The Not-So-Golden Rule

Treat others how think it will work out in your favor no matter what destruction you leave in your wake

Photo by Taras Chernus on Unsplash

This is pathetic. What, you ask? The representation of the cover picture? The people it brings to mind when you look at it for what it’s saying? No. It’s pathetic that I have A WEALTH of information to draw from to author an article based on the selfish duplicity oh-so-common in today’s business interactions. And more specifically, the business of protecting people. Yes, the curtain obscuring this needs to be ripped away. I may not be strong enough to do it all on my own, but I submit this is the first step to move it a few inches back. Courageous leaders like Travis Yates, Roland Clee, Paul Cappitelli, Daniel Carr, Jim Bontrager, and Paula Fitzsimmons. This is the burgeoning tribe being created to help me so I won’t have to do it on my own.

Start at the Beginning

This is the topic I have lived through my entire career in law enforcement, but it’s certainly not something endemic strictly to my field. Professional jockeying for favor from a supervisor or the practice of cutting away your “friends” so you could align with the people you knew would collude to affect you career for the better reaches across all lines of work. Before you jump down my throat to correct my confusion, please take a moment to remember that you are in the same boat with another group of people as well. But if you still persist in taking up against my words citing your stellar career…guess what, YOU are the person I’m writing about and for today.

I heard a story this past week I truly couldn’t believe.  A supervisor was venting to me about a situation where a person who worked for him was going through some problems from a different work group.  My friend was trying to lead courageously by inspiring others to lead with integrity as this is one of the key principles put out through the courageous policing leadership alliance.  See www.cplalliance.org for more information on how to get involved with that.

Anyway, the conversation moved to figuring out how the situation started.  The employee had no answer.  None. It was assumed a lot of different things occurred, but after unpacking the root of it all neither my friend nor his employee actually landed on why his reputation was trashed, his work environment bordered on toxic, and his motivation to continue in law enforcement was hanging by a thread.

Turns out the real reason any of this occurred reminded me of how the Boxer rebellion started.  Stay with me. In 1899, four journalists were sitting in Denver and thought it would be a great idea to find a news article as a headline that would set the world on fire. The bandied about different ideas, but collectively could not come an agreement. So, instead of leaving the bar with their plans to do something constructive, they all agreed they would publish fake news that the great wall of China was going to be ripped down to bring China into the world economic scene as approved by the Chinese!  Yeah!  What could possibly go wrong?

Here’s the headline they published:

Great Chinese wall doomed!  Peking seeks world trade!

Look what happened next. The Chinese government heard about this through the power of the lie, reacted violently, closed off China to any foreign influence, and was led into this through the intensity brought by “The Order of Literary Patriotic Harmonious Fists”, otherwise known as the “Boxers.”

Their battle cry sounded like, “Exterminate the foreigners and save the dynasty!” Then from November of 1899 through September of 1901 a nationwide dedicated effort to bring violence to expel any foreigners was unleashed…. all based on a lie.

You see, some “leaders” were talking about the employee in front of others and started making unbased assumptions as to why the employee was off work intermittently, seemed distracted when working and per their own uneducated assessments was disenchanted being a police officer.

This snowballed into a biased investigation into work productivity based on feelings and not facts.  Never once was the employee just sat down and asked what was going on and how they could help.  If they had done that, they would have discovered that person was dealing with a sick family member and some personal challenges they had held inside that obviously were preying on his emotional state.  My friend reset the employee, helped him regain his footing and helped him process through what was going on.  People are always more important than the things we ask of them.

Sounds a lot like the Golden Rule.

Fix the Problem

Treat others the way you want to be treated.

How simple this could have been to solve!  If you’re a leader and you presume your title or rank gives you the right to stamp on the throat of the people you are privileged to lead, then you’re not a leader…you’re a tyrant.  And how dare you! What could it do in relationships in marriage, with your kids, co-workers, strangers…anyone with whom you interacted if you simply adopted this golden rule and not the modified power-seeking, self-elevating, gossip-spreading version my friend discovered titled the not-so-golden rule, which says, “treat others how think it will work out in your favor no matter what destruction you leave in your wake.”

Oh, and I saw it on a poster years ago called “Everything I need to know I learned in kindergarten” …even 5-year-olds can get this.  Prideful trolls focused on ladder-climbing have no place in any circle of leadership let alone in law enforcement. Period. Kudos to my friend - you know who you are - for leading with integrity and courage pushing for the truth!

