Strategic Misintent Generating Operational & Tactical Mishaps

In order to understand why an organization may suddenly, or perennially be experiencing catastrophic mishaps that seem isolated, even unrelated yet seemingly following some patterns, we may need to shine light on its composition, leadership and outcomes thereof. We must also move away from simplistic analyses and theories that fail to address the overall syndromes associated with the evidenced breakdowns.

Let’s travel back in time and the year is November 2017. We are honored to put to close scrutiny the indictment on our (Kenya’s) National Police Service (NPS) in which World Internal Security and Police Index (WISPI), in collaboration with Institute of Economic and Peace (IEP) ranked the NPS third (3rd) worst police service globally beating only Nigeria and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in a report that was published by the local dailies on 11th November 2017 (Link: https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/kenya/article/2001259931/kenyan-police-ranked-worst-in-the-world ). WISPI measures the ability of the police and other security providers to address internal security issues in 127 countries, and this is done across four domains, using sixteen indicators. The four domains are, capacity, process, legitimacy and outcomes.

For the index to rank our NPS 3rd worst, it so followed that truly colossal blunders were observed, documented, analyzed, and interpreted. They mustn’t have been isolated; they came in clusters.

Coming back to the present, between the start of December 2020 and 4th January 2021, we have witnessed cases where members of the NPS have turned the gun on their own comrades killing their mates in cold blood over ‘disagreements’ and on members of the public that had reportedly paid them a visit only to meet their death. Many cases of brutality against the citizenry have been documented as well. Sadly too, there have been cases where public have attacked policemen.

It is only prudent to consider WISPI and IEP’s index with caution because of the expected margin of error. Nevertheless, we would still expect the NPS to have taken this damning review, if even the public outcry, as positive criticism and carried out deep introspection. Indeed, it calls on all of us to review our roles within the grand scheme of things and play our part in finding solutions against these clearly undesirable outcomes.

I am inclined to see whether we can possibly find the course of this river: mistakes evolve over time, and the reality is that there is no organization that can avoid the effects of (1) the organization’s history and (2) change. Combined, these two factors inevitably bring about shifts in the status quo, leading organizations to possess unavoidable vulnerabilities and therefore opens them up to making mistakes. Nevertheless, we cannot conclude that some sort of failure is preordained. The critical functions of its management is the stewardship through such internal dynamics to ensure that it adjusts optimally in the face of unavoidable changes, not as a choice, but for their strategic importance in their very survival, if growth and advancement.

There have been many changes: the establishment of the NPS as the chief Law enforcement organ in 2011 under article 243 of the constitution of the Republic of Kenya is one such undertaking that effectively abolished the National Police Force and the Administration Police Force bringing them under an umbrella that’s under the independent command of an Inspector General.

Tracking Down the Broken Compass

I am a firm believer in the fact that the very worst failures and mistakes have half way points where they can be recalled, renegotiated and altogether remedied. I would love to highlight some focal areas where we can start to tackle the proverbial “elephant in the room”, first from the top.

Let us consider for a moment that there could be Strategic Misintent/Misteps that generate precipitous failures or mishaps witnessed at different layers. 

As far as organizations are concerned, they are undeniably a community of people that interrelate to form the whole. Ideally, they are organized in some form and function of governance with clear lines of communication linking the junior-most to the top echelon(s) of its leadership. A review of the organizational ecosystem reveals chains of command and scalar chains that provide for effective and efficient relationships as regards task organizations and responsibilities thereof. Whilst responsibility can be assigned, even delegated, it cannot however be diminished, and so those that wield ultimate authority cannot completely divest themselves from blame when things go wrong.

As the cliché goes, “the buck stops,” with the main guy(s) under whose watch things go or went wrong. 

Flawed Mindsets that babysit False Sense of the Reality

The higher you go, the further you go and compounded is the risk of getting detached from the reality unless the roots are secure on the “ground truth”. This is indeed a major puzzle, and it is NOT plausible simply to blame the size of the bureaucracies involved, the superfluous layers of the organizational departments, or competence levels of the executives involved; evidence points at vital information that goes astray which then throws off the organization’s perception of the reality. Fortunately, with information technology currently, it doesn’t take an especially efficient organization to flag important information, process and synthesize its impact and efficiently adjust course.

For instance, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, His Excellency Uhuru Kenyatta on 25th March 2020 ordered for a dusk-to-dawn curfew to commence on the 27^th March, 2020. In under 10 days, 6 Kenyans had lost their lives to the police’s brutal and chaotic enforcement of the same. Similarly, numerous others were injured in the ensuing chaos. On 30^th March, 2020, none other than the president himself apologized to Kenyans for the excesses committed by the police. However, the NPS’s spokesperson differed with that position, to the extent of downplaying the documented ills, seemingly blinded by their own light.

