Are your managers as incompetent as the LAPD’s? (Via.)
A mentor of mine… once explained for me the difference between police officers who do police work and those who devote themselves to advancing up the chain of command. The “climbers,” he said, are mystified at how police work is actually performed on the streets. They sit in roll call and watch as other officers are handed subpoenas to appear in court day after day after making good arrests. As their own inferiority becomes more and more apparent, both to themselves and to their coworkers, they become envious and even contemptuous of those whose police skills have outpaced their own. And while their more skilled colleagues are developing expertise at making cases, the climbers busy themselves with studying for promotion so as to advance into positions that allow them to second-guess and belittle those who do the work they themselves were incapable of doing. […]
And what’s more unfortunate still is that when this column is posted, there will be many within the LAPD who are more desirous of finding and silencing me than they are of fixing the problems I’ve written about.