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Home › Evidence-Based Policing › What Works in Policing? › Review of the Research Evidence › Problem-Oriented Policing

  • Review of the Research Evidence
  • Seattle Police Case Study

What is Problem-Oriented Policing?

  • What is Problem-Oriented Policing (POP)? (Center for Problem-Oriented Policing)
  • The SARA Model (Center for Problem-Oriented Policing)
  • Problem-Oriented Policing (Herman Goldstein, 1990, McGraw-Hill; Book front matter available here)
  • Problem-Oriented Policing and Crime Prevention (Anthony A. Braga, 2008, Criminal Justice Press; introduction and first two chapters here)
  • On the Beat: Police and Community Problem Solving (Wesley Skogan et al.)

What is the Evidence on Problem-Oriented Policing?*

  • Fairness and Effectiveness in Policing: The Evidence (National Research Council)
  • See also Crime Prevention Research Review No. 4: The Effects of Problem-Oriented Policing on Crime and Disorder
  • Problem-oriented policing (CrimeSolutions.gov)

What Should Police Be Doing to Implement Problem-Oriented Policing?

Problem-Oriented Hot Spots Studies:

  • Problem-Oriented Policing in Violent Crime Places: A Randomized Controlled Experiment (Anthony Braga, David Weisburd, Elin Waring, Lorraine Mazerolle, William Spelman, and Frank Gajewski)
  • Policing Crime and Disorder Hot Spots: A Randomized Controlled Trial (Anthony Braga and Brenda Bond)
  • A Randomized Controlled Trial of Different Policing Strategies at Hot Spots of Violent Crime in Jacksonville (Bruce G. Taylor, Christopher S. Koper, and Daniel J. Woods)Vi

Strategies for Implementing POP:

  • 25 Techniques of Situational Crime Prevention (Center for Problem-Oriented Policing)
  • Problem-Solving Tips: A Guide to Reducing Crime and Disorder Through Problem-Solving Partnerships (Center for Problem-Oriented Policing)
  • Crime Analysis for Problem Solvers in 60 Small Steps (Center for Problem-Oriented Policing)

Police

Seattle Police officer image courtesy of Flickr user Hollywata and used under a Creative Commons license.

In 1979 Herman Goldstein critiqued police practices of the time by noting that they were more focused on the “means” of policing than its “ends.” He advocated for a paradigm shift in policing that would replace the primarily reactive, incident driven  “standard model of policing”  (Weisburd & Eck, 2004) with a model that required the police to be proactive in identifying underlying problems that could be targeted to alleviate crime at its roots. He termed this new approach “problem-oriented policing” to highlight the call for police to focus on problems instead of on single calls or incidents. Goldstein also argued that the police had to deal with an array of problems in the community, including not only crime but also social and physical disorders. He also called for the police to expand their toolbox to address problems. In Goldstein’s view, the police needed to draw on not only the criminal law but also civil statutes and rely on other municipal and community resources if they were to address crime and disorder problems.

Goldstein’s approach was elaborated by Eck and Spelman’s (1987) SARA model. SARA is an acronym representing four steps they suggest police should follow when implementing POP. “Scanning” involves the police identifying and prioritizing potential problems. The next step is “Analysis,” which involves the police thoroughly analyzing the problem(s) using a variety of data sources so that tailored responses can be developed. The “Response” step has the police developing and implementing interventions designed to solve the problem(s). The final step is “Assessment,” which involves assessing whether the response worked. The SARA process has become widely accepted and adopted by police agencies implementing problem-oriented policing.

Wesley Skogan and colleagues (1999) describe a five-step model used for problem solving as part of the  Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy (CAPS) :

  • Identify and prioritize recurring problems
  • Analyze problems using a variety of data sources
  • Design response strategies based on what was learned from analyzing the problem
  • Implement response strategies
  • Assess the success of response strategies

Problem-oriented policing is listed under “What works?” on our  Review of the Research Evidence. 

Weisburd, Telep, Hinkle, and Eck (2010) conducted a Campbell review on the effects of POP (i.e. studies that followed the SARA model) on crime and disorder, finding a modest but statistically significant impact among 10 experimental and quasi-experimental studies. Some of the studies in this review that showed smaller effects (or backfire effects) experienced implementation issues that threatened treatment fidelity. The more successfully implemented studies tended to show stronger effects.

Additionally, Weisburd et al. (2010) also collected less rigorous but more numerous pre/post studies without a comparison group. While the internal validity of these studies is weaker than those in the main analysis, these studies are notable in the remarkable consistency of positive findings. Weisburd et al. (2010: 164) concluded that “POP as an approach has significant promise to ameliorate crime and disorder problems broadly defined.”

* We do not include pulling levers or focused deterrence studies in this section as they are reviewed  elsewhere.  Pulling levers policing can be viewed as a type of problem-oriented policing though.

Problem-oriented policing covers a broad array of responses to a wide range of problems and the evidence base of rigorous studies remains limited. This makes it difficult to give specific recommendations as to how police agencies should deal with certain types of problems. Goldstein’s notion of problem-oriented policing, however, was not designed to provide agencies with specific ways of handling problems. Indeed, Goldstein rejected such one-size fits all tactics that had been typical in the “standard model of policing.” Essential to problem-oriented policing is the careful analysis of problems to design tailor-made solutions. While individualized solutions are important, it is also the case that police agencies across the U.S. often face very similar types of problems that may respond to similar types of solutions. The Center for Problem-Oriented Policing has recognized this, creating more than  70 problem-specific guides for police  that provide recommendations on how agencies can tackle a number of different problems.

Weisburd, Telep, Hinkle, and Eck (2008) provided some limited guidance on the types of problem-oriented policing interventions that seem to be most effective:

1.  Hot spots policing  interventions that use POP have shown particularly successful results. In such studies, it is difficult to disentangle whether problem solving or the focus on small geographic areas is driving the success, but the two strategies seem to work quite well in concert.

2. Problem-oriented policing appears most effective when police departments are on board and fully committed to the tenets of problem-oriented policing. In a problem-oriented policing project in Atlanta public housing, for example, the program suffered greatly because the police were not fully committed to problem-oriented policing.

3. Program expectations must be realistic. Officer case load must be kept to a manageable level and police should not be expected to tackle major problems in a short period of time. In the  Minneapolis Repeat Call Address Policing  study for example, officers were overwhelmed by dealing with more than 200 problem addresses in a 12-month period. Conversely,in the  Jersey City POP at hot spots experiment , officers were given a more manageable 12 hot spot case load, and officers were more effective in implementing the response.

4. Based on limited evidence, collaboration with outside criminal justice agencies appears to be an effective approach in problem-oriented policing. The two  probationer-police partnerships  included in the review were particularly successful in reducing recidivism.

5. In terms of using the SARA model to guide POP, police agencies typically fail to conduct in-depth problem-analysis. Indeed they often engage in a form of “shallow problem solving” that involves only peripheral analysis of crime data and a largely law enforcement-oriented response. While we do not want to advocate shallow adherence to the SARA model, the evidence suggests that even shallow problem analysis is effective in reducing crime and disorder. This also suggests that if police were to more closely follow the SARA model and expand their repertoire of responses beyond traditional law enforcement they might enjoy even greater crime control benefits from problem-oriented policing. The assessment phase in SARA also tends to be a weak area for many police agencies, but one that is incredibly important to inform police practice. As  Sherman (1998)  notes, evidence-based policing involves not only police using strategies and tactics shown to be effective, but also agencies constantly evaluating their practices. The assessment phase of the SARA model provides a framework for agencies to consistently learn from and improve their problem solving projects.

Micro Place Studies  from the Evidence-Based Policing Matrix

Not all micro place studies are POP studies. Problem-oriented policing studies represent 12 of the 49 micro place studies in the Matrix.

why is problem solving important in the police

Problem-Oriented Policing Studies from the  Evidence-Based Policing Matrix

full-circle

Y-axis : F = focused; G= general

Z-axis : R = reactive, P = proactive, HP = highly proactive

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When Police Are Problem Solvers

In the third installment of our #SafetyPartners blog series, criminologist Sean Varano describes the value of problem-oriented policing, and what a researcher can bring to the quest for safer neighborhoods. 

LISC works to reduce crime in low-income places by helping forge partnerships between police, community developers and researchers. When these entities, in collaboration with residents, pool their information, strategy and talent, neighborhoods begin to experience real drops in crime. Over the coming weeks, we will feature blogs from a community developer, a police officer and a researcher, each part of comprehensive safety efforts in the Olneyville neighborhood of Providence. What follows are their reflections on the challenges they face, and the solutions they see making a difference in their community.

3.22.2017 - LISC Stories Community Wise Blog

As a criminologist and researcher, I have spent more than 20 years investigating how problem-oriented policing—or problem solving, as it is also known—can upend seemingly intractable problems of crime and disorder, and make communities safer, more vital places to be. Problem solving is an approach that gets at the causes of crime and tackles them at their roots. It has challenged police and other members of the criminal justice system to rethink crime control strategies. Eventually, it could transform the entire policing enterprise in our country.

Everything I have observed in my academic life, while working with the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) at the Department of Justice, and in my partnership with the Byrne Criminal Justice Initiative Program (BCJI) in Providence, supports that possibility. But by definition, problem solving must be thoroughly integrated into policing in order to work. I’m not convinced that walking beats, or police on bikes, or having police attend community meetings are sufficient commitment to community policing. Something deeper is needed. I am committed to the notion that problem solving is a core component of all effective community policing efforts, not a sideline.

I first saw this notion in action in the 1990s, when I worked with communities throughout Michigan, attempting to implement innovative strategies to prevent juvenile offenders from developing into serious, chronic offenders. It was clear, from the vantage of problem solving, that police need not wait for serious offending to emerge before they take action. Instead, they can intervene in problem behavior at or near its onset in order to prevent escalation.

Ideas like these challenged law enforcement agencies in Michigan to recognize the limits of traditional police responses as well as the importance of longer-term solutions. Police began to give real thought to the fact that they had a role in preventing violent crime.

A solid working relationship with community members is imperative for police to problem solve successfully. Building those kinds of partnerships, of course, is a goal of BCJI. At the outset, the BCJI project in Providence focused on serious and violent crime in certain neighborhoods. But meetings with residents early in the process made it clear that they were more concerned with quality of life problems. Prostitution, flagrant disregard for traffic laws and widespread parking problems created a deep sense of disorder and lawlessness and posed daily challenges that kept people from fully participating in their community. Residents also identified locations, locally known as “cuts,” which were well-known hotspots of problem behavior. They knew about the back alleys, overgrown lots and similar places where crime took place and they wanted to do something about them.

In my capacity as researcher with the BCJI team, I listened and recorded this information, and helped disseminate it among the partners. The Providence Police Department took the residents’ concerns seriously and adjusted their strategies to take on these immediate problems. They worked with a local service provider, for example, to partner police officers and social workers to more effectively address the prostitution problem. Instead of merely arresting prostitutes, these teams regularly go on patrol together, identify prostitutes and help them access services and recovery programs. Officers have also collaborated with other teams to identify “cuts” or hotspots and implement design strategies that dissuade the factors driving crime there.

Another case in point: In the past year or more, the City of Providence has struggled with growing problems related to the homeless population, such as aggressive panhandling and vagrancy. These issues have emerged as a significant political problem in the city, and there is a groundswell of interest in devising long-term strategies for addressing the problem. The department has been part of a growing chorus of voices making it clear that arrest-based strategies are not a sustainable solution.

Although it has been a slow process, the larger law enforcement community has continued to internalize the idea that prevention lies at the heart of policing. That is, prevention is more than a political platitude or some obscure goal, but a strategy that can lead to tangible policy to make communities better places to live and work.

why is problem solving important in the police

Captain Dean Isabella of the Providence PD describes the transformation of a Rhode Island neighborhood.

Sean Varano

More from our #SafetyPartners series:

Navigating a Passage Between a Rock and a Hard Place by Tina Shepard

The What, Why and How of Community Policing: An Officer’s View by Officer Tracie Miller

Decision-Making in the Police Work Force: Affordances Explained in Practice

  • Open access
  • Published: 10 August 2018
  • Volume 27 , pages 827–852, ( 2018 )

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  • Matthijs J. Verhulst   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1238-8546 1 &
  • Anne-Françoise Rutkowski 1  

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Studies of decision-making in High Reliability Organizations as supported by Information Technology have mostly pertained to the “cold” context, that is, the planning and briefing tasks that precede intervention. Meanwhile, the degree of elasticity required of High Reliability Teams during critical processes is key to stabilizing team performance and can be enhanced through the use of technology. However, off-the-shelf technologies are often used in organizations without due consideration of their impact on task interdependence and affordance. This article presents the results from a three-step explorative field study that investigated the effects of the imbrication between human (e.g., users) and material (e.g., technology) agencies on the decision-making processes used by a police force. Particularly, we address the impact on the individual, collective, and shared affordances of mobile technology (i.e., smartphone) in terms of the daily work routine of officers on the streets. Teams of police officers were shadowed during their daily work for a period of 80 hours. This article presents the findings in the form of four vignettes. The approach used proved useful for determining the affordance of technology in relation to task interdependence on micro-processes and decision-making.

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1 Introduction

Two important facets of decision-making are that it involves problem-solving and is task-related (Simon and Newell 1973 ). Decisions are a product of our individual cognitive activities and are influenced by various psychological biases. For example, under uncertainty, individuals rely on a limited number of heuristics, which may yield either reasonable judgments or systematic errors (Tversky and Kahneman 1973 ; Klein 1999 ). The aim of this study is to explore material and human agency imbrication in decision-making in the context of the Dutch national police. Particularly focusing on incident response teams operating with smartphone technologies in the street.

Decisions tend to be assessed based on one’s prediction of a multiplicity of outcomes, forming a causal chain of behavioral reactions. Overall, making them entails information processing, information structuring, problem-solving, and interpersonal communication. Each of these activities represents a succession of goal-driven cognitive and social micro-processes. The study of micro-processes involves “understanding how interaction is coordinated in ways that help to create shared understanding with a particular focus on shared symbolic systems among the participants in situ” (Burger et al. 2018 ). At the same time, decision performance is dynamic and time dependent (Brehmer 1992 ). In making decisions, humans apply the rules of logic and use their expertise, experiences, and associated emotions (Rutkowski 2016 ). Logic and “gut feelings” thus co-exist in the processing of information for decision-making. Accordingly, the process is a complex “fuzzy” activity—and the complexity and fuzziness of the decision-making process is accentuated when it involves multiple actors. Originally, Asch ( 1952 ) was one of the pioneers who considered the impact of the social environment on micro-processes. He compared group dynamics and group decision-making to the chemical compound H2O. That is, neither quantity is a simple aggregate of its constituents (e.g., hydrogen and oxygen); rather, the ultimate outcome is affected by their arrangement. The elements of hydrogen and oxygen can produce substances with vastly different characteristics—such as ice, water, steam—based on how they are organized. Analogously, collaboration can be seen as a complex aggregation of ideas that require specific arrangement (i.e., structuring) for cooperative and efficient decision-making. In sum, decision-making in teams/groups is an interdependent process that is substantially affected by the available information, the requirements for completing a task, and the feedback of other team members.