The crux of the thought centers on motivation for why (1) “Leaders” act this way, and (2) If you’re the affected employee, how you could find victory through the situation. First, I need to draw back to Dr. Travis Yates and the Courageous Police Leadership principles, which state:

• always demonstrate and demand integrity

• stay focused on liberty, civility, and public safety

• never let feelings redefine facts

• encourage vigilance, professionalism, and cooperation

• communicate to eliminate misunderstanding

• anticipate — and continually challenge assumptions and the status quo

• inspire others to lead courageously

Your responsibility as a leader is to meticulously follow these principles. You need to work on behalf of the people you are privileged to lead, not in spite of them. Keeping emotions out of it, it is wildly counterproductive to speak about a subordinate disparagingly in front of other subordinates over which you have oversight. You gain nothing accept maybe you get a few knowing nods of the head, or chuckles when a certain part is told, but specifically the root cause behind this is the domineering and cowardly sense of letting your identity be defined by others and to be constantly seeking the favor of other people to gain success.

Secondly, assuming common sense came into play at some point, a courageous leader would seek out the “problem” employee and sit that person down to explain what the professional shortcomings to the required expectations were, keeping feelings out of the critique of the facts. Assumably, a workable consensus on how to move forward could be reached and the employee would leave knowing what was expected of them to move forward with success. And the supervisor would be able to report their correction to their supervisor to show real remediation of a valuable employee had taken place. Through conversation and documentation, the supervisor could manage the situation while minimizing liability and the possible loss of an employee to the organization.

Moving the Needle

In law enforcement, I accept that we are “in a fishbowl” where the general public can contribute their knowledge (or lack thereof) to any situation appearing interesting. Never mind that person has no background of the physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional state of the officer. Never mind that someone who has never held a firearm feels compelled to explain how police officers should modify firearm policy to be in line with the offhanded comment made by President Biden on how cops should “shoot to wound” instead of kill…when someone is trying to kill them. And never mind how the slimy chasing of promotion at the expense of courageous nobility is making me see our profession like Babylon instead of America.

But what do I know?

I submit any person in a supervisory role who betrays their oath and position in law enforcement by treating someone as described by my friend should be redirected one time with it being made very clear they will be stripped of their position and responsibilities (and pay) for one more misstep in that way. Some betrayals, as what I described above, should result in an immediate demotion and possible suspension. There exists no safe have for cowardly wolves covered in fluffy soft sheep wool whose only goal is how they can step higher off the backs of the people they were supposed to protect, train, and advocate for when needed.

Think I’m wrong? Look around at where we are. Contrary to the gaslighting from administrators we are still in a serious staffing crisis. For example, as recent as March 2023 the New Orleans Police Department has an authorized force of 1600 officers - and is working with 900. They’re using a contract company to put an estimated 50 people on the force to take accidents and non-sworn duties - except they’ve to date hired three, per the NOPD Union President. San Fransisco is at 1515 officers at a decade-low amount. The story is the same around the country.

But staffing at fully capped levels doesn’t move the needle in the profession. How do we get people to remember their noble roots in the way they interact with others? No amount of money or people can solve that problem. People need empowerment. People need autonomy, mastery, and purpose as their third drive, Daniel Pink would say. Cops up and down the line need to compare a basic dictionary definition of totalitarianism against their policy, procedures, and best practices. The closer it lines up the more problems will trend to getting worse. Read and heed: hold your position when you are right regardless of possible political pressure, media influence, or career advancement problems and you will be living out courageous nobility and leading with excellence. Stand your ground, challenge the lies, and trust the truth played out in your life!

***A new opportunity to link arms in proclaiming truth is here! Click the link to listen and download the episodes of the Trust the Truth podcast with Jeff Daukas here, where conversations on the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth are chased down!***

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Sergeant Daukas is committed to the principles of Courageous Leadership and is the lead instructor for the foundational principle of Courageous Nobility. You can listen to Jeff discuss this vital principle on a recent Courageous Leadership Podcast.  He has over 20 years in law-enforcement working through patrol, investigations, and special operations both at the line level and as a supervisor. Through the last 20 years, Jeff has embraced his passion instructing officers and civilians through the nobility of policing. He is a certified FranklinCovey Nobility of Policing instructor, as well as a certified instructor for the Blue Courage curriculum. Jeff holds a master’s degree in criminal justice with a focus on terrorism and homeland security and teaches in that discipline at the college level.  He is a graduate of the FBI-LEEDA Supervisor Leadership Institute program consistently implementing servant-leadership into training the next generation of law-enforcement professionals in both courageous leadership and followership.