Police Leadership and Administration

Book excerpt: William Walsh and Gennaro Vito have adapted the strategic management process to the police organizational world in this innovative new text, Police Leadership and Administration: A 21st-Century Approach. Focusing principally on the police executive, this book covers pioneering management techniques for leaders facing the challenges of today’s complex environment, providing the police practitioner instruction in planning, setting direction, developing strategy, assessing internal and external environments, creating learning organizations, and managing and evaluating the change process. It also tackles how to handle the political, economic, social, and technical considerations that differ from one community to the next. Police Leadership and Administration trains individuals to search for solutions, rather than relying on old formulas and scientific management principles. It shows how to tailor responses to the unique problems and issues that professionals are likely to face in the field of law enforcement, providing a foundation with which to adapt to an ever-changing criminal justice climate. This book is essential for forward-thinking police leadership courses in colleges and professional training programs.