Vogus and Sutcliffe ( 2007 ) defined HROs as “organizations that operate hazardous technologies in a nearly error-free manner under trying conditions rife with complexity, interdependence, and time pressure” (p. 2). Typical examples of HROs include emergency rescue crews, such as fire brigades, and aircraft or spacecraft crews. We similarly define High Reliability Teams (HRTs) as “any set of two or more team members who consistently and effectively work interdependently towards a shared goal in a complex environment” (Wilson et al. 2005 , p. 304). Research has demonstrated that organizational reliability supported at the team level result in higher reliability at the organizational level. The extant field research underlines the key role that expertise, pattern recognition, and intuitive decision-making play in safety performance in HRTs (Okoli et al. 2016 ). Their use of technology obviously also has an impact. However, the role of Information Technologies (IT) in supporting decision-making processes has mostly been studied in “cold” contexts, that is, during the planning and briefing tasks that precede an intervention.

Decision Support Systems (DSSs) and Group Decision Support Systems (GDSSs) have also played important roles in supporting strategic decision-making processes (Keen 1980 ; Ter Mors et al. 2005 ). Specifically, GDSSs have been used in a gaming simulation environment to support modern emergency planning and management (Beroggi et al. 2001 ; Mendonça et al. 2006 ; Yu and Lai 2011 ). GDSSs have been mindfully designed as a form of technological support that tightens tasks and micro-processes, which in turn helps improve decision-making and reduce both individual biases and collective biases such as groupthink (Janis 1982 ).

GDSS scholars have been pioneers in addressing both the human and material agencies at the operational and strategic decision-making level of groups in organizations. Although different ontological approaches underpinned the development of major GDSSs (Ackermann and Eden 2001 ; Briggs et al. 2003 ), researchers in the field nevertheless provided essential steps for understanding what Orlikowski ( 2007 ) later defined as sociomateriality. Sociomateriality is “the recursive intertwining of humans and technology in practice” (Orlikowski 2007 , p. 1437). We define material agency as the agency expressed by nonhuman entities (Jones 2014 ) and human agency as the capacity for human beings to make decisions (Bandura 1989 ). Majchrzak and Markus ( 2012 ) suggest considering the interactions between material agency and human agency simultaneously, rather than focusing on technological features or human attributes separately, for affording (i.e., enacting) or hindering, for example, collaboration. From that perspective, affordances and constraints emerge when users engage with technology. Affordance refers to an “action potential”, that is, what a user can do with a technology for a particular purpose (Markus and Silver 2008 ). Constraints concern the ways in which technology may limit users or an organization. Affordances are by definition sociomaterial (Leonardi and Barley 2008 ; Van Osch and Mendelson 2011 ). Further research introduced a differentiation among individual, collective, and shared affordances when considering the use of technology at the group level (Leonardi 2013a ). In the context of GDSSs, the material agency may not afford (enact), for instance, knowledge sharing or brainstorming and therefore bias part of the decision-making process. The GDSS literature views technologies as enablers of efficient decision-making and effective strategies in distributed and face-to-face context (Ackermann 1996 ). The imbrication of human and material agencies has afforded a sharper definition of problems through distributed and pooled output and the efficient categorization of information and reduced funnel vision overall.

GDSSs are not merely a software product provided to users, but represent the very first imbrication of human agency (i.e., participants, chauffeur, or facilitator) and material agency in the form of software tools (i.e., Decision Explorer, Group Explorer, Group Support System, Strategic Options Development, and Analysis). The goal is to achieve efficient decision-making in practice. The combination between task complexity and interdependence has been an important part of the analyses in the G(D)SS literature. It relates to both the processes and outcomes of task performance.

Complexity plays a key role in differentiating task environments (Campbell 1988 ), In this paper, we define task complexity as “the amount of processing or attention required by a task, or the amount of structure or clarity provided by a task” (Bonner and Sprinkle 2002 , p. 319) with the complexity of a task depending on at least four elements: outcome multiplicity, solution scheme multiplicity, conflicting interdependence, and solution scheme/outcome uncertainty (Luo et al. 2011 ; Wood 1986 ; Zigurs and Buckland 1998 ). Prior research in the GDSS field has demonstrated the importance for effective performance of the fit between the task and the technology (Zigurs and Buckland 1998 ). In addition, scholars have directly mapped the level of collaborative capabilities influenced by a form of “intellectual bandwidth” fitting to the organizational tasks (Nunamaker Jr. et al. 2002 ). In Asch’s ( 1952 ) terms, researchers closely considered the impact of technological design in affording decision-making as the arrangements and structuration, rather than the simple aggregation, of human information processing. In teams, the complexity and uncertainty of task performance increases (De Dreu and Weingart 2003 ; McGrath 1984 ). Congruently, technology usage affords decision-making differently at the team level.

In the recent past, HROs have implemented off-the-shelf technologies such as smartphones to help team members cope with “hot” situations. For instance, in the context of emergency response on the part of firefighting brigades, smartphone applications with embedded collaborative features have been demonstrated successful in supplying role-specific information independent of time and place that affords collaboration (Rossel et al. 2016 ). The decision-making has thus become more efficient in such contexts. The use of mobile technology during special missions or critical processes may increase the level of elasticity required in HROs when dealing with extreme uncertainty (Van Fenema 2005 ). Indeed, when fuzzy tasks are being executed, material agency provides high levels of communication support and information processing that is complemented by human process structuring (Zigurs and Buckland 1998 ). In sum, smartphone technologies can enable greater coherence and order and better interpersonal communications, all of which are essential in such “hot” situations.

Technology usage, however, can also make tasks more complex. While technologies are often developed to reduce task complexity, we emphasize that technologies can afford or constrain human decision-making, and therefore micro-processes: if the imbrication between the material and human agencies is not taken into account. The use of smartphone technology by police forces provides an interesting example, which will be studied in detail in this paper. Technology is highly interwoven into the daily practice of police work (Manning 2008 ; Sørensen and Pica 2005 ). The “smartphone on the street” has surely modified the landscape of decision-making in police forces. For example, a failure to enact technological affordances introduces potential risks for such an organization. Also, police officers have had to work around constraints brought on by technology during critical processes in order to keep their performance stable (Verhulst and Rutkowski 2017 ).

This article presents the results of a field study that ran from July 2015 to August 2016, shortly after the MEOS was introduced. Specifically, we investigated the extent to which smartphone technologies (MEOS) enables individual, collective, and shared affordances. The “More and Effective on the Street” smartphone (MEOS) is equipped with a range of applications developed within the police force organization. The MEOS smartphone provides the same functionalities as any recent smartphone: camera, e-mail, turn-by-turn navigation, etc. Additionally, using a specific application, police officers are able to access the police information systems (e.g. look up license plate information, personal information) or issue a fine. The device provides the functionalities required to conduct simple, problem-solving, decision, judgement as well as fuzzy tasks supporting police officers in completing their administrative work independently of time and place.

Police officers were shadowed for a period of 80 hours. Notes regarding incidents, work practices, and the use of the technologies served as material for the analysis. Police work is centered on incidents. Incidents are defined as a specific event where the police responses are required to ensure law and order. Incidents range from the arrest of a shoplifter, to armed robbery or burglary to name only a few. The data were alternately collected from two precincts for accuracy. We used a three-step approach. First, we built on the work of Zigurs and Buckland ( 1998 ) to assess the fit between material agency (i.e., the technology used in the police force) and the tasks performed by the officers (i.e., human agency). Second, we built on the work of McGrath ( 1984 ) in order to provide a greater understanding of the tasks and micro-processes at the team level. Third, we composed narrative vignettes based directly on field notes collected during the observation stage to illustrate the impact of the imbrication of material and human agencies on individualized, collective, and shared affordances in practice.

This paper is organized as follows. The theoretical section provides an overview of decision-making and task performance in the Dutch National Police Force. We also discuss sociomateriality and the concept of affordance in that section. The next section presents the research methods used for the field study and analyzing the observations. The results are then presented, and we conclude by discussing the study’s limitations and ideas for future research.

2 Theoretical Background

2.1 task–technology fit and decision-making in high reliability teams (hrt s ).

In their seminal work on task–technology fit, Zigurs and Buckland ( 1998 ) synthesized the literature on task. Task complexity depends on four factors: outcome multiplicity (i.e., more than one desired outcome), solution scheme multiplicity, conflicting interdependence (i.e., adopting one scheme conflicts with adopting another possible solution scheme), and solution scheme/outcome uncertainty (Luo et al. 2011 ; Zigurs and Buckland 1998 ). The authors also identified five task categories: simple tasks, problem tasks, decision tasks, judgement tasks, and fuzzy tasks . Simple tasks do not entail any outcome multiplicity (i.e., there is only one possible outcome), solution scheme multiplicity, or conflicting interdependence. The main goal of a collaborative technology in supporting simple tasks is communication support. Problem tasks are aimed at finding the best solution scheme among multiple possibilities. The goal of the collaborative technology for problem tasks is information processing. Decision tasks have no solution scheme multiplicity, but they vary in outcome multiplicity. In addition, for every possible outcome, a different stream of information may be needed, requiring high information diversity and information load. Here, the technology should satisfy both information and process-structuring needs. Judgement tasks are characterized by the focus on resolving conflicts and uncertainty in terms of information. To resolve conflicts, the technology should mainly provide communication support and information processing functionalities. Finally, fuzzy tasks have a high outcome multiplicity and high solution scheme multiplicity. The technology should provide high levels of communication support and information processing, complemented with a medium level of process structuring (Zigurs and Buckland 1998 ).

While it is a challenge to come up with an unequivocal definition of what the essential task of a police force is, it is not a stretch to assume that police officers deal with far more than simple tasks primarily. For instance, even when issuing a basic parking ticket, the outcome can be unpredictable and lead to the use of force. To sum it up in a nutshell, the tasks of the police force are “grounded in a round-the-clock capacity to take decisive action in handling all kinds of emergencies and to employ force where it is needed” (Smith et al. 1996 ). Police intervention is time critical, encompassing outcome multiplicity, solution scheme multiplicity, conflicting interdependence, and solution scheme/outcome uncertainty. Officers use various strategies to cope with uncertainty and must therefore handle fuzzy tasks. They may extrapolate future scenarios based on the information available or use assumption-based reasoning to mentally simulate outcome multiplicity (Van den Heuvel et al. 2014 ). Experienced police officers outperform their less experienced counterparts in their assessment of environments with multiple cues (Garcia-Retamero and Dhami 2011 ). Such behavior is often exhibited by members of HRTs who tend to follow their “gut feelings” in “hot” situations. One example might be when they decide there is no “exit option” and the decision taken must be followed through on—this is the case even when the use of deadly force is required. The significant consequences of failure, unpredictability, and time pressure in a police force are the three main characteristics of the HRO environment. Police officers must consequently make informed choices between discretionary decisions and procedures. Work rules and procedures (i.e., heuristics) develop among the officers over time, which are then implicitly or explicitly used to decrease the cognitive burden of discretionary decision-making (Stroshine et al. 2008 ). Moreover, contextual cues allow officers to assess whether certain behaviors are “suspicious” and to predict potential outcomes (Stroshine et al. 2008 ). When on duty, police officers are regularly confronted with non-cooperative civilians or suspects. As a result, they must routinely engage in emotional labor (Van Gelderen et al. 2011 ). According to the work of Scharf and Binder ( 1984 ), the police decision-making process can be broken down into four stages: anticipation, entry and initial contact, dialogue, and information exchange (Scharf and Binder 1984 ). The four steps are required for reaching a final decision. During the anticipation phase, the officers retrieve and look-up information, which is then confirmed or rejected during the contact phase. Congruently, informational cues relating to a suspect may significantly impact the decision to use deadly force during a face-to-face confrontation (Fridell and Binder 1992 ).

Police officers commonly operate in dyads, and when they respond to incidents, they frequently also interact with other dyads. McGrath’s ( 1984 ) circumplex has been used as a proxy to identify the complexity and uncertainty of performance tasks in teams (De Dreu and Weingart 2003 ). Prior literature has focused on planning-production tasks, decision-making, and project tasks (De Dreu and Weingart 2003 ). In their categorization, De Dreu and Weingart ( 2003 ) view planning-production tasks in terms of routines because these tasks incorporate low levels of uncertainty and complexity. The degree to which team members need to interact with and rely on other team members for information and resources is defined as task interdependence (Kiggundu 1981 ). Task interdependence can be categorized as pooled, sequential, reciprocal, or comprehensive (Saavedra et al. 1993 ). As discussed previously, this is key to understanding the role of technology in police work. Decision-making tasks in HRTs are marred by high levels of uncertainty and complexity because the tasks require consensual decisions among team members. As a result, decision-making in this context becomes a challenge. Tasks that need both planning and decision-making are considered to be highly complex and non-routine (De Dreu and Weingart 2003 ). Prior literature has thus used McGrath’s ( 1984 ) circumplex to examine group tasks as a way of disentangling these tightly coupled, complex processes. It has been used to study and classify the tasks to be completed by diverse teams in different settings. Medina et al. ( 2015 ), for example, built on this theoretical perspective to understand the use of Information Technology (IT) for assuming tasks (i.e., work substitution) in the operating room.

The circumplex is divided into four quadrants: generate, choose, negotiate, and execute. The four quadrants are then divided into two segments per quadrant. Each is a representation of a micro-process. The first quadrant, generate , consists of planning and creativity tasks. The Planning (1) segment refers to how a specific plan or action needs to be carried out. Creativity (2) refers to coming up with new ideas. The second quadrant, choose , consists of intellective tasks and decision - making tasks. Intellective tasks (3) refer to solving a problem that has one correct answer. Decision - making tasks (4) cover the type of tasks for which there is no one correct answer. The third quadrant, negotiate , entails Cognitive conflict tasks (5), which are aimed at resolving conflicts of viewpoint, and Mixed - motive tasks (6), which have to do with situations where motives differ among those involved but an agreement needs to be reached. The fourth and final quadrant, execute , covers contests and battles and performances/psychomotor tasks. Contests and battles (7) involve resolving conflicts of power, where there is only one clear winner (among the team members). The last segment, Performances/psychomotor tasks (8) covers physical tasks. The circumplex is of a continuous nature, such that each category is linked to its adjacent categories—but not necessarily interdependent. In addition, the circumplex is cyclical in nature. Planning tasks are followed by creativity, then intellective tasks, and finally at the end, the circle is completed by the psychomotor/performance tasks (McGrath 1984 ). At the team level, decision-making (Types 3 and 4) relates to decision tasks that vary in outcome multiplicity but not in solution scheme multiplicity. Judgement tasks are characterized by the focus on resolving conflicts (Types 5 and 6) and uncertainty in terms of information; they can be compared to fuzzy tasks.

The model encompasses tasks in a broad sense to investigate the impact of technologies during decision-making activities. Rees and Barkhi ( 2001 ) lament the discrepancy of the category of GDSS tested in experiential settings (mainly idea generation, Type 2) and the practical applications of GDSS that revolve around constrained production and budget planning tasks (solving problems with correct answers, Type 3) and planning tasks (Type 1). We propose combining both task–technology fit and the McGrath circumplex in order to build an efficient theoretical framework for uncovering the imbrication between human and material agencies in HRTs.

2.2 Sociomaterial Imbrication and Affordances

A debate surrounding the exact interpretation of sociomateriality is waging in the Management Information Systems (MIS) literature (Kautz and Jensen 2012 ; Leonardi 2012 ; Niemimaa 2016 ; Scott and Orlikowski 2013 ).

