job, relations with the seniors, relation with the coworkers, managerial treatment of the workers, provision of opportunities to avail personal ideas, appreciation of efforts, and provision of opportunities to give suggestions at work. Usually, there is no one single rule that works for all kinds of organizations when it comes to motivating the employees since every organization has its own distinct culture and operates under conditions of work that are different from each other. It takes effort to motivate the employees. Strategies that have worked for supervisors may not work for all supervisors since different officers have different personalities and problems (Weisskopf, n.d.). The culture of an organization has a very heavy impact upon and is one of the most fundamental drivers of motivation of its employees. Therefore, many organizations tend to induce positive changes in their culture to raise the level of motivation of their employees. Such changes can be changing the organizational structure from a project matrix to a functional organization or the other way round, diversifying the workforce culturally, and giving international exposure to the organization. Understanding the fact that not one single formula works for all organizations and all workers within the same organizations, managers tend to understand the individualistic and collective needs of the employees. Some employees value power, while for others a higher salary package matters more; managers need to read the psychology of the individual employees to be able to provide them with those benefits that are valued by them and that cause their level of motivation to raise. This makes the job of motivating the employees complicated because it is not easy to understand the psychology of every individual employee specially when an individual’s needs and desires keep changing with time as he/she gains more experience. Likewise, different theories of motivation suggest managers to take different measures to motivate the employees. Nevertheless, a positive action taken by the management at any level is likely to help raise the level of motivation of the employees; be that increasing the salary, providing employees with added benefits with salary, appreciating them for doing good work, or providing them with some days off the work to spend time with family. Irrespective of the selection of the theory of motivation, employee pay and interesting work have been found to raise the level of motivation of the employees. Therefore, options like job enrichment, job enlargement, and non-monetary and monetary compensation need to be considered (Lindner, 1998). In most organizations, managers take one or more of these positive steps and experience a positive change in the level of motivation of the employees. In one case study, several programs directed at increasing the level of accountability among the police officers that were deemed “deadwood” were implemented by Captain Frebe (Stojkovic, Kalinich and Klofas, 2003). These programs included but were not limited to increased monitoring and supervision of the police officers in the field by the supervisors, requirements imposed upon the police officers to write comprehensive reports before the end of their shifts, and to maintain records over the odometer readings. In addition to that, supervisors were asked to make reports of the performance shown by individual police officers. Captain Frebe used a quota that required the police officers to meet with the number of tickets that they would write down every month. Captain Frebe was of the view that his programs were functioning well in that the performance of the agency as a whole had improved, though the agency displayed a higher level of absenteeism. In addition to that, many supervisors wanted to be transferred from the district of Captain Frebe whereas the veteran officers called Captain Frebe “hard balls” (Stojkovic, Kalinich and Klofas, 2003). This imparted the need for Captain Frebe to strike a balance between the negative aspects and the positive aspects of the programs that he had implemented. Overall, the negative aspects of the programs were outweighed by the positive aspects. The performance of his agencies improved and the officers that were not content with the programs opted to seek other opportunities of employment. Unfortunately, the poorest yet the quickest resolution is to facilitate the officers in identifying a new employment line, though it may be counter-productive since the other officers get the idea that the agency does not care for them (Weisskopf, n.d.). Therefore, police departments tend to make every possible effort to retain the employees. How to motivate police officers in the Chicago police department In order to access adequate control over the police officers in the police departments, supervisors need to hold police officers accountable for their actions so as to ensure that all police officers maintain a high standard of work. A balance needs to be created between the amount of control desired by the supervisors and the motivation of the police officers. In the case study discussed above, Captain Frebe believed that he was able to motivate his organization’s personnel. The fundamental reason behind the implementation of those programs was to ensure that the police officers were not brought down morally by the police officers that were slacking off. Managers and administration in any organization assume a lot of responsibility of motivating the employees. However, things become very difficult for them when the police