October 8, 2024 • 50 mins
Season 6 - Episode 139
Chief Constable Chris Noble takes center stage as we explore his remarkable career in policing, starting from his unique upbringing in Northern Ireland during the '70s and '80s. With his father juggling roles as both a bank manager and a part-time reserve officer for the RUC, Chris was surrounded by the complexities of law enforcement from an early age. In our conversation, he shares how the seismic changes brought by the Patten Commission, including the transformation of the Royal Ulster Constabulary into the Police Service of Northern Ireland, shaped his career path and leadership ethos. Chris provides a candid look at the challenges and triumphs of these reforms, emphasizing their profound societal impact and the lessons he carried forward.
Explore Chris's transition from Northern Ireland to Humberside, England, in 2017, driven by a quest for new challenges in a struggling police force. With 21 years of experience under his belt, Chris shares his innovative leadership style that prioritizes frontline engagement over hierarchical, filtered reports. His approach encourages local officers to develop their own methods, fostering a culture of listening and collaboration. Discover how this strategy has helped revitalize morale and performance, paving the way for significant transformations within the Staffordshire Police under his leadership.
As we wrap up, the conversation shifts to the modern-day challenges faced by police forces, from managing young recruits to navigating misinformation-fueled unrest. Chris draws parallels between the UK and US policing landscapes, offering a global perspective on maintaining balance amidst contentious issues. Through his experiences, Chris highlights the importance of leadership that values diverse perspectives and the need for accountability and adaptability in an ever-evolving policing environment. This episode offers a comprehensive look at the trials and triumphs of police leadership today, promising insights for anyone interested in the future of law enforcement.
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Website: www.copdocpodcast.com
If you'd like to arrange for facilitated training, or consulting, or talk about steps you might take to improve your leadership and help in your quest for promotion, contact Steve at stephen.morreale@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro/Outro (00:02):
Welcome to The CopDoc Podcast.
This podcast explores policeleadership issues and innovative
ideas.
The CopDoc shares thoughts andideas as he talks with leaders
in policing communities,academia and other government
agencies.
And now please join Dr SteveMorreale and industry thought
(00:24):
leaders as they share theirinsights and experience on The
CopDoc Podcast.
Steve Morreale (00:32):
Hi again everybody, Steve Morreale,
coming to you from Boston,Massachusetts, and today we have
the opportunity to cross thepond and we're talking to a
colleague, a new friend.
He is the chief constable inStaffordshire Police Service in
the UK.
Chris Noble Chris, how are youon this Friday?
I am very well, very kind tocatch my attention.
(01:05):
That's unique, that's unusual.
I'm glad that person is sharingthat, because so many of your
colleagues kind of stay tothemselves.
They don't want to share,they're afraid of being
ridiculed, and certainly, thereare things that I write that
people will say you're just anapologist for the police.
So thank you very much.
I want to say to those who arelistening too that when I
(01:29):
reached out for Chris, we justhad a sort of an introductory
conversation and the first thingthat I said I am trying to
figure out is whether or notyour English is understandable.
And I find out in talking toyou, Chris, that you are
speaking the Queen's English andI love to have your perspective
.
Chris Noble (01:40):
So thank you, it's a pleasure and of course, I'm
speaking the King's English, Ohbit of undefined peculiar
accent, but we'll maybe come tothat as we chat.
Steve Morreale (01:49):
I I think that's great.
Let's talk about how longyou've been in policing where
you're from I know that you area transplant within the UK and
tell us about where you've beenand where you are now, and then
describe the area that you areresponsible for policing.
Chris Noble (02:03):
Okay.
So yeah, it's a bit of a sortof an interesting journey, steve
.
I was born and bred in Ireland,in the north of Ireland.
My dad was a bank manager byday and a part-time reserve cop
by night, and in the sort of 70sand 80s in Northern Ireland
that was a pretty brutalexperience.
So he was dealing with checksthrough the day and, sadly and
traumatically, he was at timespicking up body parts in the
(02:23):
evening.
So from a really young age Ihad a dad who was hugely
committed to work and his family, but then maybe three, four
nights a week I didn't see himin the evenings because he was
policing and trying to keeppeople safe and I wouldn't say
there was any one moment in timeI thought I want to be my dad,
I want to do what my dad's done,but that's got to be latent in
your own experience and memoryas a kid.
So growing up, I'd always beeninterested in law.
(02:44):
I wanted to be a barrister, afancy arguing for a living and
getting well paid.
But I pretty quickly realizedas I went through law school I
was probably going to end updoing, you know, conveyancing,
family law, divorce law, tax law, which is not the most
inspiring thing to have andapologies if any of your
listeners are specializing inthat field and policing came up
as a really good opportunity fora career.
(03:06):
So did my law degree and thenjoined as a standard entrant in
Northern Ireland, which was thenthe Royal Ulster Constabulary.
And that was what late 96 andstill a really challenging
environment to police, albeitnot the absolute heat of the
troubles.
But at least one of the guyswho I joined with, sadly, was
killed within a bit 12 months byterrorists in a bar in Belfast,
(03:26):
simply targeted because he wasa cop.
So even though it wasn't theworst of times, it definitely
wasn't the best of times to joinpolicing in Northern Ireland.
Steve Morreale (03:34):
RUC, of course, has quite a history and at one
point in time, with the PatentCommission, we saw a change to
PSNI, and you must have been inthe midst of that.
Is that correct?
Changing uniforms, changing a
Chris Noble (03:46):
name.
I joined in 96.
T he Patten Commission, andthen there's some pretty key
sort of, you know, American copsin the middle of that.
Intro/Outro (03:53):
Kathleen O'Toole from Boston was absolutely
fundamental to those changes.
Chris Noble (03:58):
So it was a difficult time, because I'm not
sure there has been a changeproject around policing like
that anywhere in the world or Ihaven't seen one because pretty
much everything changed the nameof the organization, so the
title of royal ulsterconstabulary was at least put
into the background, if notpretty much lost completely for
a lot of people.
The symbols which contained thecrown changed, the uniform
(04:18):
changed, the arrangements aroundmanagement changed, composition
and policing changed.
So for example, whenever Ijoined, 92 of cops in Northern
Ireland were Protestant, 8% wereCatholic and there was a rule
brought in that from every 100cops you recruit, 50 have to be
Catholic, 50 come from anotherbackground.
So in the course of maybe whatseven, eight years you moved to
maybe 32% of police officersbeing Catholic, they couldn't
(04:41):
yet meet the 50%, the 50-50,right.
No, and I think the target wasto try and get it to a critical
mass which was in and aroundthat 30%.
And it slowed down a bit, steve, recently for lots of different
reasons.
But you know, quadruplingrepresentation, you know, if
that was members of the blackcommunity or the gay community
or whatever, that would be ahuge change.
So it was real progress.
But it's an ongoing challengearound representation.
(05:03):
So really fundamental change,and probably the hardest change
of all, was about the symbols ofthe organization, the name of
the organization, the badge ofthe organization, because that's
what people got veryemotionally attached to and some
people felt that policing maybewas being punished or maybe
scapegoated because this waspart of a wider peace process.
But I remember the chiefconstable at the time, a guy
(05:23):
called Ronnie Flanagan, reallyinspirational, charismatic
leader, but clearly RUC throughand through, and his language
was if the pain in policing isworth it for gain in wider
society, well then, this ischange that we should embrace
and ultimately the organizationdid embrace it.
But it's an interesting onewhenever you look back and how,
on the one hand, you remembercolleagues who've been killed in
the Troubles, as we call theconflict in Northern Ireland,
(05:46):
but on the other hand, howpolicing needs to keep being
progressive and keep beinginclusive in terms of what it
does.
So, yeah, really challenging inthe late 90s, early 2000s.
Steve Morreale (05:55):
So you were with RUC later to become PSNI and
you know that I interviewed thecurrent chief constable, of
which you are the chiefconstable in Staffordshire,
simon Byrne, and it wasinteresting because he used the
term you know.
You got to set your stall and Ihad no idea what the hell he
was talking about.
I do now for certain it was oneof colloquially it was.
I don't even know how to saythat.
It was one of those termsPhrases, steve.
(06:18):
Yes, yes yes, yes, okay, that'spretty bad, but that I had never
heard.
But it made an awful lot ofsense.
And so how long were you at RUClater to become PSNI, and what
did you do there?
In other words, I presume, inorder to be a chief constable in
another organization, you hadto climb the ladder and UK
policing up until recently.
Chris Noble (06:38):
Everybody joins up the frontline, everyone's a
constable, everyone starts inresponse policing, which is your
blue lights.
Get the things as quickly asyou can deal with what's in
front of you.
So I started in exactly thesame way and then, after about
four years, moved into thatfirst line of supervision Again,
uk terminology.
As a sergeant I went to work ina police station which at that
stage was one of the most bombedpolice stations in Europe, and
(07:00):
on occasions you had to bebussed in an armoured Land Rover
.
On other occasions you coulddrive your vehicle in but it had
nets over the top of thestation because regularly some
of the local young people wouldhave taken to stoning the cars
in the station.
So it was an interesting placenot just to learn your craft as
a supervisor.
But how do you strike thebalance between keeping your
cops safe from people who wantedto kill them?
Because we drove about inarmoured vehicles?
(07:20):
We had at that stage militarysupport everywhere we went, but
on the other hand you shouldstill be serving the community
and keeping them safe.
So for a long time and there'sstill an element of that in
Northern Ireland I grew up beingreally thoughtful about my own
personal safety on and off duty,so my kids for a long time
didn't even know what I did.
Steve Morreale (07:36):
But on the other hand you join policing to help
people and that balancing of twoyou know, quite competing
concepts, I think caused a hugeamount of trauma and stress to
police officers over the yearsin Northern Ireland.
Well, I mean, when you'reconstantly under attack or
you're fearing that somebody,just because of the uniform, is
out for you, that's a verydifficult situation to find
yourself in.
Chris Noble (07:56):
Yeah, that sort of constant level of vigilance and
agitation.
You know there's very fewoccupations, apart from maybe
the and wartime, have that levelof stress on and off duty and
(08:22):
in fact actually probably Idon't know maybe 30%.
Peace is pretty well embeddedin Northern Ireland.
Runs a soccer club, footballclub, and his son was there, a
13 year old boy.
They'd finished the game, hewas coming out, he was putting
soccer balls, footballs in theback of his car and he was shot
three times in the back, threetimes in the front, in front of
his boy.
Now somehow he survived.
So, as I said before, thingshave improved in Northern
(08:50):
Ireland.
It's a very different place topolice and live in, but there's
still an element that see policeofficers as a legitimate target
.
So even now you've got policeofficers still under real
pressure, real trauma, andmental health is still probably
one of the biggest challengesfor the police service of
Northern Ireland at the minutein terms of the numbers of
officers they have strugglingwith.
Steve Morreale (09:03):
Well, it's interesting because, as I was
traveling back and forth toEurope on a plane, I was able to
watch.
I think it's called Blue Light.
Is that the name of the show?
There's a show that is based inBelfast.
Yes, it is.
It is and it's quiteinteresting when you roll up you
better have more than one ortwo people that you're going to
have to have some backup to kindof keep the crowd back.
And that leads us, of course,to discussions later on today
(09:23):
about demonstrations and howpolice are kind of caught in the
middle, sometimes on twoopposing sides.
But let's talk about how youended up leaving Northern
Ireland to go to basically themainland, the UK, england.
Chris Noble (09:36):
I served 21 years in Northern Ireland policing
from a whole range of roles.
I was part of that patentchange team I think I'm the only
serving cop left, actually, whowas part of that team so that
was a really challenging timefor the organization, but
fascinating to be involved in.
I did a lot of frontline rolesin local policing, as we call it
.
I was in specialisms like closeprotection.
I was in the change andperformance and strategy units.
(09:57):
So lots of different roles, butthere comes a point whenever
actually there's a new challengeand was personal reasons,
professional reasons, forlooking for a new challenge, and
I initially moved across inoctober 2017 to a place called
humberside and the big city inthat force is called hull or
kingston upon hull.
Actually, it's quite a historyaround royalty and conflict,
(10:17):
very deprived core city,post-industrial real challenges
around drugs, deprivation, kidsin care, and I went over over
there to be the head ofspecialist crime, forced contact
, which is where you take allthe calls, and now all the
digital contact from the public,criminal justice around your
investigations, and thenspecialist ops guns, dogs, roads
, policing all that good stuff.
So, yeah, real learning curve.
(10:38):
Because Northern Ireland eventhough 85%, I think it'd be in a
cop translates including copscrossing the pond, as you call
it as well, but the 15% can bereally challenging around the
legal framework, the culture,the busyness, the partnerships
that exist as well.
So it was a steep learningcurve for me, but no regrets at
all professionally about makingthe move.
It stretched me at a key timewhenever probably I was becoming
(10:59):
a little bit complacent.
Steve Morreale (11:02):
Can I interrupt you for a second, little bit
complacent, can I interrupt youfor a second?
What's important for me tounderstand is leaving Northern
Ireland and coming to a newplace.
Policing is the same but it'sdifferent, and so, as you adjust
to a new culture, here's anoutsider, in essence, even
though you're a member of the UKcoming in.
Those who work within theCommonwealth States and I
understand Shauna Coxon, forexample, is over down.
