Send us a text It’s amazing what getting a job will do to you. I was still taking classes at IU, but the Bloomington Police Department had already given me a call and confirmed that I was going to be hired in a few months. My first full time job. At the time I was working as a part time officer for IUPD while going to school and I was making about 7 bucks an hour. That was great, because at the time minimum wage was 4.25 an hour. Even then paying rent, putting gas in a car, and eating was about ...
Jun 25, 2025•31 min•Season 6Ep. 2
Send us a text The Gold Watch The Brass Ring Retirement You know … Winning It’s a simple topic, one that everyone should be interested in and one that everyone should applaud. Ask a retiree if they regret getting out, odds are 100 to 1 that they will just laugh in your face. Easy days of putzing around the house, playing golf, and waking up whenever you feel like it. No calls, no emergencies, no trauma, no adrenaline, just boring day in and day out. I guess it’s a little more complicated than th...
Jun 11, 2025•14 min•Season 6Ep. 1
Send us a text I am blessed with friends. I am blessed to have neighbors that rushed to my home to make sure that we were safe. I am blessed that I have people who will be there for me and my family in the darkest moments. I am blessed that I have friends who will reach out and provide moral and actual support when needed. I am blessed that I have met some amazing people over my career and they will take the time to chat with me on this podcast and I am blessed that people like you take the time...
Nov 20, 2024•8 min
Send us a text Jared Altic is a police chaplain in Kansas City, focusing his work in the patrol divisions of the Kansas City Kansas Police Department (KCKPD). He attends roll calls, goes on ride alongs, teaches at the police academy, and responds to homicides, suicides, and accidents in the city. Jared's passion is encouraging officer wellness among cops, which he also does through his podcast, Hey Chaplain . I had the pleasure to talk with Jared about informal leadership and his role as a chapl...
Nov 06, 2024•40 min•Season 5Ep. 12
Send us a text Welcome to our annual Halloween Episode. These stories have been told to me by officers around the country and they swear they are true stories. Thanks to Parker for this one. Happy Halloween.
Oct 23, 2024•6 min•Season 5Ep. 11
Send us a text In the United States there are 3,116 local jails, 1,566 State Prisons, and 98 Federal Prisons. But let’s not forget the 1,323 Juvenile Corrections Facilities, 142 Immigration detention facilities, and 80 Tribal jails. These facilities house a little over 1.2 million prisoners. These facilities are staffed with approximately 393,000 corrections officers. At first glance that might seem like a lot. A lot of facilities, A lot of prisoners, A lot of jailers, But it isn’t. Let’s take a...
Oct 09, 2024•46 min•Season 5Ep. 10
Send us a text Chief of Police is a title typically given to the head of a police department, but that simple definition gets very confusing very quickly. Sheriffs are the name we give to elected officials who preside over county law enforcement in the US, while Chief’s of Police typically preside over municipal police agencies. Sometimes Chief’s are elected. Sometimes they are appointed by a mayor or city council. Sometimes they are selected through the civil service act. Sometimes they are not...
Sep 25, 2024•36 min•Season 5Ep. 9
Send us a text Note: This was an extremely difficult episode for me to record. I want to apologize for the audio. It was the best I could do. 72 officers had to die. I refuse to let that sacrifice go unremembered. This one is for you,
Sep 11, 2024•14 min•Season 5Ep. 8
Send us a text Ethics in Leadership It’s an interesting topic and at times can be very controversial. Peter Drucker was an Austrian American management consultant, educator, and author, whose writings contributed to the philosophical and practical foundations of modern management theory. He famously said “The only definition of a leader is someone who has followers” This statement has led to some interesting classroom discussions as well as arguments about leaders. In my courses I typically lead...
Aug 28, 2024•15 min•Season 5Ep. 7
Send us a text Commander Bob Meader retired from the Columbus Ohio Police Department in February of 2022. During his tenure at Columbus PD, he served in patrol, street attack unit, property crimes, legal and training. He retired as the commander of the Columbus PD Police Academy. While working Commander Meader managed to get his law degree and today spends his retirement training Ohio police officers on issues regarding the law in Ohio. I had the pleasure to talk with Bob about legal issues pert...
