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The Prison Officer Podcast
The Prison Officer Podcast is a place where prison officers and correctional staff share their experiences, discuss leadership, cope with stress, and learn survival strategies for one of the toughest careers out there. Hosted by Michael Cantrell, this podcast delves into the lives, dreams, and challenges faced by those who work inside the walls of our nation’s prisons. It features interviews, insights, and discussions related to the unique and demanding world of corrections. Whether it’s overcoming difficult leaders, understanding rehabilitation, or addressing misconceptions about incarcerated populations, the Prison Officer Podcast provides valuable perspectives from professionals in the field.
The Prison Officer Podcast
109: Rethinking Correctional Training: Objective-Based Training with Myles Cook
What if everything we thought we knew about training correctional officers was based on flawed assumptions? In this eye-opening conversation with Myles Cook, we explore how questioning basic training objectives can transform outcomes across corrections.
Miles brings 15 years of diverse experience spanning corrections, patrol, narcotics, investigations, and academy instruction to tackle one of our profession's most fundamental challenges - training that actually works. With a master's degree, military service, and recognition as one of the International Association of Police Chiefs' 40 Under 40 Award recipients, Myles understands both theory and practical application.
The conversation dives deep into how objective-based training has revolutionized physical fitness programs at his academy, resulting in remarkable 34-38% improvement rates across all fitness metrics. Rather than forcing everyone through identical workouts, their individualized approach ensures every recruit progresses at their optimal pace - creating not just fitter officers, but lifelong healthy habits.
We explore why corrections training often gets stuck in outdated patterns, from focusing on policy over actual ethics to teaching shooting techniques that don't match real-world needs. Myles challenges listeners to look beyond their field for solutions, whether that's learning from athletic coaches for fitness training or competitive shooters for firearms instruction.
Perhaps most valuable is Myles' framework for problem-solving: questioning assumptions, reframing problems, and finding innovative solutions by focusing on the true objective rather than apparent issues. His classic elevator example demonstrates how sometimes the real solution isn't making things faster, but making the experience better.
For any corrections professional who's sat through mandatory training, wondering "what's the point?" - this episode offers a refreshing perspective and practical tools to transform your approach to teaching and learning. Connect with Miles at milescook@ws.edu to continue the conversation about revolutionizing corrections training.
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Hello and welcome back to the Prison Officer Podcast. Before we get to our topic today, I just want to take a minute to thank one of our sponsors. Innovation has always been the key to success of Pepperball, and the Pepperball Blast is just one more way to deliver a payload that will distract, disorient or incapacitate an inmate. This lightweight, refillable delivery system is perfect for carrying in a holster in your pocket or just holding in your hand as part of a cell entry team or a cert team. Each reloadable blast cartridge contains up to three projectiles worth of PAVA powder. When the quick flip safety is turned and depressed, the PAVA powder is pushed out of the tube by a 1.8 gram nitrogen cartridge. This will quickly cover the inmate and saturate the cell. Since there's no actual projectiles deployed upon firing, this is a truly non-lethal product with no impact. To learn more about Pepperball, go to wwwpepperballcom or click on the show notes today for more information. Pepperball is the safer option first.
Speaker 1:Well, hello and welcome back to the Prison Officer Podcast. This is Mike Cantrell, and today I've got a co-worker and a friend who I've gotten closer with in the last couple of years. We've been doing more work together and I'm really excited to have him on the podcast. His name is Miles Cook. He's got 15 years of public safety, law enforcement and instructor experience, eight years in the military, and we'll talk about all that. He served as a patrol lieutenant and watch commander for the Carter County Sheriff's Office. Miles worked at various positions, including patrol corrections, narcotics, investigation, swat. He was on a federal task force for the FBI and the United States Marshals.
Speaker 1:He's an adjunct professor for East Tennessee State University and in criminology and criminal justice and criminology Sorry about that Received a Master of Arts at East Tennessee State, also Beginning in 2019,. He helped develop and served as the director and lead criminal justice instructor at the Tennessee College of Applied Technology. He's developed and taught the first college program in the nation to be partnered with the American Jail Association. So we'll actually want to dig into that. And in 2022, this program was chosen by the governor's office to be implemented across 12 TCATs and all community colleges in Tennessee.