(11:24):
Well, drew, the commissionerfor Ireland, is from PSNI and
Shauna Coxon is from the TorontoPolice Service and she's in the
number two or three positionand you're doing the same thing.
What was the receptivity of thepeople working?
As curious as you were abouthow it was being done in the UK,
I'm sure they're curious aboutwhat you bring.
Tell me how you navigated that.
Chris Noble (11:46):
Yeah, and there's a lot of learning from me coming
into Humberside and my journeyinto Staffordshire as a chief as
well, so I was really reallycareful, steve, not to keep
using the P word.
I'm talking about PSNI becauseit just-.
Steve Morreale (11:57):
This is the way we did it.
I know, I know that's thequickest way to piss people off,
like I don't give a shit whatthe PSNI did.
This is Humberside.
Chris Noble (12:04):
Exactly, yes, exactly.
So I tried to be emotionallyintelligent about even if I was
seeing something really strangeand I've seen where it's been
done better Actually encouragingsomeone to go and see that for
themselves can be reallypowerful, as opposed to just
dropping it on them and imposingit, and then that breeds a
resentment.
But at the time, humberside youknow great force in terms of
the officers and staff in there,but it was the worst performing
(12:25):
force in the country, reallypoor clear-up rates for crime,
weren't getting to thingsquickly, weren't answering the
sort of triple nine system overhere which is your emergency
calls, the lowest morale in thecountry as well, and really
underpowered in terms of numbersof cops at that stage as well.
So in some ways that helpedbecause actually the force was
ready for help.
I think it had got to a pointthat it had some brilliant
(12:46):
leaders inside but it neededfresh thinking, fresh
experiences and it wanted peopleas well to get out on the front
line, and across my career Ihave loved walking the ground.
Whether it be planning for bigparades and protests, whether it
be dealing with the aftermathof a terrorist attack or a
serious investigation or acommunity engagement event, I
love genuinely getting out onthe boat.
My biggest frustration as achief is I've got to be behind a
(13:07):
desk and I've got to bestrategic.
So even now, the discipline ofgetting out isn't a discipline
for me, it's a pleasure.
So, coming to Humberside, Idon't think they were used to
that sort of level of leadershipand at the start they were
nervous, you know why are youhere?
Steve Morreale (13:20):
You checking up on me.
Have you got law?
Yes, so.
Chris Noble (13:24):
I think over time they do respect that and
whenever they realize you're notthere just to catch them out,
you're interested in the detail.
You want to be where they are,you want to solve the problems,
you want a reality check.
Steve Morreale (13:33):
Well, you want to hear from them, right?
Chris Noble (13:35):
Because that's not how you police I didn't mean to
cut you off again, but I thinkby listening did that not make
you, or help you, understandwhat was going on and then
identify ways that could beimproved.
Yeah, because the bottom lineis, as a senior cop, I no longer
have a clue what is going on inthe frontline.
Well, that's quite obvious.
(13:56):
The further up the line you goin policing, the more stuff gets
sifted and it's amazing whatpeople can polish because they
don't want the bosses to hearbad news.
My sort of style of leadershipand I'll maybe talk about it in
terms of staffature is get onthe front line, talk to staff,
have a conversation Doesn't meanyou need to be a populist,
because sometimes you've got topush back the frontline staff.
Because I've been there.
Sometimes you can talk up thebad stuff, ignore the stuff that
(14:18):
works, but people respect youbeing there.
They respect you gettinginvolved in a debate with them,
that you don't rely on what's onyour shoulders in terms of rank
just to tell them what to do.
And the people who know the jobare the people on the front
line.
They know why it's not workingand they've got a pretty good
idea about what could work aswell no-transcript, but for
(14:53):
those who are on this side, or,believe me, I just, chris.
Steve Morreale (14:57):
I just checked the stats for the podcast and I
couldn't be more pleased.
I think you're going to be a139th interview.
This podcast is being listenedto in 86 different countries and
2,900 different cities, whichjust blows my mind.
You talked about digitalcontent or, excuse me, you said
digital contact.
Can you explain that?
(15:17):
I think I understand, but Ithink it's important because
we're not there in the UnitedStates.
Chris Noble (15:22):
Yeah, so in probably a pretty typical
English constabulary or policeforce, the most common way now
that people contact the police,whether it be in an emergency or
in slower time, is over thephone.
But we've now got a lot ofdigital channels or ways of
contacting the police.
You know live chat, which ispretty ubiquitous now if you're
dealing with Amazon or Microsoftor Apple or whatever.
We've got something calledsingle online home, where you go
(15:43):
onto a web page, you type yourdetails in.
We will respond to you, if notquite in lifetime, very closely,
clearly.
You've got the email ways ofentering policing.
A lot of police forces areusing sort of AI technologies to
dynamically respond to querieswithout necessarily needing a
human being, unless that'swhat's wanted.
You've got something calledrapid video review, which is
(16:05):
where you're maybe dealing witha victim who's suffered abuse of
some kind and, as opposed to aninitial deployment, you're able
to speak to them securely andsafely on video screens it's
like a telehealth and make anassessment of what they need
what can help?
Exactly Like telehealth.
Exactly the same concept.
So all these different channelsare ways of engaging with the
public.
That is now sort of baked intothe UK policing model, because a
lot of police stations haveclosed, very often because of
(16:28):
financial challenges, but alsobecause people are just not
coming into stations anymore.
They want to pick up a phone orsend you an email or deal with
live chat.
You know that's what satisfiestheir needs.
Steve Morreale (16:37):
Well, that's quite interesting.
I would assume that, as youmoved in that direction, that
one of the things was manpower,but also in terms of being
responsive more responsivebecause you can be responsive.
You can't always send a carbecause you've only got five or
10 or 12, but you've got theability to react to them and
respond to them Okay.
So that had to be a change inculture in your career.
(16:58):
That fair.
Chris Noble (16:59):
Yeah, whenever I joined Steve, mobile phones
weren't really in play, or ifthey were, you know they
probably weighed about 10kilograms.
We were writing our reportsright, not typing them.
Go ahead, yeah, so a big change.
I think it's fair to say that alot of the contact centers, as
we call them, are force contactcenters or command centers.
It's all the same concept whenall these calls and contacts
(17:19):
come in.
They are really struggling atthe minute because a lot of
research and studies have beendone that said that about 29 to
30% of all those calls, allthose contacts, are about
policing and crime.
70% are not.
It could be mental healthissues, it could be labor
disputes, it could be litteringat the side of a road, it could
be anything but stuff wherepolicing should not be the lead
(17:40):
agency.
But we're having to manage thatlevel of contact and demand and
expectation coming in and thatis one of the biggest challenges
in UK policing today.
Steve Morreale (17:48):
Chris, one of the things I'm curious about is
the training and I understand,at least from my experience in
Europe, that you have asignificantly long-term
probation period, and I'mcurious about that.
So you could could explain itfrom your perspective and, most
importantly, about the trainingthat you receive as a high
(18:10):
ranking officer as you climb theranks.
Talk about that experience.
Chris Noble (18:14):
So for people joining policing, there's
different routes in the policingnowadays and we've got a
college of policing which coversall of the UK which sets the
standards and defines theseentry routes.
Probably about five or sixyears ago, supported by a guy
called Peter Nayrude I'm notsure if you've spoken to Peter
but and other colleagues broughtthe concept of academic
accreditation into policing.
So a lot of my cops joining nowdon't just have to learn their
(18:36):
craft on the streets for two orthree years in terms of their
probation period, but they'realso having to secure a degree
through university Criminologyand associated sort of policing
disciplines as well.
So for most people joiningpolice now there's a three-year
probation period.
They've got to satisfy me.
They're an operationally signedcop, their standards are at the
highest level and they'reachieving their academic
requirements.
(18:56):
It's only now we're startingjust to adjust that a little bit
, removing or adding anotherentry route in where you don't
need to do the degree function,because we were missing out on
people maybe from a militarybackground or who had no
interest in the academic route.
So it's probably now, I think,a better offer for people
joining.
But those first two or threeyears a lot of pressure, really
well-defined training, highexpectations, and you're not set
(19:17):
up to pass automatically.
You have to work hard to qualify, come out of your probation and
then be a fully substantive copall the way from that initial
probationary training up to whatthey call executive training,
which is the sort of chiefofficer tier of which then I'm
chief constable level andleadership training you get
(19:40):
albeit you can tap into trainingaround public order, firearms
and a whole range of operationaldisciplines, including
investigation ones.
So not a huge amount, steve, insummary, but I'm a big believer
in you.
Go and find your own CPD.
You know there's a CharteredManagement Institute in the UK.
There's an Institute ofDirectors.
I've been on sort of a programcalled LINCT, which is about
(20:01):
counterterrorism which spans US,uk, australia, new Zealand.
So I think there is aresponsibility on Policing UK
and the College of Policing toprovide a core of courses.
But I still see the mainresponsibility for my
development now sitting withmyself and tapping into partners
and other parts of governmentto just make sure I've got the
right blend of operational andbusiness skills.
Steve Morreale (20:20):
It seems like you are a member of the
International Association ofChiefs of Police and you said
you may be in Boston, and ifthat's the case, you'll be in my
hometown and I hope to see youthere in October.
But one of the questions Iwould ask is, well, what we
haven't done, been told aboutthe transition Humberside to
Staffordshire, when and how andwhy did that happen?
Chris Noble (20:39):
Yeah.
So I joined Humberside inOctober 17 and ultimately then
joined Staffordshire in December2021.
So four years in Humbersidereally steep learning curve,
really strong improvementjourney, thanks to the team I
was a part of, and it's now gonefrom being the worst force in
the country to now beingrecognized in the last 12 months
as the very best.
(21:00):
So I learned a huge amount fromthat in terms of how do you
strike the balance between, as asenior leader, a really strong
grip on the things that matterand dragging people up by their
boot laces but, on the otherhand, giving people a bit of
space to breathe, and thatwhenever you leave an
organization, success is thatother people make it better than
it was, you know, whenever youwere there.
So for me, I learned a lot inHumberside and I'd never
initially thought of myself asgoing straight to chief
(21:22):
constable level, but I had a lotof friends in Staffordshire and
they said look, you know whatyou're experiencing in
Humberside, the type ofleadership style that you value.
We think is right forStaffordshire.
We want to go back to a reallycommunity-based model of
policing.
We need some appropriate gripagain around performance.
We need to do change andtransformation with our staff as
opposed to to them.
We need to rebuildrelationships with our partners.
We need to do the basics wellabout technology and running
(21:46):
policing.
So I got a real warmth fromstaff that they would be open to
an outsider, or a blow-in as Icall myself.
A blow-in, you say Stepping intoStaffordshire, a blow-in.
Steve Morreale (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, look what just blew in now, right.
Chris Noble (22:00):
Go ahead Exactly.
Well.
You used the analogy earlier onabout I think it was a
transplant.
Yeah, for me, there's been noorgan rejection.
I have to say, in terms ofcoming into staff, the staff
have been superb and but beforeI applied, I probably spoke to
about 100 110 different peopleto say what is going on in the
force.
They were either partners, theywere retired or serving cops
(22:20):
and they just gave.
They wrote the presentationthat I gave at my interview for
me in terms of this is where weare, this is where we want to be
and this is how we want to doit.
So the things that I was saying, I was pretty much then giving
staff back what they had told me.
So the big changes we made inthe first 18 months were all
things that came from thefrontline, because they were
frustrated with what washappening and they had actually
(22:41):
gone to the time of not justcomplaining, because cops hate
two things, don't they?
You know, change and status quo.
But you know, the guys I wasworking with and the girls I was
working with in Staffordshireactually said, not, just, it's
not working, boss.
They said and this is what youshould do.
So that transition was made alot easier because the staff
were up for it, they had apassion.
They were frustrated.
I think the biggest critics ofpolicing work in policing.
(23:02):
It's not on social media, it'snot in the media, it's not
politics, it's the people whoknow what policing could be.
So I find the workforceabsolutely outstanding and a
really strong core of localleadership, supported by me,
bringing in external people withreal skills and experience,
which is what the force neededat the time to keep improving
(23:23):
needed at the time to keepimproving.
Steve Morreale (23:24):
Did that help having a few of your own people
or people that you felt hadexperience and were loyal and
had sort of a track record, toprovide the impetus to implement
ideas, to provide thelogistical ideas to try to move
the?
Chris Noble (23:34):
department forward.
I think the people I brought infrom other forces or agencies I
didn't really know that well.
I'd done my homework aroundthem.
But I think what I did knowfrom sort of triangulating their
career was the type ofleadership they brought, which
was the right balance aboutgetting stuff done but treating
people as human beings and withrespect.
And I was sort of recruiting onleadership values, leadership
approach as well as justcredibility that they've moved
(23:57):
the dial where they were before.
So I didn't know themparticularly well but I brought
in people who had done myresearch on and done due
diligence on, so I was prettycomfortable.
But I would say really early on, probably because I'd taken so
much time to speak to staff, Ibuilt up a network of well, you
probably not know this term CHIS, so covert human intelligence
sources.
It's the people you recruitoutside policing to tell you
(24:19):
about where the latest sort ofdrug deal is going to go down or
something like that.
Steve Morreale (24:24):
You had your own snitches.
Chris Noble (24:27):
I have my own network within the force.
This isn't quite working theway you expect.
