For the Troops

This is part of a weekly staff notes we're emailing to our dispatchers. The Department has had a tough time of late, and there's more than enough low self esteem to go around. But changes are coming. Some of them have started already.

So the question is how to get people who were hurt by the whole thing, and who are naturally a little cynical and, on top of that, trained to be suspicious and not accept things at face value to buy in to the way up from here.

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To start, we want to clean up our conversations—make them constructive and progressive instead of harping on the negatives of the past. If anyone is observed doing this, they will be counseled by their supervisor and it will be reflected in their evaluations as a failure to meet the standard for promoting a courteous and professional work environment. It’s one thing to blow off a bit of steam after a frustrating call, but to go on about it for minutes or hours is not acceptable.

The supervisors are committed to communicating better and following up with your concerns to get resolution as soon as possible. But those concerns must be raised in a professional manner. Complaining aloud in the room about an issue or event well after it has passed is not a professional way to address a concern.

I want this to be a great place to work. I think we all do. The supervisors do. Vicki does. The Deputy Chiefs and the Chief all do. The people who rely on you when they call 911 need it to be a great comm center.
So tell me, “What is missing?” Of all the factors that would make this a great place to work, which ones are lacking? The compensation is fair, benefits are good. We’ve got comfortable work spaces. We save people every day: sometimes from the bad guys, sometimes from themselves. Every day we answer calls from people who need something only we can do. Be proud of that. Take pride in the fact that some of the phone calls that would scare a regular person right out of their mind are the ones you can’t wait to get. The suicide threats, the domestics, the bitter, angry, confused, terrified, helpless people you’ll call back when they hang up so that you can do what it is you’ve been trained to do—so you can do the thing that only you are able to do.

It’s an amazing job. It’s rewarding. It’s meaningful. It supports our families, and as far as I’m concerned, there are no other people I’d rather be working with.

So what, then, is missing? What do we need to make dispatch a place where people look forward to coming to work? What will it take to get to a place where people are proud to say they are a dispatcher for the Arvada Police? Where our reputation as an employer is so good that people envy us for working here?

You know what I think? I think the thing that really is missing—of all the things that will make Dispatch a great place to work—it’s not the pay. It’s not the temperature or the technology. It’s not the officers being nicer or the citizens being smarter.

It’s the people who work here believing it can be just that. Just believing it.

When the person working with you starts to complain, don’t jump on the bandwagon. We’re not asking you to tell them to stop. The supervisors will do that. Just don’t join them. Let them shout at the wind all they want.

But when something good happens…when you hear your partner, your teammate, do something exceptional, tell them. When you see something good happening in the department whether in the room, in patrol, among the command staff, or where ever: get on that bandwagon. Be good peer pressure for each other. Applaud each other. Encourage and help each other.

Commit with us, now, to do this—and we’re almost there. Let’s just be that agency: The one that doesn’t complain about our command staff when we go to training classes; the agency that talks about the triumphs of our co-workers behind their backs instead of tearing them down. The agency everyone else wishes they could be a part of.