Speaker 1:In July 2021, miles was appointed to serve as a community prison criminal justice representative on the university's Institutional Review Board for the Research of Human Subjects, tennessee Corrections Institute Board of Control, as a representative for the Department of Criminal Justice at an institution of higher education. And in 2023, miles was selected as a recipient for the 2023 International Association of Police Chiefs 40 Under 40 Award, which is quite an accomplishment there. He's got a list of accomplishments here that we won't have time, but I am so excited to have him on the program. I've listened to him, I was setting his classes and he's such a great instructor and that's why I invited him on. So welcome to the Prison Officer Podcast, miles.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much, mike. I'm honored to be here with you and I thank super, super highly of you and enjoy listening to your podcast and you teach as well and I really I'm honored and I really appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 1:I appreciate that. I'm excited to learn a little bit more about you. I mean, we've been friends for a while, but one of the things I start off with in this podcast is you know where'd you grow up and how did you first get that spark for law enforcement corrections? So tell me about that.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. I think it was always there. I grew up in North Carolina with my family very, very kind of normal family situation. My father took a job he worked for the railroad, took a job in Maryville, tennessee, and I moved out there with my family and finished up high school I think maybe ever since high school I knew that I wanted to be in the public safety corrections, law enforcement realm.
Speaker 2:And after I finished up high school I had a chance to go to ETSU East Tennessee State University and went there for my undergrad and was lucky enough or blessed enough to stay there through grad school and start some uh, teaching there as an adjunct after that, and that was always. It was always a passion like I never. I never questioned it, I never had another route, I never had another plan either, for that matter, but it was just always something like I knew that was it, like that's what I was called to do, that's what I wanted to do, and I finished up and it was very unique and, I think, in some ways different for me, because I work and I forget what they call it when they're at grad school and you have a lot of grad classes, but I did that.
Speaker 2:So in some ways, I was teaching even prior to the law enforcement and corrections career, and so the instruction and the career has always been one For me. That's really where I found my passion. But once I graduated, of course, this was a different time. This was right around 2011, not that far ago and I started looking for jobs, and the jobs were much more difficult to get in those times and maybe in some ways even more selective, and so it actually took me a while to really land where I wanted to land, and I'm not sure it seems like things have changed, maybe over the years. I think Some places were maybe even more nervous to hire somebody with a degree, afraid they would leave, and so I landed at the Carter County Sheriff's Office and that's where I did the majority of my career in active corrections and law enforcement.
Speaker 1:Cool, you were also in the military, correct, yes, sir. So when did that come in?
Speaker 2:So that come in another thing was probably very different than my peers.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Very, very, very different. So I joined in 2016 and did six years in the active reserve and then two years on the IRR for the United States Marine Corps. I was a Excellent.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you for your service.
Speaker 2:I appreciate that and it was a real. It was a great learning experience for me and very different. It was one of those. I knew I had to do it and I knew since I was young that I had to do it or wanted to do it. But I was like I said, I was very blessed. The education and then my grades. I was able to get my graduate degree in high school and then I got on and then things were going good in the career and going good in the next evolution or whatever, and I just kept putting it off and putting it off and putting it off and I watched my brother, my brother-in-law, graduate from the Army. I had military service in my family. My great uncle received the Medal of Honor posthumously in Korea. Wow, and I knew I wanted to do it and I was literally running out of time, very much running out of time. And so Courtney, who is my wife, now girlfriend at the time we got married and then six months later I was like I've got an enlist.
Speaker 2:So, I aged out a week into Parris Island, two weeks into Parris Island, something like that. So I was older than my drill instructors considerably and it was different I was 29.
Speaker 2:I had help lead SWAT teams and stuff like that and I was a private with a master's degree and so it was very different and it taught me some things, especially once I got to my, to my unit, my company, probably. Just some things I needed to know, you know, to check your ego at the door and I can imagine, yeah, and so it was quite different and I really, I really enjoyed my time.
Speaker 1:Wow, I know, just coming into a new agency as a rookie when you've already got experience how tough that is. You know, trying to use both ears and not use your mouth. Number one you know I was. It was very different. You know, trying to use both ears and not use your mouth number one.