You might want to come out andpatrol and have a look at this,
so you've got to be careful youdon't undermine management
around that and in particularmiddle management.
But you need to know the rightquestions to ask, and the way of
doing that is having a networkof people who are working on
your front lines, wherever theyare.
Policing's job is too importantto take somebody else's word
(24:49):
for it.
Steve Morreale (24:49):
So we're talking with Chris Noble.
He is the chief constable inStaffordshire, uk, the police
service.
He's actually talking to mefrom his vehicle because for
some reason I suppose fornetwork security he couldn't
dial into Zoom except from hiscell phone.
So thank you for that.
Let's ask a question.
First of all, tell us a littlemore about the current
(25:10):
organization, how big it is,what's your Staffordshire Police
Service is responsible for, thepopulation is, and where it is.
Chris Noble (25:16):
Yeah.
So UK policing really, reallyquickly.
Its biggest strength is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
Its biggest strength is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
Its biggest challenge is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
So you've got 43 chiefconstables.
If you want to change policy oradjust an approach, on
occasions it can be a little bitlike herding cats.
So that concept of operationalindependence is really important
(25:37):
in UK policing.
That police geography.
You own a county or you own acity like London and as the
chief or the commissioner, as itis in London, you own that
patch and you make the decisionsaround it.
So that's the sort of policingDNA.
But there's also really goodsort of national networks.
I've talked about the Collegeof Policing which sets standards
around training, whichaccredits forces in terms of
what they do around firearms orpublic order.
(25:59):
There's police chief leads forcertain thematic areas.
So I'm the lead for how wepolice protest.
Other colleagues would be thelead for criminal justice and
how we investigate crimes ordiversity and inclusion,
whatever it would be.
So you're a local chief by daybut then you sort of take on
national responsibilities overthe course of the year as well,
and Staffordshire is, of the 43forces, about number 21 or 22,.
(26:21):
It is bang in the middle.
So it's got about maybe 2,100police officers, maybe about
1,700 police staff.
We've got special constabularyof about 150, and we've got
police community supportofficers who work in local
neighbourhoods and wards anddistricts as well.
So the overall family andstaffature is probably in and
around.
I would have thought maybenearly 4,500, 4,300 cops, which
(26:45):
is, as I say, bang in the middleof the size of police forces in
the UK.
Steve Morreale (26:48):
How many people reside in your jurisdiction?
Chris Noble (26:51):
Probably about maybe just over 1 million, maybe
about 1.2 million people, andobviously then you've got
movement in and across theborder and the big city or
conurbation near me isBirmingham, so a lot of people
commuting into Birmingham andthen, sadly, a few
ne'er-do-wells or criminalswhatever we are allowed to call
them these days also come acrossfrom Birmingham as well in
(27:12):
terms of some of the challengesaround car crime and, less
regularly, gun crime.
But a really safe county, gotchallenges around deprivation,
around what we call safeguardingin the UK in terms of people
who are subject to abuse fromtheir partners or other people,
but overall a really safe placeto live.
And whilst it's not my job tobe the tourist industry, if you
want to visit a beautiful countyin England, come to
(27:33):
Staffordshire and I'll talk,maybe a little bit, if you give
me a chance, about somewherecalled the National Memorial
Arboretum as a really specialplace for police officers in
particular to come to visit.
So I think I shared a videowith you a while ago, steve,
about it.
But we've got, as I've just said, we've got something called the
National Memorial Arboretum inthe heart of Staffordshire which
has been in place now probablyfor about 10 years and, as it
sort of hints out in the title.
(27:54):
It's a place of memories andreflection, so dominated
probably by the military storiesand by the conflicts over the
years that the UK has beeninvolved in.
But there's also elements inthere around COVID about those
who were shot for deserting.
I think there's quite a fewareas around sort of US and
Canadian colleagues as wellwho've lost their lives as well,
and there's a couple of reallyspecial places in there around
(28:16):
policing, so a really impressivememorial about UK policing and
colleagues we've lost.
There's a place and a gardenthat recognises the sacrifice of
the Royal Austro-Constabularyand then another place as well
for the police, so a reallyspecial place.
Steve Morreale (28:28):
That must be special for you.
Chris Noble (28:29):
That must be very special for you.
It is.
It's a privilege to have it onour patch and we've got a lot of
royal visits and a lot ofdignitaries come to visit as
well that we look after whenthey're on our patch.
But it's a beautiful place justto go every now and again and
just walk through and reflect.
And whilst policing is modernand progressive and of course,
we're constantly moving on interms of what we do, I think
it's really important and it'smaybe my upbringing in Northern
(28:50):
Ireland that you never forgetwhat's gone before in terms of
that sacrifice and rememberingthe memories of people who've
given everything for policing.
So it's a powerful place aswell as a place that we're proud
to police and look after.
That's great.
Steve Morreale (29:06):
By the way, we're talking to Chris Noble
from Staffordshire, the chiefconstable from Staffordshire
Police Service.
I'm curious to ask you a fewquestions regarding leadership
and your approach to leadership.
I think you've intimated agreat deal about trying to press
the flesh, be on the front line, understand what's going on,
instead of hearing it in theivory tower, experiencing it,
seeing it, asking people who areon the front line what's going
on, how's it going, providingsupport.
(29:26):
I think that's big.
But what I'm curious about isyou've got a group of presume we
call them command staff peoplewho are high ranking executive
many years ago and the evolutionof meetings now and how you
(29:48):
choose to run them to encouragefeedback rather than being top
down.
But to understand, tell me yourapproach, what's your command
staff meeting like?
Chris Noble (29:56):
So being brought up in the Royal Australian
Constabulary.
It was a very security focused,very militaristic organization.
So being in a meeting as ayoung cop and then even moving
up through the ranks Well,number one there probably been a
meeting before the meetingwhere it was all decided by the
very senior people.
So it was a bit of a charade onoccasions and a bit of for show
.
But secondly, it didn't promotea huge amount of either
(30:17):
conversation, let alonedivergence of views, and
challenge just didn't reallyhappen.
It was just very rank, veryhierarchically based and, don't
get me wrong, you know, commandcan be important in policing but
it's probably two to threepercent of the day job in terms
of just telling people to dothis and using your rank and
authority to short circuitdecision making.
So sometimes it's easier, Ithink, whenever you're growing
(30:38):
up as a leader, to almost definehow you lead, how you make
decisions, how you run your ownteams and meetings, by what
you've seen not working in thepast.
So for me, you know, whilstultimately as the chief I've got
to own the big decisions in theorganization and I've got to
take responsibility for them, Ithink you're a fool if you think
you're the most intelligent orknowledgeable person in the
organization and I'm prettyconfident I am.
(30:59):
So, recruiting the right people,bringing them in as senior
leaders, having practitioners inthe key decision-making
meetings One of my keychallenges to my staff whenever
they bring me a new policy,let's say, about how we deal
with high-risk missing people.
You know, a 12-year-old kidgoes missing or an older adult
with Alzheimer's goes missing.
We grade those normally ashigh-risk missing people.
Okay, well, let's build apolicy around that.
(31:20):
But you tell me, before we dothis as a command team, have you
spoken to the detective who'sgoing to own that policy
tomorrow?
Have you spoken to thefrontline cop who's got to
complete the 30 box checklistthat you've now put in place to
cover the organization'sbackside whenever the inspection
body comes back in?
So for me, ultimately, seniorleaders are there to earn their
money and make decisions and bedecisive, but the way they get
(31:43):
there is critically importantand you need to understand not
just the problem you're tryingto solve.
I'm very ready to seniorleaders really understand the
root causes of why there's aproblem.
And then, secondly, instead ofjust giving a policy or decision
to staff, you know, if needs be, give them some parameters and
ask them to break it, or askthem what would you do and
involve them in thedecisionmaking process, as
opposed to the implementationprocess on its own.
(32:04):
How?
Steve Morreale (32:05):
do you find you set expectations?
In other words, you'repronouncing this is what I want
to do or this is what we want todo.
We've talked about it.
These are my expectations Interms of holding your I hate the
word subordinates, but yourfellow leaders accountable for
their particular unit.
How do you set expectations?
Chris Noble (32:24):
I think even before they become a senior leader,
you know, whenever they'relooking for promotion or looking
to join Staffordshire Police,the first thing I sit down and
say is this is what we're about,this is what we're looking for.
If it doesn't work and itdoesn't fit, don't even bother
applying.
So there's something about.
Even before they're part of theteam at that level or even join
Staffordshire Police, they knowexactly the rules of engagement
and what the expectations areand how they're going to be held
(32:45):
to account.
So I think there's somethingthere almost pre-birth, if that
makes sense, then wheneveryou're selecting them, it's not
to say that technical skillsaren't important.
There's other ways of measuringthose, even before they come
into the process.
So whenever I'm testing,interviewing, running promotion
processes, it's about gettingunder the skin of who that
person is and not just what havethey done in the past, because
everybody can memorize somereally great examples about what
(33:06):
they've done.
It's about what would you do ifand how have you and what are
you about?
And drilling down and gettinginto the detail of who that
individual is.
And then for me, the third partis if you're seeing behaviors or
ways of working that aren'tappropriate, this isn't about
criminality or even misconduct,it's just poor leadership or
inconsistent leadership in amature way.
Deal with it right there, don'tlet it sit, don't let it
(33:27):
atrophy, don't let it slide,don't let it go past.
Just have a really early,mature intervention to say
spotted that, tell me what'sgoing on.
Or I've got a bit of feedbackabout an issue you've dealt with
.
Chat me through that becauseyou might want to think about
how you can deal with itdifferently.
And then finally, steve, modelit yourself.
You know, if I talk aboutleadership that's really engaged
with the workforce, with thepeople we serve.
(33:47):
If I'm not doing that, it'sjust noise.
People pick apartcontradictions very, very
quickly, so you've got to livethat and make sure your habits
are the habits that you wantyour own staff to adopt as well.
Steve Morreale (33:57):
You know, one of the things that strikes me and
haven't been around policing fora long, long time is when we
get into positions of leadership, sometimes we forget how to
investigate, and what I mean bythat.
We're trained to investigateand so part of your job is to
investigate.
Whatever that is and you saidsomething a little bit ago and
that was asking questions, and Ilove the idea of leading
through questions, askingprobative questions, deep
(34:18):
questions that will start tomake people.
Even when I'm doing training,just posing questions sometimes
stifles people.
It stunts them Like I can'tbelieve I'm being put on the
spot.
But leading through questionscan be very valuable.
What's your experience?
Chris Noble (34:32):
There's a phrase in policing called the ABC of
policing.
So accept nothing, believe noone and check everything.
Now that's an extreme, becauseif you do that you're not going
to engender a huge amount oftrust or empowerment in an
organization.
But there's something aboutbeing professionally curious
about what is really going on inpolicing, and I suppose my
approach is you know, before Ijust ask a random question and
(34:52):
get lucky by asking a good one,as a senior cop again, I'll talk
to the people who are doing thejob, whether it be a middle
management or the front line ora police staff specialism or a
partner, and get their sense ofwhere things are.
So the questions that I'masking then of my senior leaders
are informed by what isactually going on.
Now, I don't mean not to bemischievous, because in the end,
if they're doing their job andleading that way, there should
(35:13):
be no surprises in the questionsI ask.
But your questions have got tobe informed by reality, as
opposed to getting lucky withasking a really good question on
occasions, and I think it's.
I wouldn't even call itquestioning as such.
I think it's more about aconversation, that you sit down
with someone and have aconversation and, as you say, a
part of that.
You probe until you get to thesource reason as to why
something isn't working orindeed why something is working.
(35:34):
And I think most staff if youask the questions in the right
way, if you're clearly notseeking to blame people at every
opportunity, if you then dosomething with the conversation
you've had with them actuallyvalue the fact that you care
enough to ask and understandwhat's going on in their world.
So yeah, I think questions, asyou say, isn't just for the
investigation side and forsuspects.
It's got to be how you improveand indeed tackle challenges
(35:58):
within the organization.
Steve Morreale (35:59):
Sometimes I find people just avoid asking
questions because they do notlike the work or the
consequences that comes with theanswers yeah, when you start
digging what you uncover, itsometimes becomes uncomfortable
or, oh my God, it becomes myproblem.
And I'm sure what you're sayingto your crew through your
behavior, through your modeling.
That I want to know.
I want you to be curious, Iwant you to identify problems, I
want to solve problems beforethey explode.
(36:20):
Let's kind of get ahead ofthose problems, try to figure
out what the difficulties areand come up with process, a new
process to deal with it, toallow those in the field the
options to handle that.
Chris Noble (36:31):
And, steve, I don't like to swear on podcasts, but
there's something about, youknow, policing deals in shit
every single day.
So if I'm not getting a whiff ofsomething on a daily basis, I
get really suspicious, becauseit generally means people are
hiding stuff from me.
So you go looking for thingsthat aren't working, you lift
stones.
But how you handle that, Ithink, is really important
because if, whenever there's acrisis or a ball's been dropped
(36:53):
or somebody's done somethingstupid or potentially malicious,
you have got to handle that asa senior leader in a mature way.
And if people are bringing youinformation proactively which is
what you want as a seniorpolice leader you have got to be
mature and neither shoot themessenger or two people behind
them.
