By Chris Jones
I have a number of good friends in the corrections business. Sometimes we sit around and discuss the career that we have dedicated ourselves to. We discuss the great things about corrections, and we also discuss the bad and ugly parts. One of the topics we discuss most is the way our brothers and sisters either support or, just as often, don’t support, their co-workers.
In my last article I discussed our interaction with offenders in regards to rehabilitation. I focused on pro-social role modeling and interpersonal communications. While these things are absolutely important in our daily interactions with offenders, they are just as important in our daily interactions with our fellow officers.
Think back to your first few days in your institution. Do you remember the different personalities you encountered?
When I started, I was assigned to the shift supervisor on the 0600-1400 shift. In my institution, that is a high seniority shift. In fact, the vast majority of the seniority at my institution is on that shift. In the four months that I was on days, I had the opportunity to work with some of the best people in the business. They took the time to explain to a new hire — who had been a purchasing agent and restaurant manager in previous lives — what being an officer was all about.
These senior officers explained to me that they could say things to the offenders that I could not, because they had developed a rapport with them, and I had not. They explained to me the importance of knowing what each and every key on your ring was for, and what it opened. They told me how important it was to watch out for my fellow officers while they were on the ranges or on the yard.
These senior staff members helped me to develop my own style. They understood the importance of training your replacement, and of giving new officers every tool they could to ensure that the new officer — as well as the officers he or she would be working with — remained safe while still doing the job the state hired them to do.
In those early days I also encountered the exact opposite. They were the senior officers that had no interest at all in helping my development because the ink on my contract wasn’t dry, or because they weren’t sure I had what it took to be an officer, or (my favorite) their philosophy was: “I don’t talk to new hires.”
It was disappointing because I was certain that these officers had just as much — if not more — to offer me in terms of teaching, but they were entirely unwilling to do so. These officers failed to recognize the fact that they would one day retire, and that they owed it to the officers who would take their place to share the wisdom they had learned over the course of a 20- or 30-year career.
The first group of officers clearly understood the importance of being a good role model for new officers. They took the time to talk to me and the other new hires that came in with my group. They not only talked the talk — they walked the walk. It was never “Do as I say, not as I do” for these veterans. They communicated the way they thought the job should be done, they explained the way they thought we should conduct ourselves, and then they went out on the ranges or the yard and they did exactly what they told us we should do.
Pro-social role modeling, in the same way it affects the inmates we are charged with keeping, also affects the officers and other staff members that we come into contact with. Its lack also sends just as powerful a message.
We do a job that most are unwilling to do. We put ourselves in the line of fire, and are asked to deal with people and incidents that the rest of society does not want to have to deal with. Doesn’t it make sense for us to make every effort to help those staff members around us, rather than throw them a set of keys and wish them luck?
The next time you have an opportunity to help a brother or sister, think back to your first days on the job. Think of the officers that helped you, and the ones that had no interest in your development, and ask yourself, “Which one do I want to be?”
Doing the right thing isn’t always the easiest — and it certainly isn’t always the most popular — decision, but you can go home at the end of your shift knowing that you made a difference. Whether it’s with inmates or co-workers, making a difference is what our business is all about.
