Increasing Police Applicants with Brian Ellis

We dig into why police staffing shortages persist even when plenty of people still want to serve, and why slow, confusing hiring pipelines push good candidates out. Brian Ellis explains how agencies can raise recruit conversion by reducing friction, clarifying expectations, and preparing applicants for every gate without lowering standards.

• the real cost of understaffing across morale, fatigue, overtime, and response times
• why agencies still recruit like it is 1995 and why today’s generation will not wait
• the hiring pipeline as a compounding dropout problem across tests, boards, backgrounds, psych, academy, and FTO
• voluntary dropout as the biggest opportunity and why clarity beats bigger bonuses
• a systems mindset for identifying friction at every touchpoint
• how Tactical Concepts helps demystify the process for applicants and supports agencies with practical tweaks
• options for applicants needing coaching, cohorts, and structured preparation

We invite you to join other leaders at travisyates.org and reach out to Brian Ellis at badgereadycoach.com. 

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Transcript

Welcome And Why Staffing Matters

Announcement 0:01

Welcome to Courageous Leadership with Travis Yates, where leaders find the insights, advice, and encouragement they need to lead courageously.

Travis Yates 0:12

Welcome back to the show. I'm so honored you decided to spend a few minutes with us here today. And as you know, when it comes to leadership, one of the things that we often talk about is recruiting and retention. And today's guest has pioneered a way for agencies to get ahead of that really colossal crisis going on in public safety. If we don't recruit and staff our agencies full, all else seems to fail. So I'm really excited to bring on Brian Ellis on the show today. You're familiar with Brian, he's been on the show before, really a leadership guru out there, but man, he has pioneered something that I think you need to hear about. Brian's a retired police lieutenant with over 25 years of experience. He's an author, he's an instructor, he's a crisis management professional. Throughout his police career, he served in numerous tactical incidents and high-stakes missions with several accommodations for meritorious service. Brian led numerous specialty teams, and during his time as a SWAT commander and specialty team leader, he developed a strong understanding of the dynamics that make people and missions thrive. And when it comes to thrive, there's very little I've seen as good as what you're about to hear. Brian is the founder of Paschal Concepts, where he drives recruit conversion for public safety. Brian Ellis, how are you doing, sir?

Brian Ellis 1:31

Oh, just trying to live the dream, brother. How are you doing?

Brian Ellis And The Problem

Travis Yates 1:34

Man, I'm doing great. And man, you I don't know if people are going to be, I know some people are familiar with you. You've been you've been sort of on the speaking circuit and in the leadership space for some time now. But you I will tell you right up front, uh, maybe I'm biased here. I know I'm not. I know you well. You're one of the best creative minds in the profession today. And uh you have you you have pioneered this concept, you've launched this company that I think can change everything we think we know about police recruiting. Before we get to tactical concept, just sort of give me the roadmap for your career and how you set where you do today.

Brian Ellis 2:13

Well, first of all, I'm humbled that you think of that way. Uh uh, you know, think that of me, that uh that you know, those are big, big pants to fill. Um, I I appreciate that. Uh you know, I when I look back at my police career, I I really think, you know, I I've historically I've been a white kid, right? Uh and I chase a lot of things for the sake of just trying to understand them. And and when I you know, when I had the opportunity to uh you know look at the next thing that I wanted to do out outside of public safety, I mean I wasn't done with with with the profession. Like I the profession gave me a lot of scars, marks, and tattoos, but it also gave me, you know, uh uh it it it challenged me and grew me as a human being and the things that are important to me and they and important to the community and and and to the profession at large. So I have the utmost respect for the profession. And sitting on the sidelines and doing something else this last three and a half years uh was felt good, but I saw this big problem in in law enforcement. It I mean, it's been a problem for uh over a decade. And I can remember when I first got promoted to lieutenant uh in uh 2014, the chief was all excited about, you know, hey, we've we're we we've got some uh additional bodies, we're gonna we're gonna ramp up three academies, we're gonna be at full staff, no time. And now uh 12 years later, there's still a staffing shortage. Uh and this and this crisis just uh I mean still it's still sitting in front of us, and and and there's a lot of opportunity for us to get really creative and start thinking about this in in in a dynamic and unique way. Um and so that's kind of you know really what started me to to think about hey, what is the biggest pressing pressing issue for for law enforcement right now? And it's it it's it's the entry gates into the into into the profession.