And how you are in a bad dayand losing the rag, as we would
say in Ireland, or blowing yourtop, that is the stuff that will
be remembered and people willnot come to you again, will not
(37:16):
raise things, whether that be ina meeting format or a
one-to-one or even just droppingyou an email and saying boss, I
think you want to be aware ofthis.
So how you handle bad news as asenior leader is fundamental.
Or all of a sudden, people willstart covering stuff up.
Steve Morreale (37:28):
Yeah.
Well, what you're just sayingis really important.
I had something to think about,but you just said something
that triggered with me, and thatis you need to set that up.
You need to basically set, Iguess, the expectation that I'm
willing to hear from you In fact, I'd prefer to hear from you.
Please don't cover it up.
We don't know everything that'sgoing on, and so if you see an
issue, it's almost if you seesomething, say something, that
old adage, but but about theorganization?
(37:50):
Because if you care about theorganization, I care about your
input, and that becomes reallyimportant, because what you're
doing is you're saying bring theproblems to us, don't ignore
the problems, don't let themfester.
Chris Noble (37:59):
Fair statement yeah , for sure, and some of this is
about improving the service weprovide, but some of this is
around police standards andmisconduct as well.
We've had a couple of reallyhigh profile cases in policing
policing and some of it's beenaround the metropolitan police
in london.
But you know, but for the graceof god goes every single police
service.
Quite frankly, and at the coreof it, some of these guys as
they nearly nearly all werepeople within their team knew
(38:20):
they were, quite frankly,deviants in some occasions or
had criminal behaviors or werecorrupt cops and they didn't
speak up.
And there's a pretty goodchance their supervisors had a
really clear sense thatsomething wasn't right but they
didn't have the courage tochallenge.
So there's something aboutcreating an environment.
If you want to work and improvepolice culture, police
standards, there's something tobe creating an environment that
isn't about touting or tellingtales in each other.
(38:42):
It's about owning thereputation of the organization
at the very frontline, peoplebeing proud of it, people having
courageous conversations withcolleagues and indeed, frontline
supervisors intervening early,as opposed to, in 20 years' time
, that individual all of asudden doing something
completely and utterlyhorrendous to a colleague or to
a member of the public.
So you know that's the UKexperience.
(39:02):
You guys in the States andNorth America and wider will
have your own cases of extrememisconduct, but a lot of this
stuff.
If there was strongerleadership, courageous
leadership earlier on, you maywell not be able to stop it all,
but at the very least someonewould have been held to account
much more sharply than they everwere before we're talking with
Chris Noble, who is the chiefconstable, basically the big
shot in Staffordshire PoliceService, and I very much
(39:25):
appreciate your time, yourenergy and your perspective.
Steve Morreale (39:27):
I think that's important.
I want to talk about the issuesthat you are confronting as an
organization, the things thathave been brought to your
attention, even recently, andwhat you're working on and one
of the things you said at thevery beginning was about mass
demonstrations and your role inthat UK wide.
So tell us about the issues ofthe day, the week, the month
that you're working on.
Chris Noble (39:47):
OK, well, I think when we've touched on already
about policing used to be anagency of last resort.
So when it all went wrong, youcalled the cops, you called the
police.
Probably in the last 10 to 15years in the UK I don't know
about other jurisdictions it'snow become an agency of first
resort.
So the big challenge we have ishow do you triage all those
incidents, all those calls forservice from the public to deal
with the really key prioritycalls?
(40:08):
That is one of our mostenduring day-to-day challenges
and we don't always get thatbalance right.
So that's one.
Secondly, it's a bit of acoming together of a really
young and inexperiencedworkforce but really keen but
learning their craft.
30% of all my police officersare student officers.
So in and around the sort oftwo, two and a half year mark,
and whenever I come intopolicing I join big teams with
(40:28):
really experienced guys aroundproactive policing.
You know how to build a case,how to do a good stop and search
, community confidence, etcetera, et cetera.
So that sort of inexperiencedbut really keen workforce and
then the need to deliver reallygood quality investigations and
then have that confidence in thestreet that you're neither
over-aggressive but you don'tencourage at times conflict with
members of the public who liketo try it on with the police.
(40:51):
So there's a couple of thingscoming together there.
We've seen a real increase inassaults on police officers
recently in the UK, but inparticular in Staffordshire.
We've had real challenges aboutdelivering good quality
investigations consistently overtime.
And then we've had challengesbecause our cops are going
through this probationary periodand being in university on a
regular basis about putting outgood numbers every single day to
(41:11):
deal with the challenges thatwe face.
So there's probably a bit of ait's not a triangle of doom,
because I'm really optimistic.
In a few years time we'll havematured as an organization and
for me the silver lining isevery cop that joins
Staffordshire I get time withand they all join for pretty
much the same reason they wantto serve the public, they want
to stand in the gap, they wantto make a difference.
But it is hard yards at theminute for them, really hard
(41:31):
yards about learning their craft, getting their academic
qualifications and even justrecognizing that not every
member of the public loves thepolice.
That can be quite a shock forsome people.
So that's a learning curve.
And then talking about protest,because I think there's a
relevance locally, even before Italk a bit about my national
role.
You may not have picked up onit, but on the back of a really
tragic stabbing involving someyoung kids in a and actually in
(41:52):
a taylor swift dance school inliverpool, there was a lot of
misinformation indeeddisinformation being put out on
the internet about this beingdone by immigrants coming into
the uk.
Yes, and that sparked quite afew riots across major cities,
including stoke in my place andalso tamworth, which is also on
my patch as well.
Probably for the first time inmaybe 13 years in uk policing,
(42:13):
you had full-on serious,sustained riots and violence
against the police.
You know ripping up trees andcharging riot shields, throwing
petrol or pouring petrol andcops throwing bricks at police
officers and police dogs.
And you know, despite myexperience in northern ireland,
which was you went through ariot and you had a gun on your
hip in case it all got reallybad.
Over here you don't have that,so they were taking a huge
(42:34):
amount of abuse for a long timeuntil we got reinforcements.
So that's a dynamic, even in thelast couple of months, which
has created a huge amount ofpressure for cops in terms of
trying to balance the day joband dealing with crime and then
having to stand in the gapbetween local people, rioters,
violent individuals, criminalswho are wanting to set fire to a
hotel where immigrants arehoused for a whole raft of
(42:55):
different reasons.
So we haven't seen that sort oflevel of violence or disorder
in the UK for a long time.
So that's been a challenge forus.
But there's a differencebetween that and protest,
because in the UK the bigchallenges we face recently
around protest has generallybeen non-violent, what we call
non-violent direct action.
So climate activists blockingthe big motorways around London,
or a group called PalestineAction doing various things,
(43:18):
again to try and disruptparticular industries or
generate attention, or a groupcalled Just Stop Oil, which you
can probably imagine what theirethos is spraying paint over
landmarks and over expensivepieces of art, et cetera, et
cetera.
So whilst in no way acceptablegenerally speaking, it doesn't
step into the violence spacethat we've seen in the last
month, but very challenging forcops to deal with.
(43:39):
A really senior inspector ofpolicing about five years ago
said that policing protest isthe brain surgery of policing,
because you need to weigh upproportionality, you need to
decide when they intervene ornot.
You've got case law you need tointerpret.
You've got to make sure thatall your disclosure of evidence
is got right.
You've got to just carefullybalance things or you will end
(43:59):
up paying out money to peoplewho've been arrested wrongly
whenever people look at this inthe cold, hard light of day.
So real challenges aroundprotest policing, especially in
London.
It's a very political space, sothe previous government was
making laws on a pretty regularbasis around trying to clamp
down on protests and policingthem, was constantly having to
train and retrain and adjust itstactics for how it responds to
(44:20):
that.
But look you guys, 2020 was areally challenging year for
policing.
In the States it was.
You're in the teeth of apresidential election and who
knows what that might bring interms of dynamics and tensions
and protest as well.
So we watch what's happening inyour world to pick up the
learning.
I would much rather learnvicariously, steve, than have to
learn ourselves.
Steve Morreale (44:37):
Well, you know it's interesting.
Well, one of the things thatstrikes me too is that police
officers, no matter where, arevery often caught in the middle,
as you just said.
And if you think about thosewho are on side in our country
and maybe in your country, onthe Israeli side and on the
Palestinian side, you're stuckin the middle and you're trying
to allow them.
So that doesn't get out of handthe ability to have free speech
and protest, as long as it'snot violent and then very often
(45:00):
you become the target because ofthe uniform, and that's a very
difficult position to find yourpeople in.
For sure, yeah.
Chris Noble (45:06):
And policing has got to be accountable, it's got
to be transparent and there's alot of host events, host
protests, inspections,complaints go in, and so you've
got a lot of cops who are reallynervous on the front line
making decisions.
And we don't just see it inprotest.
We've seen it in armed policingin the last sort of couple of
years as well, where people aredoing their very best, really
challenging environment.
It's not the settledenvironment of a courtroom where
(45:26):
they're trying to make snapdecisions.
It could be use of force, itcould be use of legislation,
could be locking people up andthen in slower time they're
having their decisions pulledapart and it could be career
threatening.
They could be demoted in rank,they could have their name
plastered all over the paper.
So there's a really significantconversation taking place at
the minute between police chiefsand politicians about what we
call an accountability review,about what is the right balance
(45:46):
between holding police toaccount and giving cops the
confidence that they can makehonest, fair and decent
decisions at the time withouthaving them picked apart, with
someone applying 20-20 vision tothem.
So I don't know if that's asimilar challenge in the States
or in North America, but that issomething that is very
challenging in the protestenvironment, but also whenever,
sadly, police officers then haveto use lethal force against
(46:08):
people as well.
Steve Morreale (46:09):
Yes, well, unfortunately, this conversation
has flowed so easily and sowell that we're about running
out of time, so I want to winddown and give you a few
opportunities to answer somequestions and have the last word
.
We're talking with Chris Nobleand he is in Staffordshire, uk.
He's the chief constable, so ifyou had the chance to talk to
(46:30):
somebody who is no longer withus to gain some insight and
knowledge, who might that aroundpolicing or life more generally
it's entirely up to youdealer's choice, as they say
that is a good question.
Chris Noble (46:45):
That is a good question.
There was a police officer whowas in northern ireland who
sadly passed away to a guycalled colin cramporn and you
know, a really wise leader, areally gentle guy but incredibly
effective in terms of what hedid.
And I only had the opportunityto meet him a couple of times as
part of the sort of progressionof the change process in
Northern Ireland, and I thinkit's very rarely you find a
senior leader who carries a realair of authority because of
(47:08):
their humility, and he wassomeone who, just for me, had
that sweet spot in terms of anincredibly capable leader having
authority about him, but was agentle, compassionate, humble
leader.
And I didn't get a huge amountof time to be around him or
speak to him, but I would haveloved just to get a sense from
him as to how he came throughwhat would have been a very
command and control era ofpolicing.
How did you survive with thatleadership style whenever a lot
(47:31):
of the other senior leadersaround you had something that
was very, very different?
Because as I've gone through mycareer, I've always tried to
learn not from the bad examplesof leadership but those people
who just instinctively I justrespected as senior leaders and
he was one of those, but sadlyhe was taken I think he was in
his 40s whenever we lost him butdidn't really get a chance to
sort of download his experience.
And I think I would find thatvaluable as a relatively young
(47:53):
chief constable, still learningmy craft and knowing how you
strike that balance betweenbeing authoritative but then
sometimes just knowing when toshut up, be gracious with people
as well as firm.
Steve Morreale (48:02):
This has been a wonderful and wide ranging
conversation.
It seems to me that you are athought leader and I really
appreciate being with you andgetting your feedback and
hearing your perspective.
Chris, as we get ready to leave, I'd like to know how you feel
about policing.
Do you have hope for the?
Chris Noble (48:20):
future Absolutely and hope for now as well,
because, well, first of all, thejob we do is like no other, I
think.
For me, it's the highest formof community service actually
being a police officer, a memberof police staff, and in some
ways.
Sadly, I don't think the policeare ever going to be made
redundant.
As an organization, I thinkwe're always going to have to
deal with challenges andfrictions and fallouts and
tensions in society.
So I think there is a job forlife and perpetuity for police
(48:42):
officers.
So there's a bit of hope there,steve, in terms of pay packets.
But, more seriously, I thinkpeople are still joining
policing 99% of the time for theright reasons, and I think
they're getting the chance tomake a difference.
And I also think that policeleaders now are much more tuned
on to not just caring aboutvictims and communities, but
their own staff and lookingafter them, thinking about
resilience, thinking aboutwellbeing, the right balance
(49:04):
between being inclusive as anemployer and then needing to
deliver a service for the public.
So I think that really clearfocus on the public people
joining for the right reasonsand I think now finally seeing
the importance of treating ourpeople with respect and well, I
see that coming together.
But it will be hard yards goingforwards because the world we
deal with is not going to becomemore simple and there's going
to be increasing demand onpolicing.
(49:26):
So I think we just continue toneed the support of the people
who write the laws that we allwork to and who also hold
policing to account that it'sfair and it's reasonable and the
policing is giving a chance tosucceed.
Steve Morreale (49:36):
What a great way to end and I do appreciate it.
We've been talking to ChrisNoble he's the Chief
Superintendent of theStaffordshire UK Police Service
and I really appreciate yourperspective and your time and
your honesty and humility andyet the challenges you faced and
how you have worked with peopleto A give them hope and, B to
provide better service.