Based on the earlier work of Zigurs and Buckland ( 1998 ), we assume that the human and material can be separated as they are in the context of task complexity and are thus imbricated in practice. Thus, we follow the school of thought of Leonardi and others that view sociomateriality through a critical realism philosophical lens (Leonardi 2012 , 2013b ; Leonardi and Barley 2008 ). The social and material agencies are not entangled (Orlikowski 2007 ; Orlikowski and Scott 2008 ; Scott and Orlikowski 2012 ), but imbricated in practice. Imbrication implies an interlocking of social and material agency, allowing for a distinction to be drawn where material agency ends and human agency begins. Recent work has aimed to integrate the two streams of sociomateriality literature. Kautz and Jensen ( 2013 ) point out that the main difference between them is the choice of vocabulary when referring to the social and the material being imbricated in practice (Leonardi 2012 ) or the human and the technology being entangled in practice (Orlikowski 2007 ). Leonardi ( 2011 ) suggests that “people’s work is not determined by the technologies they employ” (p. 148). In other words, users are free to decide how they use a certain technology, assessing mindfully how it might better serve their task or team interest in reaching their goal. When humans experience constraints from technology, they can change it. Conversely, the feeling of affordance causes them to change their own routines. Leonardi ( 2011 ) examined the effects of the imbrication between human and material agency on work routines. He argues that the interplay between material and human agency develops over multiple iterations and that the perception by humans of technology constraining their behavior leads them to modify their technology usage. On the other hand, if the technology results in humans perceiving affordance, this affects their routines through imbrication (Leonardi 2011 ).

Prior research has not addressed human and material agencies at the team level in the context of decision-making. However, Leonardi ( 2013a ) studied how affordances were used within and between groups in accomplishing organizational network change. We define individualized affordance as a specific instance “that someone enacts when using a technology’s features, but that affordance is not common to his or her workgroup or department” (Leonardi 2013a , p. 752). A shared affordance is defined as “an affordance that is shared by all members of a group” (Leonardi 2013a , p. 752). Lastly, a collective affordance is defined as “an affordance that is collectively created by members of a group, in the aggregate, which allows the group to do something that it could not otherwise accomplish” (Leonardi 2013a , p. 752). The differentiation between individualized, shared, and collective affordances relies on task interdependence (Leonardi 2013a ). However, Leonardi does not take into account the wide variety in levels of interdependence and their potential effects on the level of affordance at the team level. As Saavedra et al. ( 1993 ) argue, different levels of interdependence exist, and these are especially relevant within the context of HROs such as the police force. Task interdependence is deemed to be pooled, sequential, reciprocal, or comprehensive (Saavedra et al. 1993 ). Pooled interdependence is observed when group members complete their task independently, and the outcome is simply combined to represent the team output. Sequential interdependence is when team members perform different tasks in prescribed sequence, and team members only depend on the output previously provided in the sequence. Reciprocal interdependence is when team members interact with only a limited subset of other team members to complete the team’s work. Comprehensive interdependence is when team members have a great deal of discretion in terms of what they do and with whom they interact in the course of the collaboration involved in accomplishing the team’s work (Saavedra et al. 1993 ).

The use of mobile technology during critical processes may increase the level of elasticity required in HRTs when dealing with extreme uncertainty (Van Fenema 2005 ). Based on the discussion above, we assume that the degree of elasticity can be observed in practice through individual, collective, and shared affordance. The distinction between individualized, collective, and shared affordances is essential in studying collaborative technology, since the level of affordance is reflected in the level of decision - making. Individual decision-making may require only individualized affordance. Yet, when multiple team members are involved in the process, in situations of high interdependence and uncertainty, collective or shared affordance should emerge. This relationship between the level of affordance and the level of decision-making is two-fold. First, there may be a direct relationship between decision-making and the level of affordance; that is, individual decision-making implies an individualized affordance of retrieving information to reduce uncertainty. In group decision-making, collective affordance emerges, where the ability for the team to achieve a goal is a sum of the individual affordances. Second, collaborative communication technologies’ affordance affects the level of decision-making. A shared affordance enables shared decision-making in cases where synchronous communication is required for decision-making. In addition, collective affordances may enable shared decision-making in the case of pooled interdependence in the decision-making task. For example, each of the group members may supply different pieces of the information required for the group to make its decision. In this explorative field study, we address the impact on individual, collective, and shared affordances of mobile technology (i.e., smartphone) as employed in the daily work routine of police officers on the streets.

3 Explorative Field Study

3.1 research method.

Throughout 2016, following the introduction of the MEOS, 10 teams of two police officers each were shadowed during their daily work for a period of 80 hours at two police stations in the Netherlands. To ensure a diversified impression of the police work, the times of observation varied: two day shifts (7 a.m. until roughly 4 p.m.); eight afternoon shifts (2 p.m. until roughly 10 p.m.); and one night shift (8 p.m. until roughly 5 a.m.). The data was collected over a period of 10 months. A total of 34 incident responses were identified following the structuration of the observation. Typically, when the team of police officers was not involved in an incident, they would spend time patrolling or conducting smaller police tasks, such as handing out court summons or completing administrative work at the police station.

It was agreed with the police organization that video recording equipment would not be used, so as to avoid any legal implications for the police, victims, suspects, and other stakeholders. In order to ensure privacy, a non-disclosure agreement was signed. Full disclosure regarding the purpose of the research was given to the police officers. Officers were encouraged to engage in the study and share their rich experiences on the use of technology in practice. During the observations, no details regarding suspects or victims were recorded. The recorded data were anonymized and shared with the organization after analysis. Observations on any kind of impressions regarding what was witnessed were recorded directly, rather than deciding in advance which elements were relevant for the data collection (Eisenhardt 1989 ). Data were collected using electronic media and paper. Within 24 hours, additional information was added to the field notes and structured. Secondary data were composed of notes taken during weekly meetings of the Business Support unit of the Dutch National Police’s organizational program responsible for development and implementation of the smartphone within the department. Additionally, internal documents such as the business case for the implementation of the smartphone and the implementation plan were analyzed. The police organization defines mobile technologies as the technologies that can be used irrespective of time and place. We limited our research to the technologies carried by the officers on their person, excluding the mobile and other technology in police vehicles and at police stations.

3.1.1 Data Analysis

The 34 incidents were used to structure the observations. To identify the variety of affordances that emerged, we modeled our approach after Pentland and Rueter ( 1994 ), looking at routines as a grammar of action in the context of help desk employees. We focused on the narrative as well as the collected feedback, making sense of the events from an incident collaborative perspective. Service calls and police incident responses revolve around solving a problem. In both contexts, the problem is solved by employing previously successful subroutines and procedures to come up with new ways of solving the problem in question.

In the present research, the incident response was “cut up” into smaller subroutines. Each included only one technology being used during that subroutine. This analysis allowed us to identify both similarities and differences between the incident responses. The affordances were coded following a two-stage coding process. First, the technological features in use for each of the subroutines and affordances were identified. Second, we categorized individualized, collective, or shared affordances. Individualized affordances are specifically those that are not shared with other members. Collective affordances are those where one member of the group enacts the technology in a way that benefits the entire team. Shared affordances are present when all of the HRT’s members enact the technology in one particular way. Contrary to Pentland and Rueter ( 1994 ), we used a narrative approach rather than a statistical descriptive approach. Such an approach has already proven successful for studying the impact of technology on decision-making at the HRT level both in a police force context (Verhulst and Rutkowski 2017 ) and at the individual level in the context of the operating room of a hospital (Medina et al. 2015 ). Using such an approach allows us to demonstrate the critical impact of mindfulness expressed through the human agency of users/police officers on successful collaboration when using IT in the context of a police organization.

3.1.2 Vignettes to Explore Narrative

The use of narrative vignettes in the literature on group decision-making to identify micro-processes was exemplified by Burger et al. ( 2018 ). They used a vignette to illustrate the micro-processes at play in a group decision workshop. Exploration narratives with the support of vignettes make it easier to ask participants about their opinions on sensitive topics and also to uncover the judgements individuals may hold in a specific situation (Barter and Renold 2000 ). Vignettes are also used in survey research to quantitatively measure respondents’ hypothetical actions in the situations outlined (Barter and Renold 2000 ). Alternatively, narrative vignettes can be used to present the results of a qualitative study, showing the significance of key incidents (Khrushlov and Kroon 2002 ). They are also used to strengthen the rigor of qualitative research and to “let the facts speak for themselves” (Iacono et al. 2009 ). Narrative vignettes serve as “a vivid portrayal of the conduct of an event of everyday life, in which the sights and sounds of what was being said and done are described in the natural sequence of their occurrence in real time” (Erickson 1986 , pp. 149–150).

The vignettes selected and presented here are grounded in the entirety of the body of data that was collected, in accordance with established practice (Miles and Huberman 1994 ). They were selected based on their power to explain the daily routines of police work, as well as their representativeness. The organizational practice of enforcing the law is an essential part of the police work. Therefore, recurrent incidents related to the previous were reported. Similarly, the other affordances presented in the vignettes were observed multiple times during incident responses. These affordances are the building blocks composing police force’s incident responses. The four vignettes have the merit to illustrate how each of the three affordances were typically witnessed in practice. Therefore, these were selected. The affordances identified are a critical part of the daily routines of police officers. The first vignette demonstrates how technology is used in one of the primal tasks of police work: issuing a fine. Vignettes two, three, and four show the centrality of the incident response and the affordances resulting from the use of technology during these responses.

Material Agency

As explained in the theoretical section, we build on the work of Zigurs and Buckland ( 1998 ) on the task–technology fit approach to assess the fit between material agency (i.e., the technology used in the police force) and the tasks performed by the officers (i.e., human agency). Table  1 provides a detailed analysis of the technologies used in practice by the police force. In the first step, it was possible to map the technology to a particular task and the micro-processes supported.

Table  1 suggests that the technologies used by police officers on the street mostly support simple, problem, and decision tasks. In this article, we focus on the MEOS interface, which is connected to 18 different information systems. The MEOS application offers a variety of functionalities. For example, the Mobile-ID application allows police officers to verify a person’s identity based on one single legal document: scanning the document and/or reading the information stored in its chip (e.g., passports) provides identification. The Mobile-ID application incorporates a feature that alerts officers when they have encountered a dangerous person by vibrating for a number of seconds. Another functionality allows them to retrieve additional information (e.g., vehicle license and address). Affordances from the applications can be combined for pooling information. For example, the ticketing application can be connected to the Mobile-ID application. The ticketing application allows police officers to search through the applicable sections of law for the appropriate sanction when a fine needs to be issued. Two main categories of information are stored in two different, interconnected systems: governmental and specific police information systems. Non-police information systems contain information such as residence address or vehicle ownership information. Police information systems contain information regarding previous allegations or convictions and a risk categorization (e.g., possession of a firearm, use of drugs/alcohol, mental illnesses). In the process of retrieving the information about an individual, a vehicle, or an address, the technology enables officers to check a person’s identity and develop a more complete image of that person. In other words, the information adds to the contextual cues usually used in assessing a suspect’s behavior (Stroshine et al. 2008 ). Along with the specific police functionalities developed in-house, the smartphones provide a range of off-the-shelf functionalities. One of the most frequently used is the camera. Officers use this functionality to not only take pictures of evidence, but also record personal details about a suspect by photographing their identity card. Finally, the officers use the e-mail functionality to take notes by sending an e-mail to their own e-mail address.

Human Agency

The officers work primarily in teams of two, coordinating with other HRTs and the dispatcher on a regular basis throughout their shift. A predominance of surveillance and emergency response to incidents was observed and reported as fragments of the field notes: narrative vignettes (Erickson 1986 ). Incidents are generally called in by a citizen, with the citizen speaking to a dispatcher who then assigns one or multiple HRTs. The officers spend their time otherwise surveilling an area. At the beginning of a shift, the ranking officer shares information with them face-to-face. Topics discussed include significant events that happened during the past 24 hours, felons wanted in the area, and special assignments based on the time of year (e.g., in autumn the risk of burglary might be higher because the days are shorter). The slides used during the briefing are later accessible on officers’ smartphones. Officers patrol a given geographical area. The patrols will head to a given location and are in charge of determining an appropriate response when assigned to an incident. In the context of this study, we defined HRTs responding to an incident as a “focal group”. Police officers develop routines using their own discretion (Stroshine et al. 2008 ). We build on the work of McGrath ( 1984 ) to provide a greater understanding of tasks at the team level. In Table  2 , we illustrate each of the segments from the McGrath circumplex with an example specific to the police micro-processes observed in practice.

4 Analysis and Discussion

Vignette 1: Individual Affordance: Enforcing the Law

During their surveillance, the police officers spot a car illegally parked on the pavement. After some deliberation, they decide that they will issue a ticket. The officers calmly exit their vehicle, and one of them takes out her smartphone and opens up the dedicated application to complete this task. She enters all the required information (location, vehicle identification, offence) and attaches a picture of the parked car that will serve as evidence.

The first narrative vignette represents how technology is being used to enforce the law. Once the information has been entered into the system, the citizen will receive a fine in mail, and he/she will need to pay the ticket or face additional charges. Such a micro-process does not require collaborative activity. It is a simple task requiring that the officer make a decision with a right answer (McGrath 3) on what they have witnessed, combining that with the laws that apply. The affordance of enforcing the law through the MEOS smartphone is categorized as a McGrath 8, since it is considered to be the execution of police work.

Vignette 2. Three Collective and Shared Affordances: Weapon Seen with Teenagers

So far, it has been a quiet night for the two officers on patrol at the fancy fair. Around 12 a.m., though, a radio call comes in from the dispatcher that a group of youngsters has been spotted on the security cameras. One of them appears to be carrying a firearm. Two teams of officers are directed to the location where the group was spotted. Using their radiotelephones, the officers communicate quickly about the estimated time of arrival at destination. The officers all approach cautiously from different directions. They seem fully concentrated on the task at hand. The suspect is identified based on the information provided by their colleagues, derived from the security cameras, and received from the dispatcher. From that moment, the police response shifts into an even higher gear. Two officers separate the suspect from the group. He is pressed firmly against a nearby glass wall. He is searched, and the suspicious object, a plastic replica of a gun, is found. Once it becomes clear that there is no actual weapon involved in this situation, the atmosphere becomes less tense. The bags and pockets of the other youngsters are also searched. Because carrying any object that resembles a firearm is forbidden under certain circumstances, the incident has to be reported. Using the smartphone, the officers retrieve the personal details of the suspect. Since the suspect is a minor, special rules apply. The boy’s parents are called and informed that their son will be brought home by the police. Meanwhile, the police officers discuss how to correctly enter the information into the system. More discussions follow regarding the section of law that has been broken. With the information provided by the MEOS ticketing application, the officers reach a consensus.

The second vignette covers three additional affordances: coordinating, understanding the situation, and reaching consensus. The coordinating affordance is categorized as McGrath 1: generating plans. Here, the officers communicate using their radiotelephones to agree on the planning. The second affordance, understanding the situation, involves looking up the information about the suspect using the smartphone; using this information, the officers are able to collectively decide how to proceed. In this specific instance, the fact that the suspect is a minor influences the decision as to whether to take him to the police station or home to his parents instead. The answer agreed upon is regarded as the correct one, thus this affordance is categorized as McGrath 4. The third affordance, reaching consensus, involves a process in which the officers use information retrieved through a smartphone to discuss and reach consensus. In this case, additional information about the legislation on replica firearms that had recently changed was needed to convince all of the officers involved about the course forward and resolve the conflict of viewpoint regarding the situation.

