Active Learning Discussion Respond to the stated question, including any relevance to and implications on the field of criminal justice. Be sure to discuss the issue(s) to which the question pertains. Remarks can include your opinion(s), but must be based on experience, research, and/or prior learning. Use this exercise to foster a rich dialogue with your colleagues about issues that are important to the field of criminal justice. During the span of the discussion, you must post to this board on four unique days. Your initial posting must be no less than 300 words and is due no later than Thursday 11:59 PM EST/EDT. The day you post will count as one of your required four unique postings. You will also be required to post responses to at least three of your colleagues' initial postings. Responses must be no less than 100 words, be posted on at least three unique days, and are due no later than Sunday at 11:59 PM EST/EDT. INITIAL POST As correctional agencies move towards evidence-based-practices, change is inevitable. • • Why does some correctional staff resist change when it is inevitable? Explain current leadership practices that will help facilitate change. POST 1 posts Abodunrin Oduyemi posted Apr 2, 2019 9:05 PM Subscribe Importance of Team Building Team building can mean anything from improving communication skills and resolving conflict to set up a self-directed work team. When people come together for any type of mission, they bring with them different values, beliefs, and skills to the team. Team building is designed to help employees understand how to deal with conflict because it puts people in different roles than they are used to playing. Team building is designed to help people see things from other people’s points of view. However, implementing a team building policies where employees may have to leave their work for a day or two can be a challenge, especially when some employees are reluctant to leave their desks even to go for lunch ( Jerene, 2016) Change Leaders, managers, and supervisors in an organization realize that not every problem will require money to solve; sometimes it is just about moving with the trends. Money is essential in any organization, but it can fail to buy or even to deliver the best results if used in the wrong context. Leaders, managers, and supervisors need to act in a manner that would make changes to the organization go as smoothly as possible and would also make resistance to change futile. However, it is not just about adopting change; it depends highly on how to go about it because an organization can be good at embracing change but does not have the necessary skills to do it which would make the efforts into changes futile. Why People are Resistant to change Change is not as easy as it looks and one thing to note is that there are many factors that come into play as to why people resist change. Gladwin and McConnel (2014), stated that a manager’s failure to keep up with a legitimate change in a chosen profession could severely a manager’s effectiveness as well as future prospects. One of the reason employees are afraid of change is because of fear because change has been known to implement fear for other people. Another reason why people are resistant to change is that people are not big believers in drastically new techniques or the workability of marvelous new technology (Gladwin & McConnel, 2014). People would resist change when the rewards are not aligned to their needs. Employees would resist change if they do not see a reward for implementing the change and without a reward, it could be hard to motivate employees to support the move. Other reasons why people would resist change are peer pressure, organizational politics, fear of failure and poor implementation policy. For change to be achieved by leaders, the leaders must establish attainable targets because unattainable targets will get the organization nowhere, which would result in a waste of resources and time. In order for change to be achieved, transparent and faultless communication should flow not only from top to bottom level but also from bottom to top. The organization also requires constructing futuristic plans for generating positive results. The business also needs to have good risk management that should be able to understand and measure the risks and also help the system in the smooth flow of the company for a more extended period. Leadership Practice that helps Supervisors Implement Change For change to take shape; communication should form the hallmark of strong leadership. Maxwell (1998) agrees that communication helps to create trust and openness; not forgetting it helps to build bonds and promote teamwork. the best practice for a leader in implementing change would be to tell them what to do, convince them to do it and involve them in planning for the change (Gladwin, &, 2014). Reference Gladwin, B. P., & McConnell, C. R. (2014). The Effective Corrections Manager. Burlington, MA:Jones& Bartlett Learning Maxwell, J. (1998). The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership. New York. Barnes & Noble Jerene, G. (2016). The HR Directors Guide to Teambuilding. Retrieved from: https://www.humanresourcesonline.net/features/hr-directors-guide-teambuilding/ POST 2 Olisia Rowe Active Learning Question: Week 5 CRJ-523 As correctional agencies move towards evidence-based-practices, change is inevitable. 1. Why does some correctional staff resist change when it is inevitable? Change for anyone is hard to accept because no one likes the dealing with the unfamiliar. People become comfortable in their positions and duties especially in the correctional setting. People fight against change because it requires us to grown and do so something new. But it seems to be part of the human experience to resist change on a gut level, no matter the nature of the change - even if it's positive and much- anticipated. If the change is not something we're excited about, our resistance quickly turns to resentment. And (unconsciously, perhaps), we telegraph and impart that unhappiness to everyone around us. The thing is, even though it's tremendously challenging, change is good. If we're not changing, we're stagnating (or dead). Change forces us to adapt, innovate, experience new things, solve problems, take risks (2010). A lot of correctional staff become complacent in their jobs which is why is so hard for some of them to adapt changes within the agency. 