NCJ Number
142626
Date Published
Unknown
Length
27 pages
Annotation
Influenced by the principles espoused in Total Quality Management, the Madison (Wisconsin) Police Department has implemented a program called Quality Leadership. Comprised of 12 basic tenets, Quality Leadership has proven to be an exceptional leadership philosophy to serve the city's citizens and employees.
Abstract
The principles of Quality Leadership related to "systems" include improving systems and examining processes before blaming people, having a customer orientation, asking and listening to employees, and implementing a problem solving process. In terms of leadership, Quality Leadership calls for developing an open and facilitating atmosphere, encouraging creativity through risk taking, avoiding power-oriented decisionmaking, and managing based on the behavior of the majority "good employees." Quality Leadership promotes teamwork, develops agreed-upon goals with employees and a plan to achieve them, seeks employee input before key decisions are made, and strives to develop mutual trust among employees. Some stories of internal change at the Madison police department are used here to illustrate how the Quality Leadership principles relate to squad cars, attendance policy, a new departmental promotional process, and performance evaluations. 29 notes