FTO Training: It Should Not Be This Complicated

On-boarding new police or corrections officers is one of the most important processes for an organization. It pairs up new police recruits (recently graduated from the police academy) with veteran officers, to prepare those recruits for the realities of law enforcement “on the street.”  In an effort to do it effectively and efficiently, agencies often over-complicate the Field Training process. They create too many course objectives, introduce overly detailed procedures, and require the Field Training Officers (FTOs) to complete enough lesson plans to choke a horse.

I use a mantra in my basic and advanced Field Training courses: "Smarter not harder." With this in mind, I look for inspiration from Richard Feynman. (If you follow me on Twitter at @dworakt or @TheAdaptiveFTO, you have certainly seen posts or retweets from @ProfFeynman.)   

Feynman was a theoretical physicist and really, really smart. How smart? As a 24-year-old PhD student, he worked with the likes of Einstein and Oppenheimer on the Manhattan Project. So, what does that have to do with training Probationary Police Officers (PPO)? 

Feynman knew:

1.    We really don't know as much as we think we do.

2.    Because we don't, we over complicate what we do know.

3.    If you can't explain it in simple terms, you don't really know it.

Feynman writes there is two types of knowledge:

1.    Things we know.

2.    Things we know the name of.

And the majority fall into the "things we know the name of" category. We don't have deep understanding, but rather possess only a superficial knowledge over a broad spectrum. How does this relate to a police Field Training program? 

Here are two quick examples:

A police department in a Facebook post announced that a trainee had completed his/her Field Training and Evaluation program. The trainee had completed 12 weeks of training with a single Field Training Officer (FTO) and successfully completed 597 training standards. That is impressive! But let’s do the math: 

·      3 months of training (average of 5 days a week for 12 weeks) is 60 days.

·      Now with a little Jethro ciphering that's almost 10 objectives a day. Not too bad!

·      Working 8-hour days, minus two 15min breaks and half-hour lunch? About 1.2 objectives per hour.

·      And factor in: one FTO = single perspective.

In another post I wrote about an organization that had over 200 lesson plans in their FTO manual. Again, another impressive document. I understand the need for standardization, but does it add up?  A 14-week program is about 70 total contact days - which equates to about 2.85 lesson plans per day. Since not all of the contact days will be “training” days, the math easily yields 3 lesson plans per day.    

Back to the new Probationary Police Officer. 

How many of those 597 training standards is the officer going to remember?

What happens if s/he forgets one -  a really, really, really important one?

My question was then and continues to be now: Why do we build these lengthy, complicated training curricula? To name a few: Liability, rules, checklists. And, while we’re at it, did anyone explain the Why behind the 597 standards to the trainee?  

But what does the PPO really know? It seems agencies are becoming more concerned with "covering" 597 training standards or 200 lesson plans than the How or Why behind them. In Feynman's terms, we are feeding the "know the name of" versus "really knowing" something. 

There is a need for task lists and check boxes. But who are they really for? From a pure learning perspective, simplification is key - plain language, with limited jargon and acronyms. For the FTO, if you can't explain what you’re teaching to your 8-year-old nephew, you don't know it well enough! (And before you send hate mail, I am not equating the PPO to an 8-year-old.)

For the FTO: Do you really know what you’re teaching? If not, what are YOU doing to become a more complete trainer and police officer?

Your agency's FTO program is based on time and schedule. That time should be spent on preparing the PPO to really know his/her job rather than just know the name of things. Simplify your training. Teach how "things" inter-connect and learn the answers to why questions. FTOs should be training smarter not harder.

Why? Because really smart guys say so.

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Thom Dworak is a Senior Instructor with The Virtus Group Inc. Thom’s signature course is The Adaptive FTO, a field training method that combines Emotional Intelligence, Lawful and Ethical Decision Making, Critical Thinking, Cognitive Coaching and a millennial-proof feedback model. For more information about or to host The Adaptive FTO, email [email protected] You can also follow Thom on twitter @dworakt and @TheAdaptiveFTO