Outshining Expectations

-by Shrabonee Paul

My toddler has always been obsessed about police cars. Whether it is their glowing lights or blaring sirens, or just the flashy cool exteriors, police cars has always fascinated my little one. Amongst all his toys, his most favorites and priced possessions are all the police cars of varying sizes.

Every year I bake goodies on Thanksgiving for our local police departments, bankers and healthcare professionals. I was also a part of the citizen’s police academy and was on a 10 weeks training course to study the profession closely as an industrial psychologist.  I am not sure if my work had any influence on him but he showed very natural tendency to admire them. The fascination was doing fine with his toys at home or even him getting super excited at the back seat every time he saw a police car down the road. But the time when he started waving madly at them and persuading me to chase a cop-car down the road so he could take a closer look I realized it was time to make some special requests.

So, I called one of the officers I knew and explained them the situation, informing that they have a 2 and ? foot tall fan who wants to visit them. The department responded in the affirmative with a date and time for our visit and even allowed a guest. The particular officer I connected with informed that he would be on a day off, but had informed his colleagues. So on the chosen day, a friend joined me as we visited our local police department with our kids and some home baked goodies.

We were welcomed at the lobby by a police officer who ushered us to the cafeteria. There we were joined by few other officers who introduced themselves, welcomed us and made the rest of the evening so amazingly special for the children and even us. They toured the little ones around the department and showed them what they do and gave them a real experience of a cop-car. The kids had fun setting off the sirens blaring and the light flash and pose for pictures. They even played ‘fetch’ with a handsome police dog who had a fun time playing with two kids and his handler at the department’s parking lot.

Once the boys played enough, the officers led us back to the cafeteria, where to our amazement, the officers gifted the children custom goodie bags filled with coloring books, crayons, police stickers, department stationery and candies. Needless to say their hospitality and gestures were amazing and it was certainly very pleasant for all of us.  It was surprising, warm and was so exciting that our little boys were gushing about the visit for the next many weeks.

We shared articles about Compassion and Competence and Making a Difference in the Mindful Musings. This department stands to serve a very bright example for the same. As I enjoyed that evening, there were things I observed that really inspired me to share this experience. Despite having a strong persona to be perceived as tough and sometimes even rigid, the department gave us an experience that displayed some very valuable qualities of professionalism.

1.      They work as a team to build their brand - The officers collectively build a very strong brand image which contributes in building better trust and service mindset. They are sincere in their service and yet choose to stay un-rigid. Good leaders are not intimidating. Being strong and powerful does not mean you need to display arrogance or appear rude or mean. Some of the finer qualities of true strength and leadership are manifested by being kind and approachable.

 2.      Setting an example by breaking the barriers and the stereotype - stepping out of the box - Display alternate ways of ensuring better citizenship behavior. The department has a very good community outreach. The personality that this department carries as a team is they are fun and involved and very participative. This is not what law enforcement generally looks like. So while they are sincere in service, they don’t necessarily need to brush their primary qualities on your face, unless you rub law the wrong way.

3.      Investing in the brand in you! Something that we often do not realize that we are setting a standard and an identity about what we do by how we do it. So just fulfilling KRAs is a way of getting our job done. But delivering an experience even as we focus on the job is a style of its own.  Your primary work and professional roles may not change – but how you build your brand and its identity is a skill.

 4.      Some of the best experiences and lessons of leadership lies in the simplicity and non-complexity of behavior and conduct. How you make others feel even if you are dealing with complex situations will determine how others will look up to you. Your conduct speaks loud about your character and dignity. And while there are good and bad apples in every profession, it is the few good men and women who keep our faith in the law enforcement going strong because of the integrity and ability to outshine expectations.

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