Editor’s Note: This article is part of Police1’s Training Week, which explores how agencies can improve knowledge retention, prevent skill decay and ensure officers can apply what they’ve learned under pressure. Thanks to our Training Week sponsor, T4E.
By Robert Graziano
The operation is over.
The suspect is in custody. The warrant is complete. The protective movement is finished. The range is cold. The scenario has ended.
Everyone wants to move on.
That is exactly when we should be asking what we learned.
Throughout my military and law enforcement careers, one principle has followed me from operational environments into training: finishing the mission does not mean we are finished learning from it.
Over the years, I have participated in and conducted debriefs following military training, law enforcement operations, firearms and sniper training, executive protection movements and scenario-based exercises. The equipment and mission may change, but the value of the conversation afterward does not. Sometimes the lesson is tactical. Sometimes it is communication, planning, equipment or leadership. And sometimes the lesson is simply realizing that what we thought we did and what actually happened were two different things.
Good tactical teams understand this. High-performing organizations understand it.
They debrief.
Not because something necessarily went wrong. A debrief is not a negative action. They debrief because something can almost always be done better.
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The AAR is bigger than training
We often associate an after-action review, or AAR, with formal training. It should not stop there.
Think about the totality of our profession: a patrol officer responds to a violent domestic; a SWAT team serves a high-risk warrant; detectives execute a search warrant; a protection team moves a principal through a crowded venue; officers become involved in a vehicle pursuit; or an agency manages a critical incident.
In each case, decisions were made. Information was processed. People communicated. Tactics were selected and equipment was used.
The question is not simply, “Did we accomplish the mission?” The better question is, “What did this mission teach us?”
Success does not mean perfect
The suspect was arrested. Nobody was injured. Mission accomplished. Great. Now let us talk about it.
Did communications work? Did everyone understand the plan? Did our intelligence match what we encountered? Were officers where they needed to be? Did equipment perform as expected? Was there a moment when things could have gone differently?
A successful outcome can hide poor decisions just as easily as a bad outcome can hide good ones. If our only measurement is whether the mission succeeded, we may miss the lessons that prevent the next operation from going wrong.
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Leave ego out of it
Years ago, after a SWAT competition in Texas, I learned a lesson about ego that has stayed with me throughout my career. I had made a cocky comment to members of another SWAT team. Then the competition ended — and I lost.
Afterward, someone put it into perspective for me: “In your own backyard, you may think you’re the big dog. But once you leave your backyard, you enter a world filled with big dogs — and even bigger dogs.”
It was humbling, and that was exactly what I needed.
The lesson had very little to do with winning or losing a SWAT competition. It was about remaining teachable. There will always be someone with more experience, a different skill set or something valuable to teach you. Confidence is important in this profession, but ego becomes dangerous when it prevents us from recognizing our weaknesses or listening to someone who can make us better.
I have carried that lesson with me ever since: Never allow your ego to become stronger than your willingness to learn.
Whether you are a new officer, a veteran operator, an instructor or a leader, the moment you believe you have nothing left to learn is probably the moment you need a lesson the most.
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The officer should speak first
Whether I am debriefing a training evolution or discussing an operational decision, one of my first questions is simple: “How do you think that went?”
Then I listen. Let the officer walk through the event. What did you see? What were you thinking? Where did things change? What would you do differently?
Once that self-assessment is complete, the instructor’s job is not to unload a list of everything the officer did wrong. Too much corrective information can become noise. With experience, I have learned to identify the corrections that matter most.
Was there a safety issue? Was there a decision that significantly changed the outcome? Was there a fundamental problem that will affect several other skills? Correct those first.
An instructor may see ten things that could have been done differently, but the officer may only need two or three corrections to substantially improve the next repetition. Good instruction is not demonstrating how much the instructor noticed. It is determining which lesson the officer needs most.
That develops something we desperately need in this profession: officers who can self-assess. Eventually, there will not be an instructor standing behind them.
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Decision error or execution error?
