Communication and Problem Solving Skills
Communication and Problem Solving Skills
Communication and Problem Skills of Police Officers
Community policing and law enforcement are important aspects of the process of law enforcement. The qualities of law enforcement personnel include integrity, strength, and honesty, among others. However, the qualities of a professional law enforcement officer are beyond the qualities mentioned above. It goes on to include factors such as good communication skills, commitment to the course at hand, and psychological competence. All the above characters are essential in the quest to maintaining efficient law enforcement services. Normally, many law enforcement offices resolve to using force and physical confrontation to resolve conflicts, however, the best and the most effective method of resolving conflicts is by the nun-physical confrontation means. Thus, effective communication is possibly one of the important tools and assets that law enforcers should adopt in their duties of providing security to the citizens. Effective communication and problem solving skills enables the officers to create a rapport with the citizens, comrades, and informants in the security docket (Levine et al, 2002).
Additionally, law enforcers will be in a position to learn and adopt the many verbal and nonverbal cues which are relevant in the process of protecting the citizens. Effective communication and problem solving techniques will enable police officers to interact effectively in the work and community contexts which contain diverse races, culture, and individuals of diverse socio-economic backgrounds. Moreover, good communication skills will play handy in the process of interviewing and resolving conflicts among suspected criminals. Learning the appropriate communication skills play a major role in the advancement of careers of the police officers who want to join high ranks. Any interview that they have to go through will involve a thorough test of their ability to communicate. This is because any superior office or managerial position will require an individual with proper communication skills to enable him/her lead and communicate to the juniors.
Importance of Non-Verbal Communication and Body Language to Communication
Although words can communicate a great deal of information, people are also able to enrich their communication through body language and non-verbal cues. The non-verbal cues include facial expressions, and tones, among others. The nuances above are so important because they have the abilities of offering different sets of words different meanings. In law enforcement, the use of non-verbal and body languages is important because, first it hides the information the people want to communicate. As said above, a gesture or a sign language may have more than one meaning, thus barring the unimportant people from understanding the message that is meant to be communicated. Additionally, non-verbal communication has been for long as a coded language by the military at war (Payrato, 2009). Normally, when the law-enforcers have a duty to attend to, they do not talk in the course of the duty. Rather, they use a coded sign language, understandable to the team itself.
Nonverbal communication is an important factor that predates verbal communication. For a long period of time non-verbal communication has been an important factor in which individuals express themselves. The behavior of using non-verbal communication is a factor in the field of communication. Even before a word is uttered by the speaker, the hearer first observes the gestures and facial expressions of the speaker, and then gets an idea of the mood of the conversation. In the context of law enforcement, when a police officer has a better knowledge of nonverbal communication, he/she can easily identify a criminal suspect. When an officer asks a question, how a person answers it will give the officer a clear indication of whether the individual is guilty or not.
Many reasons exist for the fail of interpersonal communications. In many communications, many messages are not received the way they are intended. In many communications, it is therefore important for the sender to receive a feedback that their message has been understood. There exist several barriers to effective communication, such as: gender barrier, cultural barrier, psychological barrier, and language barrier, among others. The focus today is on language barrier. Although people may be speaking the same language, it is still difficult for them to understand each other if they come from different regions of the country. Also, if the people emanate from different generations, then the language would be a barrier in their communication (Button & Rossera, 1990). Additionally, communication may be affected by jargons, and colloquialism.
The SARA problem solving model entails the techniques of Scanning, Analysis, Response, and Evaluation. The method id usually used by the community policing and the law- enforcement to identify and resolve crimes in the community. By the approach dividing the project into discrete stages, SARA helps to ensure that every step is followed by the law enforcers. The process helps guide the law enforcement personnel in the suitable processes that should be followed in the process of resolving dispute in the community. For instance, it is not possible to come up with solutions before an analysis is done. The police use the process to clearly investigate a crime scene before a conclusion is reached. It provides a step by step process that should be followed in case of an occurrence of a crime.
References
Levine, D. R., Harris, P. R., & Wong, H. Z. (2002). Multicultural law enforcement: Strategies for peacekeeping in a diverse society. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Payrató, L. (2009). Non-verbal communication. Key Notions for Pragmatics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 163-194.
Button, K., & Rossera, F. (1990). Barriers to communication. The annals of regional science, 24(4), 337-357.