Speaker 2:It was very different, you know, because rank structure, you know it's me and this 17-year-old kid. You know who's doing. You know probably still living with his parents, right, you know, mopping in the rain or whatever, what have you? And we would both mop it in the rain or whatever, what have you? But on the reserve side, we're all probably from the same general geographic area, and so my first platoon sergeant was a partner that I worked plainclothes narcotics with Interesting. Yeah, and so a very strange dynamic that taught me a lot.
Speaker 1:The reason I ask about it is I talked to a lot of people and some of them got their first start in learning how to train others in the military, and did you experience some of that also?
Speaker 2:That was certainly not my first.
Speaker 1:Okay, that was.
Speaker 2:It was a very, it was a very different experience. Yeah, Okay, Like I said, I mean I was nearing in on 30.
Speaker 1:Interesting. By the time I got there yeah. So tell me about Carter County. You show up there. You're new to law enforcement and corrections at this point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I showed up there and I was new to corrections, new to law enforcement. It was interesting. They had just, for better or for worse, they had just sued the county for a new facility, right, and they were doing a big hire and push there for a new jail. So I got to experience at least an hour what I would call an old jail, one older facility and a new one right. So I got very shortly, you know, I got to experience the all right one. One officer can feed the entire jail. You know 200, some people or whatever you know they can dig a feed. And I also got to experience the three tier towered system with control locks and automatic doors and and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:And it's things that I was not used to at that time.
Speaker 2:And so I worked corrections just over a year and a half on that first step Right and fell in love with just really just working at a sheriff's office. Of course, in Tennessee you know our local jails are handled by the sheriff's office and that was really my first experience, my first foot through the door, and it's an interesting thing. You know where we talk. My first foot through the door, it's an interesting thing. You know we talk about checking your ego at the door. I know that's things me and you certainly agree on such as yourself, no matter how high you rise in an agency or a system.
Speaker 2:When I got there I was fit, I had a formal education, I was ready to roll or I thought I was ready to roll and I get into into working, into corrections and all right, first thing, I remember, I remember Vivley. I remember the guy's name and everything. It's all right. You know we're going to, we're going to search, search this guy out before he goes upstairs. When he goes upstairs, you know the whole squat and cough and that that whole kind of that whole kind of thing.
Speaker 2:He was about six foot six, gangly, you know, and you know been stabbed in the throat, had some metal in there and I got very nervous and I figured out very quickly the skills that I was missing and it was a real awakening moment for me in corrections and then into my into my patrol and law enforcement career. I was not as ready as I thought I was and I have always held the belief especially in Tennessee with the sheriff's offices locally where corrections and patrol revisions are shared that if you want to learn to get good at those power skills like the book behind you, there is no better world than corrections.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it forces you to. You have to talk to people. You don't have a. There's not a whole lot on the belt when you're inside. Yeah, so where'd you go from there? What was the next step for you so?
Speaker 2:the next step after corrections. It was just a gamut of different things. So I went out, promoted to patrol division, went to the basic academy and then from there did various things. I was still teaching adjuncts occasionally at ETSU at that time, but went to patrol or patrol. I was promoted to a patrol sergeant. I worked some warrant service stuff in between there, had worked part-time for the marshal's task out on that I was promoted as a shift lieutenant in the patrol division or as a watch commander.
Speaker 2:Okay, I loved that career, I loved that agency. That was my home. It still is my home. But teaching and instruction was always my passion, and so I had a chance before with a, I think, a mutual friend of ours, wayne South.
Speaker 1:Yep, absolutely.
Speaker 2:We had worked together. I worked full-time at the Tennessee College of Applied Technology in Elizabethan with that program that you were discussing, and Wayne will come in and work some days and he certainly mentored and helped me kind of understand that process because he certainly had a background in that and what we tried to do was get a criminal justice corrections program off the ground in the technical college system for the state and how'd that go?
Speaker 2:because you know those are kind of few and far between well, they're, they're few, and they're few and far between, and it's it's something that's still active in the state and they're trying. They're few and far between, and it's something that's still active in the state and they're trying to figure out how best it makes sense for both the state and the money and the students and things like that.