Vignette 3: One Collective Affordance: Verification of Identity

A report comes in via the radiotelephone. Five teenagers have been spotted in a local parking garage carrying bags. It is unclear what the purpose of their presence is. Two teams of two officers head out to the parking garage; they are eager to catch the suspects. The teenagers are found and brought outside. Because they have no explanation for their presence, the officers use Mobile-ID to check the teenagers. Upon consulting the system, it becomes clear that one of the teenagers is housebound to a juvenile home. The officers address the teenager with a stern voice, informing him that he is under arrest. The teenager is taken under arrest, and two officers bring him back to the juvenile home. The remaining youngsters are sent away. A report is filed in the system, registering their unauthorized presence in the parking garage.

In this third vignette, one affordance is identified: verifying. The MEOS smartphone allows the officers to verify the identity of the persons that have been detained. Usually, there is a picture on file that enables the officers to cross-check the picture on the identity card with the picture stored in the system, guaranteeing that the identity card is not forged or has not otherwise been tampered with. Clearly, there is one right answer (McGrath 3): whether or not the suspect is indeed the person he claims to be/represented on the identity card. In this vignette, the MEOS provides the officers with information indicating that one of the suspects resides in a closed facility and does not have the right to be outside unsupervised.

Vignette 4: One Individualized Affordance: Arrest of High-Profile Suspect

During the past week, a rip deal (drug deal gone awry) has taken place. One of the duped parties has threatened to take revenge at the local fancy fair. This is a serious threat with potentially severe consequences for the safety of everyone present. A warrant for the arrest of the potential victim has also been issued. This information is provided during the pre-shift briefing. Throughout the shift, the officers call up the information from the briefing multiple times, indicating that they are on the alert for any of the parties involved. Later that evening, around 7:30 p.m., two other officers report that they have found the car of the potential target for revenge inside a parking garage near the fancy fair. The hood of the car is still warm, indicating that it has just been parked. This could be an indicator that the wanted person is currently at the fancy fair. After deliberation, officers are posted at numerous central positions in an attempt to locate the suspect. When a suspect is spotted, the officers compare his appearance to the picture presented at the briefing by accessing their smartphones. Although the suspect looks slightly different, the three officers have enough confidence that it is him and approach him. They inform the suspect that they have a warrant for his arrest. Since he is with his wife and children, they agree not to handcuff him if he cooperates.

In the fourth narrative vignette, officers have to make a decision with a right answer about whether a person spotted is the person they are looking for. This demonstrates the affordance of identifying. Making this decision is challenging, since the available photograph may be outdated, and both a false positive and a false negative could have severe consequences for the “suspect”. Using the photographs available on their smartphones, the officers reach sufficient confidence that the person they have spotted is indeed the suspect. This affordance is categorized as a McGrath Type 3 task, since there is one right answer to the question of “Is this the person that is wanted?”. Table  3 presents a summary of work practice, affordance, and interdependence for each of these vignettes.

A graphical representation of the process can be found in Fig. 1 .

figure 1

Conceptual representation of the research

4.1 Individualized Affordances

A number of individualized affordances were identified for problem-solving problems with one correct answer. One task frequently conducted by the officers is verifying identity. The Mobile-ID functionality affords the ability to scan a person’s identity card, whereupon the officer is presented with supplemental information about the document and the person in question. This allows the officer to make sure that the person is indeed who she/he claims to be. Another affordance in Type 3 tasks is the temporary storage of personal details by taking a picture of an identity card or passport. This allows the officer to look back at this information later, with such details as name and date of birth, thereby limiting the probability of making mistakes. Before the smartphones were introduced, officers would record personal details on a piece of paper, increasing the chance of mistakes. In the individualized affordances discussed here, the task interdependence is sequential. Towards the end of the response to the incident, the tasks are combined, so the interdependence is pooled. Strictly speaking, the individualized affordances could differ between the officers without affecting the outcome at the group level. However, there is a need for standardization, since the information stored is later used by other (external) stakeholders, such as the Department of Justice. Interestingly, although the affordance of issuing a ticket can be considered individualized, the organization can only reach its goal of enforcing the law if a “critical mass” of officers share this affordance. Otherwise, citizens might realize that very few officers were issuing tickets and commit more offences.

4.2 Collective Affordances

Collective affordances were witnessed in decision-making that had no right answers (Type 4). Usually, these involved multiple HRTs of officers due to the more complex nature of the situation and hence the decision-making tasks. One of the officers looks up information through the Mobile-ID application, and this information is then shared with colleagues. The information is an input in the further collective decision-making process. A similar approach is taken to resolving conflicts of viewpoint during cognitive conflict tasks (Type 5). Information from the ticket application is used as input to discuss and then correctly enter into the system what has happened with a group of youngsters seen with a fake weapon. Also, in a contest to outsmart the suspect who has left the scene of a car accident, one officer looks up additional information on the vehicle’s registration. Again, this information is shared with his colleague. The observations on collective affordances align with the pooled and comprehensive interdependence of the tasks that the group has to fulfil, such as in the situation where the youngsters were spotted with a weapon. After the suspects were stopped, different subtasks are divided among the officers: looking up the information or asking questions of the suspect. A decision was made collectively on how to proceed in this situation.

4.3 Shared Affordances

Shared affordances were mostly observed during the planning tasks associated with coordination. In our illustration, the officers all share the exact same affordance of using their radiotelephones. In fact, there is a strict policy on the procedures for using the radiotelephones. The policy involves a set of rules on communication procedures. To make certain that every message is received, the dispatcher will first call the designated officer using his call sign (a four-digit number). The officer will then respond, after which the dispatcher passes on the message. The interdependence is therefore sequential. The officer may then request additional information or confirm that the message has been received. If an officer speaks without requesting voice contact first, they will be reprimanded by the dispatcher. The only exceptions to this rule are for emergencies. In their communications using the radiotelephone, there is reciprocal interdependence between the officers. Clearly, even a limited number of officers not enacting the proper use of the radiotelephones could jeopardize the communications (and thus coordination/planning tasks) of all of the officers involved.

In this paper, we assessed how the micro-processes involved in social and material agency result in a range of individualized, collective, and shared affordances. Individualized affordances revolved around officers solving intellective tasks, that is, making sure someone is who he says he is. Yet, in some cases, we saw a similar affordance being used as part of a collective affordance—for example, when one officer looks up information about an address and shares this with his colleagues in the vicinity as input for a discussion on what went down in that situation. The situations in which shared affordance were evident involved planning tasks where officers communicated through their radiotelephone. There is a high level of reciprocal and comprehensive interdependence in such situations. All the officers enacted the affordance of the radiotelephone in a similar fashion. Task interdependence clearly affects the level of affordance. We witnessed an individualized affordance when it came to “identifying” a suspect. In that situation, the officers independently made their assessments as to whether this was the suspect they were looking for. Where one officer used his smartphone to look up a picture, another used a printed picture to identify the suspect. So, although the officers were achieving the same goal (identifying), their affordances were different. We witnessed collective affordances in the cases of decision-making tasks both in deciding on a preferred answer (Type 4) and resolving conflicts of viewpoint (Type 5). To reach consensus, one of the officers looked up information and then shared that information with colleagues. The information serves as input in the further collective decision-making process. A similar approach was taken to resolve conflicts of viewpoint during cognitive conflict tasks (Type 5). Information from the ticket application was used as input for discussing and then correctly entering into the system what had happened with a group of youngsters seen with a fake weapon.

This exploratory field study aimed to assess the imbrication in practice between the social and material through the lens of affordances. A number of insights emerge from the illustrations provided. By design, the majority of the smartphone functionalities are intended as individualized affordances. However, in practice, those individualized affordances are enacted as collective or shared affordances as a result of the degree of task interdependence. We observed a shift in terms of technology functionalities as mapped on the McGrath circumplex (McGrath 1984 ), from micro-processes to micro-processes supporting a particular task. Functionalities that can be categorized as aimed at solving problems with correct answers (Type 3) and functionalities to be used for task execution (Type 8) were both used as inputs in the more complicated decision-making tasks for which there is no one correct answer (Type 4). The differentiation between individualized, collective, and shared affordances (Leonardi 2013a ) proved useful for studying the impact of technology use on HROs. This study has shown that it is only in practice (Orlikowski 2008 ) that the enacted can be studied. Indeed, those affordances may differ from those intended by the organizational designers. Clearly, the actualized affordances will push new practices and impact organizational routines (Pozzi et al. 2014 ).

5 Conclusion, Limitations, and Future Research

Our findings may prove useful to practitioners and designers. The results demonstrate the limited predictability of how technology functionalities will be used in practice. From a theoretical perspective, our three-step approach has been useful. The task–technology fit approach certainly proved valuable, since it allowed for micro-processes at the team level to be mapped according to the McGrath approach (1984). Meanwhile, the sociomaterial imbrication lens (Leonardi 2011 ; Leonardi and Rodriguez-Lluesma 2013 ; Niemimaa 2016 ) provided an interesting angle. However, we believe that the entanglement approach (Orlikowski and Scott 2008 ; Scott and Orlikowski 2014 ) also has its merits—for example, when the technology becomes an extension of human agency. Requiring as it does time and iteration, we believe entanglement will become more and more evident in the future with the development of new technology such as helmets or technological wearables. Many decisions are being taken even faster and with more connectivity than before. Instead of functioning as a tool in the hands of the worker, technology is developing agency of its own (see Leonardi 2011 ; Scott and Orlikowski 2012 ). A “robocop” may not be too far in the distant future, and fiction will become reality.

Every study has its limitations, and here we identify a few of ours. First, we were not able to address the emergence of affordances over time. Similar to other studies of this concept (Pozzi et al. 2014 ), we studied the affordances after emergence. Also, we did not address the circumstances upon which the actualizations of affordances depend. For example, we did not look into the level of tech savviness of the police officers. Interestingly, the anecdotal evidence suggests that the younger police officers seemed more comfortable with the technology. Future studies should therefore closely examine human agency within the law enforcement context, since the decision-making by officers depends heavily on their level of discretion. The greater role played by technologies through their material agency may limit officer discretion (see, e.g., Bovens and Zouridis 2002 ) and intuition (Dörfler and Ackermann 2012 ). Due to team DSSs becoming more ubiquitous, users may increasingly rely on those systems instead of their own judgement. Also, it would be interesting to more closely examine the emotional root of officers’ decisions and see when and how they take the technological affordances into consideration when deciding to report a fact. Furthermore, it would be interesting to study the diffusion of affordances throughout organizations. The aim of this study was not to report on the 80 hours of observation in a tight case study, but to offer an illustration of the imbrication of human and material agency in practice. Another limitation is that it was not always possible to observe every aspect of the response to an incident at the same time. For example, one cannot simultaneously observe the dispatching police officer, the responding officers, and the citizen reporting the incident. Currently, we are in the process of gathering log data generated by the applications to complement our qualitative approach quantitatively.

To conclude, the implementation of new mobile technologies has surely improved the degree of elasticity and speeded up decision-making processes in HROs (Van Fenema 2005 ). The availability of such communication support or repositories serves both the synchronous and asynchronous sharing of information. “The availability of such material agency has given opportunities to participate in large-scale sensemaking, problem-solving, and efforts to organize collaborative action” (De Vreede et al. 2016 ). However, the wild proliferation of technologies in HROs is not trivial. Research has proven that it impacts organizational routines and brings new challenges (Medina et al. 2016; Saunders et al. 2016 ). Technology is a mixed blessing in achieving reliability in HROs because it increases the amount of information as well as the speed of delivery. While uncertainty is classically associated in the literature with a lack of information (e.g., Daft and Macintosh 1981 ), an increasing amount of information does not decrease uncertainty systematically. In the context of HROs and IT usage, greater amounts of information may add uncertainty. The volume of solution scheme/outcome uncertainty may simply expand, overloading the decision-makers. It can also interrupt routines that had been efficient in the past. In other words, technology usage may add complexity, increasing equivocality in the decision-making process, even more so when the decision ought to be collective. More research is warranted for considering that crucial dimension. Indeed, in the specific context of HROs, Vogus et al. ( 2010 ) have demonstrated that expert individuals have an experientially learned sense of salience that helps them process the incoming information and prioritize their actions. Managing critical incidents requires accurate and minimal processing time (Goldstein and Gigerenzer 2002 ; Hilbig 2010 ). Technologies should therefore afford efficient decision-making, not constrain it. While the use of collective intelligence has predominantly been associated with better decisions in times of crisis (Van de Walle and Turoff 2008 ), mostly in terms of reducing information asymmetry, quantity of information is not synonymous with “intelligence”. Expertise and dedicated processes are required for organizing the many informational cues at work in order for proper action to be taken towards efficient decision-making. It is therefore dubious to equate better decision-making with the availability of mobile technology in HROs from a linear perspective, especially given that the underlying technological design primarily supports information sharing and barely addresses information processing, other than through automation and algorithms.

Sykes and Macnaghten ( 2013 ) stated that “it would be nice to think that (…) we are more capable as a society of considering new technologies in a mature way, and thinking through some of the benefits, and also the potential inequity and downsides, in advance of their application (…) how to ensure the impact of new development creates a better world based on shared values” (pp. 85–86). Two decades ago, Zigurs and Buckland ( 1998 ) stated that they “regretted that no generally accepted theory of task–technology fit had emerged yet” (p. 313). In that same period, pioneers in the GDSS field recommended “being cautious of being driven by the opportunities that technological developments provide” (Ackermann and Eden 2001 , p. 63). It was after this that Technology, Affordances, and Constraints Theory (TACT) emerged, partly in response to Zigurs and Buckland’s ( 1998 ) desire for a theory to understand the fit between tasks and technology.

Finally, the benefits of using technologies are clear when addressing collaborative activities in HROs and HRTs, as underlined in this article, as well as in reducing information asymmetry at the societal level in crisis situations (Turoff et al. 2004 ). However, up until now, too little effort has been focused on the impact of the technological design (material agency) on group processes in practice. Off-the-shelf technologies may be used inconsiderately in organizations. There is a lack of thorough studies addressing the combination between task interdependence and affordances. For example, organizations nowadays apply comprehensive approaches involving collaboration among private and public stakeholders in times of peace or crisis (Gans and Rutkowski 2015 ). It might be necessary to responsibly design technology that affords collaboration among stakeholders. Based on our work, these shared affordances could be theoretically supported with a tight understanding of the interdependencies to cradle mindful decision-making. Such an approach would also be of added value in addressing new challenges ranging from cybersecurity to cyber defense. Hopefully, our research represents an initial step in proposing a way to tackle these types of problems.

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Verhulst, M.J., Rutkowski, AF. Decision-Making in the Police Work Force: Affordances Explained in Practice. Group Decis Negot 27 , 827–852 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10726-018-9587-5

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The Police Can’t Solve the Problem. They Are the Problem.

Twenty-five years after the infamous 1994 crime bill, too many criminal justice groups are simply reimagining mass incarceration.

why is problem solving important in the police

By Derecka Purnell and Marbre Stahly-Butts

Ms. Purnell and Ms. Stahly-Butts are lawyers .

A quarter-century on, criminal justice advocates agree that the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, signed by Bill Clinton in September 1994, was a disaster for poor people and people of color, and a driver of mass incarceration. Elected officials, policy experts and academics have recently sought to undo this damage by reimagining public safety. But too many of them are keeping law enforcement central to their vision for reform. This is a fundamental mistake.They are not reimagining public safety. They are reimagining mass incarceration.

