NCJ Number
164897
Journal
Gazette Volume: 58 Issue: 9 Dated: (September 1996) Pages: 21-24
Date Published
1996
Length
4 pages
Annotation
Based upon the author's participant observation case study of a 36-member, in-house, unionized security force of a major Ontario university (Canada), this article discusses the selection and training of such personnel.
Abstract
The article notes that the recruitment and demographic characteristics of officers, combined with training tactics, produced two competing rank and file work groups. The security- oriented group consisted of older, less-educated officers nearing retirement. Their previous police or security training and experience had been acquired in the distant past. The long- standing role associated with traditional private security comprised the primary work emphasis of this group. The police- oriented group, on the other hand, consisted of younger, better- educated officers with recent police or security training and experience. This group enthusiastically embraced the tasks of order maintenance and especially crime control. The few arrests during the study period were made by those in the police-oriented group. The development of a security model that emphasizes crime control, however, may be unsuitable for the practice of private security that has traditionally served as an alternative to the police function. Organizations with security forces may wish to construct recruitment and training policies designed to de- emphasize the practice of a crime-control style of policing that is inconsistent with loss-prevention and service objectives. One alternative may be to hire personnel without police training, experience, and orientation and later train them for the kinds of security duties most valued by their employers. Organizations that hire and train persons to perform crime-control functions may find themselves having to cope with personnel who are continually lobbying for the symbolic and material trappings associated with the police occupation.