Why Old Recruiting No Longer Works

Travis Yates 4:29

Yeah, you know, and it this comes from the creativity you have and the mind that you have is you're a problem solver. And I very similar, like you, I think that's why we get along so well, or we don't get along so well, we're very similar. We we met a few years ago, we immediately hit it off. We were going through some of the similar things, and we were sort of battling the similar things. I I'm as the audience knows, is I'm somewhat involved in recruiting because I'm involved in leadership. And when you speak about leadership, you must talk about recruiting. It's the most important topic out there. If you don't staff your agency, what else are you doing? So I I sort of felt like I was dragged into this recruiting space. Like, like it's a big problem. I need to be part of the solution. And man, when we say big problem, I mean, Brian, I just want to line this out for people that may not understand this is yes, we have a shortage in a lot of law enforcement agencies. In fact, the bigger agencies are down 15, 20, 25 percent. But that shortage reverberates, right? It's it hurts officer fatigue, it hurts officer morale. You can't perform the mission, you can't respond to calls quickly enough. The overtime costs, I mean, Phoenix Police alone spent 95 million dollars last year with most of it filling beats because of a 600-person shortage. And I've spoken to representatives there, and they just don't seem to really understand. They see they keep trying to do things the way they've always done it. It's no, it's no attack on one agency. Most agencies are doing that. They're still recruiting like it's 1995. They still don't understand why people aren't just getting hired, and and that's really not that has nothing to do with 2020, it's got nothing to do with with the defund police, it's got nothing to do with that. I I know from the recruiting spaces, there's no sorts of people that want to go into law enforcement, but the change has been the generation. The generation of me and you, Brian, where I took a police test and waited by a mailbox for six months and hoped I got a letter. You know, I'd call them once in a while, they'd be like, You'll get a letter when you get a letter, relax. Well, they could do that because I tested with a thousand people for nine jobs. They could do that. Those days are over, and the kids today are not going to wait around. They're not gonna wait around six months or six days. Like they they want, they it's just generational. And I don't think we've understood that in public safety. The private industry has had to understand that because they go out, they go bankrupt if they if they lack staffing. We just pay gobs and gobs of overtime. And by the way, not to get up all on a tangent, but I know you're you do a lot of stuff in the wellness space. What will law enforcement look like in five years, 10 years if we keep working cops this hard?

The Hiring Pipeline Dropout Cascade

Brian Ellis 7:01

Well, there's there's there's a I mean, you got to really start digging on the problem. And and I, you know, I put my Y hat on uh in a lot of sp on this thing. And so one of the biggest challenges is you know having good stats because you know there's over 18,000 law enforcement agencies you know in the United States, and so that you know tracking becomes really challenging. Um when what we know about most agencies is when they have a problem, they you know they reach out to friends of other neighboring agencies to say, hey, what are you doing and how are you doing it? And and not every police organization has hiring problems. I mean, sometimes it has to do with culture and and um or the just the amount of volume of people that they need and and what their attrition looks like and and and and and their planning efforts. But but well and yeah, we could say what we want about COVID and how it it's I mean, it's COVID's changed the game for for just what a workforce looks like. If you look at the private sector, the vast majority of jobs now are remote or hybrid. Um, whether an organization likes it or not, I mean, this is kind of where jobs have gone. Um, and so there's a lot of perks on the private side. Um, but it doesn't still mean, just like you said, there's there's plenty of people that I think uh want to step up, want to serve. It's a great job. There's uh a lot of autonomy, the the ability to do kind of what you want to do. But you know, there's a one of the biggest challenges when you look at law enforcement, uh, you know, just a just a pipeline. Let's just talk about the pipeline itself, uh there's a high volume of of of uh dropout, voluntarily drop out, because the process is so complicated. And and you know, I've seen up as high as 92% report that they voluntarily drop out. So if you only if you're only capturing, and that comes from at you know, my backyard right now, and the Atlanta Police Department said, you know, they they see about an on average, about a over a I think it was a five-year trend, 92% of people just voluntarily drop out of the application uh process. And so if you're like, okay, well, I'm only capturing eight percent of people, that's a huge issue. And then that doesn't even talk about the compounding cascading issues behind the scenes because there's disqualifiers at every gate. You know, you talk about the written test, you're gonna drop another 20 or 30 percent uh you're gonna fail out of that process, the physical agility, you know, and depending on who you talk to, I mean, it's as high as a 70% fail rate, but on average, it's it's anywhere from 20 to 70 percent. The oral board's gonna drop another 20 to 40 percent, the the the background's gonna drop 40 to 75 percent, the the psychological uh the the psyche valve is gonna drop another you know 10 to 25 percent. The academy's gonna have a failure rate of 13, 14 percent. And then the FTO process, you know, we you know, there's people that make about 5% fail out of the FTO process. So if you start just compounding the cascade of failure uh in this process, there's a tremendous load up front to do this work for little return. And so we if we want to get really better at at this at this process, we have to start thinking like you know in a in a systems mindset and look at every touch point and and look for friction. And um, you know, and that's what I've tried to do is is you know, I started really thinking about, well, what's really driving uh this voluntary drop-off. Um, because as you said, there's plenty of people that are still, you know, getting criminal justice degrees, wanting to do the work, you know, in the the profession. But we have a really bloated, long, you know, not simplified process um with a lot of ambiguity. And and I think that that's that's the opportunity that we have.

