HOW WE WIN MATTERS
Institutional success carries its own risks. When an organisation begins to produce the outcomes it has worked towards, achievement can become the dominant measure of progress. Targets are met, strategies yield results and performance indicators move in the desired direction. Yet institutional transformation demands a wider assessment. It asks whether improved outcomes have been accompanied by changes in culture, conduct and professional standards. This is the distinction at the centre of Police Commissioner Dr Kevin Blake’s latest Commissioner’s Corner, as he considers the JCF’s continuing reduction in murders while reminding members that the manner in which those results are achieved remains an essential measure of the organisation we are becoming.
The Commissioner writes at a time when the JCF is approaching another record-low quarter in reported murders, continuing a pattern of reductions that has required sustained operational effort and considerable sacrifice from members. “Consistently breaking records for subsequent periods, is not an easy achievement,” he observes, thanking members for their “sacrifice” and “blinkered focus” in helping to achieve safer communities. Yet Blake deliberately places those achievements within a broader conception of transformation. “While we continue to drive the crime figures down,” he writes, “let us remember that a truly transformed JCF goes beyond lowering the numbers.” He immediately identifies the other measures that must accompany those results: “professionalism, discipline, respect for the rule of law and respect for all.”
There is an important distinction here between organisational modernisation and institutional transformation. Modernisation can be seen in new technologies, improved systems, better facilities, revised policies and stronger operational capabilities. Transformation reaches further into organisational culture and the behaviour of the people who give the institution its practical expression. Blake makes this explicit: “A transformed JCF only has one meaning, and that is we the members are transformed as individuals.” The proposition places considerable responsibility on each member. The JCF cannot become transformed solely through changes implemented at the organisational level if those changes are not eventually reflected in individual conduct.
This is particularly important in policing because professional conduct cannot be separated from operational effectiveness. Police officers exercise considerable authority on behalf of the State, often in difficult circumstances and sometimes within seconds. The public therefore experiences the organisation through the decisions, language, temperament and conduct of individual members. Blake cautions that “while we give full support to the mission with great exuberance, our energy does not translate to offensive and overly aggressive interactions”. He further insists that the approach to carrying out our duties must display “the discipline expected in adhering to the policies of the Force”. Operational determination, in other words, must remain subject to professional discipline.
Seen in this context, the Commissioner’s references to how members “wear the uniform”, “groom our beards”, “interact with citizens” and “interact with social media” are connected by the larger question of discipline. These, he argues, are among the things that “determine the extent of a transformed organization”. Organisational standards cannot operate effectively if compliance depends primarily on whether individual members consider particular rules important enough to observe. Discipline requires consistency, including in matters that may appear less consequential than frontline operations. The habits developed around everyday standards inevitably influence the wider culture within which more consequential decisions are made.
The same principle applies to our interactions with the public. A police action may be lawful while the manner in which it is carried out falls below the professional standard expected of the organisation. An instruction can be legitimate and still be delivered unnecessarily aggressively. An officer can exercise authority without breaching the law while still leaving a citizen with an experience that diminishes confidence in the institution. Blake puts the issue plainly: “When we put on the uniform, every interaction with a citizen is an opportunity to demonstrate who we are becoming.” These encounters may never appear in crime statistics, but collectively they help determine how the JCF is understood by the people it serves.
This is why the discussion eventually arrives at public confidence. “The Jamaica Constabulary Force that we are building,” Blake writes, “must not only be effective; it must also be worthy of the confidence that the people place in us.” His next sentence is even more direct: “We cannot demand respect for the institution while some of our own conduct diminishes it.” The point is especially relevant during a period of strong operational performance. Declining murders provide compelling evidence that important aspects of our policing strategy are working. They do not remove the responsibility to examine the quality of our interactions, adherence to policy or standards of professional conduct.
Indeed, sustained success may require greater attention to these questions. Strong results can create confidence, but institutional confidence must remain accompanied by self-examination. Blake’s caution that we should “never become so consumed with the destination that we lose sight of how we are travelling” is therefore central to the transformation agenda. The objective is a JCF capable of producing better results while ensuring those results are achieved within the professional standards, discipline and respect for law that define the organisation we are building.
Transformation ultimately becomes visible in ordinary behaviour: how supervisors enforce standards, how members respond under pressure, how officers treat difficult citizens, how policies are observed when compliance is inconvenient, and how institutional authority is exercised when there is no senior officer present. Blake captures the point succinctly: “Transformation is not something that happens around us. It happens within us, one member at a time.”
The declining murder figures tell an important story about the progress being made in public safety. Blake’s final admonition places that achievement within the larger institutional project: “how we achieve our victories matters just as much as the victories themselves.” The task, then, is to ensure that the organisation producing those results increasingly reflects, in its everyday conduct, the standards of the transformed JCF we have spent years working to build.