Speaker 2:But it went great. It taught me a lot. I think it taught the students. We had a lot. It's an amazing concept. It's an amazing concept and at the time it was, I think, eight months in length for a technical certificate and the training and we had developed basically what we call a shared training model. You know, five days a week we're training.
Speaker 2:We've got eight months to train a lot of time to train and those kind of colleges obviously focus on technical certificates, Right? So really no different than welding, electrician, Kubota, diesel, things like that. So we really just apply the same model to corrections and criminal justice. So we really just applied the same model to corrections and criminal justice. These younger people, some of them, some of them not, but these folks will come out. You think of the number of classes you could take in eight months. They would come out with more training and more certificates than in some local places You're going to get 15 years. But it is difficult to and it's a hard sell to ask somebody hey, don't go work for eight months, do this.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's a long day and that's the, especially when the hiring is constant here in that room, right. So that's a harder, that's a harder thing to. I think they're still trying to kind of figure that out, but I think the idea of it is outstanding. You know we had our course department with the Tennessee Corrections Institute on that and had some really good discussions with the Tennessee Department of Corrections and the American General Association, which TCI was involved with, to try to help with the educational component of that. But I do think it's an amazing idea. It's there just how it pans out, how exactly it looks on the back end.
Speaker 1:Sure, sure, you brought up TCI there and a lot of people aren't going to know what that is. I didn't know what it was until a few years ago and we've been working with them. I know you work with them closely. Tell me about TCI, because it's a pretty unique thing.
Speaker 2:You know, I suppose it is In the corrections world. It is a pretty unique thing it's. I've been so blessed, and TCI stands for the Tennessee Corrections Institute, and for any of your listeners that are familiar, at least in some states, with the patrol side, it is some some easy way to say it would be the post of the corrections for the state. But in truth, as an agency and I'm sure somebody could correct me on a lot of this it acts a little bit different. Right, so it is. It is not so much a regulatory agency, as it sets up these minimums for, you know, to meet compliance, whether it be constitutional compliance, local jails or or whatever, and so TCI serves in that role. But they also serve, and so TCI serves in that role. But they also serve in a role to serve the shareholders. You know, like if a county sheriff is having an issue with a jailer, they're trying to get something through the county commission to make sure something is up to par or legal. The Tennessee Corrections Institute is there to help.
Speaker 2:So not only are they doing jail inspections, and things like that, but they're really, really helping these local agencies out to make sure everything, even if it's going and working with county commissions all that's needed, or jail site plans or things like that.
Speaker 2:So it's really neat, they're very, very progressive, or things like that. So it's really neat, they're very, very progressive. They have done some things that I haven't seen any other state, whether on the corrections or law enforcement side of the house do, and I'm just blown away with some of the ideas and, outside the box, thinking that those folks have, and TCI is funded by the state.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's a legislative funding that they put forward. Now one of the things I noticed and Missouri and Tennessee have a lot in common in this we have agencies, you know, as big as Franklin County, st Louis County, jackson County, big jails, and then you go to some of these small counties and they might have six, seven people working in the jail total, and with TCI, all of them get invited to the table to train and get the same level of training. The burden doesn't fall on each agency, so much Is that accurate.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's absolutely accurate and I think me and you were obviously around for the big push on the training for TCI and David Alola and Will Wall, the executive director, and Dave the training director. They're just doing fantastic, fantastic things on the way they're revolutionizing training for corrections. But yeah, it's everywhere and so they're there to help. You know the small agency you know with a holding that's holding 20 people and has 20 employees. Or you know the Shelby County Jail in.
Speaker 2:Memphis. Who knows how big it is, I don't know and I hate to throw a number out there, but I know it's gigantic, and so you know they do all have a table. They can, all you know, meet these minimums and they can go well beyond that, recognize training conferences, there's just, there's so much that they can do, grant opportunities, and yet TCIs is legislated through the state as kind of housing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was excited. You know we got to go over there with command presence and we've been teaching classes there for a couple of years on and off with them and it's been so exciting to just see the way that works and get to see guys from little bitty agencies excited to go to training the same as this big agency that can usually afford more and yeah, I've just loved it. It's been a great group of people over there.