officers are not skilled in the art of self-motivation. Good police officers try to identify ways in which they can fuel their passion for work. The very passion serves as a powerful force that keeps the police officers going in the right direction (Law Enforcement Today, 2011). A very effective recourse is to develop programs to be able to supervise the unmotivated so as to ensure that their work conforms to the agency’s standard for the minimum. The Chicago police department needs to develop such values in the organization that place emphasis upon the individual creativity, ingenuity, and initiative among the members of the department at all levels. It is important for the department to nurture and reward these qualities in the personnel since these qualities do not happen instantly. Factors that play an important role in boosting the morale and productivity of the police officers include innovative training approaches, new ways of gauging their results-based performance, regular opportunities of career development, and ongoing and better quality communication among the police officers and the management of the police department (Daley and Rodriguez, 1993, p. 16). To further enrich the employee excellence, it is advisable for the Chicago police department to tap into a broader recruitment base of individuals that are equipped with the techniques and concepts of team building as well as problem solving. Highly motivated and trained civilian personnel that comprehend the mission of the Chicago police department and are able to contribute to it should be hired. To motivate the police officers that have been working in the Chicago police department already, prioritizing the measures to raise the level of motivation according to the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory might yield the most favorable results. Use of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory has been found to satisfy more than one needs with the satisfaction of one level of needs (Raus, Haita, and Lazar, 2012), so it is quite likely for the Chicago police department to derive immediate benefits from the use of this theory. Some of the changes cannot be induced without making police-level changes in the department whereas other needs like the needs of love and belongingness and the need of self-esteem can instantly be addressed by bringing positive changes in the attitude of the senior officers toward the juniors. Since the field of Law Enforcement is quite tiring and demanding as a career both physically and emotionally, police supervisors are concerned to keep the police officers motivated. Police officers frequently have to deal with situations and unthankful people that are quite dangerous. Therefore, supervisors need to constantly encourage the police officers to place their focus upon the excellence. Police officers should be given adequate time off as well as counseling to ensure that they are in their best shape both mentally and physically during their shifts. Police agencies need to achieve accountability and motivation in such a way that is rewarding not only for the police officers but also for the supervisors. Police officers need to learn how to motivate themselves partly because of the fact that they were aware of the tough nature of the career path they had chosen at the outset. Successful police agencies implement the programs of accountability to ensure that the goals of all police officers are the same and that all are making the necessary efforts during their shifts that they ought to make. Despite the tough nature of the field of Law Enforcement, it can be quite rewarding provided that the right people are serving the society. References: Daley, R. M., and Rodriguez, M. L. (1993, Oct.). Together We Can. Chicago Police. Retrieved from http://www.popcenter.org/library/unpublished/OrganizationalPlans/37_Together_We_Can.pdf. Grimme, D., and Grimme, S. (2009). The New Managers Tool Kit: 21 Things You Need to Know to Hit the Ground Running. USA: AMACOM. Hossain, F. (2011). Motivational Status of Subordinate Police Officers (SPOs): A Study of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP). North South University, Bangladesh. Retrieved from http://mppg-nsu.org/attachments/339_Complete%20Report%20on%20DMP%20(Faruk).pdf. Lameck, W. U. (2011). Non Financial Motivation as Strategy for Improving Performance of Police Force. International Journal of Management & Business Studies. (4), 57-63. Law Enforcement Today. (2011, Oct. 31). Motivational Policing. Retrieved from http://lawenforcementtoday.com/2011/10/31/motivational-policing/. Lindner, J. R. (1998, June). Understanding Employee Motivation. Journal of Extension. 36(3). Retrieved from http://www.joe.org/joe/1998june/rb3.php. Perez, J. (2011, Aug. 15). World without Police! Crime Watch. Retrieved from http://blog.ctnews.com/crimewatch/2011/08/15/world-without-police/. Raus, A., Haita, M., and Lazar, L. (2012). HIERARCHY of needs, perception and preference for leadership styles within a police educational institution. Transylvanian Review of Administrative Sciences. 35, 238-255. Rivera, B. (2006, July 6). Case Study- Police Motivation. Retrieved from http://voices.yahoo.com/case-study-police-motivation-49539.html. Stojkovic, S., Kalinich, D., and Klofas, J. (2003). Criminal justice organizations: Administration and management (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Thompson/Wadsworth. Weisskopf, R. (n.d.). Unmotivated Officers. Law Enforcement Today. Retrieved from http://lawenforcementtoday.com/tag/police-motivation/. Read More