The reality is this: The police fill prisons. We can’t repair the harm that the 1994 crime bill has done by promoting mass incarceration without reducing the size and scope of the police.

The crime bill articulated an obsession with punishment and prescribed policing as the cure to a host of social ills. It provided funding for 100,000 new police officers, $14 billion in grants for community-oriented policing, $9.7 billion for prisons and $6.1 billion crime prevention programs. The legislation was partly responsible for a 30 percent increase in police officers from 699,000 in 1990 to 899,000 in 1999, and funded over 7,000 school officers. Today, there are over one million law enforcement officers in the United States

But did the plan work? The Government Accountability Office concluded that while there was a 26 percent decline in overall crime from 1993 to 2000, only 1.3 percent of the decline could be attributed to additional police officers. The majority of that decrease, the office said, came from other, unspecified factors; smaller studies have found that everything from preschool to job programs for young people decreases crime rates.

Approximately 1 0.5 million people are arrested each year in this country. While a majority of these arrests ultimately result in dismissed charges , their impact is devastating. Being arrested, whatever the outcome, can jeopardize a person’s employment, housing, physical and mental health and parental rights.

Politicians promise jail closings even as they increase police budgets — and, as a result, arrests. Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York has acknowledged that the 1994 crime bill was a mistake and wants the city’s Rikers Island jail to close by 2026 . Yet New York's transportation agency just announced a plan to hire 500 police officers to combat fare evasion and manage homeless people in the subway.

Free public transportation, living wages and quality housing would be better responses to these issues than increased policing. Nationwide, nearly half of the people whom the police arrest multiple times have incomes below $10,000 a year. It’s important to put this in historical perspective: Since it originated with efforts to prevent labor organizing and to patrol slaves , modern policing has punished the poor. No number of diversity workshops , body cameras and community policing initiatives will change that.

Reformers on both sides of the aisle praised President Trump for signing the First Step Act last year as a measure toward ending mass incarceration. The act is a modest, underfunded criminal justice reform package that a coalition of over 150 black led organizations opposed. Last week, White House economists announced a plan to use the police to get homeless people “off the street.” This direction is misguided. Police officers cannot solve underlying causes of homelessness or other social problems. They can only temporarily manage these issues with punishment and more violence.

And even more misguided ideas are being proposed. After a movement against police violence erupted in 2014, scholars, nonprofit groups and politicians reimagined police officers as youth mentors , mental health professionals , and social workers — against the wishes of many police officers. But the police do not help vulnerable populations — they make populations vulnerable. Excessive force is the No. 1 investigated complaint against police officers, and sexual violence is the second. People with mental illness are 16 times more likely to be killed by the police. People of color, people with disabilities, immigrants, queer and trans people, those with mental illness and the homeless disproportionately experience violence from officers, who kill an average of nearly 1,000 people annually, and sexually assault , physically assault , harass, and surveil hundreds of thousands more

Philanthropists and politicians have called for more “community policing,” the idea of having police departments develop partnerships with community groups to ease tensions between law enforcement and residents. In the last 10 years, the Department of Justice included “community policing” in its consent decrees with police departments accused of misconduct in Baltimore, Cleveland, Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans, Newark, Puerto Rico and Ferguson, Mo., and Oakland, Calif.

But community policing is an empty phrase. A Washington Post report showed that law enforcement use of force increased in half of police departments with consent decrees. Asking police officers to strengthen community relationships — including by doing things like playing football with children or handing out ice cream — does not reduce their power to harm anyone.

There’s hope. Community organizations are working to solve the problems our communities face without putting them in more danger. The San Francisco school board recently passed a resolution limiting the role of the police on school campuses , acknowledging that law enforcement’s presence criminalizes students under the guise of protection. The Oakland Power Projects trains community members in health skills and emergency response practices to reduce reliance on the police and to create the support networks needed to address the issues that cause problems in the first place.

In New York, the Audre Lorde Project’s Safe Outside the System produces resources for L.B.G.T.Q. communities to build safe spaces without police involvement. Nationally, the People’s Coalition for Safety and Freedom is organizing for the repeal of the 1994 crime bill and for a community-driven process to decide how to respond to community-based violence and corporate harm.

Systems of oppression, like slavery, Jim Crow, and mass incarceration, must be reduced and abolished — not reimagined. Police officers, who primarily put people in cages, are the enforcers of mass incarceration. We must reckon with the reality that the police are part of the problem and stop investing money, power and legitimacy in them.

Derecka Purnell ( @DereckaPurnell) is a human rights lawyer. Marbre Stahly-Butts is the executive director of the Law for Black Lives network of lawyers.

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Introduction, a citizen-centric approach, evaluating the pilot, conclusion and discussion.

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Meaningful interventions: Applying a citizen-centric approach to problem-solving in community policing

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Ronald van Steden, Jordi den Hartog, Meaningful interventions: Applying a citizen-centric approach to problem-solving in community policing, Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice , Volume 18, 2024, paae030, https://doi.org/10.1093/police/paae030

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Citizens generally express confidence in the police organization, but satisfaction with police services can diminish after voluntary contact with an officer. It appears that officers sometimes struggle to understand what citizens expect and need from them. Victims of crime may not necessarily wish to punish an offender; they may just want to be heard and have their problem resolved. In response, the Dutch police have introduced a pilot to provide ‘meaningful interventions’, such as conflict mediation, as a way to bridge institutional and citizen perspectives successfully. This article presents a qualitative evaluation of the pilot by applying the EMMIE framework, which stands for Effect, Mechanisms, Moderators, Implementation, and Economics, to the available data. In conclusion, meaningful interventions show promise in better aligning police service delivery with the needs and expectations of citizens. Future research is necessary to gain a fuller evidence-based analysis of how meaningful interventions work.

As is the case with other police forces across the West ( Home Office, 2023 ), the Dutch constabulary face a peculiar paradox. On the one hand, the police are the most trusted institution in the country. According to Statistics Netherlands, 77% of the population expresses confidence in the police, surpassing confidence in, for example, the press (40%), the parliament (30%), and the church (30%) ( CBS, 2023 ). On the other hand, after there has been personal contact with police officers, public satisfaction with their daily work drops significantly. While most people (64%) still hold positive views about their initial contact when reporting a problem to the police, there is also disappointment with the outcome of this contact. Among those dissatisfied with police contact, 40% complain that their problem has not been resolved ( CBS, 2022 ).

The challenge for (community) police officers is how to best support citizens to deal with problems they report. While officers address various ‘problems the public expect them to solve’ ( Eck and Spelman, 1987 , p. 37), scholarly publications in the field of policing tend to restrict their content to ‘what works’ in reducing (fear of) crime ( Mannings et al. , 2016 ; Moore and Braga, 2003 ). Yet, crime is just one element of public demand for police service. The majority of calls and reports received at police stations involve mental health crises, domestic violence, incidents, accidents, neighbourly disputes, non-criminal behaviour complaints, and requests for help or assistance ( Boulton et al. , 2017 ; Laufs et al. , 2021 ). Such problems require prompt or long-term action and do not necessarily follow a criminal justice logic. Individuals may just need support.

Citizens have high expectations of the actions taken by police, as uniformed officers carry significant symbolic meaning and value. They represent a trustworthy pillar of peace and order that offers people a sense of security in a chaotic world ( Loader, 1997 ; Walker, 1996 ). However, citizens’ personal experiences with the police matter as much, if not more, than symbolic attitudes ( Orr and West, 2007 ). Given that actions taken by officers can frequently be disappointing, a better understanding of police–citizen contact and its outcomes is essential for the development of ‘customised’ or ‘tailor-made’ solutions ( Arlbjørn et al. , 2011 ) that address citizens’ needs. Currently, there is limited knowledge about how these solutions are implemented and appreciated in the context of community policing. When people voluntarily contact the police, subsequent interventions need not only to be ‘just’ and ‘fair’ ( Wells, 2007 ) but also to meet their specific requirements.

Against this background, we introduce and explore the concept of ‘meaningful interventions’ ( betekenisvolle interventies ; Felser et al. , 2017 ), a term coined by the Dutch police. This concept does not suggest that the police primarily engage in meaningless interventions. Rather, it emphasizes the importance of thinking ‘from outside in’ ( Alford and Speed, 2006 ) to better align their service delivery with the interests and expectations of citizens. Police officers are stimulated to find the preferably ‘restorative’ ( Clamp and Paterson, 2017 ) solutions within or outside of the criminal justice system that fit citizens’ intentions and needs best. It is not an institutional-centric approach, but a citizen-centric approach that must be the starting point for police actions and interventions.

The three research questions of our article are: (1) What kind of problems and conflicts do citizens report to the police? (2) What kind of meaningful interventions are offered by the police? and (3) How do citizens and the police assess the practices and outcomes of these interventions? These questions are answered through a pilot evaluation carried out by a specially trained community police officer and a project secretary (second author) under supervision of an academic scholar (first author) and a broader project steering committee. The subsequent section briefly outlines the theoretical background of a ‘client’ (or, more accurately phrased ‘citizen’) focus in policing, followed by an overview of the study’s methodology, analytical framework, and empirical results. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of our findings.

Skogan and Hartnett (1997) identify responsiveness to people’s needs and encouragement of positive relationships between officers and neighbourhood inhabitants in solving local safety problems as core elements of community policing. Under the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy, these scholars and the police organized so-called ‘beat meetings’ to allow groups of voluntary citizens to inform local officers directly about crime and safety issues in their local areas and to build partnerships around solutions. The philosophy behind meaningful interventions ( Felser et al. , 2017 ), as developed within the Dutch police service, takes the ideal of responsive problem-solving one step further by applying individual and individualized attention to citizens who report crime, disorder, nuisance, and conflicts.

The importance of this customization focus deserves a little more elaboration. Although the Dutch police use the terms ‘clients’ and ‘customers’ in official policy documents themselves, this private-sector style jargon creates some unease in relation to the public and regulatory task of the force. Citizens do not directly pay for police services, they are unable to choose among different competing companies, police contact is often involuntary and stressful, and the police do not simply aim to please customers or provide straightforward ‘value-for-money’ ( Alford, 2002 ). Therefore, it seems more appropriate to refer to a ‘citizen’ rather than a ‘client’ approach. Following this citizen-centric approach, as implied in meaningful interventions, does not mean the police should be ‘run like a business’ ( Beckett, 2000 ). Instead, the police should adjust their internal organizational logic towards what citizens need from them.

To illustrate this, let’s consider the fictional example of a fight between two ex-lovers. The victim reports the incident at a local police station. A standard bureaucratic reaction (the ‘institutional-centric approach’) would involve completing a crime report without any assurance of a proper follow-up. In a police view, ‘minor’ relationship disputes are not their priority, making further criminal investigation highly unlikely. This would disappoint the victim, resulting in negative consequences for public satisfaction regarding police contact and, more crucially, undertaking action. Moreover, the criminal justice trajectory is regarded as an ultimum remedium , a last resort, when all other options have failed ( Bittner, 1990 [1970 ]). Overuse of criminal law enforcement serves the interests of neither victims nor offenders.

It is very well possible that the victim in our fictional example has intentions other than mere retribution and deterrence when reporting the incident to the police ( Wemmers, 2002 ). Perhaps she or he wants to put an end to a problem, draw a firm line under it, or ask for advice. Criminal justice responses may not be the best route to follow in addressing this kind of need. Hence, within the constraints of rules, regulations, and directives, community police officers are expected to make ‘discretionary judgement’ in determining how to handle situations and what works best for an individual citizen. Following Lipsky, ‘to a degree, the society seeks not only impartially from its public agencies but also compassion for special circumstances and flexibility in dealing with them’ ( 2010 [1980 ], p. 15). Tailor-made responses are necessary to ‘fit’ a police intervention to specific situations and needs.

Putting people’s problems first sheds another light on how to structurally organize the everyday practices of community policing. As Seddon argues, if organizations are designed ‘to do the “value work’”—what matters to the customer [i.e. the citizen]—and only the value work, cost will fall as service improves’ ( 2017 , p. 31). Pursuing a citizen-centric approach thus seeks to better understand victims’ and offenders’ (or a mix thereof) intentions and needs. This approach should be taken into account in daily police operations through meaningful interventions that contribute to effective problem-solving. Effective problem-solving, in turn, is expected to increase public satisfaction with police and may lead to a variety of other contributions from the general public that create ‘public value’ ( Moore, 1995 ). Think, for example, of providing the police with useful information and compliance with the law.

Examining meaningful interventions

The pilot was conducted between January and October 2022 within the southern district of the Amsterdam police force in the Netherlands ( Den Hartog and Van Steden, 2023 ). The goal was to offer the police a fresh perspective on handling crime reports, with the potential for meaningful interventions and, as anticipated, resolutions addressing citizens’ demands and needs. A community police officer underwent additional training before the pilot intervention. The training, spanning 6 days, focussed on acquiring fundamental negotiating skills, including conversation techniques, decision-making processes, de-escalation tactics, facilitating acceptable solutions between parties, and enhancing awareness of the legal and ethical aspects of mediation. Upon completing the training, the officer received a formal certificate. Moreover, a non-executive (administrative) police practitioner, who also served as the project secretary (the second author of this paper), collected, documented, and analysed the data following the interventions. Prior to participating in the pilot program, citizens provided the police with their consent.

Initially, the project secretary examined eighty meaningful interventions. However, in eight cases, the community police officer decided not to implement the intervention, mostly due to ongoing recidivism among conflicting parties. As a result, she was left with a total of 72 cases. The project secretary interviewed 40 respondents involved in the interventions to gather information about the outcomes in terms of problem resolution and to interview them about their other experiences with the pilot (as also described below). Additionally, he had conversations with the community police officer during and after each case to reflect on the process, time commitment, and outcomes of the interventions. Detailed notes were taken and recorded in his research diary.

The interventions carried out by the community police officer were uniquely tailored to the citizens and the problems they faced. Once an intervention was made, the responsibility for upholding the outcomes rested with the conflicting parties. However, the community officer sometimes needed to follow-up on her interventions to reinforce previous agreements made. This pilot was conducted under the supervision of a project steering committee in which the first author, an academic scholar, took part. The committee, which convened three times, discussed interim findings and assisted the project secretary in structuring and interpreting the data.

Calling citizens back

The project secretary contacted the conflicting parties approximately 2 months after the completion of the intervention. In these telephone conversations, he inquired about how they experienced the intervention and its effect or impact on their current situation. Participation in the interviews was voluntary. We were able to collect qualitative information about 28 cases (39% of the 72 cases, involving 40 respondents) by conducting interviews with at least one of the conflicting parties, resulting in 40 conversations. The evaluation of the remaining 44 cases was impeded by multiple factors, including unresponsiveness from respondents (4 cases), lack of cooperation or denial of responsibility by individuals involved (17 cases), indirect involvement of a community officer (4 cases, where advice was given to a colleague), the risk of reigniting conflicts (9 cases), and ongoing or recently completed cases (10 cases), rendering a comprehensive assessment either impossible or imprudent due to these constraints.