Finding And Removing Process Friction

Travis Yates 11:20

Yeah, we had Doug Larson here on the show a few months back with Safeguard Recruiting, it's the only uh law enforcement specific recruiting company, and they're doing very well. But even he said that there's only about a 4% higher rate, meaning if 100 people apply, by the time they get to the end, an agency averages about hiring four of them. Well, what that causes, it causes a lot of work on the front end, and agencies having to work really hard. If you need to hire 10 people, uh man, you got to have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people come through the initial gate. And that's what he does. He they they stack that funnel for people. And he, I know he talks to them about the processes and and sewing it up, but he talks about friction all the time. And so what you've done is you you come in and you say, okay, you've got 500 people that have applied. Let's take your rate from 4% to 8, 9, 10%. Here's how you do it. And that's where tactical concepts come from. By the way, I think it's incredible because it's a tremendous amount of money and resources. Let's just let's just use that 500 number. That may be a lot for some departments. Let's just use that to get 500 applicants. No longer do you just set back and wait for 500 applicants. There's a lot of work that goes into that time and money and resources. I mean, you're probably having to do a digital recruiting campaign to get that amount. You probably got to optimize your website to get that amount. You probably got to hit every public event in your city to get that amount of applicants, just the way it is. A lot of our applicants today are passive applicants, meaning they're thinking about it, but they're just not sure. So you have to work really hard to get them. By the way, I'll back up. This is why I discuss the 80-20 rule a lot. The 80-20 rule is every department in the country is pretty much gonna get 80% of the department full. That's just old school that people want to be cops, they're gonna go through the process, they're gonna wait it out. They've always wanted to be a police officer, 80%. But you're never gonna get fully staffed if you don't go after the other 20%. And that's what Doug's company does for agencies. And what you're coming in is you're you optimize that. So if you have 500 applicants, where you may only get uh you know 10 through and hire them, your company comes in, Brian, you're and you're saying, and you can hire 20 or 30 if you implement what I've done here. So tell us a little bit about tactical concepts and what you do.

Tactical Concepts And Demystifying Hiring

Brian Ellis 13:35

Yeah, so I mean uh so the reason I I you know I call it you know tactical concepts is is you know the the Greek word for for tactical is uh I'll probably butcher it, but it's a tactitose. And it and it basically just means, you know, like skill, this you know, intentional skill, you know, to towards uh you know what what you're doing. And and and so the uh and so that's really what I want to do with uh you know, with this problem is just let's just get tactical on it. Like let's let's just do uh let's do the scout, let's just let's have a great, you know uh uh operational outline plan, let's let's make assignments, let's let's really just uh have a good contingency plan and and and really uh look at all that friction that we have, uh, especially when you come uh when when you talk about the the you know the applicant side. So let's just focus straight on that is if they don't really know what they're walking into, I think the vast majority of people think that they're walking into any other job application. And that's just not true. You know, it's not like being a uh it's it's not like you're going to Bank of America and applying for a teller position. You know, like the application process is really easy. And then just because you do it doesn't mean you you did it right. And and there's a lot of different ways that an applicant can end up putting themselves in this position where they don't get a callback. And it's not that they're a bad person, they just didn't really understand what uh the process was, what the department's trying to measure. Uh, you know, they look at all this work that gets put in front of them and they're like, man, is the juice worth the worth the squeeze? And so I think there's just a lot of opportunity on the front side to really demystify the process to help applicants, you know, you know, to give them enough information to where they don't have the problem that that you know a lot of people have. We haven't even talked about, you know, I've I tried to do as much research as I can on this topic, and some of the research that I found shows that only about 30% of applicants get through the process the first time. So and that in of itself leads a lot of opportunity to just, you know, if if we can make the process better, then um, and we and it doesn't have to, we don't have to lower standards, but we have to put things in in specific order uh to to get us the best results and demystify this process to to enough degree where where people don't fail, uh then we're number one, we're getting more qualified applicants to choose from. But number two, we're setting people off on, you know uh up front, we're setting them up for success because just because they get in doesn't mean that they're not gonna fail the academy, then they're not gonna, you know, uh make it through FTO, you know, and and we're still gonna have the opportunity to give them a little bit more mindset on the on the challenges that still are ahead of them. So that's kind of essentially what what what we're setting out to do. And I think that there's uh you know a lot of opportunity to help organizations uh change that conversion rate, right? I mean, that it's it's it's really low-hanging fruit at this point.

