Human Resources: Recruitment and Training

Police Recruitment
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Police Recruitment
The selection and the recruitment of the law enforcement officers from all the potential candidates is a crucial element in the fight against crime. Selecting the right candidates means a massive positive step towards the eradication of crimes using the most competent officers (Archbold, Lytle, Weatherall, Romero & Baumann, 2006). Lately there have been a lot of cases where law enforcements officers across the states are violating the rights of citizens, extra judicial killing of innocent citizens and absurd police brutality. While there are quite a number of factors that lead to such acts, there is a significant element of selection, recruitment and training that plays in the background. It is for this reason that Bradford, (1998) estimates that between 60-80% of government funds are spent as personnel costs, relative bad hires of incompetent personnel.
There have been quite a number legislation all carved out to ensure that the element of law enforcement officers selection, recruitment and training are streamlined. From the beginning of the year 1969, there were quite a number of lawsuits which cited discrimination in the recruitment mechanisms of the law enforcement offices within the United States (McCrary, 2007). This aspect led to one of the most aggressive affirmative action detailing the idea that the municipal police departments should use police quotas as guided by the court orders. Relative to the affirmative action through the court order, some of the states are still practicing the quotas in their hiring and training mechanisms within the police force, such as Boston (McCrary, 2007). Over the years the elemental start point of the recruitment mechanisms employed by most of the police departments is the entry examination alongside background checks based on crime records. Based on their performance in this examination candidates are selected to join the force. The tests are largely based on aptitude tests which are based in the civil service.
Most of the studies show that, the entrance examination does not in any way indicate the level of performance expected in the field for positions such as patrolmen (Bradford, 1998). Historically, African Americans have not performed equally as they white counterparts, with the scenario spreading to the second generation applicants. It was for this reason that the quota systems were introduced in most of the police departments relative to the litigation scares. The share of the African Americans in the forces increased significantly over the next course of years, however there were no significant changes in the crime rates reduction. Some of the states have complied with the need to apply the quotas, however other have not found the need to chan...