Speaker 2:They're wonderful people Always, so yeah, and so I got to. It was prior to anything with the command presence, but when we partnered with them on the educational side when that program was rolling out, I was very blessed to get appointed to their board of control.
Speaker 2:And so that's my main involvement with them now is kind of as a steering advisory kind of committee, and we absolutely treasure those days to spend with those folks. It's such an amazing group and so right at the end of that, you know, as we're trying to figure that out an opportunity was presented to really do my absolute dream career, which was the police academy, and so that's how I wound up. I know every state is different. The training coordinator for the Walter State Regional All-Person Training Academy the number two, the XO is probably, I guess, the best way some folks would understand that and I got to come over here and work with fantastic people Travis Stans is the director and Chuck Evans is our new full-time instructor and work with those folks about trying to change the face of what we do in law, courts and tribunals.
Speaker 1:Right, and that's absolutely. I sat through your class up at Aelita and you were talking a lot about what you guys were doing there. One of the things you keyed on was, you know, learning objectives and objective focus training. So I want to hear more about that, because I sat through it but everybody listening hasn't, Are you sure? Are you sure you want to talk about that?
Speaker 2:I can go on for a while.
Speaker 1:I know you're passionate. I am passionate about it. Yeah, it makes such a difference and I'm gonna I'm gonna preview this with you. Know, in corrections we sit through so much training annual training, whatever you call it where you're at, where they come out and they say, today we're going to teach ethics, and there is no goal in their mind about what everybody's going to walk out of there with. It's just getting through the class, getting through the PowerPoint. So I was so excited to listen to you talk about setting those objectives and ensuring that they get met. Talk to us about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I mean, I think, as a general overview, what I, what I talk about in that and you know, whether it's objective oriented training, whether whether you call it disruption or disruptive discourse, it is is very much in the same in the in the private world, on what they what they call disruptive innovation. And it came to me in an interesting way. I was teaching instructor development, which I absolutely love instead of and I've got a very unique some may think it's strange approach to instructor development, but it is leadership, nonverbal and verbal communication, problem solving. It's all these things that it's not how to build a PowerPoint, right, right, and so there's so many other things.
Speaker 2:And what I've noticed is in my field, training classes and my instructor development and all these things a lot of it come down to trying to solve either broad cultural issues at an agency. It would come down to I've got this class and I can't quite figure out how to make it better, what I'm trying to do with it as an instructor come down to I've got this class and I can't quite figure out how to make it better, what I'm trying to do with it as an instructor. We've had people in class. Okay, what's the problem I'm trying to work on it. I'm burnt out and so it was these wide-ranging issues and perhaps the most helpful part of the class, the part that was enjoyed the most or seemed to have the most value benefit, was this problem-solving exercise and, of course, I know we've talked about people in the private world whether it be the theory of constraints or some other things that have this really unique idea of problem solving, whether that be reframing the problem or things like that, and it was helpful.
Speaker 2:It was so helpful and I started we would go through this list of what began as a list of questions. And you know the questions might be like what is your why? What are your actual objectives? What is the actual terminal objective at the end of the day, right? What is you know, know, are you rewarding the behavior or the pattern that you're looking for? And so these we started building the questions through these classes and kind of kind of tweaking them.
Speaker 2:I started kind of saving them and then I started seeing, uh, things like like kristen cox, you know from theory concerns. Well, that's, that's kind of what I was thinking, but that's a much better way to articulate. You know exactly what I was trying to get to the point and and I have found some of my favorite books in the world are Adam Grant's books on relearning and rethinking, ok, and that's that's really what it come down to. It was kind of relearning and rethinking, but you got to start first with the right question, right? Or you got to start first with with what the problem actually is, yes, and so we started that through instructor development and it really just kind of become an animal or a class on its own accord on how to do that, and what we eventually kind of landed with was a set of questions, and in some ways it's a big word metacognition, right? Why am I thinking how I'm thinking? You know that forces us to reframe or to question the validity of the problem in the first place, or what our objectives actually are.
Speaker 1:Great. So let me step in here real quick, because I have my own little theory. And when I'm at that point and I'm developing the objectives or what the question is, I notice that a lot of instructors, they'll sit down in their office, they'll type, they'll think, okay, this is what I, this is what I. It's not always about you Walk out, go ask, go ask the people that you're going to teach, because I had this happen a couple of times in my career where I came in and I built this beautiful class, you know, and then when I got done, they were just kind of like I'm like, what's wrong?