Travis Yates 17:16

Yeah, it's kind of a no-brainer because what you're doing is is you have a you have somebody that applies in the police department and they don't really know the intricate details of the process. I mean, they could Google it, but it's different in every department, right? And so what you do is you go in and you customize that process for that candidate that's applying to that specific department, and you and you you I mean, just just having a conversation with them or a quick class to them on here's what you're gonna expect at each step, because the dropout rate, and I know this from my work on the recruiting side, is there's a tremendous amount of drop out dropout rate just simply because they don't know what to expect. If you get told, show up for this test, you're like, well, what's this test about? Is there math? Is there writing? Is there I mean, I wasn't too good in school, or I'm kind of concerned. I mean, so there's just a lot of nervousness. And then, you know, uh, there's departments that have up to a 50% dropout rate at the physical fitness. Well, that doesn't mean they're not physically ready. Like they're just not showing up for it oftentimes because they're like, I don't know what to expect here. Now, departments have done a decent job of sort of some of them will explain it on their website, but sometimes you have to go deeper than that. And so what you're doing, Brian, with your company here is you're you're hyper-preparing a candidate for maximum success. And what the department's gonna see from that is is more people will get through the process, meaning they're gonna be able to hire more people with the pipeline they have. Uh, so kind of tell me what the options are. Can the candidates take this on their own? And because or does can the department align with you for their candidates? What kind of what do you what do you do here?

Agency Support And Candidate Coaching Options

Brian Ellis 18:50

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of different options, and it's uh, you know, for the agencies, it's it's it's really helping them have a um a systems approach to you know getting people into their organization. Because we often, again, I I think we think of this as just a it's it's just a recruiting problem. And and it's not. I mean, that I think that's just too wide of a net and it really doesn't uh do itself justice in going, okay, well, it's just recruiting. It's just recruiting. You know, we don't have you know, recruiting and retention. You know, it doesn't it it's uh it's too ambiguous to really kind of uh you know set out a really good plan uh you know to to conquer and and and win. So that's uh that's uh uh you know for the agency decide, that's that's what we're doing is is we're reducing friction for applicants. At the same time, we're showing uh organizations, you know, some some kind of best practices and some things that that that uh again are are are fairly easy tweaks, and then others, you know, might might challenge an organization a little bit more. And every organization is going to be different and just like you said, in in in the in their their mechanism of action of how they you know uh where you ask for a personal history statement, you know. Um you know, uh you're more than likely to get people to bow out and go, ah, too much work for me if you ask somebody to do that up front. I mean, that's just that's a lot to ask from somebody, and you haven't even uh you know made uh an assessment of whether you're that they're hireable or not. Uh the other thing that we have to understand is that in this day and age where everybody has this problem, you know, you see it every day where agencies are doing hiring bonuses because they're trying to do well, hiring bonuses. I don't, you know, just just dangling some money isn't always the right answer. And I think that there's a lot of other opportunities that we're just missing because there is so much friction. And then on the the applicant side, again, it's demystifying the process. And so um every applicant's different, you know, like every human being's different. You know, some of us can hear something one time and go, got it, you know, I know what to do, and I, you know, and I can take the hill. Other people may need, you know, different stages of assistance. And so uh, and that's really what it's about. It's yeah, I have a a product that you know demystifies the process, you know, most definitely prepares them for every stage of hiring. Um, because I think it's universal, you know, some of those things are very universal uh for agencies, what what they're looking for and what they want out of out of people, as well as give them some development in areas that will will definitely help them not only during their their the testing process and every stage of their testing process, but we'll help them the academy and in field training and in their career following. And then, you know, some are going to raise their hand and need a little bit more help. They they might need some uh you know one-on-one coaching. Uh they might need uh a a cohort, you know, just to kind of, you know, just to have that community where they're where where they can kind of see that they're not alone in this thing, right? I mean, and not and and and they're not the only ones having this these same worries. This is totally normal. You know, me and you even like you you mentioned, I mean we yeah, we we worried if we were going to get hired in the first place because there was so many the the there was just so many applicants. You're like you know God, you know, how many how many how many people are they going to hire in the in in in this stage? So I I just think there's a lot of opportunts that that I think plenty of people uh you know are are talking about in this profession.

