By Police1 Staff
As most cops know, it takes many hats to be a police officer. You can be a councelor, a nurse, a traffic cop, an office administrator, an accountant, and a racecar driver all within a single shift. But which of those skills, if any, are valued over the rest?
We asked our P1 Facebook fans to rank these skills most-to-least crucial in the line of law enforcement, and 3,025 took the challenge. Take a look at the results:
1. The following are proficiencies commonly referenced as skills necessary to be a successful law enforcement officer. Rank them 1-9 (9 being most crucial to the profession).
The above chart shows the total average ranking for each skill. You’ll notice, each skill hovers around the the 5 mark — meaning there was no single skill a majority of officers thought was most valued in the profession. The biggest outliers, by a hair, were social skills and critical thinking/ problem solving, followed by knowledge of the law.
More interesting and certainly more opinionated, however, was the next question.
2. Which of these skills do you believe you most excel at?
As you can see, social skills and critical thinking/ problem solving take the cake when it comes to skills most officers feel most confident in saying they excel at. In fact, the other seven skills combined make up only 27.47% It’s no surprise — policing is all about communication, whether its explaining laws and regulations to your community, presenting a new idea to colleagues, or relaying important information over the radio to dispatch.
So if your New Year’s Resolution was to become a more well-rounded cop — it looks like you’ve got your work cut out for you. Better yet, if you’re an aspiring cop, it looks like computer technology might be a great way to make a splash at the agency.
