Reference no: EM131464719

Response to each post (4) 150 words or more.

1. As stated in the video office politics are "The use of one's individual or assigned power to obtain advantages beyond one's legitimate authority" (Working Together," 2012). This can result in multiple types of conflict ranging from personal to group as well as vertical and horizontal conflicts.

These types of conflicts can take away from the overall mission as well as create divided groups in the workplace. To manage these conflicts, I would invest my time in process intervention and become directly involved. To do this I would make sure that everyone knew the informal rules that are in place at the organization.

Doing this should help the problems solve themselves at the lowest levels as a rookie street cop would not be coming up to the Captain with issues and they would instead take it to the Corporal who could handle it. Also, the different ranks would be able to see if any office politics were starting and could squash them prior to them picking up steam and becoming a conflict.

While using process intervention I would also keep in mind that "conflict management in criminal justice system must be economical of time and effort" (Stojkovic, Kalinich, & Klofas, 2015, p. 332). Meaning I do not need the station Captain spending all of their time trying to squash office politics if it can be handled another way. No one process is perfect and different methods must be used given the scenario.

2.According to the video "Office politics and managing conflict" "Office Politics" is defined as "The use of one's individual or assigned power to obtain advantages beyond one's legitimate authority." (Films Media Group, 2012). "Office politics" is unfortunately a reality in many organizations. "Office Politics" contributes to workplace conflicts by causing conflict among employees, reducing employee morale and reducing organizational capability. Many people in the work place often turn to "Office Politics" to achieve promotions, receive increased pay or to attain additional authority (Films Media Group, 2012).

Thomas (1985:405-411) identifies two ways of dealing with conflict situations: process interventions and structural interventions (stojkovic, Kalinich & Klofas, 2015 P. 327). "Office Politics" such as gossip, harassment and workplace bullying are a real danger to an organizations ability to achieve its goals; and must be taken seriously by leaders.

As an organizational leader, I would utilize aspects from both process intervention and structural intervention to address these issues. I would utilize an interaction management strategy to inject myself directly into the issue in attempt to solve the problem. I would address personal characteristics, discuss informal rules, attempt to relieve constituent pressure, address power / status conflicts and modernize my organizational policy if necessary.

Concerning structural intervention, I would implement training to ensure that my employees are aware of the organizations goals, priorities, standards of ethics and ethos. Additionally, I would begin to implement a selection process to attempt to weed out employees with low moral standards. Lastly, I would attempt to increase communications across the board.

3. Critical thinking and problem solving is a necessity for those in the criminal justice field. The unique situations that officers face mean that not everything can fit into a cookie cutter response. The ability to think critically and solve problems is needed for these situations in order to make rational choices.

The idea of bounded rationality says that "absolute rational decisionmaking requires all information necessary and as much time as necessary to process the information," but reality of decisionmaking in law enforcement is that "rationality is bound by limited time" and "incomplete information," (Stojkovic et al., 2015, p. 349). In order to be able to make rational decisions in limited time and with limited resources, it is necessary for officers to possess good problem solving skills and decision making abilities.

By using critical thinking and problem solving, criminal justice professionals can make rational decisions. According to a study by Wilkins, there are four types of decision makers. The first type are sequentialists, who use their experience to determine what information is relevant by looking at items in sequential fashion and deciding their importance.

The second type is the "Ah yes" type, which gather large amounts of information and look for a pattern they recognize. If the data doesn't fit their profiles, they reinterpret it until it does. The third type is the simplifier, which reduces complex issues to their simplest forms. The final type are the ratifiers, who wait for comments on something from someone else then associate their views with that of the other person.

4. Critical thinking and problem solving has become a key tool for law enforcement in today's ever changing societal threats. There are countless scenarios where police have utilized satisfycing decision on a matter that later needs more investigation. An officer get called out to a domestic dispute, once the officer arrives he needs to determine how safe is the environment prior to engaging.

Critical thinking can influence decision making for the officers approach towards a incident. Once the officer has made an arrest, they hand over the gathered information to the courts where it is determined whether or not the suspected offenders will face criminal sanctions.

"Critical thinking and effective problem solving is an optimal process to reach well thought-out decisions that not only develop strong remedies to organisational perplexities, but also create an ability to rank and assess how well the solution meets the overall goals and objectives"(Phillips & Burrell, 2009). In dealing with corrections it's important to have an increasing agreement on goals and decision rules, and this will improve the quality of information that will produce increasingly rational decisions, this is called consistency in theory.
Correctional officer deal with constant threat and take risks on a daily basis.

The environment they work in is facilities that house state and federally sanctioned criminal offenders. These offenders sometimes are emotionally unstable and unpredictable. Officers have to arm themselves with effective problem solving skills with use of their critical thinking to create a rational decision. On a federal aspect of security, 911 was a clear example of when critical thinking came into play.

There was a decision made on what steps was needed to be executed at the plane headed for the white house. " While there may be many other challenges that exist, these examples suggest that a detailed thinking strategy is vital to a successful, proactive approach towards addressing national security threats"(Phillips & Burrell, 2009).
Law enforcement organization culture relies on critical thinking.

This skill is a countermeasure towards being the split hair moment where a life can be saved. "By developing critical thinking skills and tools, public safety and law enforcement professionals can enhance their ability to solve problems constructively through the engagement of new forms of decision analysis assessment"(Phillips & Burrell, 2009).