Aug 14, 2024•46 min•Season 5Ep. 6
Send us a text Leading Up General William T. Sherman once said "We have good corporals and good sergeants and some good lieutenants and captains, and those are far more important than good generals." Sherman recognized the importance of leading up. What is leading up? It’s providing leadership in an organization from a position of lower authority. It’s understanding the role played by various members of an organization and how to properly and effective work within that organization. This is more...
Jul 31, 2024•19 min•Season 5Ep. 5
Send us a text Sheriff, a word, and position that derive from the old English term Shire-Reeve. This person was responsible for managing a shire or county in England. The practice began sometime before 700 A.D. and when America was colonized by European settlers we brought the concept with us. Today in the US, 48 out of the 50 states have sheriffs. Alaska doesn’t have counties and therefore has no sheriff’s and Connecticut replaced its sheriff system with State Marshalls in 2000. In 46 out of th...
Jul 17, 2024•43 min•Season 5Ep. 4
Send us a text Fear is the Mind Killer, That statement is as relevant today as it was in 1965 when Frank Hubert published his novel Dune. Paul Atraides, the main character in Dune, quotes from the Litany of Fear in the first chapter of the book. The entire quote is; "I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its...
Jul 03, 2024•19 min•Season 5Ep. 3
Send us a text I had been a sergeant for about 6 years before my agency sent me to my very first leadership class. I didn’t know what to expect and honestly, I thought it was going to be a waste of time. I mean I had been an informal leader on night shift for years as the old guy and the FTO. When they promoted me to sergeant, they obviously didn’t think leadership was important because they didn’t bother to send me to any training. So, I wasn’t very interested. This story could have had a very ...
Jun 19, 2024•53 min•Season 5Ep. 2
Send us a text Leadership Journeys. You are going to hear me talk a lot about leadership journeys this season. What do I mean about leadership journeys? It’s how I describe the process of growing as a leader, of taking on formal and informal responsibilities and about not only learning the process of leadership, but embracing it as well. I decided the best way to start this season off was to talk you through my leadership journey, and no it wasn’t very pretty. Many of you out there have had the ...
Jun 05, 2024•18 min•Season 5Ep. 1
Send us a text Leadership, The Oxford English Dictionary defines leadership as; The action of leading a group of people or an organization. The state or position of being a leader. Got it. That’s a simple one. Next important lesson please… Not so fast. Leadership has to be one of the most vexing skills to learn in our profession. First of all, it’s critically important. It’s important for the officer working the beat who must deal with the public every day. They must lead on scenes and at calls ...
May 22, 2024•5 min
Send us a text That's a Wrap. In 2020 at the height of the COVID pandemic I decided to start this podcast. I had just retired and started full time teaching and consulting when the world came to a grinding halt. The podcast was a way to fill that void. To scratch my teaching itch and to share what I had learned in 30 years of working as a cop. I couldn’t be more happy with the results. Over the last four years I have had the pleasure of reconnecting with old friends, making new ones, and sharing...
Nov 29, 2023•2 min
Send us a text In 2022 Rafael Mangual a senior fellow and head of research for policing and public safety at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research published his book Criminal (In)Justice. If your profession revolves around the criminal justice system then this is a must-read book. Using extensive studies and documentation Mangual takes the fight to the decarceration and depolicing narrative. He quickly and succinctly destroys the concept of defunding the police. Criminal (In)Justice points...
Nov 15, 2023•24 min•Season 4Ep. 12
Send us a text Rick Snyder started in law enforcement over 27 years ago and continues to serve on a major metropolitan police department. Rick is the president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 86 and also serves as the National FOP Chaplain. Rick has been vocal about the issues involving police reform for many years and I was pleased to have an opportunity to talk to Rick about the state of policing and the war on cops. Rick had so much more to say, but do to technical difficulties and schedul...
Nov 01, 2023•28 min•Season 4Ep. 11
Send us a text This is our fourth annual Halloween Special and it's a doozy. Ever had one of those creepy encounters that just set the hair on the back of your neck straight up. Usually we just move on and forget about them, but sometimes they can really spook you. In this episode we hear the real true story of a creepy conversation that took a dark turn quickly. Dim the lights and settle in for another true Halloween story....