So thank you very much.
As you go into your weekend, Iwish you the best of luck.
(49:57):
Thank you for your time.
I hope to see you in Bostonquite soon.
Cheers, Steve.
Thank you.
Well, that's it.
Another episode of the Cop Talkpodcast is in the can.
Thank you so much for listening.
Stay safe and reach out.
If you can Remember, peoplefrom 86 countries and almost
3,000 cities and towns acrossthe globe have been listening.
So if you like what you hear,spread the word.
(50:18):
Thanks, have a good day.
Intro/Outro (50:21):
Thanks for listening to The Cop Doc Podcast
with Dr.
Steve Morreale.
Steve is a retired lawenforcement practitioner and
manager, turned academic andscholar from Worcester State
University.
Please tune into The Cop DocPodcast for regular episodes of
interviews with thought leadersin policing.
Welcome to The CopDoc Podcast.
This podcast explores policeleadership issues and innovative
ideas.
The CopDoc shares thoughts andideas as he talks with leaders
in policing communities,academia and other government
agencies.
And now please join Dr SteveMorreale and industry thought
(00:24):
leaders as they share theirinsights and experience on The
CopDoc Podcast.
Steve Morreale (00:32):
Hi again everybody, Steve Morreale,
coming to you from Boston,Massachusetts, and today we have
the opportunity to cross thepond and we're talking to a
colleague, a new friend.
He is the chief constable inStaffordshire Police Service in
the UK.
Chris Noble Chris, how are youon this Friday?
I am very well, very kind tocatch my attention.
(01:05):
That's unique, that's unusual.
I'm glad that person is sharingthat, because so many of your
colleagues kind of stay tothemselves.
They don't want to share,they're afraid of being
ridiculed, and certainly, thereare things that I write that
people will say you're just anapologist for the police.
So thank you very much.
I want to say to those who arelistening too that when I
(01:29):
reached out for Chris, we justhad a sort of an introductory
conversation and the first thingthat I said I am trying to
figure out is whether or notyour English is understandable.
And I find out in talking toyou, Chris, that you are
speaking the Queen's English andI love to have your perspective
.
Chris Noble (01:40):
So thank you, it's a pleasure and of course, I'm
speaking the King's English, Ohbit of undefined peculiar
accent, but we'll maybe come tothat as we chat.
Steve Morreale (01:49):
I I think that's great.
Let's talk about how longyou've been in policing where
you're from I know that you area transplant within the UK and
tell us about where you've beenand where you are now, and then
describe the area that you areresponsible for policing.
Chris Noble (02:03):
Okay.
So yeah, it's a bit of a sortof an interesting journey, steve
.
I was born and bred in Ireland,in the north of Ireland.
My dad was a bank manager byday and a part-time reserve cop
by night, and in the sort of 70sand 80s in Northern Ireland
that was a pretty brutalexperience.
So he was dealing with checksthrough the day and, sadly and
traumatically, he was at timespicking up body parts in the
(02:23):
evening.
So from a really young age Ihad a dad who was hugely
committed to work and his family, but then maybe three, four
nights a week I didn't see himin the evenings because he was
policing and trying to keeppeople safe and I wouldn't say
there was any one moment in timeI thought I want to be my dad,
I want to do what my dad's done,but that's got to be latent in
your own experience and memoryas a kid.
So growing up, I'd always beeninterested in law.
(02:44):
I wanted to be a barrister, afancy arguing for a living and
getting well paid.
But I pretty quickly realizedas I went through law school I
was probably going to end updoing, you know, conveyancing,
family law, divorce law, tax law, which is not the most
inspiring thing to have andapologies if any of your
listeners are specializing inthat field and policing came up
as a really good opportunity fora career.
(03:06):
So did my law degree and thenjoined as a standard entrant in
Northern Ireland, which was thenthe Royal Ulster Constabulary.
And that was what late 96 andstill a really challenging
environment to police, albeitnot the absolute heat of the
troubles.
But at least one of the guyswho I joined with, sadly, was
killed within a bit 12 months byterrorists in a bar in Belfast,
(03:26):
simply targeted because he wasa cop.
So even though it wasn't theworst of times, it definitely
wasn't the best of times to joinpolicing in Northern Ireland.
Steve Morreale (03:34):
RUC, of course, has quite a history and at one
point in time, with the PatentCommission, we saw a change to
PSNI, and you must have been inthe midst of that.
Is that correct?
Changing uniforms, changing a
Chris Noble (03:46):
name.
I joined in 96.
T he Patten Commission, andthen there's some pretty key
sort of, you know, American copsin the middle of that.
Intro/Outro (03:53):
Kathleen O'Toole from Boston was absolutely
fundamental to those changes.
Chris Noble (03:58):
So it was a difficult time, because I'm not
sure there has been a changeproject around policing like
that anywhere in the world or Ihaven't seen one because pretty
much everything changed the nameof the organization, so the
title of royal ulsterconstabulary was at least put
into the background, if notpretty much lost completely for
a lot of people.
The symbols which contained thecrown changed, the uniform
(04:18):
changed, the arrangements aroundmanagement changed, composition
and policing changed.
So for example, whenever Ijoined, 92 of cops in Northern
Ireland were Protestant, 8% wereCatholic and there was a rule
brought in that from every 100cops you recruit, 50 have to be
Catholic, 50 come from anotherbackground.
So in the course of maybe whatseven, eight years you moved to
maybe 32% of police officersbeing Catholic, they couldn't
(04:41):
yet meet the 50%, the 50-50,right.
No, and I think the target wasto try and get it to a critical
mass which was in and aroundthat 30%.
And it slowed down a bit, steve, recently for lots of different
reasons.
But you know, quadruplingrepresentation, you know, if
that was members of the blackcommunity or the gay community
or whatever, that would be ahuge change.
So it was real progress.
But it's an ongoing challengearound representation.
(05:03):
So really fundamental change,and probably the hardest change
of all, was about the symbols ofthe organization, the name of
the organization, the badge ofthe organization, because that's
what people got veryemotionally attached to and some
people felt that policing maybewas being punished or maybe
scapegoated because this waspart of a wider peace process.
But I remember the chiefconstable at the time, a guy
(05:23):
called Ronnie Flanagan, reallyinspirational, charismatic
leader, but clearly RUC throughand through, and his language
was if the pain in policing isworth it for gain in wider
society, well then, this ischange that we should embrace
and ultimately the organizationdid embrace it.
But it's an interesting onewhenever you look back and how,
on the one hand, you remembercolleagues who've been killed in
the Troubles, as we call theconflict in Northern Ireland,
(05:46):
but on the other hand, howpolicing needs to keep being
progressive and keep beinginclusive in terms of what it
does.
So, yeah, really challenging inthe late 90s, early 2000s.
Steve Morreale (05:55):
So you were with RUC later to become PSNI and
you know that I interviewed thecurrent chief constable, of
which you are the chiefconstable in Staffordshire,
simon Byrne, and it wasinteresting because he used the
term you know.
You got to set your stall and Ihad no idea what the hell he
was talking about.
I do now for certain it was oneof colloquially it was.
I don't even know how to saythat.
It was one of those termsPhrases, steve.
(06:18):
Yes, yes yes, yes, okay, that'spretty bad, but that I had never
heard.
But it made an awful lot ofsense.
And so how long were you at RUClater to become PSNI, and what
did you do there?
In other words, I presume, inorder to be a chief constable in
another organization, you hadto climb the ladder and UK
policing up until recently.
Chris Noble (06:38):
Everybody joins up the frontline, everyone's a
constable, everyone starts inresponse policing, which is your
blue lights.
Get the things as quickly asyou can deal with what's in
front of you.
So I started in exactly thesame way and then, after about
four years, moved into thatfirst line of supervision Again,
uk terminology.
As a sergeant I went to work ina police station which at that
stage was one of the most bombedpolice stations in Europe, and
(07:00):
on occasions you had to bebussed in an armoured Land Rover
.
On other occasions you coulddrive your vehicle in but it had
nets over the top of thestation because regularly some
of the local young people wouldhave taken to stoning the cars
in the station.
So it was an interesting placenot just to learn your craft as
a supervisor.
But how do you strike thebalance between keeping your
cops safe from people who wantedto kill them?
Because we drove about inarmoured vehicles?
(07:20):
We had at that stage militarysupport everywhere we went, but
on the other hand you shouldstill be serving the community
and keeping them safe.
So for a long time and there'sstill an element of that in
Northern Ireland I grew up beingreally thoughtful about my own
personal safety on and off duty,so my kids for a long time
didn't even know what I did.
Steve Morreale (07:36):
But on the other hand you join policing to help
people and that balancing of twoyou know, quite competing
concepts, I think caused a hugeamount of trauma and stress to
police officers over the yearsin Northern Ireland.
Well, I mean, when you'reconstantly under attack or
you're fearing that somebody,just because of the uniform, is
out for you, that's a verydifficult situation to find
yourself in.
Chris Noble (07:56):
Yeah, that sort of constant level of vigilance and
agitation.
You know there's very fewoccupations, apart from maybe
the and wartime, have that levelof stress on and off duty and
(08:22):
in fact actually probably Idon't know maybe 30%.
Peace is pretty well embeddedin Northern Ireland.
Runs a soccer club, footballclub, and his son was there, a
13 year old boy.
They'd finished the game, hewas coming out, he was putting
soccer balls, footballs in theback of his car and he was shot
three times in the back, threetimes in the front, in front of
his boy.
Now somehow he survived.
So, as I said before, thingshave improved in Northern
(08:50):
Ireland.
It's a very different place topolice and live in, but there's
still an element that see policeofficers as a legitimate target
.
So even now you've got policeofficers still under real
pressure, real trauma, andmental health is still probably
one of the biggest challengesfor the police service of
Northern Ireland at the minutein terms of the numbers of
officers they have strugglingwith.
Steve Morreale (09:03):
Well, it's interesting because, as I was
traveling back and forth toEurope on a plane, I was able to
watch.
I think it's called Blue Light.
Is that the name of the show?
There's a show that is based inBelfast.
Yes, it is.
It is and it's quiteinteresting when you roll up you
better have more than one ortwo people that you're going to
have to have some backup to kindof keep the crowd back.
And that leads us, of course,to discussions later on today
(09:23):
about demonstrations and howpolice are kind of caught in the
middle, sometimes on twoopposing sides.
But let's talk about how youended up leaving Northern
Ireland to go to basically themainland, the UK, england.
Chris Noble (09:36):
I served 21 years in Northern Ireland policing
from a whole range of roles.
I was part of that patentchange team I think I'm the only
serving cop left, actually, whowas part of that team so that
was a really challenging timefor the organization, but
fascinating to be involved in.
I did a lot of frontline rolesin local policing, as we call it
.
I was in specialisms like closeprotection.
I was in the change andperformance and strategy units.
(09:57):
So lots of different roles, butthere comes a point whenever
actually there's a new challengeand was personal reasons,
professional reasons, forlooking for a new challenge, and
I initially moved across inoctober 2017 to a place called
humberside and the big city inthat force is called hull or
kingston upon hull.
Actually, it's quite a historyaround royalty and conflict,
(10:17):
very deprived core city,post-industrial real challenges
around drugs, deprivation, kidsin care, and I went over over
there to be the head ofspecialist crime, forced contact
, which is where you take allthe calls, and now all the
digital contact from the public,criminal justice around your
investigations, and thenspecialist ops guns, dogs, roads
, policing all that good stuff.
So, yeah, real learning curve.
(10:38):
Because Northern Ireland eventhough 85%, I think it'd be in a
cop translates including copscrossing the pond, as you call
it as well, but the 15% can bereally challenging around the
legal framework, the culture,the busyness, the partnerships
that exist as well.
So it was a steep learningcurve for me, but no regrets at
all professionally about makingthe move.
It stretched me at a key timewhenever probably I was becoming
(10:59):
a little bit complacent.
Steve Morreale (11:02):
Can I interrupt you for a second, little bit
complacent, can I interrupt youfor a second?
What's important for me tounderstand is leaving Northern
Ireland and coming to a newplace.
Policing is the same but it'sdifferent, and so, as you adjust
to a new culture, here's anoutsider, in essence, even
though you're a member of the UKcoming in.
Those who work within theCommonwealth States and I
understand Shauna Coxon, forexample, is over down.
(11:24):
Well, drew, the commissionerfor Ireland, is from PSNI and
Shauna Coxon is from the TorontoPolice Service and she's in the
number two or three positionand you're doing the same thing.
What was the receptivity of thepeople working?
As curious as you were abouthow it was being done in the UK,
I'm sure they're curious aboutwhat you bring.
Tell me how you navigated that.
Chris Noble (11:46):
Yeah, and there's a lot of learning from me coming
into Humberside and my journeyinto Staffordshire as a chief as
well, so I was really reallycareful, steve, not to keep
using the P word.
I'm talking about PSNI becauseit just-.
Steve Morreale (11:57):
This is the way we did it.
I know, I know that's thequickest way to piss people off,
like I don't give a shit whatthe PSNI did.
This is Humberside.
Chris Noble (12:04):
Exactly, yes, exactly.