Reality can be shredded further when the higher echelons are missing in oversight and develop the “I-hear-what-I-want-to-hear” attitude. This sets them up for failure, then you get to discover the extent to which their picture of the reality is mistaken simply because they assume that those reporting to them are relaying information accurately. A case of ‘broken telephone”, perhaps?

The last nail in the coffin in this narrative of a mistaken picture of the reality is PR campaigns that reinforces the skewed reality by spreading a generous veil of ignorance over the real issues. Even with abundant evidence of ills, if brutality by a section of the police, mishaps and misdemeanors, a PR machinery that comes out to defend the same cuts off decision makers from realistically adjusting solutions to the operant reality, whilst worsening the (bad) situation(s) at play. Worse still, this actually emboldens those committing the ills for they feel “defended”, if even appreciated.

Whereas you can PR yourself into temporary ‘good’ perceptions, these Band-Aids must be shoved out of the decision making table where the NPS and indeed the leadership at different levels inevitably MUST properly consider real issues and hammer out realistic adjustments on their strategic, cultural, tactical breakdowns in order to avoid exacerbating the inherent weaknesses at critical times. 

On Christmas eve, a video clip of a motorist getting assaulted by 3 NPS officers at a road block in Nakuru emerged and went viral on social media, raising quite a storm from the public, human rights groups and IPOA, among others. However, in sharp contrast to the prevailing opinions on the incident at the time, the top echelons of the police asked the public to “desist from provoking officers.”

Days later, on the 26^th December, 2020, an incident report from Siaya county indicated that 2 police officers were viciously attacked by a 19 year old, form 3 student who was reportedly one of the attacked officers’ girlfriend.

In yet another incident, a police report dated 2nd January, 2021 from Kamukunji police station indicated that police officer Ewoi attacked and killed his comrade called Maureen and shot another officer in the hands when he opened fire on both of them at close range. Ewoi then disappeared from the scene.  He was later to return to the station a day later where he shot himself when he got cornered by other officers. The NPS indicated that the shooting was occasioned by some “disagreement over money.” 

On 4^th January 2021, a police officer at Mwea GK Prison shot and killed a fellow male officer, then shot himself in what is believed to be a love triangle.

The sad news is that the gapsbetween the occasions that prompt (or provoke) members of the NPS into violent and vicious responses to crises of sorts that almost always end in fatalities, and their culpability to do the same has grown so steadily narrower, these have become a daily occurrence. Something must be seriously wrong. What are we missing? Where did the ball drop?

Let me pause here and note with happiness that the Inspector General of Police (IGP) started directly engaging members of the public in his Twitter handle, #EngageTheIG where he is exposed to a myriad of their concerns. Truly laudable!

As the well-worn cliché cautions “the road to failure is paved with good intentions,” this game’s goal must be to make it as easy as possible for people to count, to be heard, to have a voice; while a culture of open-mindedness gets embraced as a critical prerequisite, it’s important to back it up with multiple avenues of debate, discussion, and data.

“In God we trust; all others bring data.”

W. Edwards Deming

Fixation on the Wrong Scoreboard: Selection/Recruitment; Training; Career Progression & Reward (and Punishment) Systems.

Could it be that the NPS is also predestined to hit headwinds due to its very unsuitable genetic makeup; the suboptimal composition combined with technical and tactical unfitness of its constituents that erect hurdles between the organizations’ own ambitions and the probability of achieving them?

Recruitment into the disciplined service follows a ‘quota system’ that rationalizes representation of ethnic tribes vis a vis population. However, corruption has reared its ugly head into this very critical piece that then puts to question, if not altogether upset the very suitability of those selected to join the ranks of the NPS; bad raw material, bad finished product. Starting from this foundation, it so follows that the navigational landscape is already predestined to fail, if poised to hit unsuitable scores as regards the candidates’/recruits’ assimilation of training, lack of passion and drive in the profession, and lowering their productivity thereof.

As regards recruitment, eradication of corruption will allow for stringent adherence to selection matrices. Even then, injection of psychologically suitable approaches beyond the ‘traditional’ ones will help weed out dreamers by helping to unpack what helps to differentiate successful hotshots from the crowd. Modern psychologists are grateful to Colonel John Clemans Flanagan for conceiving and refining a method of interviewing potential candidates known as the ‘Critical Incident Technique’ (CIT).