What Help Looks Like For Chiefs

How To Connect And Closing

Travis Yates 23:04

Yeah no I I think it's uh it's a cheat code so to speak for these agencies and and I know I'm not going to put you in a bad spot to talk about costs but I we've we've talked offline and I know there's probably not a hiring bonus out there right now that you don't beat. Meaning for the less than one hiring bonus they can bring Brian Elson's company in and you're going to increase the conversions. I mean it just seems to be a no-brainer. So I will say this Brian law enforcement is kind of traditional and I just know this from the recruiting side is they're really nervous about outside folks being involved or you know we're recruiters and you know and we can do this or this and that. But so explain to me if I'm a police department and I and I want the help of tactical concepts to increase my conversion what does that look like what do you do for them? Yeah I mean there's again it's it's really kind of sitting down with that organization trying to trying to better understand uh you know all all their friction points uh and again the the nice thing about you know having over two decades of of experience in this profession is you know I've sat on hiring panels I've I've I've myself I've tested for you know countless specialty uh jobs as a officer as a sergeant you know um you know as you know when you get into management you just kind of get uh placed in in in in different areas uh but you know so I've sat on both sides of the table I've I've helped other agencies across the country in their in their uh promotional uh processes and and so I you know I I feel like I've got a really good understanding of of of the system itself and then it's just it's it's a big problem that that just like you said earlier I I mean I still got a lot to give uh a profession that that meant that meant a lot to me and I you know I want to figure out a way of uh of of providing really good value to to a profession that I love so um you know we won't leave any s stone unturned and and as well as we'll you know we'll help their applicants really understand the process and I and I think that that's you know that in of itself is is is such a massive pain point in you know recruiting and I and I I again I think it's in hiring right you know it's just understanding your pipeline that that in itself is is uh is is worth the squeeze of uh you know uh uh of conversation yeah and if I'm listening to this uh as a uh chief or HR representative I mean my first my first my first thought is well hey Brian we can't change our processes we can't we can't move this around this has been set in stone for years we just can't do it what I like about what you're doing is that's okay because what you have is you have an education platform for the candidate to take away that nervousness that anxiety and that in itself will increase the conversion rates will it not yeah I I I believe so uh uh just from the standpoint of just just looking at you know the you know human psychology and and you know uh sometimes walls aren't put up to keep you out they're they're they're put up to see how bad you want it but at the same time you you know if you don't understand that wall and understand your want you may just go eh I'm not I'm not gonna try to go over that wall so I you know there is a there is opportunity I think again to to to legitimate look look at their process and I'm not saying changing you know just like you said I think you don't have to always change your process you might you might um uh reposition your process to where it's it's getting uh the best it's making the most sense for what you need and and for the applicant and I think that there's opportunities there but first and foremost if 92 percent of people are voluntarily just dropping out that's a problem itself is there's a problem yeah is a is a massive opportun you know that's a that's a problem needing fixing yeah man i i'm telling you i think this could really really change the game when it comes to this so-called recruiting crisis because it's not really a crisis it's a decision crisis and one of the best decisions an agency could make is is not only are they not getting your education uh which is an online format for every candidate to take Brian but they're getting your experience and expertise and this is really hands off for the recruiters not that we're this didn't put more work on the recruiters it's just gonna it's gonna help them be able to convert more people to work they're already doing and I just think it's a no-brainer man so um if you're out there and you're frustrated because you're doing all this work and you're getting you know a hundred applications but you're only hiring three or four you need to call Brian Ellis I mean there's an easy easy way to increase that number that's with this company here with Catholic Concepts. Brian how can they reach out to you?

Brian Ellis 28:31

How can they find out what you're doing and and and contact you yeah I'm all over LinkedIn unfortunately that's a curse right you know I you know like I I post every day on LinkedIn you can find me on LinkedIn um yeah I I I do that more at you know it's just my gift of curiosity right I always want to make sure that you know people are are are chewing on on things that uh you know maybe or maybe not that they're they're thinking about uh our our website is uh badgeradycoach.com and um and yeah there'll be there'll be more to come in in in regards to you know this police conversion conversation and and you know there's there's definitely a lot uh for for applicants to consider yeah whether you if you're an applicant and you want to help reach out to them badgereadycoach.com if you're an agency that wants to increase the increase the end of that pipeline where you're not losing so many people badgereadycoach.com is a no-brainer brian ellis thanks so much for joining us thanks for having me if you've been listening you've been watching thank you for doing that we'll see you next time and just remember lead on and stay courageous thank you for listening to courageous leadership with Travis Yates we invite you to join other courageous leaders at travisyates.org