So I tried to be emotionallyintelligent about even if I was
seeing something really strangeand I've seen where it's been
done better Actually encouragingsomeone to go and see that for
themselves can be reallypowerful, as opposed to just
dropping it on them and imposingit, and then that breeds a
resentment.
But at the time, humberside youknow great force in terms of
the officers and staff in there,but it was the worst performing
(12:25):
force in the country, reallypoor clear-up rates for crime,
weren't getting to thingsquickly, weren't answering the
sort of triple nine system overhere which is your emergency
calls, the lowest morale in thecountry as well, and really
underpowered in terms of numbersof cops at that stage as well.
So in some ways that helpedbecause actually the force was
ready for help.
I think it had got to a pointthat it had some brilliant
(12:46):
leaders inside but it neededfresh thinking, fresh
experiences and it wanted peopleas well to get out on the front
line, and across my career Ihave loved walking the ground.
Whether it be planning for bigparades and protests, whether it
be dealing with the aftermathof a terrorist attack or a
serious investigation or acommunity engagement event, I
love genuinely getting out onthe boat.
My biggest frustration as achief is I've got to be behind a
(13:07):
desk and I've got to bestrategic.
So even now, the discipline ofgetting out isn't a discipline
for me, it's a pleasure.
So, coming to Humberside, Idon't think they were used to
that sort of level of leadershipand at the start they were
nervous, you know why are youhere?
Steve Morreale (13:20):
You checking up on me.
Have you got law?
Yes, so.
Chris Noble (13:24):
I think over time they do respect that and
whenever they realize you're notthere just to catch them out,
you're interested in the detail.
You want to be where they are,you want to solve the problems,
you want a reality check.
Steve Morreale (13:33):
Well, you want to hear from them, right?
Chris Noble (13:35):
Because that's not how you police I didn't mean to
cut you off again, but I thinkby listening did that not make
you, or help you, understandwhat was going on and then
identify ways that could beimproved.
Yeah, because the bottom lineis, as a senior cop, I no longer
have a clue what is going on inthe frontline.
Well, that's quite obvious.
(13:56):
The further up the line you goin policing, the more stuff gets
sifted and it's amazing whatpeople can polish because they
don't want the bosses to hearbad news.
My sort of style of leadershipand I'll maybe talk about it in
terms of staffature is get onthe front line, talk to staff,
have a conversation Doesn't meanyou need to be a populist,
because sometimes you've got topush back the frontline staff.
Because I've been there.
Sometimes you can talk up thebad stuff, ignore the stuff that
(14:18):
works, but people respect youbeing there.
They respect you gettinginvolved in a debate with them,
that you don't rely on what's onyour shoulders in terms of rank
just to tell them what to do.
And the people who know the jobare the people on the front
line.
They know why it's not workingand they've got a pretty good
idea about what could work aswell no-transcript, but for
(14:53):
those who are on this side, or,believe me, I just, chris.
Steve Morreale (14:57):
I just checked the stats for the podcast and I
couldn't be more pleased.
I think you're going to be a139th interview.
This podcast is being listenedto in 86 different countries and
2,900 different cities, whichjust blows my mind.
You talked about digitalcontent or, excuse me, you said
digital contact.
Can you explain that?
(15:17):
I think I understand, but Ithink it's important because
we're not there in the UnitedStates.
Chris Noble (15:22):
Yeah, so in probably a pretty typical
English constabulary or policeforce, the most common way now
that people contact the police,whether it be in an emergency or
in slower time, is over thephone.
But we've now got a lot ofdigital channels or ways of
contacting the police.
You know live chat, which ispretty ubiquitous now if you're
dealing with Amazon or Microsoftor Apple or whatever.
We've got something calledsingle online home, where you go
(15:43):
onto a web page, you type yourdetails in.
We will respond to you, if notquite in lifetime, very closely,
clearly.
You've got the email ways ofentering policing.
A lot of police forces areusing sort of AI technologies to
dynamically respond to querieswithout necessarily needing a
human being, unless that'swhat's wanted.
You've got something calledrapid video review, which is
(16:05):
where you're maybe dealing witha victim who's suffered abuse of
some kind and, as opposed to aninitial deployment, you're able
to speak to them securely andsafely on video screens it's
like a telehealth and make anassessment of what they need
what can help?
Exactly Like telehealth.
Exactly the same concept.
So all these different channelsare ways of engaging with the
public.
That is now sort of baked intothe UK policing model, because a
lot of police stations haveclosed, very often because of
(16:28):
financial challenges, but alsobecause people are just not
coming into stations anymore.
They want to pick up a phone orsend you an email or deal with
live chat.
You know that's what satisfiestheir needs.
Steve Morreale (16:37):
Well, that's quite interesting.
I would assume that, as youmoved in that direction, that
one of the things was manpower,but also in terms of being
responsive more responsivebecause you can be responsive.
You can't always send a carbecause you've only got five or
10 or 12, but you've got theability to react to them and
respond to them Okay.
So that had to be a change inculture in your career.
(16:58):
That fair.
Chris Noble (16:59):
Yeah, whenever I joined Steve, mobile phones
weren't really in play, or ifthey were, you know they
probably weighed about 10kilograms.
We were writing our reportsright, not typing them.
Go ahead, yeah, so a big change.
I think it's fair to say that alot of the contact centers, as
we call them, are force contactcenters or command centers.
It's all the same concept whenall these calls and contacts
(17:19):
come in.
They are really struggling atthe minute because a lot of
research and studies have beendone that said that about 29 to
30% of all those calls, allthose contacts, are about
policing and crime.
70% are not.
It could be mental healthissues, it could be labor
disputes, it could be litteringat the side of a road, it could
be anything but stuff wherepolicing should not be the lead
(17:40):
agency.
But we're having to manage thatlevel of contact and demand and
expectation coming in and thatis one of the biggest challenges
in UK policing today.
Steve Morreale (17:48):
Chris, one of the things I'm curious about is
the training and I understand,at least from my experience in
Europe, that you have asignificantly long-term
probation period, and I'mcurious about that.
So you could could explain itfrom your perspective and, most
importantly, about the trainingthat you receive as a high
(18:10):
ranking officer as you climb theranks.
Talk about that experience.
Chris Noble (18:14):
So for people joining policing, there's
different routes in the policingnowadays and we've got a
college of policing which coversall of the UK which sets the
standards and defines theseentry routes.
Probably about five or sixyears ago, supported by a guy
called Peter Nayrude I'm notsure if you've spoken to Peter
but and other colleagues broughtthe concept of academic
accreditation into policing.
So a lot of my cops joining nowdon't just have to learn their
(18:36):
craft on the streets for two orthree years in terms of their
probation period, but they'realso having to secure a degree
through university Criminologyand associated sort of policing
disciplines as well.
So for most people joiningpolice now there's a three-year
probation period.
They've got to satisfy me.
They're an operationally signedcop, their standards are at the
highest level and they'reachieving their academic
requirements.
(18:56):
It's only now we're startingjust to adjust that a little bit
, removing or adding anotherentry route in where you don't
need to do the degree function,because we were missing out on
people maybe from a militarybackground or who had no
interest in the academic route.
So it's probably now, I think,a better offer for people
joining.
But those first two or threeyears a lot of pressure, really
well-defined training, highexpectations, and you're not set
(19:17):
up to pass automatically.
You have to work hard to qualify, come out of your probation and
then be a fully substantive copall the way from that initial
probationary training up to whatthey call executive training,
which is the sort of chiefofficer tier of which then I'm
chief constable level andleadership training you get
(19:40):
albeit you can tap into trainingaround public order, firearms
and a whole range of operationaldisciplines, including
investigation ones.
So not a huge amount, steve, insummary, but I'm a big believer
in you.
Go and find your own CPD.
You know there's a CharteredManagement Institute in the UK.
There's an Institute ofDirectors.
I've been on sort of a programcalled LINCT, which is about
(20:01):
counterterrorism which spans US,uk, australia, new Zealand.
So I think there is aresponsibility on Policing UK
and the College of Policing toprovide a core of courses.
But I still see the mainresponsibility for my
development now sitting withmyself and tapping into partners
and other parts of governmentto just make sure I've got the
right blend of operational andbusiness skills.
Steve Morreale (20:20):
It seems like you are a member of the
International Association ofChiefs of Police and you said
you may be in Boston, and ifthat's the case, you'll be in my
hometown and I hope to see youthere in October.
But one of the questions Iwould ask is, well, what we
haven't done, been told aboutthe transition Humberside to
Staffordshire, when and how andwhy did that happen?
Chris Noble (20:39):
Yeah.
So I joined Humberside inOctober 17 and ultimately then
joined Staffordshire in December2021.
So four years in Humbersidereally steep learning curve,
really strong improvementjourney, thanks to the team I
was a part of, and it's now gonefrom being the worst force in
the country to now beingrecognized in the last 12 months
as the very best.
(21:00):
So I learned a huge amount fromthat in terms of how do you
strike the balance between, as asenior leader, a really strong
grip on the things that matterand dragging people up by their
boot laces but, on the otherhand, giving people a bit of
space to breathe, and thatwhenever you leave an
organization, success is thatother people make it better than
it was, you know, whenever youwere there.
So for me, I learned a lot inHumberside and I'd never
initially thought of myself asgoing straight to chief
(21:22):
constable level, but I had a lotof friends in Staffordshire and
they said look, you know whatyou're experiencing in
Humberside, the type ofleadership style that you value.
We think is right forStaffordshire.
We want to go back to a reallycommunity-based model of
policing.
We need some appropriate gripagain around performance.
We need to do change andtransformation with our staff as
opposed to to them.
We need to rebuildrelationships with our partners.
We need to do the basics wellabout technology and running
(21:46):
policing.
So I got a real warmth fromstaff that they would be open to
an outsider, or a blow-in as Icall myself.
A blow-in, you say Stepping intoStaffordshire, a blow-in.
Steve Morreale (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, look what just blew in now, right.
Chris Noble (22:00):
Go ahead Exactly.
Well.
You used the analogy earlier onabout I think it was a
transplant.
Yeah, for me, there's been noorgan rejection.
I have to say, in terms ofcoming into staff, the staff
have been superb and but beforeI applied, I probably spoke to
about 100 110 different peopleto say what is going on in the
force.
They were either partners, theywere retired or serving cops
(22:20):
and they just gave.
They wrote the presentationthat I gave at my interview for
me in terms of this is where weare, this is where we want to be
and this is how we want to doit.
So the things that I was saying, I was pretty much then giving
staff back what they had told me.
So the big changes we made inthe first 18 months were all
things that came from thefrontline, because they were
frustrated with what washappening and they had actually
(22:41):
gone to the time of not justcomplaining, because cops hate
two things, don't they?
You know, change and status quo.
But you know, the guys I wasworking with and the girls I was
working with in Staffordshireactually said, not, just, it's
not working, boss.
They said and this is what youshould do.
So that transition was made alot easier because the staff
were up for it, they had apassion.
They were frustrated.
I think the biggest critics ofpolicing work in policing.
(23:02):
It's not on social media, it'snot in the media, it's not
politics, it's the people whoknow what policing could be.
So I find the workforceabsolutely outstanding and a
really strong core of localleadership, supported by me,
bringing in external people withreal skills and experience,
which is what the force neededat the time to keep improving
(23:23):
needed at the time to keepimproving.
Steve Morreale (23:24):
Did that help having a few of your own people
or people that you felt hadexperience and were loyal and
had sort of a track record, toprovide the impetus to implement
ideas, to provide thelogistical ideas to try to move
the?
Chris Noble (23:34):
department forward.
I think the people I brought infrom other forces or agencies I
didn't really know that well.
I'd done my homework aroundthem.
But I think what I did knowfrom sort of triangulating their
career was the type ofleadership they brought, which
was the right balance aboutgetting stuff done but treating
people as human beings and withrespect.
And I was sort of recruiting onleadership values, leadership
approach as well as justcredibility that they've moved
(23:57):
the dial where they were before.
So I didn't know themparticularly well but I brought
in people who had done myresearch on and done due
diligence on, so I was prettycomfortable.
But I would say really early on, probably because I'd taken so
much time to speak to staff, Ibuilt up a network of well, you
probably not know this term CHIS, so covert human intelligence
sources.
It's the people you recruitoutside policing to tell you
(24:19):
about where the latest sort ofdrug deal is going to go down or
something like that.
Steve Morreale (24:24):
You had your own snitches.
Chris Noble (24:27):
I have my own network within the force.
This isn't quite working theway you expect.
You might want to come out andpatrol and have a look at this,
so you've got to be careful youdon't undermine management
around that and in particularmiddle management.
But you need to know the rightquestions to ask, and the way of
doing that is having a networkof people who are working on
your front lines, wherever theyare.
Policing's job is too importantto take somebody else's word
(24:49):
for it.
Steve Morreale (24:49):
So we're talking with Chris Noble.
He is the chief constable inStaffordshire, uk, the police
service.
He's actually talking to mefrom his vehicle because for
some reason I suppose fornetwork security he couldn't
dial into Zoom except from hiscell phone.
So thank you for that.
Let's ask a question.
First of all, tell us a littlemore about the current
(25:10):
organization, how big it is,what's your Staffordshire Police
Service is responsible for, thepopulation is, and where it is.
Chris Noble (25:16):
Yeah.
So UK policing really, reallyquickly.
Its biggest strength is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
Its biggest strength is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
Its biggest challenge is it'sreally local there's 43 police
forces.
