Law enforcement is a prestigious career path, but recently, the younger generation isn’t as keen into entering this field with the expanse of opportunities and possibilities being presented by the ever-evolving economy, technology, and society.

To further intensify the effect of the reduced applicant pool, there is a need to replenish positions that are being vacated. Those who are already in law enforcement do not remain working for the same role forever. Officers get promoted or are laterally moved into different teams or field of specialty. The higher-ups inevitably retire.

Being in the process of recruitment constantly creates losses for the organization, both in money and productivity. With this in mind, the hiring process must be streamlined to ensure that those recruited are top-notch candidates. On top of this, safeguard retention and promotion of the best ones already within the team.

In this goal, the significance of emotional intelligence is stressed. Thomas Dworak from the Virtus Group has an extensive background in law enforcement training, as well as experiential learning and emotional intelligence. Thom discusses on this webinar techniques to meet these objectives. Some of the points he raised includes:

• What the Adaptive FTO is, its design and the critical issues it yearns to address.
• The specific skills that the Adaptive FTO teaches which are essential for new recruits as well as those moving up in their roles.
• Factors to consider and things to watch out for when hiring new recruits.
• The top 10 skills that law enforcement expects from their employees, and a comparison of how the essential skills expected changed within a 5-year timeframe.
• IQ versus EQ, and how these two integrate into making up your ideal law enforcement employee.
• The five pillars of emotional intelligence, the EQ core competencies for police officers and how these two are related to each other in application.
• The traditional questions that applicants are asked during the recruitment phase.
• Guidelines on identifying a high level of emotional intelligence on candidates through questions dealing with:
  • Conflict management and working with a team.
  • Behavior, weaknesses, and areas for improvement.
  • Empathy and human relations.
  • Sense of accomplishment, pride, and their role models.
• Factors to consider by the interviewers such as applicants’ language/positioning/interaction and non-verbal cues like body language.
• The various tests that may be applied to assess emotional intelligence.
• Using these assessments not to just merely see which ones passed or failed, but also to see insights on the applicants’ behavior and tendencies which will be most useful to the team/supervisor/manager he/she will be working with.
• The impact of investing in emotional intelligence assessment to the organizations.
• The Q&A portion tackled:
  • How to get the buy-in of decision makers towards adapting the EQ-based recruitment.
  • Utilizing the personality assessment tools, its impact on the hiring process, and how to maximize these towards recruiting the best applicants.
  • Other assessment tests that are available for this purpose.

Recommended Reading:

• Inside Change: Transforming Your Organization with Emotional Intelligence
• Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action
• Coaching for Emotional Intelligence: The Secret to Developing the Star Potential in Your Employees
• Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