Inspired by the What Works Centre for Crime Reduction in the UK, we analysed our data using the EMMIE framework ( Johnson et al ., 2015 ; Thornton et al. , 2019 ). This framework serves as an analytical toolkit for synthesizing literature reviews and empirical findings from fieldwork and offers a practical format for engaging policymakers and practitioners with scholarly evidence. The acronym EMMIE represents five elements: E ffect (direction and impact size of an intervention), M echanisms (factors that produce specific effects), M oderators (conditions under which variations in outcomes occur), I mplementation (of interventions), and E conomics (cost-benefit analysis of an intervention). The individual items that inform these elements are listed below:

E ffect : What is the impact of interventions on solving citizens’ problems and conflicts?

M echanisms : Which factors contribute to this impact, positively or negatively?

M oderators : What are favourable and unfavourable contexts for interventions to work—or not?

I mplementation : What is necessary for successfully implementing an intervention?

E conomics : How much time did the community police officer spend on the inventions (costs) and how satisfied were the participating citizens with these interventions (benefits)?

Data collection took place by calling back participating citizens and by obtaining reflections from the trained community police officer regarding cases, interventions, and outcomes. The data were grouped under the five elements of EMMIE afterwards. The results of our qualitative pilot evaluation are provided in the next section.

Types of conflicts

Table 1 provides a brief description of the 72 types of conflict that are being investigated. The cases were reported to the police through different channels, particularly intake and service staff, the internal case-screening bureau, and other police colleagues such as community officers. Each case began with citizens reporting a crime or problem to the police. In many instances, police solutions other than strictly criminal justice interventions (investigation, apprehension, and prosecution) were preferred because most conflicting parties knew each other quite well and wanted to restore their disturbed relationship. Additionally, the reported cases often lacked investigative indications such as clear evidence or independent witnesses and would normally be dismissed. However, by contacting the police, citizens did expect that their conflict or problem would be addressed in some way. The anticipated meaningful interventions intended to meet their specific interests and needs.

Types of conflict

Types of interventions

In response to problems and conflicts in local neighbourhoods, the police implemented six types of meaningful intervention, all of which had a restorative component ( Table 2 ). These tailor-made interventions are not infinite in scope and can be grouped under the following categories:

Types of intervention

Consultation: Providing practical and legal advice to the citizen reporting a crime or conflict, guiding them on the best course of action to resolve their problem;

‘Valuable’ conversation: Offering practical advice to enhance citizens’ ability to resolve conflicts themselves.

Reprimand: Issuing a firm warning to make it clear to a suspect that he/she crossed a line, aiming to raise awareness and prevent future unwanted behaviour;

Specific deterrence conversation: Delivering an oral and/or written notice to demand that a suspect immediately cease his/her (allegedly) illegal action;

Shuttle mediation: Assisting disputing parties in reaching an agreement (reconciliation, settlement, or compromise) outside of the criminal justice system, without requiring direct physical contact between them;

Face-to-face mediation: Facilitating a resolution between disputing parties by bringing them physically together outside of the criminal justice system.

Within these categories, the community officer had much room to manoeuvre in making decisions. There were no clear correlations between the type of conflict and the chosen intervention in response.

A majority (77%) of our respondents involved in 24 cases ( N  = 35; for 5 respondents, it was too early to judge any effects) gave positive feedback regarding the police interventions. They had experienced progress or a settlement of their problem and praised the ‘constructive’ police contacts, the ‘added value’ of police involvement, and the ‘beneficial impact’ of the community officer. Respondents specifically felt ‘reassured’ and ‘at peace’ after the officer’s interventions:

I am very pleased with the community officer. My situation has been solved through a restorative intervention. (Respondent #11) After the first specific deterrence letter, there was no contact whatsoever between us. Yet, at the beginning of this year, a photo of me was sent to the other party. This was likely a trigger to re-establish contact again. The community police officer has spoken to both of us and communicated the outcomes. [. . .] It has been quiet again ever since. (Respondent #13) When something happened, I looked at my own role and felt shame: how could I have been so stupid? Now that feeling has been straightened out in the contact with the community officer. The shame has been removed. (Respondent #23) The community officer provided valuable advice and support. I am now better equipped to stand my ground, for example, by saying, ‘and now it is over’. [. . .] I feel also reassured because I used to be afraid that new situations would arise. (Respondent #30)

However, according to other respondents, the impact of interventions was less effective or sustainable than anticipated. In eight cases, they reported a lack of effects. Situations had not changed or could escalate again:

The community police officer provided advice and reassurance, but ultimately [. . .] the situation did not change. (Respondent #1) The sustainability of the agreement is not assured. It should have been written down. The outcome is too non-committal now. (Respondent #20)

It is thus important to note that tailor-made police interventions, designed to meet citizens’ needs and settle their situations, are not a panacea.

Our respondents mentioned five main mechanisms for achieving a positive effect resulting from police interventions. These mechanisms are complex and may interfere with each other, but for the sake of clarity, we present them separately. The first mechanism refers to the police time made available for constructive contact:

I liked the fact that there was time to discuss the situation despite time pressures and staff shortages. (Respondent #3) I liked the fact that I could directly text the police officer on her phone. There was time for personal contact, which simulated a sense of trust. (Respondent #22)

Respondents described the community police officer as ‘discrete’, ‘friendly’, and ‘professional’. One felt that covert conflict mediation was much preferable over an invasive ‘bunch of uniformed officers on my doorstep’ (Respondent #14).

Secondly, offering tailor-made interventions has contributed to greater clarity about what the police could or could not do for citizens, particularly those who were having their first contact with the police:

It was the first time I was in contact with the police. So, it was all new. (Respondent #37)

Respondent #9 added that she had reported a crime to the police before but had not heard anything since. She now knows that something is happening with her case, which has restored her confidence in the police. However, because the search for ‘meaningful interventions’ was not (and is still not) part of the standard police repertoire, citizens sometimes felt uncertain about potential financial costs and legal consequences. A few respondents (#5 and #8) were caught by surprise by the telephone call from the police offering them an alternative conflict settlement.

Thirdly, the respondents mentioned the ‘knowledge’, ‘expertise’, and ‘decisiveness’ of the community police officer. They described her as a ‘go-getter’ as she prevented conversations from devolving into mere ‘yes-no-discussions’. In addition, the community officer effectively calmed parties down when tensions escalated due to differing viewpoints:

[It] was very nice [. . .] that steps were taken. The community police officer was understanding, listened well, and acted professionally. (Respondent #13) The community police officer was incredibly committed. [. . .] She did not let frictions put her off. [. . .] Whether left or right, she tried to guide and restore contact with the conflicting party. (Respondent #15) The case was settled thanks to the quality of the community police officer. She managed to [. . .] find a smart way forward. (Respondent #16)

Fourthly, the community officer provided practical advice on how conflicting parties could adequately respond to a conflict. She discussed the pros and cons of potential actions and ensured that promises and agreements among conflicting parties were upheld. In 12 of our cases, consideration was given to financial compensation for damages. Ultimately, such compensation was disbursed in only four cases. It is important to note that agreeing on financial settlements was always voluntary. In instances where citizens denied personal responsibility for losses or property damages, no compensation was awarded.

A fifth and final mechanism that helped to carry solutions forward was the community police officer involving third parties in the equation. For example, in cases of domestic disputes, she made contact with Safe at Home ( Veilig Thuis ), a Dutch non-profit social support organization for people in conflict situations such as domestic violence and abuse:

I started a trajectory with Safe at Home. The community police officer also made a connection. It’s a good thing this has been done. [. . .] Advice has been given on the next steps. (Respondent #9)

This kind of collaboration between police and third parties contributed to more comprehensive case files that could be used for undertaking further action by police or by others. Meaningful interventions thus provided a clearer overview of conflict situations.

The interventions carried out by the community police officer took place within a broader social context, which influenced the observed outcomes. Apart from the mechanisms discussed above, the circumstances under which the police must operate had an impact, whether intended or unintended, on the effectiveness of these interventions. While it was impossible to accurately evaluate the interactions between mechanisms, moderating factors, and their potential effects, engaging in reflective conversations with the community police officer yielded some general insights.

According to her perspective, the circumstances were deemed ideal when the parties in conflict were familiar with each other and the conflict had begun relatively recently. Whether they were family members, friends, business associates, or neighbours, if the likelihood of future interaction was high, it often, though not invariably, fostered receptiveness to restorative and other non-punitive interventions. Additionally, it was preferable for the number of involved parties to be limited. Among our cases, 61 instances comprised conflicts between two individuals or between multiple individuals belonging to two conflicting groups or households, encompassing the vast majority (total N  = 72). In 11 cases, 3 or more individuals were involved. While most conflicts tend to be short-lived, 13 of our cases had persisted for several years. In these prolonged conflicts, where parties had entrenched themselves in a recurring ‘fighting attitude’, achieving transformation was particularly challenging. Meaningful interventions seemed less effective here.

A related observation was that meaningful interventions were most likely to succeed when the conflicts were not overly complicated and lacked criminal justice entanglements or solutions. The presence of physical harm most probably increases the occurrence of suboptimal outcomes. While we did not encounter cases in which individuals displayed erratic behaviour or other forms of psychological instability, it was conceivable that such circumstances could also undermine the effectiveness of police interventions. Participants needed to exhibit a certain level of rationality to fully engage in the pilot. Otherwise, a referral to public or mental health institutions might be a more viable option.

Implementation

The implementation of interventions refers to how things are done to produce successful outcomes. Police colleagues involved in responding to reported conflicts and problems, along with the trained community officers, made decisions about cases suitable for alternative interventions by taking into account their context, history, and complexity (moderators). If cases appeared promising, the community officer or her police colleagues contacted citizens to inform them about their options and to seek their consent to participate in the pilot. External parties that played a role included housing associations in cases of neighbourhood disputes and Safe at Home in cases of domestic problems. The police occasionally collaborated with these partners on issues such as behavioural agreements.

Regarding citizens involved, telephone contact was crucial for discussing cases on short notice. The community police officer, in consultation with the conflicting parties, sometimes chose to continue with phone contact (so-called ‘shuttle mediations’). In other instances, people received a formal letter inviting them to a personal meeting at the police station. Almost everyone responded to this invitation. Customization was continuously the focal point of interventions: What did citizens need? Where had citizens been most helped, and how could support be achieved?

Just like customization, thoroughness was an important factor in the implementation process. This applied to both the preparation and execution of the interventions. Well-prepared initial meetings with the citizens were crucial to identify the relevant factors that had led to their conflicts. It was also important that participants had enough time to consider their options. As shown in Table 3 , during the pilot period, half of the 72 cases had a lead time of approximately 1 month, and 89% of the cases were resolved within two months. A ‘quick fix’ was often not a viable option.

The lead time of cases

Nevertheless, despite the community police officer’s efforts, not all respondents reacted positively to her interventions. One respondent (#13) believed that the situation was too complicated to be satisfactorily discussed in just half an hour. In his opinion, the community officer did not get the complete picture. Two others (#1 and #5) expressed criticism regarding the officer’s approach towards considering the interests of suspects. As victims, they felt that their interests should have been prioritized. Respondent #10 expressed frustration because his neighbours were not willing to participate in a restorative conversation. The principle of voluntariness may hinder the effective implementation of tailor-made solutions.

There are costs and benefits associated with police interventions. However, estimating these is an extremely complex task. To provide a general impression, we first calculated the time spent on the meaningful interventions. Our calculations included the following components: preparation and administration, telephone contact, and/or in-person conversations at the police station. Table 4 provides an overview of the average time consumption related to the various interventions.

Average hours spent on interventions

It can be argued that meaningful interventions cost the police less time (and budget) compared to the traditional route of reporting a crime, filing a report, screening this report, and taking criminal justice action—or not. Furthermore, if the police do postpone a case, this may result in double handling. As a respondent explained:

When reporting a crime to the police, I expected that they would address my case. And had I not been satisfied, I would have made another report. (Respondent #30)

In addition, failing to intervene in a conflict situation could lead to escalation, resulting in even more police work and harm caused to those involved:

If the police do nothing, there is the possibility of vigilantism: taking the law into one’s own hands. My brother had found out a lot about the perpetrator. Action by the community officer had a de-escalating effect. (Respondent #9) The police intervention likely prevented a worsening situation of noise pollution. [. . .] If the conflict had persisted, it would have further deteriorated the atmosphere. (Respondent #11)

In our analysis of the pilot’s ‘benefits’, we evaluated these kinds of ‘costs’ in relation to citizen satisfaction with the meaningful interventions. Their feedback was generally promising. In 22 out of the 28 cases, 34 respondents answered the question regarding their satisfaction with the mediator on a scale of 1–10 (it was decided to include this question after six interviews had already been conducted). This yielded an average rating of 8.1, with 2 respondents giving unsatisfactory ratings. Here are three examples of positive comments:

I already had trust in the police but have become even more positive about them. (Respondent #15) I would probably not have gotten that far without help of the police. [. . .] The situation was handled just fine. (Respondent #18) I did not realise that conflict mediation was an option too. It really helped me. (Respondent #27)

We can thus cautiously conclude that the cost-benefit balance of meaningful interventions looks favourable. Interventions seem ‘cheaper’ (i.e. cost less police time) than traditional criminal justice trajectories and strengthen trust in and satisfaction (benefits) with the police.

There exists a gap between the general public’s confidence in the police as a government agency and their personal trust and satisfaction with their experiences of voluntary police contact. Citizens rank the police as a highly trusted state institution, but they can frequently become disappointed and frustrated when the police fail to take adequate action to address their public safety concerns. This discrepancy is worrisome because a lack of trust and confidence in the police can erode the perceived legitimacy of law enforcement and reduce public support for their actions. Consequently, people may become less willing to cooperate with the police and share information about crimes or suspects ( Home Office, 2023 ).

In addition to investment in community engagement as a means of improving problem-solving and enhancing public perceptions of the police ( Skogan and Hartnett, 1997 ), the Dutch police conducted experiments with ‘meaningful interventions’ ( Felser et al. , 2017 ) designed in accordance with a citizen-centric perspective. This tailor-made approach differs from the traditional police way of working, which is rooted in criminal justice responses ( Bittner, 1990 [1970 ]). Such responses are not always effective because citizens may not consistently report crimes, or they may be unwilling to seek prosecution and punishment for the offender ( Wemmers, 2002 ). Instead, they may be seeking help, support, and advice. It is thus vital for the police to better understand these intentions and needs.

In our study of a pilot project in the Netherlands, we found that people frequently contacted the police regarding neighbour quarrels, youth problems, relational conflicts, and various other types of disputes. These problems were, at times, grave and harmful, but people did not necessarily advocate for harsh criminal justice sanctions. Their main preference was to stop or resolve the conflicts and restore broken relationships with spouses, neighbours, or business partners. In response, the Dutch police provided consultations, valuable conversations, reprimands, specific deterrence conversations, shuttle mediations, and face-to-face mediations. All interventions were designed to best meet the expectations, interests, and needs of the people involved in the pilot.

Our qualitative evaluation of the meaningful interventions revealed that, in general, these interventions had a positive effect on the situations: respondents felt ‘reassured’ and more ‘at peace’ after seeing progress in their situations. Possible factors contributing to positive effects included the availability of time to listen to people’s stories and explain what the police can and cannot do, the community officer’s decisiveness in taking appropriate action, and the involvement of third parties such as social support services if necessary. Meaningful interventions seem most effective when a limited number of conflicting parties are familiar with each other, conflicts are not prolonged or too severe, participation is voluntary, and the parties demonstrate an appropriate level of rationality and willingness to resolve their disputes. ‘Customisation’ (tailor-made solutions) and ‘thoroughness’ (good preparation) are key factors in implementing these interventions, which, at first glance, appear to be cost-effective compared to criminal justice processes.