So you've got 43 chiefconstables.
If you want to change policy oradjust an approach, on
occasions it can be a little bitlike herding cats.
So that concept of operationalindependence is really important
(25:37):
in UK policing.
That police geography.
You own a county or you own acity like London and as the
chief or the commissioner, as itis in London, you own that
patch and you make the decisionsaround it.
So that's the sort of policingDNA.
But there's also really goodsort of national networks.
I've talked about the Collegeof Policing which sets standards
around training, whichaccredits forces in terms of
what they do around firearms orpublic order.
(25:59):
There's police chief leads forcertain thematic areas.
So I'm the lead for how wepolice protest.
Other colleagues would be thelead for criminal justice and
how we investigate crimes ordiversity and inclusion,
whatever it would be.
So you're a local chief by daybut then you sort of take on
national responsibilities overthe course of the year as well,
and Staffordshire is, of the 43forces, about number 21 or 22,.
(26:21):
It is bang in the middle.
So it's got about maybe 2,100police officers, maybe about
1,700 police staff.
We've got special constabularyof about 150, and we've got
police community supportofficers who work in local
neighbourhoods and wards anddistricts as well.
So the overall family andstaffature is probably in and
around.
I would have thought maybenearly 4,500, 4,300 cops, which
(26:45):
is, as I say, bang in the middleof the size of police forces in
the UK.
Steve Morreale (26:48):
How many people reside in your jurisdiction?
Chris Noble (26:51):
Probably about maybe just over 1 million, maybe
about 1.2 million people, andobviously then you've got
movement in and across theborder and the big city or
conurbation near me isBirmingham, so a lot of people
commuting into Birmingham andthen, sadly, a few
ne'er-do-wells or criminalswhatever we are allowed to call
them these days also come acrossfrom Birmingham as well in
(27:12):
terms of some of the challengesaround car crime and, less
regularly, gun crime.
But a really safe county, gotchallenges around deprivation,
around what we call safeguardingin the UK in terms of people
who are subject to abuse fromtheir partners or other people,
but overall a really safe placeto live.
And whilst it's not my job tobe the tourist industry, if you
want to visit a beautiful countyin England, come to
(27:33):
Staffordshire and I'll talk,maybe a little bit, if you give
me a chance, about somewherecalled the National Memorial
Arboretum as a really specialplace for police officers in
particular to come to visit.
So I think I shared a videowith you a while ago, steve,
about it.
But we've got, as I've just said, we've got something called the
National Memorial Arboretum inthe heart of Staffordshire which
has been in place now probablyfor about 10 years and, as it
sort of hints out in the title.
(27:54):
It's a place of memories andreflection, so dominated
probably by the military storiesand by the conflicts over the
years that the UK has beeninvolved in.
But there's also elements inthere around COVID about those
who were shot for deserting.
I think there's quite a fewareas around sort of US and
Canadian colleagues as wellwho've lost their lives as well,
and there's a couple of reallyspecial places in there around
(28:16):
policing, so a really impressivememorial about UK policing and
colleagues we've lost.
There's a place and a gardenthat recognises the sacrifice of
the Royal Austro-Constabularyand then another place as well
for the police, so a reallyspecial place.
Steve Morreale (28:28):
That must be special for you.
Chris Noble (28:29):
That must be very special for you.
It is.
It's a privilege to have it onour patch and we've got a lot of
royal visits and a lot ofdignitaries come to visit as
well that we look after whenthey're on our patch.
But it's a beautiful place justto go every now and again and
just walk through and reflect.
And whilst policing is modernand progressive and of course,
we're constantly moving on interms of what we do, I think
it's really important and it'smaybe my upbringing in Northern
(28:50):
Ireland that you never forgetwhat's gone before in terms of
that sacrifice and rememberingthe memories of people who've
given everything for policing.
So it's a powerful place aswell as a place that we're proud
to police and look after.
That's great.
Steve Morreale (29:06):
By the way, we're talking to Chris Noble
from Staffordshire, the chiefconstable from Staffordshire
Police Service.
I'm curious to ask you a fewquestions regarding leadership
and your approach to leadership.
I think you've intimated agreat deal about trying to press
the flesh, be on the front line, understand what's going on,
instead of hearing it in theivory tower, experiencing it,
seeing it, asking people who areon the front line what's going
on, how's it going, providingsupport.
(29:26):
I think that's big.
But what I'm curious about isyou've got a group of presume we
call them command staff peoplewho are high ranking executive
many years ago and the evolutionof meetings now and how you
(29:48):
choose to run them to encouragefeedback rather than being top
down.
But to understand, tell me yourapproach, what's your command
staff meeting like?
Chris Noble (29:56):
So being brought up in the Royal Australian
Constabulary.
It was a very security focused,very militaristic organization.
So being in a meeting as ayoung cop and then even moving
up through the ranks Well,number one there probably been a
meeting before the meetingwhere it was all decided by the
very senior people.
So it was a bit of a charade onoccasions and a bit of for show
.
But secondly, it didn't promotea huge amount of either
(30:17):
conversation, let alonedivergence of views, and
challenge just didn't reallyhappen.
It was just very rank, veryhierarchically based and, don't
get me wrong, you know, commandcan be important in policing but
it's probably two to threepercent of the day job in terms
of just telling people to dothis and using your rank and
authority to short circuitdecision making.
So sometimes it's easier, Ithink, whenever you're growing
(30:38):
up as a leader, to almost definehow you lead, how you make
decisions, how you run your ownteams and meetings, by what
you've seen not working in thepast.
So for me, you know, whilstultimately as the chief I've got
to own the big decisions in theorganization and I've got to
take responsibility for them, Ithink you're a fool if you think
you're the most intelligent orknowledgeable person in the
organization and I'm prettyconfident I am.
(30:59):
So, recruiting the right people,bringing them in as senior
leaders, having practitioners inthe key decision-making
meetings One of my keychallenges to my staff whenever
they bring me a new policy,let's say, about how we deal
with high-risk missing people.
You know, a 12-year-old kidgoes missing or an older adult
with Alzheimer's goes missing.
We grade those normally ashigh-risk missing people.
Okay, well, let's build apolicy around that.
(31:20):
But you tell me, before we dothis as a command team, have you
spoken to the detective who'sgoing to own that policy
tomorrow?
Have you spoken to thefrontline cop who's got to
complete the 30 box checklistthat you've now put in place to
cover the organization'sbackside whenever the inspection
body comes back in?
So for me, ultimately, seniorleaders are there to earn their
money and make decisions and bedecisive, but the way they get
(31:43):
there is critically importantand you need to understand not
just the problem you're tryingto solve.
I'm very ready to seniorleaders really understand the
root causes of why there's aproblem.
And then, secondly, instead ofjust giving a policy or decision
to staff, you know, if needs be, give them some parameters and
ask them to break it, or askthem what would you do and
involve them in thedecisionmaking process, as
opposed to the implementationprocess on its own.
(32:04):
How?
Steve Morreale (32:05):
do you find you set expectations?
In other words, you'repronouncing this is what I want
to do or this is what we want todo.
We've talked about it.
These are my expectations Interms of holding your I hate the
word subordinates, but yourfellow leaders accountable for
their particular unit.
How do you set expectations?
Chris Noble (32:24):
I think even before they become a senior leader,
you know, whenever they'relooking for promotion or looking
to join Staffordshire Police,the first thing I sit down and
say is this is what we're about,this is what we're looking for.
If it doesn't work and itdoesn't fit, don't even bother
applying.
So there's something about.
Even before they're part of theteam at that level or even join
Staffordshire Police, they knowexactly the rules of engagement
and what the expectations areand how they're going to be held
(32:45):
to account.
So I think there's somethingthere almost pre-birth, if that
makes sense, then wheneveryou're selecting them, it's not
to say that technical skillsaren't important.
There's other ways of measuringthose, even before they come
into the process.
So whenever I'm testing,interviewing, running promotion
processes, it's about gettingunder the skin of who that
person is and not just what havethey done in the past, because
everybody can memorize somereally great examples about what
(33:06):
they've done.
It's about what would you do ifand how have you and what are
you about?
And drilling down and gettinginto the detail of who that
individual is.
And then for me, the third partis if you're seeing behaviors or
ways of working that aren'tappropriate, this isn't about
criminality or even misconduct,it's just poor leadership or
inconsistent leadership in amature way.
Deal with it right there, don'tlet it sit, don't let it
(33:27):
atrophy, don't let it slide,don't let it go past.
Just have a really early,mature intervention to say
spotted that, tell me what'sgoing on.
Or I've got a bit of feedbackabout an issue you've dealt with
.
Chat me through that becauseyou might want to think about
how you can deal with itdifferently.
And then finally, steve, modelit yourself.
You know, if I talk aboutleadership that's really engaged
with the workforce, with thepeople we serve.
(33:47):
If I'm not doing that, it'sjust noise.
People pick apartcontradictions very, very
quickly, so you've got to livethat and make sure your habits
are the habits that you wantyour own staff to adopt as well.
Steve Morreale (33:57):
You know, one of the things that strikes me and
haven't been around policing fora long, long time is when we
get into positions of leadership, sometimes we forget how to
investigate, and what I mean bythat.
We're trained to investigateand so part of your job is to
investigate.
Whatever that is and you saidsomething a little bit ago and
that was asking questions, and Ilove the idea of leading
through questions, askingprobative questions, deep
(34:18):
questions that will start tomake people.
Even when I'm doing training,just posing questions sometimes
stifles people.
It stunts them Like I can'tbelieve I'm being put on the
spot.
But leading through questionscan be very valuable.
What's your experience?
Chris Noble (34:32):
There's a phrase in policing called the ABC of
policing.
So accept nothing, believe noone and check everything.
Now that's an extreme, becauseif you do that you're not going
to engender a huge amount oftrust or empowerment in an
organization.
But there's something aboutbeing professionally curious
about what is really going on inpolicing, and I suppose my
approach is you know, before Ijust ask a random question and
(34:52):
get lucky by asking a good one,as a senior cop again, I'll talk
to the people who are doing thejob, whether it be a middle
management or the front line ora police staff specialism or a
partner, and get their sense ofwhere things are.
So the questions that I'masking then of my senior leaders
are informed by what isactually going on.
Now, I don't mean not to bemischievous, because in the end,
if they're doing their job andleading that way, there should
(35:13):
be no surprises in the questionsI ask.
But your questions have got tobe informed by reality, as
opposed to getting lucky withasking a really good question on
occasions, and I think it's.
I wouldn't even call itquestioning as such.
I think it's more about aconversation, that you sit down
with someone and have aconversation and, as you say, a
part of that.
You probe until you get to thesource reason as to why
something isn't working orindeed why something is working.
(35:34):
And I think most staff if youask the questions in the right
way, if you're clearly notseeking to blame people at every
opportunity, if you then dosomething with the conversation
you've had with them actuallyvalue the fact that you care
enough to ask and understandwhat's going on in their world.
So yeah, I think questions, asyou say, isn't just for the
investigation side and forsuspects.
It's got to be how you improveand indeed tackle challenges
(35:58):
within the organization.
Steve Morreale (35:59):
Sometimes I find people just avoid asking
questions because they do notlike the work or the
consequences that comes with theanswers yeah, when you start
digging what you uncover, itsometimes becomes uncomfortable
or, oh my God, it becomes myproblem.
And I'm sure what you're sayingto your crew through your
behavior, through your modeling.
That I want to know.
I want you to be curious, Iwant you to identify problems, I
want to solve problems beforethey explode.
(36:20):
Let's kind of get ahead ofthose problems, try to figure
out what the difficulties areand come up with process, a new
process to deal with it, toallow those in the field the
options to handle that.
Chris Noble (36:31):
And, steve, I don't like to swear on podcasts, but
there's something about, youknow, policing deals in shit
every single day.
So if I'm not getting a whiff ofsomething on a daily basis, I
get really suspicious, becauseit generally means people are
hiding stuff from me.
So you go looking for thingsthat aren't working, you lift
stones.
But how you handle that, Ithink, is really important
because if, whenever there's acrisis or a ball's been dropped
(36:53):
or somebody's done somethingstupid or potentially malicious,
you have got to handle that asa senior leader in a mature way.
And if people are bringing youinformation proactively which is
what you want as a seniorpolice leader you have got to be
mature and neither shoot themessenger or two people behind
them.
And how you are in a bad dayand losing the rag, as we would
say in Ireland, or blowing yourtop, that is the stuff that will
be remembered and people willnot come to you again, will not
(37:16):
raise things, whether that be ina meeting format or a
one-to-one or even just droppingyou an email and saying boss, I
think you want to be aware ofthis.
So how you handle bad news as asenior leader is fundamental.
Or all of a sudden, people willstart covering stuff up.
Steve Morreale (37:28):
Yeah.
Well, what you're just sayingis really important.
I had something to think about,but you just said something
that triggered with me, and thatis you need to set that up.
You need to basically set, Iguess, the expectation that I'm
willing to hear from you In fact, I'd prefer to hear from you.
Please don't cover it up.
We don't know everything that'sgoing on, and so if you see an
issue, it's almost if you seesomething, say something, that
old adage, but but about theorganization?
(37:50):
Because if you care about theorganization, I care about your
input, and that becomes reallyimportant, because what you're
doing is you're saying bring theproblems to us, don't ignore
the problems, don't let themfester.