Moreover, there’s been reported disquiet in the way promotions, career progression and reward systems are handled in the service that is characterized with lobbying/soliciting rather than structured, meritocratic placements.

Individuals’ affinity for the wrong motivators (money, make money quick) seem to drive certain choices for postings within the service where such departments as traffic seem to churn up a wave of ‘hopefuls’ and the ‘lucky ones’. The same can be said of other ‘lucrative’ departments.

Additional concerns are registered when dysfunctional corrective measures are taken on some highlighted misdemeanors; prevalence of corruption in one spot of deployment attract ‘transfers’ as a punitive action that surely pay lip service to solving the very problems, if not addressing the root causes of the same. These aren’t just isolated incidences; they seem so widespread that some time back, the current IG came across his own officers who then asked for and received a bribe to ‘allow’ the IG go past some section of a road after his taxi was flagged for some ‘traffic offense’.

Leadership challenges may account for some internal impediments towards mission attainment. This goes well beyond the quality, organization and soundness of operational orders that drive missions, to include the orientation and feelings of the leaders at all levels, and how that gets to bleed out and affect those around them – a phenomenon psychologists call ’emotional contagion’. A strong, well oriented and incorruptible leadership that inspires teamwork and holds aloft a moral guiding light for his team will sure incentivize performance and boost positive orientation among the led while starving off unwanted traits, if habits.

Administrative challenges as regards accountability, poor maintenance of arms registry, Occurrence Book (OB) records, staff Welfare, among others may also be blamed for some undesirable outcomes.

Whereas the undertaking to digitize the OB in the NPS is a huge leap towards addressing the hitherto chaotic management of cases reported to the NPS, thanks to the IG Mutyambai’s ambitious interventions, matching revolutionary thinking establishment of accountability measures, staff welfare, among other morale boosting measures, requisite controls on stores and personnel, is required. During the merger between the AP and the regular police, in one of his public addresses, His Excellency the president noted the existence of thousands of ‘ghost workers’ in the service had ensured that millions of taxpayers  went to, well, ‘ghosts’. When it comes to arms, crimes or deaths happen when they are unaccounted for, or there’s less controls in their possession and usage.

There’s also the question on the leadership’s fixation on the wrong scoreboard. The past public vetting exercise laid bare the depth of ill acquired riches/wealth and it was clear to all they were proceeds of crime and corruption among the bosses. If business acumen were to be considered plausible (in alleged poultry farming, merry go rounds, quarries, mining et al), then it potentially meant that there was a level of focus on very lucrative commercial undertakings and dogged investment of time and effort, so much so it would simply have left the personalities with no time for their primary jobs. BUT, no, there was simply evidence of fixation on the wrong scoreboard, if brilliant execution of the wrong visions as the critical roles suffered.

It is NOT all gloom. There’s quite a number of laudable achievements – primary being the existence of relative peace and security and the obvious fact that we are not swimming in a steady stream of disasters.

What’s more, here’s a way the NPS can learn from and adjust sail in the face of the challenges.

Change the Mind-set to Accurately Reflect Reality. By questioning it’s own idea of excellence, perfection and attitude from a force to a service, we’d sure see better engagements that reflect upon collaboration rather than competing interests internally and externally.

Challenge Delusions that keep the service from Facing Reality. The risk of falling deeper into complacency is compounded by a people that keep burying their heads in the sand rather than risk disrupting the status quo. The emphasis must shift to critical thinking, innovation and challenging the status quo.

Manage Information More Efficiently. Unfocused organizations tend to punch in the dark and get dragged into reactive ‘firefighting’ which are treated to aspirin solutions. The fairer exchange is for the NPS to drill down into the data (numbers) and figure out just what’s going on. For instance, since 1st January, 2021, we have fatal shooting incidents dotting police stations across the county happening every day? What could be going absolutely wrong?

Lastly, Change Unsuccessful Leadership Habits. For instance, start by spelling out the visions and missions clearly stating the “who”, “what”, “how”, and then communicate these clearly outlining measurable desirable outcomes. These may boil down to what are called operational briefs with clear control measures as to limits and boundaries. Build teams with mechanisms to oversight and quality control their actions.

In the next articles, we will take a deeper dive into how the societal pressures affect and/or influence NPS work and outcomes. Could there be a way our societal conventional aspirations have coalesced to inspire deviant behavior in our NPS? How about the Psychological mini-warfare (Mental Health challenges) our NPS grapple with in their clearly challenging battlements?

What of the Curse of Knowledge and the Power Factor?

It would be great to get your feedback and join me in this noble journey that is aimed at finding solutions, and helping lessen the burdens of the myriad challenges that threaten to crush our society in general.