Speaker 1:Well, that doesn't apply to us. You know what was it that they needed? And so I started, at least. And you can't do it all based on what students say. You still have to be the instructor, you still have to focus. But going out there and talking to the students and getting their perception or their what they're dealing with, their challenges at that time, and then bringing that into your class, I find helps a lot when you're building those objectives, your thoughts.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And so I know for us and in some ways in my instructor development, that's what it was You're going to develop a problem, then we're going to work on a problem statement. Right, I don't care. I don't care if the problem is I want my line of shooters to be faster at firing a handgun, or I've got a cultural problem, or how do I get the older people in my agency to get excited about training, or I'm burnt out and I'm ready to quit. How do I fix it? I don't care what the problem is. Right, it's not mine, it's yours. So I just want to kind of help you look at it different or see if we can find an answer. And we were able to do that, and I do think taking obviously what they need into account is important.
Speaker 2:I know for our, for that instructor development. I'm sure you said there were a ton of them. I know I have a lot of times. You know the end is a five minute presentation on whatever you pick and it's you know how to apply a target, or you know, maybe something with pepper ball Right.
Speaker 2:And so you kind of deliver that for us in our instructor development class. When you sit through the leadership and you sit through the problem solving and you sit through the verbal and nonverbal communication we have some really killer exercises for that that are just amazing and you sit through all these things, what you're working toward is actually solving the problem. Then you go through a day of trying to solve the problem and then your exercise at the end is a 15 to 20-minute presentation on how, based on adult learning, based on all the other things we went through, how you plan to fix that problem.
Speaker 2:And so what you leave with is a packaged 15-minute pitch to your administration on how to actually fix the problem. Nice, so it's worked really well for us. But you know, I don't think it's just training. I think there are some good examples In the law enforcement world. We want to reduce foot pursuits. That sounds great. I would ask you, is that the actual terminal objective? The actual real objective is probably to reduce the liability associated with foot pursuits. That's going to end up in a different answer. Absolutely it will. This is another common one. I've got a book of these examples, mike, and you know that, but an interesting one that I haven't talked about much or taught much, and it's nuts.
Speaker 2:The answers are never right or wrong. It's your situation, your problem. What could work? The general idea right. We want to lower domestic violence rates. So almost every state Tennessee, I'm sure, missouri is the same is a mandatory arrest policy, right, once the primary aggressor is determined. What was the effort in that? The effort, the objective, is to lower domestic violence rates. I would question if that has occurred and it would probably not be a super popular thing to say do these mandatory arrest policies work and are they meeting the actual objectives? Because if you want less domestic violence calls, you just pick the phone up off the hook, right? There's an easy way to answer that question. It's not the right way, but it is a way. Your objective at the end, I think, is to actually help the victims get out of that situation.
Speaker 2:I think is to actually help the victims get out of that situation. So, as we know, the mandatory arrest very rarely works that way. And so would it be based on our actual objectives of helping the victim. Would we be better suited to offer more services to a victim.
Speaker 2:You know, when those kinds of calls on the patrol side when you answer domestic violence and let's just say it's the male, you know a victim. You know, when those kind of calls on the patrol side when you answer domestic violence and let's just say it's the male, you know a male and a female and you're going to arrest the male. A quarter of the time you'll probably get attacked by a female freely. Those are the way those things happen. So if the objective is to help and a lot of times they stay we know that the domestic violence victims want to stay in that situation. Well, let's look at the reasons for that no money to get out, no car and no job prospects, no safety. So if you answered every domestic violence call and could get them a ride and a safe place to stay for a month and a job, you'd probably really lower your domestic violence rates.
Speaker 2:Much better than the mandatory arrest policy, right? But it's a hard sell to say maybe we don't need to arrest immediately, right?
Speaker 1:I get that, does it, but based off the objectives, that answer might make more sense yeah, no, that makes that, makes perfect sense, and that's learning to focus and learning to study what the true issue is. And I'm going to step back to ethics again. You know that's one of them that they just push in corrections Every time something bad happens. We have more ethics classes, but the ethics classes are about policy. Well, people know the policy. That's not what's causing the ethic lapses.
