Police De-Escalation Training?
Police receive a substantial amount of training to prepare for the risks of being on the job, many self-control skills they learn in the academy cannot be effectively applied to real-life situations, which results in them acting on impulsive instincts.
Police officers receive extensive training in combat and handling weaponry, but when it comes to non-confrontational de-escalation training, barely any is offered to them. This training is perhaps as important as the skills they learn in combat training because it is a vital step between mild conflicts and violent interactions. If a possibly aggressive perpetrator is subdued in time, it can minimise the adverse outcomes and even potentially save lives.
Gaining a vital skillset of de-escalating situations from Resolution Education Training programs can prove to be very beneficial for the police.
Importance Of De-Escalation Training For Police Officers
In recent times, the need for de-escalation training for police has increased significantly as people have started to hold law enforcement to a higher moral standard of behaviour. The police are not judged solely based on whether their actions were lawful, but also for their cultural sensitivity, display of respect and trust, and their regard for the sanctity of human life.
Since police officers are held to a higher standard as compared to the general public, they need to behave with patience and possess high levels of tolerance in their dealings with the public. They oversee the safety of the people, and they need to conduct themselves in a manner that reflects this. They are trained to protect, and they instinctively do so by disarming the threat by any means necessary.
This approach is often seen as counter-productive since, through small but effective changes made in their code of conduct, they can significantly minimise dangerous outcomes of interactions with non-compliant individuals. Training in de-escalation strategies will help officers improve the quality of their interactions with individuals that are non-compliant by equipping them with simple, yet significantly effective techniques such as empathy.
Reducing Aggressive Confrontations With Resolution Education
The De-escalation training for police offered by us at Resolution Education will help the officers to incorporate effective strategies that will reduce aggressive and dangerous encounters by introducing them to alternative ways to handle stressful events.
The methods of de-escalation taught by the Resolution Education have been derived from psychology and help to accurately appeal to the aggressor in a way that releases his tension and keeps you in control of the situation. Successful de-escalation is achieved through a combination of emotional intelligence and empathy, effective communication skills, and timely application of conflict management techniques.
If the aggressor is behaving in a manner that is not an immediate threat to anyone, an officer trained in de-escalation techniques will engage them in talking and help them vent out their frustrations and use verbal communication techniques to diffuse the situation.
The process is designed to show officers the importance of diffusing a situation at any stage they might encounter, rather than using excessive force that will further aggravate the situation. When situations with erratic perpetrators intensify, they can easily turn violent and even deadly. Such disasters can be easily avoided through tactful handling of the situation by using de-escalation strategies.
Using Communication to Resolve Conflict
The point of employing de-escalation techniques is to effectively diffuse tension to allow for a constructive discussion to take place. However, these strategies are most effective when put into place even before the conflict arises. Officers can learn to do this by understanding how to recognise signs of aggression and resolve them by intervening and using their verbal communication skills.
In de-escalation training for police, officers will learn how to:
- Actively listen and practice empathy.
- Use communication rather than force to get others to cooperate.
- Decide what level of force is appropriate in time-sensitive situations.
- Adapt to using the least aggressive method possible in every confrontation.
- Learn to assess threats appropriately and respond with proportionality, rather than resorting to instinctual, but disproportionate and harmful responses
Our programs take into account human emotions and likely reactions and set out a guideline on how an officer should conduct themselves when faced with a disruptive yet non-threatening individual.
What Benefits Does Resolution Education Bring
Officers who complete the training will learn:
- Self-control in intense situations.
- Timely assessment of all possible dangers.
- Management of critical conditions under pressure.
- The ways to safely subdue an individual in cases where the use of force is the only possibility.
Officers will be able to apply the strategies of de-escalation in their daily interactions and keep many otherwise potentially dangerous situations from occurring, thereby also reducing the chance of being assaulted or even sued for assault.
Resolution Education’s training techniques are designed to: improve observational skills and increase efficiency in decision making, resulting in an outcome that is in the best interests of everyone. We provide many different programs, such as physical and non-physical Occupational Violence and Aggression training, Conflict Resolution Training, and De-escalation Training.
Contact us at 1300 884 589 to get more information regarding our various training programs and see which one best fits the needs of your police departments.
