Leadership Hiring: Does the Promotional Practice and Selection in Public Service Result in Placing Highly Skilled Experts in Our Communities?

Primarily, this technical article intends to address the hiring practices of executive police leadership. The article questions police executives' capability based upon a significant number of police chiefs exiting their position for several reasons related to the summer of 2020, whereas several societal crises ensued. The article demonstrates how police executives are not hired based on their ability to be capable leaders or, highly skilled experts but are repeatedly hired based upon tenure, deemed as qualified. Subjective measures exclude specific demographics, human and conceptional skills, and the lack of community input from the societies they are appointed to serve are continually used to hire police leaders. Additionally, the subsequent promotional exams allowing aspiring police leaders are subjective, demonstrated by the multiple suits filed from across the country, as is the proper selection or lack of essential training such as entry to the FBI academy law enforcement training. A specific model, the Three Skill Approach, outlines the various skills for selection criteria. The article asserts that other models can be employed, emphasizing that multiple skills within potential leaders are critical. Also strongly suggested in the report is that the community in which police serve must be aware of how police executives are selected and included in that process, allowing for a partnership between the police leadership and the community. Often, unknown to the community is the right to articulate and establish how they are policed, which can only be realized by a leader who has the multiple skills and has developed a genuine relationship with the community, eventually seen as part of the community.