Speaker 2:Ethics and policy are two different things Absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2:So you know we've had this discussion in the training world from the law enforcement side. You know what do you want when an officer graduates their basic training? I want them to really trust themselves, have good confidence, have good command presence, be able to think for themselves, think on their own two feet. What do you do to them at the academy? Shave their heads, dress them all the same, never allow them to speak, tell them they're stupid. Right, that doesn't make sense based on the actual objective that you're looking for. You want them to be self-disciplined, but you never get them the role of responsibility. Yeah, yeah, and it's an interesting thought that we you want them to be self-disciplined, but you never get them the role of responsibility.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's an interesting thought that we really miss.
Speaker 1:And one I'd never thought about and I've been put through it for years is physical training, and I think it was you that talked to me about when physical training becomes punishment, well, that's all it is, and why would anybody want to do it? After that, after they've been through there, you guys have been doing some really interesting stuff with the individualized physical training. Is that a good way to put it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's a great way to put it Tell me about that? Yeah, I'd love to, depending on how much your listeners know. Depending on how much your listeners know, what we have here is a linearly progressive PT training program for every individual officer that comes. So we train about 250 officers a year from across the state. Well, as we know whether you're going through any kind of corrections academy or whether you're going through basic police academy, it is generally based off a military model where PT happens.
Speaker 2:First thing in the morning You're going to go out and do physical training in a group format. Usually your guy at the front is kind of leading it. Your poor guy at the back has died because he's overweight and a smoker right, he's just trying to survive it and what you find is that it doesn't help the guy in the front and it doesn't help the guy in the back. You know it. Really, it might help somebody in the middle mate. Right, we know. We know that there is a better way to program physical fitness. We've been doing it for like 90 years, right, we would never train an athlete that way. Which brings me to a point what is the objective of your physical training in that environment? Is it something to do? Is it to punish, or is it to make them healthier and set them on a life course in which they understand the nutrition and programming and proper exercise protocol? For us that was the case. We do not run a military style academy, we run a professional model academy and so our physical training. I don't want to have done any different than what an athlete deserves and so what we do. To kind of answer that question. We had some very specific things.
Speaker 2:I wrote an article about it and I had a list a few years back. But I wanted to maintain group physical training. I just had to. You've got 60 recruits. You've kind of got to do that with differing expectations because I got slower in the police academy, I got weaker at Parris Island with the Marine Corps. Now when you drop 60 pounds, that's going to happen. When you're underfed and think you're going to die, it's a little bit different. But they come to orientation. They lay down baseline numbers based on what our tests are for the state of a mile and a half run, a 300-meter sprint, push-ups and sit-ups maxed out for a minute, and then I take those numbers and I pop them into an Excel doc that I made.
Speaker 2:And it's very, very simple. The programming is based off an 800-meter sprint training program with very simple matrix for push-ups and sit-ups and how those are trained, and when they get here day one, they know what they're going to do every single morning, every single what we call hack time, or expected time for a run, for a sprint, for reps, for push-ups and sit-ups or wherever the exercises may be Right. So if Monday morning is a two-mile run, be so. If Monday morning is a two mile run, miles Cook's time might be 21 minutes and 38 seconds, yours might be 24 minutes and two seconds. We're all going to train together. We're all going to run two miles. We're running at 80% of our maybe one mile time trial.
Speaker 2:And so we're all giving the same effort in a smart, progressed, built way. And the best way I explain it? Because we get a lot of folks that go to the gym. We don't get a lot of folks that are runners Sometimes we do or at least professionally trained runners. And for your listeners they might get this If you bench press 315, you cannot go downstairs once a day. Bench 315 once, come back upstairs and you get better at the bench press, right, you go three times a week and you do four sets of six at 225. Right, so it's very unusual and it's very strange when we get folks here. I want to give you 100%. Well, awesome, I need you to run 80% today, right, right, I want you to run slower than you're used to.