Oct 18, 2023•6 min
Send us a text Jeff Schemmer is a longtime friend and colleague of mine. He is also an expert on the 911 system. Jeff began working in the 911 community thirty-five years ago as a dispatcher with the Bloomington Indiana Police Department. After the 1998 consolidation of dispatch services with BPD and Monroe County Sheriff's Office, he continued to serve as a dispatcher, training coordinator and Communications Manager until 2019, when he accepted the position of Executive Director with Hamilton C...
Oct 04, 2023•36 min•Season 4Ep. 10
Send us a text There isn’t an easy answer to the origin of the black mourning band. The use of black clothing to show that the wearer is in mourning for the loss of a loved one, can be traced all the way back to ancient Rome, where the traditional white toga would be replaced with a black toga pulla. Over the centuries and in various cultures white and black have battled it out for dominance as the prevailing color for mourning however in the 14th century, Christian Churches had made the wearing...
Sep 20, 2023•15 min•Season 4Ep. 9
Send us a text Kathleen Dias isn’t a cop, but her husband was and the experiences he faced everyday as a rural police officer made her want to write about the issues faced by rural officers in America. She began studying, writing, and researching topics important to rural officers and speaking out against the Mayberry perceptions that most people have of the job. Not only does Kathleen write a column for police one dot com but she has also starting tracking rural officers who are assaulted and k...
Sep 06, 2023•45 min•Season 4Ep. 8
Send us a text During my 3 years as the Administrative Captain, I hired 43 police officers. 43 in three years. That number becomes amazing when you realize that my department was only allowed 100 cops at maximum staffing. 43% turnover in 3 years. Sadly, only in policing can you get away with that. If I were to address the board of directors for a company and told them that employee turnover was 43%, I probably wouldn’t have my job for very long. But in policing that’s not uncommon. If you add in...
Aug 23, 2023•21 min•Season 4Ep. 7
Send us a text I will never forget some advice given to me by one of my FTOs. “Write it down. Write something down everyday and at then end of your career you’ll have a best-selling novel. You’ll never have to work again.” Unfortunately, my rookie self wasn’t smart enough to take him up on his advice. I never wrote it down and because of that so many stories have slipped through the cracks. Glenn Topping is someone who did write those things down and because of that he has gone on to write six n...
Aug 09, 2023•32 min•Season 4Ep. 6
Send us a text In this episode we will look at the terms typically used to define the police, warriors and guardians. Where did these terms come from and why have they become so divisive within our profession. Warrior, Guardians, and Cops.
Jul 26, 2023•12 min•Season 4Ep. 5
Send us a text Officer involved shootings are some of the most difficult and important internal investigations you will ever be a part of. Making sure they are done properly at all levels is critically important to the officers involved, the agency, and the community. To talk about this topic as well as other issues involving internal affairs, I had the pleasure of speaking with Marlon Marrache. Marlon retired from the Los Angeles Police Department after 25 years of service. During his 15 years ...
Jul 12, 2023•44 min•Season 4Ep. 4
Send us a text Demotivation is simply a lack of interest and motivation at your work. It doesn’t seem like a big deal; I mean everyone gets a little demotivated at work. You slack off a little, spend some extra time at the water cooler or on a smoke break, and once the weekend kicks in you get a little rest and relaxation before you’re better next week. That’s not what’s going on in policing. Demotivation is more than just a little frustration at the workplace. In policing it’s one of the things...
Jun 28, 2023•21 min•Season 4Ep. 3
Send us a text Today’s policing is more dangerous than ever. Staying sharp and following proper professional and tactical procedures is the key to staying alive and I couldn’t think of a better guest to talk to about this topic than Scott Savage. Scott Savage began his career in public safety at age 19, first as an E.M.T and then as a licensed paramedic working in a busy emergency medical system. In 1999, he became a police officer with the Palo Alto Police Department in California where he work...
Jun 14, 2023•38 min•Season 4Ep. 2
Send us a text There are a lot of people, including those in our profession that don’t like to hear the phrase “War on Cops”. They feel it will promote the Us vs Them mentality and broaden the divide between the working police officer and the public they serve. In 2014 Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown after Brown violently attacked him. That’s right, contrary to what you have heard from the media, social justice pundits and professional athletes the investigati...
May 31, 2023•17 min•Season 4Ep. 1
