Policing Is Human Work—Stop Leading It Like It Isn’t
“If an officer violates a general order, then they are either incompetent or insubordinate.”
I had an officer repeat this statement to me after they had finished a disciplinary hearing with their command staff. The source? Their Chief of Police.
It stopped me—not just because of the statement itself, but because of the message it sends to the rank and file.
From a rigid, black-and-white perspective, this statement has some substance. Policies exist for a reason. Standards matter. Discipline matters. But whether intended or not, statements like this can communicate that there is little room beyond compliance. The message is that performance is rigid, binary, and deviation is failure.
That is not how human beings operate, especially under stress.
Expecting officers to consistently operate under these conditions goes against what we know about human performance, decision-making, and organizational behavior. The message assumes that behavior is attributed solely to character, that errors are personal failures, and that compliance is always a simple choice.
It isn’t.
What this statement misses is that not all policy violations come from the same place.
When an officer violates a general order or regulation, the issue is not always incompetence or insubordination. Sometimes it is a lack of training. Sometimes it is inconsistent supervision. Sometimes it is fatigue, cumulative stress, or cognitive overload. And sometimes, it is a failure in the system itself.
These are not the same problems and they do not require the same solutions.
Not every mistake is a character flaw. Not every violation is defiance.
If leadership only sees two options, they are not diagnosing the problem and are limiting their ability to take full responsibility for correcting it.
And when problems are misdiagnosed, they repeat. Repeated patterns are where agencies and command assume the greatest risk and are exposed to greater liability.
I do not know a Chief who is an expert SWAT officer, accident reconstructionist, instructor, negotiator, evidence technician, field-training officer, traffic officer, investigator, juvenile officer, and motorman. But we have all seen leaders held accountable when patterns emerge—patterns tied to insufficient training, poor oversight, or preventable failures.
That is the point.
Leadership is not about knowing everything. It is about recognizing what is driving outcomes and responding accordingly.
Maslow’s Blueprint
In the 1940s, Dr. Abraham Maslow (1908–1970) studied human behavior through the lens of motivation and growth, rather than pathology and dysfunction. His work led to a theory based on hierarchical progression, from basic physiological needs to safety, belonging, esteem, and ultimately self-actualization (Maslow, 1943, 1954).
This is not just theory—it is a practical framework for leadership.
People will not operate at peak performance when their basic needs are being threatened. In policing, that often looks like sleep-deprived officers working rotating shifts, operating in environments where psychological safety may be uncertain, and relying heavily on peer connection to maintain stability.
When these foundational needs are compromised, performance is compromised.
The Chief’s statement ignores that reality and in doing so, undermines leadership credibility. Their message can create the perception that command is removed from accountability in factors that influence performance. In the process, it strips away the human element and fails to consider that an officer’s capacity may be impacted by unmet needs.
Police agencies do not operate with robots, nor do they serve robots. They serve communities made up of individuals, staffed by individuals.
The Ten Shared Principles adopted by the Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police and the Illinois NAACP State Conference establish preservation of life and respect for human dignity as foundational values of professional policing (Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police & Illinois NAACP State Conference, 2018).
These principles are often posted and repeated, but they are easy to lose sight of.
Chiefs and command staff operate under a distinct set of pressures and responsibilities than they did earlier in their careers. That shift is real. But it makes intentional reflection even more important.
They may still be sworn officers, but the job is no longer the same and the beat car they once drove looks vastly different today.
A Cracked Foundation
Being a police officer in this country is difficult enough. Agencies face ongoing challenges with staffing, funding, and retention, while officers are expected to demonstrate professionalism and empathy in every interaction. At the same time, cumulative trauma exposure continues to rise without consistent opportunities for recovery.
The consequences are not abstract.
They show up in chronic fatigue, anxiety, depression, substance use, and strained relationships—both personal and professional.
From a physiological standpoint, repeated activation of the stress response system keeps the brain and body in a state of survival. The limbic system takes priority, and the prefrontal cortex—responsible for reasoning, judgment, and decision-making—becomes less accessible.
In that state, behavior shifts.
Fight. Flight. Freeze. Fawn.
Decision-making becomes reactive. Long-term thinking narrows. The ability to connect with the public, with peers, and with the job itself begins to erode.
You can see it in the pattern:
Find a secluded parking spot.
Answer the call for service.
Take the report—or find a way to avoid taking it.
Clear the call.
Return to isolation.
Wait for the next dispatch.
Repeat that cycle enough times, and it becomes the default setting and acceptable
behavior.
When people withdraw, they become more vulnerable to cognitive distortions and overreliance on defense mechanisms to maintain a sense of control. Symptoms of anxiety and depression increase, often managed through maladaptive coping strategies. These patterns are well-established risk factors for both mental and physical health decline.
At the same time, we know that perceived peer support is one of the strongest predictors of recovery from post-traumatic stress injury.
Humans are wired for connection. When that connection erodes, performance follows.
Stop Avoiding—Start Diagnosing
Command staff must ensure that the culture within their agency creates a sense of internal safety. It is not just operational safety on the street, but psychological safety within the organization.
The station should not feel like another threat environment where officers remain guarded or hypervigilant. It should be the place where they can reset, recalibrate, and reconnect.
If that foundation is missing, policy and discipline alone will not produce the outcomes leadership is looking for.
This requires a bottom-up approach—not as a replacement for accountability, but as a prerequisite for it.
These are not novel ideas. They are practical, accessible measures: peer support programs, wellness checks, trauma-informed debriefs, access to competent clinicians, and shift structures that allow for recovery.
If an officer violates a general order, the question should not stop at whether they are incompetent or insubordinate.
The better questions are:
What conditions made this outcome more likely?
What did I miss?
How do we prevent this from happening again?
That is purposeful leadership.
That is accountability.
The Bottom Line
Policing is human work. It always has been.
Officers are not robots. They are human beings operating in one of the most demanding professions in the country. When leadership reduces mistakes to simple labels, it oversimplifies complex problems and limits its own effectiveness.
The goal is not to excuse behavior. It is to understand it well enough to prevent it and create a place where our officers can reach their peak.
References
Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board. (2018). Board adopts Ten
Shared Principles. https://www.ptb.illinois.gov/news/news-important-information/board-
adopts-ten-shared-principles/
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4),
370–396. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0054346
Maslow, A. H. (1954). Motivation and personality. Harper & Brothers.