Westpig's heart-warming story about his heroic colleague Geoff (who probably just said he was doing his job) is a very good reason why I'm glad that C4P is still going. Without a chat-room like this we probably wouldn't have heard about it. For all the flak that the police get in the Press, I'm certain that the vast majority of police officers are in the same mould as Geoff, and indeed WP himself who I'm sure would have done the same as Geoff.
Forgive a bit of thread drift (and C4P is good at that too!) but I've wondered recently whether the police service benefits from its quasi-military structure, with formal ranks, orders given and superior officers called 'Sir'.
In the profession that I've just retired from after 45 years (accountancy, most of it as a trainer) bosses have been called by their Christian names for about 40 of those years - with no loss of respect. I can see why this structure is still needed in the armed services, but what do people think about whether it's still suitable for the police? In my experience if you treat juniors as colleague rather than underlings you get much more lateral thinking from them. Or is that not what's wanted in the police service?
I'm not expressing a strong opinion - just asking a question.
|