This distinction matters during a debrief. An officer can make the right decision and execute it poorly. An officer can also perform a tactic perfectly after making the wrong decision. Those are different problems and should be coached differently.
If the officer selected a reasonable course of action based on the information available but struggled with execution, the correction may involve positioning, communication, weapon manipulation, movement or another physical skill.
A decision-making error requires a different conversation. What did the officer see? What information was available? What information was missed? What options were considered? Why was that particular option selected?
During the debrief, we have the benefit of hindsight. The officer did not. Our job is not to judge yesterday’s decision using today’s knowledge. We should evaluate whether the decision was reasonable based on what the officer knew at that moment.
That distinction is especially important when the outcome is bad. A poor outcome does not automatically mean the officer made a poor decision. Conversely, a successful outcome does not automatically validate the decision-making that produced it.
Take the lesson back to the organization
The greatest value of an AAR is not correcting one officer. It is improving the organization.
Maybe a radio problem identified during a warrant service needs to be corrected agency-wide. Maybe a SWAT operation exposes an equipment problem. Maybe a patrol incident identifies a weakness in policy or training. Maybe a protection operation reveals a planning issue.
Now the lesson becomes bigger than the people who were there.
One incident can improve the next one hundred officers.
That is where the AAR becomes organizational learning.
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Four questions
A useful AAR can begin with four questions:
- What was the plan?
- What happened?
- What worked and why?
- What can we do better?
Then do something with the answers. Change the training. Fix the equipment. Improve communication. Adjust the plan. Share the lesson.
And when it is training: Run it again.
Run it again — but don’t make it the same
The second repetition should not simply give the officer an opportunity to perform the instructor’s correction. That only proves the officer can follow directions. As an instructor, I want to know whether the officer understood the lesson and can apply it.
So change something. Alter the starting position. Change the information provided. Move the threat or problem. Introduce another decision point. Make the officer recognize when the principle applies rather than simply repeat the exact solution that was just demonstrated.
During that next repetition, I am looking for recognition, decision-making and adaptation. Did the officer recognize the problem earlier? Did the officer make a better decision without being prompted? If conditions changed, did the officer adjust, or simply repeat what worked the first time?
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That is where we begin to see whether learning actually occurred. If the officer can only perform the correction under the exact circumstances in which it was taught, we may have corrected a repetition without actually improving the officer.
Training should not create officers who can reproduce an instructor’s answer. It should develop officers who can recognize problems, make reasonable decisions and adapt when circumstances change.
The totality of the profession
Law enforcement is built on experience. But experience alone does not automatically make us better.
Examined experience does.
From a rookie’s first scenario to a veteran patrol officer, SWAT operator, instructor or command staff member, the principle should remain the same:
We perform. We evaluate. We learn. We improve.
The scenario creates experience. The operation tests experience. The debrief turns that experience into knowledge — first for the officer, then for the team and, when we do it correctly, for the entire organization.
That is the lesson after the lesson.
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About the author
Robert Graziano is a U.S. Army sergeant first class combat medic with multiple combat deployments and a law enforcement sergeant with experience in patrol, the FBI Violent Crimes Task Force, Metro Narcotics, fugitive apprehension, academy instruction and 15 years on SWAT.
He currently serves as director of academy operations for the Ohio Attorney General’s Office at the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy (OPOTA). He also serves as a commissioned part-time police officer with the Granville Police Department and as a staff conference instructor for the Ohio Tactical Officers Association.
Graziano holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice, a Certified Protection Professional (CPP) credential through ASIS International and a CPOM credential through the Terrapin Group.
His instructor certifications include U.S. Army instructor, Texas peace officer instructor, Ohio instructor, semi-automatic pistol instructor, advanced carbine/rifle instructor, select-fire/automatic rifle instructor, precision rifle/sniper instructor, low-light CQB instructor, advanced active shooter resolution instructor, shoot house instructor, dignitary/VIP protection specialist instructor and building search instructor.