However, when viewed critically, meaningful interventions can also lead to an increased police workload. In the absence of the pilot study, the police are typically less inclined to follow-up on reports of neighbour conflicts and other minor quarrels unless they escalate. Additionally, not every participant in the pilot felt fully satisfied because their situations remained vulnerable. Some respondents also expressed concerns that the community officers spent too little time on their cases, had uncertainties regarding the economic and legal implications of the meaningful interventions, or, as self-proclaimed victims, criticized the restorative justice premise that victims and offenders should voluntarily engage in an equal dialogue.

One limitation of our pilot study is the sample size of 72 cases, which may not be representative of the full range of cases that police typically encounter for potential meaningful interventions. The cases we studied were only those that happened to occur during the pilot study’s timeframe. Furthermore, we could only gather information from respondents in 38% of the 72 cases. This may introduce a ‘positive bias’ ( Quingley et al. , 2015 ) towards meaningful interventions, as it is conceivable that less enthusiastic or non-cooperative participants in the pilot were more likely to not talk about their experiences.

To go beyond the perceptions of respondents, future research should aim to provide more robust evidence about ‘what works’ in offering meaningful interventions. Consider the use of quantified ‘randomised controlled trials’ ( Knutsson and Tompson, 2017 ) in which two groups of citizens who report a (crime) problem to the police are randomly assigned to receive ‘treatment’ (e.g. the possibility of conflict mediation) or not. Are there clear group differences in terms of conflict resolution and public satisfaction with the police? Up to this point, we have established exploratory theoretical and empirical foundations to further pursue such a line of research.

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Knutsson , J . and Tompson , L . (eds.) ( 2017 ). Advances in Evidence-Based Policing . London : Routledge .

Laufs , J. , Bowers , K. , Birks , D. , and Johnson , S. ( 2021 ). ‘Understanding the Concept of “Demand” in Policing: A Scoping Review and Resulting Implications for Demand Management.’ Policing and Society 31 ( 8 ): 895 – 918 .

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Center for Problem oriented policing

The Key Elements of Problem-Oriented Policing

  • A problem is the basic unit of police work rather than a crime, a case, calls, or incidents.
  • A problem is something that concerns or causes harm to citizens, not just the police. Things that concern only police officers are important, but they are not problems in this sense of the term.
  • Addressing problems means more than quick fixes: it means dealing with conditions that create problems.
  • Police officers must routinely and systematically analyze problems before trying to solve them, just as they routinely and systematically investigate crimes before making an arrest. Individual officers and the department as a whole must develop routines and systems for analyzing problems.
  • The analysis of problems must be thorough even though it may not need to be complicated. This principle is as true for problem analysis as it is for criminal investigation.
  • Problems must be described precisely and accurately and broken down into specific aspects of the problem. Problems often aren't what they first appear to be.
  • Problems must be understood in terms of the various interests at stake. Individuals and groups of people are affected in different ways by a problem and have different ideas about what should be done about the problem.
  • The way the problem is currently being handled must be understood and the limits of effectiveness must be openly acknowledged in order to come up with a better response.
  • Initially, any and all possible responses to a problem should be considered so as not to cut short potentially effective responses. Suggested responses should follow from what is learned during the analysis. They should not be limited to, nor rule out, the use of arrest.
  • The police must pro-actively try to solve problems rather than just react to the harmful consequences of problems.
  • The police department must increase police officers' freedom to make or participate in important decisions. At the same time, officers must be accountable for their decision-making.
  • The effectiveness of new responses must be evaluated so these results can be shared with other police officers and so the department can systematically learn what does and does not work. (Michael Scott and Herman Goldstein 1988.)

The concept of problem-oriented policing can be illustrated by an example. Suppose police find themselves responding several times a day to calls about drug dealing and vandalism in a neighborhood park. The common approach of dispatching an officer to the scene and repeatedly arresting offenders may do little to resolve the long term crime and disorder problem. If, instead, police were to incorporate problem-oriented policing techniques into their approach, they would examine the conditions underlying the problem. This would likely include collecting additional information—perhaps by surveying neighborhood residents and park users, analyzing the time of day when incidents occur, determining who the offenders are and why they favor the park, and examining the particular areas of the park that are most conducive to the activity and evaluating their environmental design characteristics. The findings could form the basis of a response to the problem behaviors. While enforcement might be a component of the response, it would unlikely be the sole solution because, in this case, analysis would likely indicate the need to involve neighborhood residents, parks and recreation officials and others.

Problem-oriented policing can be applied at various levels of community problems and at various levels in the police organization. It can be applied to problems that affect an entire community, involving the highest level of police agency, government, and community resources. It can be applied at intermediate levels (for example, a neighborhood or a police district), involving an intermediate level of resources. Or it can be applied at a very localized level (for example, a single location or a small group of problem individuals), involving the resources of only a few police officers and other individuals.

  • What Is Problem-Oriented Policing?
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The Need for Relationship-Based Policing

February 10, 2023

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Dimitrios Mastoras

Master Police Officer (Ret.) and Relationship-Based Policing Instructor

Over the last several years, law enforcement has acknowledged the need to improve trust and build relationships within their communities. Police departments have relied on community- oriented policing (COP) to address this need; however, police can do more to strengthen these efforts. Research has shown that while community policing is beneficial for improving public satisfaction, there is still a need for a formal COP model (Gill et al., 2014). Law enforcement needs a systematic, evidence-based foundation for teaching officers to build relationships before a crisis occurs, and relationship-based policing can meet this need.

Relationship-based policing is defined as “Establishing and maintaining individual relationships with community members and collateral professionals with the purposeful goal of collaborative problem-solving and management of complex community issues” (Mastoras, 2022).

Additionally, relationship-based policing strengthens the pillars of COP by providing the “how to” for community collaboration, problem-solving, and organizational change (Gill & Mastoras, 2021). This multidisciplinary approach founded on counseling psychology helps officers build meaningful, individual relationships with community and collateral stakeholders to enhance strategies such as problem-oriented policing (POP).

Police are already familiar with evidence-based policing strategies such as hot spots policing, where officers are directed to locations where crime is concentrated. Additionally, implementing POP as a hot spots policing strategy can significantly reduce violent crime (Koper et al., 2011) in the long term. However, the challenge for many police departments when implementing a POP strategy is that it needs to be faster to develop and takes time to implement (George Mason University Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy, 2022). POP also involves officers collaborating with other municipal agencies and community stakeholders, which requires building individual and reliable relationships.

A recent Route Fifty article discusses the problem-oriented approach to curb violent crime in the Community Safety Partnership (CSP) in Los Angeles, California (Potts, 2022). However, the article does not acknowledge the relationships that CSP officers built with stakeholders that reduced the conditions that fuel gang-related violence. In 2020, Dr. Jorga Leap of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) released an evaluation of the CSP, providing findings and recommendations. For example, the CSP approach begins with training for officers to build trust and relationships within the community. The UCLA review found that residents have improved confidence in CSP officers and perceptions of safety in CSP areas while reducing conditions contributing to violent gang crime (Leap, 2020).

Police leaders have acknowledged the value of procedural justice in improving community perceptions of the legitimacy of police activities (Tyler, 2014) and officer de-escalation training.They are focused on tactics during a crisis (Police Executive Research Forum, 2022). However, the challenge remains: how do officers build relationships with community members and municipal agency staff to collaborate on holistic problem-oriented strategies solely focused on prevention?

During my career as a police officer in Arlington County, Virginia, I often found it challenging to engage stakeholders and develop the individual relationships needed to collaborate. I also needed help finding training available that addresses this need. Although some law enforcement leaders use the term “relational policing” (Acevedo, 2019), it lacks empirical evidence and a proven training model. Police typically hold outreach events such as ‘Coffee with a Cop,’ which primarily attract community members who already support the police. In my experience, these community policing events rarely interest members of the community that police need most to prevent crime.

Collaborative problem-solving with the most affected community members and municipal agencies requires relationship-building skills beyond what officers are already trained to do. I’ve often heard that connecting with people in the community is easy, common sense, and is often referred to as a “soft skill.” However, building a productive and lasting relationship is a complex endeavor that needs to be valued as a core competency in addition to defensive tactics, firearms, and emergency vehicle operations.

Moving forward, officers need training that teaches them techniques to build genuine, individual relationships that allow them to work on systemic issues collaboratively. In 2016, Molly C. Mastoras, MA, LPC, pioneered and created the Proactive Alliance relationship-based policing approach using evidence-based counseling psychology principles adapted for officers and municipal enforcement staff. It addresses a key finding in the UCLA evaluation of the CSP: the need for a systematic, replicable model that officers can learn and apply. Proactive Alliance relationship-based policing (Gill & Mastoras, 2021) provides officers with the tools to become agents of change, break down barriers with other municipal staff, and reach stakeholders who may need to be more active in working with the police.

Relationship-based policing was the foundation of my work in reducing alcohol-related violence as the lead of the Arlington Restaurant Initiative (ARI) multi-agency program (National Institute of Justice, 2019). It focuses on building productive relationships and trusts with bar owners, staff, and security. A unified approach and commitment to building relationships by county agencies helped convince bar owners to join the first voluntary bar accreditation model in the United States. In addition, the program raises operational standards for bars and restaurants through employee policies and training to proactively address problems with Arlington County agencies before they escalate. Implementing ARI resulted in a drop in alcohol-related violence and a change in culture where all stakeholders, bar owners, municipal agencies, and resident groups work together to manage issues.

Relationship-based policing was also the foundation for the Arlington County Homeless Outreach Coalition (Arlington County, 2020). This program unified all agencies and organizations to address homelessness in Arlington by breaking down agency communication barriers, collaborative problem-solving, and incorporating a unified strategy.

There is a distinct contrast between amorphous community policing and the evidence behind relationship-based policing. The success of programs such as the Community Safety Partnership, the Arlington Restaurant Initiative, and the Homeless Outreach Coalition illustrate the value of structured training for law enforcement to build relationships with stakeholders when implementing evidence-based policing strategies. Law enforcement leaders should begin supporting relationship-based policing within their agencies to improve their capacity for problem-solving with the community and other municipal agencies.

Dimitrios Mastoras is a retired master police officer from Arlington County, Virginia. He is now a nightlife management and relationship-based policing consultant at Safe Night LLC.

Arlington County, Virginia (2020). Arlington Launches Homeless Outreach Coalition. https://www.arlingtonva.us/AboutArlington/News/Articles/2020/Arlington-Launches- Homeless-Outreach-Coalition

George Mason University Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy (2022). What Works in Policing? Hot Spots Policing. https://cebcp.org/evidence-based-policing/what-works- in-policing/research-evidence-review/hot-spots policing/#:~:text=Hot%20spots%20policing%20covers%20a,where%20crime%20 is%20highly%20concentrated.

Gill, C., & Mastoras, M. C. (2021). Proactive Alliance: Combining policing and counseling psychology. Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being, 6(3), 112–117. https://doi.org/10.35502/jcswb.193

Gill, C., Weisburd, D., Telep, C.W. et al. (2014). Community-oriented policing to reduce crime, disorder, and fear and increase satisfaction and legitimacy among citizens: a systematic review. J Exp Criminol 10, 399–428. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-014-9210-y

Leap, J. (2020). Evaluation of the LAPD Community Safety Partnership. UCLA Luskin. http://www.lapdpolicecom.lacity.org/051220/CSP%20Evaluation%20Report_202 0_FINAL.pdf

Mark43 (2019). Episode 4: How Relational Policing is Saving Lives with Chief Art Acevedo. https://mark43.com/resources/podcast/episode-4-how-relational-policing-is-saving-lives- with-chief-art-acevedo/

Mastoras, M.C., (2022). Proactive Alliance: Combining Policing and Counseling Psychology. Arizona State University Center for Problem-Oriented Policing https://popcenter.asu.edu/sites/default/files/proactive_alliance_mastoras.pdf

National Institute of Justice (2019). Arlington Restaurant Initiative, Partners Work Together for Safety. https://nij.ojp.gov/library/publications/arlington-restaurant- initiative-partners-work-together-safety

Police Executive Research Forum (2022). ICAT Training. https://www.policeforum.org/icat- training-guide

Potts, J. (2022). Curbing Violent Crime Through Place-based Policing, Route Fifty. https://www.route-fifty.com/public-safety/2022/03/curbing-violent-crime- through-place- based-policing/363096/

Taylor, B., Koper, C. S., Woods, D. J. (2011). A randomized controlled trial of different policing strategies at violent crime hot spots. Journal of Experimental Criminology, 7(2): 149-181. https://cebcp.org/evidence-based-policing/the-matrix/micro- places/micro-places-taylor-et-al-2011/

Tyler, T. (2014). Legitimacy and Procedural Justice: A New Element of Police Leadership, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs. https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual- library/abstracts/legitimacy-and-procedural-justice-new-element-police-leadership

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I just want to share a presentation on Community Policing: Behavioral Communication is the Key to Relationships at the 2017, International Criminology Conference by myself and P.S.Perkins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiSKaODh_c0

P. S. Perkins, Human Communication Institute and University of the District of Columbia

Rodney Parks, Assistant Chief of Policy (Retired) and Penn State Public Safety Justice Institute

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Read our research on: Immigration & Migration | Podcasts | Election 2024

Regions & Countries

How americans view the situation at the u.s.-mexico border, its causes and consequences, 80% say the u.s. government is doing a bad job handling the migrant influx.

why is problem solving important in the police

Pew Research Center conducted this study to understand the public’s views about the large number of migrants seeking to enter the U.S. at the border with Mexico. For this analysis, we surveyed 5,140 adults from Jan. 16-21, 2024. Everyone who took part in this survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories. Read more about the ATP’s methodology .

Here are the questions used for the report and its methodology .

The growing number of migrants seeking entry into the United States at its border with Mexico has strained government resources, divided Congress and emerged as a contentious issue in the 2024 presidential campaign .

Chart shows Why do Americans think there is an influx of migrants to the United States?

Americans overwhelmingly fault the government for how it has handled the migrant situation. Beyond that, however, there are deep differences – over why the migrants are coming to the U.S., proposals for addressing the situation, and even whether it should be described as a “crisis.”

Factors behind the migrant influx

Economic factors – either poor conditions in migrants’ home countries or better economic opportunities in the United States – are widely viewed as major reasons for the migrant influx.

About seven-in-ten Americans (71%), including majorities in both parties, cite better economic opportunities in the U.S. as a major reason.

There are wider partisan differences over other factors.

About two-thirds of Americans (65%) say violence in migrants’ home countries is a major reason for why a large number of immigrants have come to the border.

Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents are 30 percentage points more likely than Republicans and Republican leaners to cite this as a major reason (79% vs. 49%).

By contrast, 76% of Republicans say the belief that U.S. immigration policies will make it easy to stay in the country once they arrive is a major factor. About half as many Democrats (39%) say the same.

For more on Americans’ views of these and other reasons, visit Chapter 2.

How serious is the situation at the border?

A sizable majority of Americans (78%) say the large number of migrants seeking to enter this country at the U.S.-Mexico border is eithera crisis (45%) or a major problem (32%), according to the Pew Research Center survey, conducted Jan. 16-21, 2024, among 5,140 adults.