2. Explain current leadership practices that will help facilitate change Many organizations are also creating teams of employees to accomplish work goals. These companies give increasing amounts of responsibility to these teams by allowing them to be self-managed or assigning them the authority to plan and implement strategic change. In some instances, entire plants have been built around work teams (Landrum, Howell, & Paris, 2000). This is great way to incorporate change in such a major organization as corrections. It is more effective for a team of leaders to motivate people to change rather than one of two people. Another great way to make people receptive to change is to allow them seeing you utilizing the changes. People are more open to do what you do rather than what you say, References: Change is good. change is bad. change is inevitable. (2010). Veterinary Economics, 51(9), 4. Retrieved from https://saintleo.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search-proquestcom.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/docview/749646482?accountid=4870https://saintleo.idm.ocl c.org/login?url=https://search-proquestcom.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/docview/226918808?accountid=4870 Landrum, N.E., Howell, J.P., L. (2000). Leadership for strategic change Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 21(3), 150-156. Retrieved from https://saintleo.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search-proquestcom.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/docview/226918808?accountid=4870 POST 3 Raymond Swallows posted Apr 3, 2019 4:27 PM Subscribe "Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times." --Niccolo Machiavelli Given that corrections is constantly evolving, change is absolutely inevitable. Much like every other industry, resistance to change virtually guarantees failure. If not failure, certainly inefficiency. Correctional practices of the 1930s through the 1950s was more focused on rehabilitation. The 1960s saw an increase in community corrections programs, founded under the philosophy that rehabilitation could better occur in the community rather than in facilities. Fast forward to the 1980s and yet another philosophical swing to more of a justice model with hard and fast incarceration sentences, minimum/mandatory sentences, and “3 strike” rules that saw offenders being imprisoned for life, in what would normally not substantiate such sentences. It would seem the 2000s have found their way back around to a rehabilitative model, as evidenced with the amount of offender programs available in various jails and prisons around the country. In my local jail for instance, when I first began working as a detention officer back in 1994, the only rehabilitative programs we had at the county level was a program called “Life Skills” and the school board’s GED program. Everyone knows what a GED is. However, the Life Skills class few people know about. What it does is incorporate some academic elements with real-life skills that people need to be successful in the community. At our jail, it included computer familiarization, banking and economic training, cooking education, anger management stuff, government and law classes, etc. There is research that shows inmates who successfully complete programs like the Life Skills class reduce the overall recidivism rate. As of the latter 2010s, our jail has countless numbers of inmate vocational programs, a dedicated reintroduction specialist, community monitoring specialist, and more. The officers within our jail are highly suspicious of these programs and their efficacy. One of the reasons why the officers doubt the programs is because they tend to see several repeat offenders almost persistently in these programs every time they return to jail. Granted, the small number of repeat offenders that are well known to the officers represent a much smaller part of the whole than the officers would have you to believe. However, if you were to ask the officers, they would repeat probably verbatim the argument I made above that they think the programs are ineffective because of the repeat customers. Why does some correctional staff resist change when it is inevitable? Status quo offers a certain amount of security and comfort. According to Gladwin & McConnell (2014), some of the reasons for resistance relate to managerial changes that may involve a change to whom individuals report to, new management takes a department over, job tasks are changed or how the job is done is changed, technological advances and changes, etc. Explain current leadership practices that will help facilitate change. Again, according to Gladwin & McConnell (2014), there are three ways to institute change in the correctional setting. First and foremost, law enforcement generally is autocratic; the troops function on orders passed down through the chain of command. Thus, implementation of change through directive is generally the preferred and most frequent method used in law enforcement and corrections. I cannot tell you how many times through my career I have witnessed "change for the sake of change" and it always drove me crazy. However, at the end of the day, as a subordinate you do as you are told to do. An order is an order and not following an order that is lawful, ethical, and moral is tantamount to insubordination which no one wants. The next method would be by convincing the staff that the impending change is the right thing to do. Through this method, the manager would explain what the change is and why it needs to happen. Lastly, if at all possible, involve the employees in the change. Not every instance of organizational change can involve input from the taskers, but some can. There is no better way to gain acceptance than involvement. Through a combination of the above with excellent communication to those involved, and proper planning for the change, leadership can set a better stage for success relative to whatever the change is (Gladwin & McConnell, 2014). ~RS Gladwin, B., & McConnell, C. R. (2014). The effective corrections manager: Correctional supervision for the future (3rd ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning. Effective action: advice from Machiavelli. (2011, January 10). Retrieved from https://www.businessinsider.com/effective-action-advice-frommachiavelli-2011-1
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