Chris Noble (37:59):
Fair statement yeah , for sure, and some of this is
about improving the service weprovide, but some of this is
around police standards andmisconduct as well.
We've had a couple of reallyhigh profile cases in policing
policing and some of it's beenaround the metropolitan police
in london.
But you know, but for the graceof god goes every single police
service.
Quite frankly, and at the coreof it, some of these guys as
they nearly nearly all werepeople within their team knew
(38:20):
they were, quite frankly,deviants in some occasions or
had criminal behaviors or werecorrupt cops and they didn't
speak up.
And there's a pretty goodchance their supervisors had a
really clear sense thatsomething wasn't right but they
didn't have the courage tochallenge.
So there's something aboutcreating an environment.
If you want to work and improvepolice culture, police
standards, there's something tobe creating an environment that
isn't about touting or tellingtales in each other.
(38:42):
It's about owning thereputation of the organization
at the very frontline, peoplebeing proud of it, people having
courageous conversations withcolleagues and indeed, frontline
supervisors intervening early,as opposed to, in 20 years' time
, that individual all of asudden doing something
completely and utterlyhorrendous to a colleague or to
a member of the public.
So you know that's the UKexperience.
(39:02):
You guys in the States andNorth America and wider will
have your own cases of extrememisconduct, but a lot of this
stuff.
If there was strongerleadership, courageous
leadership earlier on, you maywell not be able to stop it all,
but at the very least someonewould have been held to account
much more sharply than they everwere before we're talking with
Chris Noble, who is the chiefconstable, basically the big
shot in Staffordshire PoliceService, and I very much
(39:25):
appreciate your time, yourenergy and your perspective.
Steve Morreale (39:27):
I think that's important.
I want to talk about the issuesthat you are confronting as an
organization, the things thathave been brought to your
attention, even recently, andwhat you're working on and one
of the things you said at thevery beginning was about mass
demonstrations and your role inthat UK wide.
So tell us about the issues ofthe day, the week, the month
that you're working on.
Chris Noble (39:47):
OK, well, I think when we've touched on already
about policing used to be anagency of last resort.
So when it all went wrong, youcalled the cops, you called the
police.
Probably in the last 10 to 15years in the UK I don't know
about other jurisdictions it'snow become an agency of first
resort.
So the big challenge we have ishow do you triage all those
incidents, all those calls forservice from the public to deal
with the really key prioritycalls?
(40:08):
That is one of our mostenduring day-to-day challenges
and we don't always get thatbalance right.
So that's one.
Secondly, it's a bit of acoming together of a really
young and inexperiencedworkforce but really keen but
learning their craft.
30% of all my police officersare student officers.
So in and around the sort oftwo, two and a half year mark,
and whenever I come intopolicing I join big teams with
(40:28):
really experienced guys aroundproactive policing.
You know how to build a case,how to do a good stop and search
, community confidence, etcetera, et cetera.
So that sort of inexperiencedbut really keen workforce and
then the need to deliver reallygood quality investigations and
then have that confidence in thestreet that you're neither
over-aggressive but you don'tencourage at times conflict with
members of the public who liketo try it on with the police.
(40:51):
So there's a couple of thingscoming together there.
We've seen a real increase inassaults on police officers
recently in the UK, but inparticular in Staffordshire.
We've had real challenges aboutdelivering good quality
investigations consistently overtime.
And then we've had challengesbecause our cops are going
through this probationary periodand being in university on a
regular basis about putting outgood numbers every single day to
(41:11):
deal with the challenges thatwe face.
So there's probably a bit of ait's not a triangle of doom,
because I'm really optimistic.
In a few years time we'll havematured as an organization and
for me the silver lining isevery cop that joins
Staffordshire I get time withand they all join for pretty
much the same reason they wantto serve the public, they want
to stand in the gap, they wantto make a difference.
But it is hard yards at theminute for them, really hard
(41:31):
yards about learning their craft, getting their academic
qualifications and even justrecognizing that not every
member of the public loves thepolice.
That can be quite a shock forsome people.
So that's a learning curve.
And then talking about protest,because I think there's a
relevance locally, even before Italk a bit about my national
role.
You may not have picked up onit, but on the back of a really
tragic stabbing involving someyoung kids in a and actually in
(41:52):
a taylor swift dance school inliverpool, there was a lot of
misinformation indeeddisinformation being put out on
the internet about this beingdone by immigrants coming into
the uk.
Yes, and that sparked quite afew riots across major cities,
including stoke in my place andalso tamworth, which is also on
my patch as well.
Probably for the first time inmaybe 13 years in uk policing,
(42:13):
you had full-on serious,sustained riots and violence
against the police.
You know ripping up trees andcharging riot shields, throwing
petrol or pouring petrol andcops throwing bricks at police
officers and police dogs.
And you know, despite myexperience in northern ireland,
which was you went through ariot and you had a gun on your
hip in case it all got reallybad.
Over here you don't have that,so they were taking a huge
(42:34):
amount of abuse for a long timeuntil we got reinforcements.
So that's a dynamic, even in thelast couple of months, which
has created a huge amount ofpressure for cops in terms of
trying to balance the day joband dealing with crime and then
having to stand in the gapbetween local people, rioters,
violent individuals, criminalswho are wanting to set fire to a
hotel where immigrants arehoused for a whole raft of
(42:55):
different reasons.
So we haven't seen that sort oflevel of violence or disorder
in the UK for a long time.
So that's been a challenge forus.
But there's a differencebetween that and protest,
because in the UK the bigchallenges we face recently
around protest has generallybeen non-violent, what we call
non-violent direct action.
So climate activists blockingthe big motorways around London,
or a group called PalestineAction doing various things,
(43:18):
again to try and disruptparticular industries or
generate attention, or a groupcalled Just Stop Oil, which you
can probably imagine what theirethos is spraying paint over
landmarks and over expensivepieces of art, et cetera, et
cetera.
So whilst in no way acceptablegenerally speaking, it doesn't
step into the violence spacethat we've seen in the last
month, but very challenging forcops to deal with.
(43:39):
A really senior inspector ofpolicing about five years ago
said that policing protest isthe brain surgery of policing,
because you need to weigh upproportionality, you need to
decide when they intervene ornot.
You've got case law you need tointerpret.
You've got to make sure thatall your disclosure of evidence
is got right.
You've got to just carefullybalance things or you will end
(43:59):
up paying out money to peoplewho've been arrested wrongly
whenever people look at this inthe cold, hard light of day.
So real challenges aroundprotest policing, especially in
London.
It's a very political space, sothe previous government was
making laws on a pretty regularbasis around trying to clamp
down on protests and policingthem, was constantly having to
train and retrain and adjust itstactics for how it responds to
(44:20):
that.
But look you guys, 2020 was areally challenging year for
policing.
In the States it was.
You're in the teeth of apresidential election and who
knows what that might bring interms of dynamics and tensions
and protest as well.
So we watch what's happening inyour world to pick up the
learning.
I would much rather learnvicariously, steve, than have to
learn ourselves.
Steve Morreale (44:37):
Well, you know it's interesting.
Well, one of the things thatstrikes me too is that police
officers, no matter where, arevery often caught in the middle,
as you just said.
And if you think about thosewho are on side in our country
and maybe in your country, onthe Israeli side and on the
Palestinian side, you're stuckin the middle and you're trying
to allow them.
So that doesn't get out of handthe ability to have free speech
and protest, as long as it'snot violent and then very often
(45:00):
you become the target because ofthe uniform, and that's a very
difficult position to find yourpeople in.
For sure, yeah.
Chris Noble (45:06):
And policing has got to be accountable, it's got
to be transparent and there's alot of host events, host
protests, inspections,complaints go in, and so you've
got a lot of cops who are reallynervous on the front line
making decisions.
And we don't just see it inprotest.
We've seen it in armed policingin the last sort of couple of
years as well, where people aredoing their very best, really
challenging environment.
It's not the settledenvironment of a courtroom where
(45:26):
they're trying to make snapdecisions.
It could be use of force, itcould be use of legislation,
could be locking people up andthen in slower time they're
having their decisions pulledapart and it could be career
threatening.
They could be demoted in rank,they could have their name
plastered all over the paper.
So there's a really significantconversation taking place at
the minute between police chiefsand politicians about what we
call an accountability review,about what is the right balance
(45:46):
between holding police toaccount and giving cops the
confidence that they can makehonest, fair and decent
decisions at the time withouthaving them picked apart, with
someone applying 20-20 vision tothem.
So I don't know if that's asimilar challenge in the States
or in North America, but that issomething that is very
challenging in the protestenvironment, but also whenever,
sadly, police officers then haveto use lethal force against
(46:08):
people as well.
Steve Morreale (46:09):
Yes, well, unfortunately, this conversation
has flowed so easily and sowell that we're about running
out of time, so I want to winddown and give you a few
opportunities to answer somequestions and have the last word
.
We're talking with Chris Nobleand he is in Staffordshire, uk.
He's the chief constable, so ifyou had the chance to talk to
(46:30):
somebody who is no longer withus to gain some insight and
knowledge, who might that aroundpolicing or life more generally
it's entirely up to youdealer's choice, as they say
that is a good question.
Chris Noble (46:45):
That is a good question.
There was a police officer whowas in northern ireland who
sadly passed away to a guycalled colin cramporn and you
know, a really wise leader, areally gentle guy but incredibly
effective in terms of what hedid.
And I only had the opportunityto meet him a couple of times as
part of the sort of progressionof the change process in
Northern Ireland, and I thinkit's very rarely you find a
senior leader who carries a realair of authority because of
(47:08):
their humility, and he wassomeone who, just for me, had
that sweet spot in terms of anincredibly capable leader having
authority about him, but was agentle, compassionate, humble
leader.
And I didn't get a huge amountof time to be around him or
speak to him, but I would haveloved just to get a sense from
him as to how he came throughwhat would have been a very
command and control era ofpolicing.
How did you survive with thatleadership style whenever a lot
(47:31):
of the other senior leadersaround you had something that
was very, very different?
Because as I've gone through mycareer, I've always tried to
learn not from the bad examplesof leadership but those people
who just instinctively I justrespected as senior leaders and
he was one of those, but sadlyhe was taken I think he was in
his 40s whenever we lost him butdidn't really get a chance to
sort of download his experience.
And I think I would find thatvaluable as a relatively young
(47:53):
chief constable, still learningmy craft and knowing how you
strike that balance betweenbeing authoritative but then
sometimes just knowing when toshut up, be gracious with people
as well as firm.
Steve Morreale (48:02):
This has been a wonderful and wide ranging
conversation.
It seems to me that you are athought leader and I really
appreciate being with you andgetting your feedback and
hearing your perspective.
Chris, as we get ready to leave, I'd like to know how you feel
about policing.
Do you have hope for the?
Chris Noble (48:20):
future Absolutely and hope for now as well,
because, well, first of all, thejob we do is like no other, I
think.
For me, it's the highest formof community service actually
being a police officer, a memberof police staff, and in some
ways.
Sadly, I don't think the policeare ever going to be made
redundant.
As an organization, I thinkwe're always going to have to
deal with challenges andfrictions and fallouts and
tensions in society.
So I think there is a job forlife and perpetuity for police
(48:42):
officers.
So there's a bit of hope there,steve, in terms of pay packets.
But, more seriously, I thinkpeople are still joining
policing 99% of the time for theright reasons, and I think
they're getting the chance tomake a difference.
And I also think that policeleaders now are much more tuned
on to not just caring aboutvictims and communities, but
their own staff and lookingafter them, thinking about
resilience, thinking aboutwellbeing, the right balance
(49:04):
between being inclusive as anemployer and then needing to
deliver a service for the public.
So I think that really clearfocus on the public people
joining for the right reasonsand I think now finally seeing
the importance of treating ourpeople with respect and well, I
see that coming together.
But it will be hard yards goingforwards because the world we
deal with is not going to becomemore simple and there's going
to be increasing demand onpolicing.
(49:26):
So I think we just continue toneed the support of the people
who write the laws that we allwork to and who also hold
policing to account that it'sfair and it's reasonable and the
policing is giving a chance tosucceed.
Steve Morreale (49:36):
What a great way to end and I do appreciate it.
We've been talking to ChrisNoble he's the Chief
Superintendent of theStaffordshire UK Police Service
and I really appreciate yourperspective and your time and
your honesty and humility andyet the challenges you faced and
how you have worked with peopleto A give them hope and, B to
provide better service.
So thank you very much.
As you go into your weekend, Iwish you the best of luck.
(49:57):
Thank you for your time.
I hope to see you in Bostonquite soon.
Cheers, Steve.
Thank you.
Well, that's it.
Another episode of the Cop Talkpodcast is in the can.
Thank you so much for listening.
Stay safe and reach out.
If you can Remember, peoplefrom 86 countries and almost
3,000 cities and towns acrossthe globe have been listening.
So if you like what you hear,spread the word.
(50:18):
Thanks, have a good day.
Intro/Outro (50:21):
Thanks for listening to The Cop Doc Podcast
with Dr.
Steve Morreale.
Steve is a retired lawenforcement practitioner and
manager, turned academic andscholar from Worcester State
University.
Please tune into The Cop DocPodcast for regular episodes of
interviews with thought leadersin policing.
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