Related: Migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border hit a record high at the end of 2023 .

Chart shows Border situation viewed as a ‘crisis’ by most Republicans; Democrats are more likely to call it a ‘problem’

  • Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to describe the situation as a “crisis”: 70% of Republicans say this, compared with just 22% of Democrats.
  • Democrats mostly view the situation as a major problem (44%) or minor problem (26%) for the U.S. Very few Democrats (7%) say it is not a problem.

In an open-ended question , respondents voice their concerns about the migrant influx. They point to numerous issues, including worries about how the migrants are cared for and general problems with the immigration system.

Yet two concerns come up most frequently:

  • 22% point to the economic burdens associated with the migrant influx, including the strains migrants place on social services and other government resources.
  • 22% also cite security concerns. Many of these responses focus on crime (10%), terrorism (10%) and drugs (3%).

When asked specifically about the impact of the migrant influx on crime in the United States, a majority of Americans (57%) say the large number of migrants seeking to enter the country leads to more crime. Fewer (39%) say this does not have much of an impact on crime in this country.

Republicans (85%) overwhelmingly say the migrant surge leads to increased crime in the U.S. A far smaller share of Democrats (31%) say the same; 63% of Democrats instead say it does not have much of an impact.

Government widely criticized for its handling of migrant influx

For the past several years, the federal government has gotten low ratings for its handling of the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. (Note: The wording of this question has been modified modestly to reflect circumstances at the time).

Chart shows Only about a quarter of Democrats and even fewer Republicans say the government has done a good job dealing with large number of migrants at the border

However, the current ratings are extraordinarily low.

Just 18% say the U.S. government is doing a good job dealing with the large number of migrants at the border, while 80% say it is doing a bad job, including 45% who say it is doing a very bad job.

  • Republicans’ views are overwhelmingly negative (89% say it’s doing a bad job), as they have been since Joe Biden became president.
  • 73% of Democrats also give the government negative ratings, the highest share recorded during Biden’s presidency.

For more on Americans’ evaluations of the situation, visit Chapter 1 .

Which policies could improve the border situation?

There is no single policy proposal, among the nine included on the survey, that majorities of both Republicans and Democrats say would improve the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. There are areas of relative agreement, however.

A 60% majority of Americans say that increasing the number of immigration judges and staff in order to make decisions on asylum more quickly would make the situation better. Only 11% say it would make things worse, while 14% think it would not make much difference.

Nearly as many (56%) say creating more opportunities for people to legally immigrate to the U.S. would make the situation better.

Chart shows Most Democrats and nearly half of Republicans say boosting resources for quicker decisions on asylum cases would improve situation at Mexico border

Majorities of Democrats say each of these proposals would make the border situation better.

Republicans are less positive than are Democrats; still, about 40% or more of Republicans say each would improve the situation, while far fewer say they would make things worse.

Opinions on other proposals are more polarized. For example, a 56% majority of Democrats say that adding resources to provide safe and sanitary conditions for migrants arriving in the U.S. would be a positive step forward.

Republicans not only are far less likely than Democrats to view this proposal positively, but far more say it would make the situation worse (43%) than better (17%).

Chart shows Wide partisan gaps in views of expanding border wall, providing ‘safe and sanitary conditions’ for migrants

Building or expanding a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border was among the most divisive policies of Donald Trump’s presidency. In 2019, 82% of Republicans favored expanding the border wall , compared with just 6% of Democrats.

Today, 72% of Republicans say substantially expanding the wall along the U.S. border with Mexico would make the situation better. Just 15% of Democrats concur, with most saying either it would not make much of a difference (47%) or it would make things worse (24%).

For more on Americans’ reactions to policy proposals, visit Chapter 3 .

Facts are more important than ever

In times of uncertainty, good decisions demand good data. Please support our research with a financial contribution.

Report Materials

Table of contents, fast facts on how greeks see migrants as greece-turkey border crisis deepens, americans’ immigration policy priorities: divisions between – and within – the two parties, from the archives: in ’60s, americans gave thumbs-up to immigration law that changed the nation, around the world, more say immigrants are a strength than a burden, latinos have become less likely to say there are too many immigrants in u.s., most popular.

About Pew Research Center Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts .

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The Art of Problem Solving in Software Development: Beyond Technical Expertise Problem-solving in digital creation transcends basic coding skills, requiring a fusion of creativity, strategic thinking, and a deep understanding of technology and human needs.

By Vaibhav Sethi • Feb 20, 2024

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

You're reading Entrepreneur India, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media.

Problem-solving in digital creation transcends basic coding skills, requiring a fusion of creativity, strategic thinking, and a deep understanding of technology and human needs. In this complex realm, developers navigate the nuances of each challenge, exploring uncharted territories to discover innovative solutions. Their journey is marked by continuous learning and adaptation, constantly reimagining technological possibilities to meet evolving demands.

At the heart of this process lies the ability to understand a challenge's core, envision a range of possible solutions, and then skillfully craft code that addresses the present problem and anticipates future scenarios. This iterative approach, enriched by ongoing data and feedback, guides developers in continuously refining their solutions. The overarching goal is to create software that stands out in terms of functionality, efficiency, resilience, scalability, and user engagement.

Embracing a Multifaceted Skill Set

Solving problems in digital development transcends coding prowess. It encompasses various skills, including analytical reasoning, inventiveness, and clear communication. Developers must excel at deconstructing complex problems, often needing imaginative and unconventional solutions. Jagan Mohanraj, a veteran software architect, highlights this aspect: "In digital development, problem-solving is as much about creativity and strategic thinking as it is about technical knowledge. My work with the Build Health framework utilizing Microsoft Azure Appinsights is a testament to this approach."

Effective communication is also vital, especially in conveying intricate technical issues to stakeholders with diverse backgrounds. This ability is crucial in collaborative settings where multidisciplinary teams address complex challenges. "Clear communication is key in problem-solving, ensuring all parties grasp both the challenge and the solution," Mohanraj adds.

The Vital Role of Teamwork and Dynamics

In digital development, effective teamwork is essential for innovative problem-solving. Collaborative efforts combine varied perspectives and skills, often leading to more comprehensive solutions. Mohanraj observes, "Teamwork in problem-solving unites diverse viewpoints, vital for the best solutions in complex digital challenges."

The dynamics within a team significantly impact the problem-solving approach. Teams that cultivate open dialogue, mutual respect, and innovation readiness often surmount obstacles. Each team member feels valued and encouraged to contribute their insights and expertise in such environments, fostering a rich and creative problem-solving culture.

Navigating an Evolving Technological Landscape

The digital development domain is in constant flux, with emerging technologies and methodologies reshaping the landscape. For developers, this reality necessitates adaptability and an unwavering commitment to continuous learning. Mohanraj notes, "Staying adaptable and continually learning is critical in the dynamic field of digital development. Regularly reviewing the source code of Microsoft products and participating in events and technical forums helps me stay abreast of the latest developments and understand the nuances of problem-solving in this field."

Developers need to maintain a mindset that embraces exploration and flexibility, key traits for adapting to rapidly evolving technologies. This means being willing to delve into new programming languages, adopt various development methodologies, and stay abreast of emerging fields such as machine learning and blockchain technology. Such agility is crucial in positioning developers at the cutting edge, fully prepared to effectively address new and complex challenges.

Prioritizing the User in the Development Process

At the crux of problem-solving in digital development is the end-user. Grasping user needs and expectations is fundamental in crafting effective digital solutions. This user-centric approach ensures the software functions optimally and delivers a positive user experience. Mohanraj emphasizes, "Every solution we develop in digital development should always aim to serve the user, addressing their specific needs and expectations. Understanding the big picture and looking beyond immediate challenges to how solutions fit into the broader context of a project or system is key to effective problem-solving."

Engaging with users, understanding their challenges, and empathizing with their experiences are integral to this approach. It often involves user research, iterative testing, and feedback mechanisms to align the software with user requirements. By centering on the user, developers craft technically robust solutions while also being intuitive and engaging.

A Holistic View of Problem Solving in Digital Development

The art of problem-solving in digital development extends far beyond coding expertise and technical know-how. It involves a comprehensive approach that blends creativity, strategic vision, teamwork, adaptability, and a profound understanding of user needs.

As this field continues to evolve, these skills will become increasingly pivotal, guiding developers in their mission to forge impactful, innovative, and user-centric digital solutions.

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  3. Why problem-solving and decision-making skills are important?

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  1. Problem Solving

    NON-FEDERAL RESOURCES Center for Problem-Oriented Policing Nonprofit advancing the concept and practice of problem-oriented policing in open and democratic societies Inter-University Consortium of Political and Social Research Summer Program in Quantitative Methods

  2. PDF Identifying and Defining Policing Problems

    Problem-Solving Tools guidebook deals with the process of identifying and defining policing problems. Under the most widely adopted police problem-solving model—the SARA (Scanning, Analysis, Response, Assessment) model—the process of identifying and . defining policing problems is referred to as the . Figure 1. The SARA model of problem solving

  3. PDF A practice guide

    Foreword Preventing crime is a core mission of the police service. The effectiveness of routine and systematic problem-solving to prevent crime has long-been established. It is common-sense and a way to reduce demand whilst better serving the public. Within the police service itself, who needs to be involved in problem-solving?

  4. Problem-Oriented Policing

    The "Response" step has the police developing and implementing interventions designed to solve the problem (s). The final step is "Assessment," which involves assessing whether the response worked. The SARA process has become widely accepted and adopted by police agencies implementing problem-oriented policing.

  5. Problem-solving policing

    19 October 2022 9 mins read Problem-solving policing is also known as problem-oriented policing. It's an approach to tackling crime and disorder that involves: identification of a specific problem thorough analysis to understand the problem development of a tailored response assessment of the effects of the response

  6. PDF Problem-Solving Tips

    Taking a problem-solving approach to addressing a specific crime problem calls for a broad inquiry into the nature of the particular problem. As part of that inquiry, many police-community problem-solving teams have found it useful to analyze the patterns of repeat calls relating to specific victims, locations, and offenders. Research

  7. Problem-Oriented Policing

    Overview Problem-oriented policing (POP) means diagnosing and solving problems that are increasing crime risks, usually in areas that are seeing comparatively high levels of crime (e.g., "hot spots"). POP is challenging in that agencies need to diagnose and solve what could be any of a wide range of crime-causing problems.

  8. Problem-oriented policing

    Problem-oriented policing (POP) - also known as problem-solving policing - is an approach to tackling crime and disorder that involves: identification of a specific problem thorough analysis to understand the problem development of a tailored response assessment of the effects of the response

  9. PDF U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services

    There are four basic reasons why any particular problem-solving initiative might fail: 1. The problem was inaccurately identified: the underlying problem was something other than what it first appeared, the problem was not as acute as initially believed, or the police agency or the community was not as concerned about the problem as first thought.

  10. PDF Implementing and sustaining problem-oriented policing

    The police have always solved problems. The range of problems the police are expected to handle is immense, and increasingly so - from exploitation and cybercrime to missing persons and metal theft. This guide is about police problem-solving.

  11. The Use and Effectiveness of Problem-Oriented Policing

    The quintessential component of problem-oriented policing is the concept of problem solving (Eisenberg & Glasscock, 2001, p. 2). To effectively solve the problems lying before law enforcement, several methods have been introduced, studied, and practiced in the field. ... The Boston Police Department utilized problem-oriented policing in the ...

  12. When Police Are Problem Solvers

    Our Stories When Police Are Problem Solvers by Sean Varano In the third installment of our #SafetyPartners blog series, criminologist Sean Varano describes the value of problem-oriented policing, and what a researcher can bring to the quest for safer neighborhoods.

  13. PDF Problem Analysis in Policing

    problem-oriented policing and specific problem-solving components and examples, please see the end of this report for a list of resources. From the COPS Office perspective, this problem analysis forum is very important because it further intensifies our prior work and begins to link crime mapping, crime analysis, and problem solving in support of

  14. PDF PROBLEM SOLVING FOR NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICING

    Problem solving is a term used to describe legal and ethical action that prevents a specific type of crime or disorder in a specific place. Problem solving aims to ensure that fewer crimes occur, and that the problem does not reappear. Solving problems is important because many years of academic research and practical experience have shown

  15. Problem-Oriented Policing in Depth

    (a) sense a problem; (b) dither—waste time on intermural squabbling; (c) declare a solution—usually by someone in a position of authority; (d) forget about it—nothing changes. Another poor approach we are all familiar with is to stay only at the level of experience . . .

  16. Decision-Making in the Police Work Force: Affordances Explained in

    Service calls and police incident responses revolve around solving a problem. In both contexts, the problem is solved by employing previously successful subroutines and procedures to come up with new ways of solving the problem in question. In the present research, the incident response was "cut up" into smaller subroutines.

  17. Community-Oriented Policing and Problem-Oriented Policing

    Or police might encourage youth to participate in activities, such as police athletic leagues, which were designed to prevent and reduce the occurrence of juvenile crime and delinquency, while also seeking to improve police and youth attitudes toward each other (Rabois and Haaga, 2002).

  18. PDF The Role of Lawyers in the Police Problem-Solving Process

    Often, in the course of a problem-solving activity, the police may collaborate. with lawyers to jointly address a crime problem or other quality of life issue. The. purpose of this research was to determine the nature, extent, and desirability of this. collaboration by collecting data from the police perspective.

  19. The Police Can't Solve the Problem. They Are the Problem

    Last week, White House economists announced a plan to use the police to get homeless people "off the street.". This direction is misguided. Police officers cannot solve underlying causes of ...

  20. Meaningful interventions: Applying a citizen-centric approach to

    Victims of crime may not necessarily wish to punish an offender; they may just want to be heard and have their problem resolved. In response, the Dutch police have introduced a pilot to provide 'meaningful interventions', such as conflict mediation, as a way to bridge institutional and citizen perspectives successfully.

  21. The Key Elements of Problem-Oriented Policing

    Addressing problems means more than quick fixes: it means dealing with conditions that create problems. Police officers must routinely and systematically analyze problems before trying to solve them, just as they routinely and systematically investigate crimes before making an arrest.

  22. The Initiative: Partnerships Between Police and Communities of Color

    The Initiative brings together local leaders, communities, and progressive police departments to implement effective community policing solutions to create mutual respect and healthy relationships between police and the communities they serve. The Initiative was founded on the premise that we must push through our differences and work with each ...

  23. The Need for Relationship-Based Policing

    In my experience, these community policing events rarely interest members of the community that police need most to prevent crime. Collaborative problem-solving with the most affected community members and municipal agencies requires relationship-building skills beyond what officers are already trained to do.

  24. Partnerships

    Chief officers should establish strategic and collaborative partnerships to accomplish shared objectives, both across forces and outside the police service. Stakeholder mapping helps to identify the most appropriate partners who can help to resolve specific problems. In most successful problem-solving, partners are not limited to statutory ...

  25. The U.S.-Mexico Border: How Americans View the Situation, Its Causes

    Democrats mostly view the situation as a major problem (44%) or minor problem (26%) for the U.S. Very few Democrats (7%) say it is not a problem. In an open-ended question, respondents voice their concerns about the migrant influx. They point to numerous issues, including worries about how the migrants are cared for and general problems with ...

  26. The Art of Problem Solving in Software Development ...

    The art of problem-solving in digital development extends far beyond coding expertise and technical know-how. It involves a comprehensive approach that blends creativity, strategic vision ...