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POLICE CHIEF PERCEPTIONS OF GOOD POLICING IN NON-URBAN DEPARTMENTS

ABSTRACT This qualitative study identifies what police chiefs consider to be the distinguishing characteristics of their best police officers. To combat the shortcomings of traditional performance appraisals, police chiefs in small, non-urban departments were asked to rank each of their police officers from best to worst. This provided a clear demarcation between high and low-performing officers. The chiefs were then administered a structured interview in order to identify themes in personality and behavioral characteristics of their best-performing police officers. Three themes surfaced in the interviews: the relative unimportance of quantitative measures of performance, a generation gap in officer loyalty, and the importance of maturity to good police work. The findings suggest that police executives are looking for officers with a combination of common sense, technical skills, and emotional intelligence.