Speaker 2:So we're and there's different ways of doing this but we increase our volume and we lower our intensity, and so they generally never run over 70, 80, 85 percent of what they can run, and then we generally stretch it out to about three miles. That's the most they're going to run, and we have seen amazing results almost well, actually, without fail. The entire class average and I've got all the years of data and statistics on this 34 to 38% improvement across the test. Nice, wow, and I can't if anybody else is keeping up with their math. I can't find anybody else that can match those improvements. We have the strictest PT standards in the state and I think we have the highest pass rate.
Speaker 1:Isn't that amazing.
Speaker 2:And PT is enjoyable and they generally ask for continued programming after they graduate.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's really neat, I think, mike, because what is the objective? Is this punishment this morning, or are we training athletes? You know, if you can ask that simple question, if you can ask that simple question off the start, what is the objective? I want them to get healthier. I know one of ours is. I want everybody to get better. Well this makes sense because if you come in running a 10 minute mile and a half, you'll probably leave running like an 8.3.
Speaker 2:If you come in running a 20-minute, I can probably get you around 16.4, something like that, and so everybody improves. And in many ways, Mike, you're only competing against yourself and your own expectations. So what you see is the folks that generally despise physical training let's say, on a run, that are in the very back. Well, they beat their half time by 12 minutes Right Now. Traditionally, the people that hated physical training the most are the most excited about the physical training I can see that.
Speaker 2:Everybody improves right, and I don't have that on this but when they leave the number of messages and emails I get for hey, can I get this program? Hey, I'm in my six-foot pursuit today or whatever the case may be, or hey, you'd be really proud. I'm 60 pounds down.
Speaker 1:I'm the healthiest I've spot in my life.
Speaker 2:It's really, I think, made a difference just because we viewed it differently.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. You know law enforcement has done a better job for years because they do have academies. They have academies that are outside of agencies a lot of times. There are some that have their own academies, but a lot of them have these academies outside of agencies who are able to do things like what you're talking about. Corrections is one of the worst. They always want to have their academy inside their agency with their trainers. How do we change that mindset? How do we get corrections to grab a hold of some of this outside training? Because when you just give someone the training title, you're now the training officer, but they normally don't get skills to go with that. And I know you study all the time. I spent most of my career studying from other people but as a class nobody gave me a training class to come out and train in adult learning styles to learn objective-based skill development. How do we get corrections to grab a hold of what I think law enforcement already has?
Speaker 2:You know, I think. Well, I'll say I think we're all a bit behind the curve, you know, and I think law enforcement may be ahead of corrections in some areas. One of the questions on our objective-based training or disruption is are there models outside that match? If I want to train them like athletes, I don't need to find other police or other correctional professionals. I need to find athletic coaches. That's exactly what I did. You know D1 track coaches. Those guys know right, they know how to train somebody.
Speaker 2:If I want you to be a better, faster, more accurate pistol shooter on the line and you know I fought his way to it's not cops. I need USPSA performance shooters. Right, and you know, and then you'll see. And we've changed ours, and I could talk about that all day too. But the objective is not slow prep, press front, sight squeeze, pop, click to an audible reset. That's Olympic-style shooting. We do not do that in police work. That is not it. So what I needed to learn how to do was see what I had to see and smash that trigger without moving the gun. Well, that's what's taught in performance shooting and for the last 50 years 60, 80,. That is not what is taught on a law enforcement plan Right and we miss the objective, a very simple objective, if you'll just ask yourself.
Speaker 2:So I think, if we're talking about corrections getting to the outside, I think if we're talking about objectives, we've got to look at what the problem with that is, and I know for a lot of places, especially in our area, that's going to be funding you have to invest. If we're talking about local corrections in Tennessee or Missouri, that sheriff is going to have to invest the same amount of training dollars in the corrections division as in the patrol division. We're talking about a state prison system or federal prison system. Obviously, you can speak to that, but that's a different way. But that funding needs to be there and they need to be able to get outside influence. I think Alita and I know you're back at Alita, I think you're on their-.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about Alita.
Speaker 2:Their podcast very soon. I made the joke this year, but it's not a joke, it's very serious. Well, it's kind of a joke. I couldn't spell adult learning the first time I went there, you know, and I met this amazing group of people who took me down these amazing rabbit holes. You know to learn this amazing network, and so you know now if I, if I've got a question about adult learning, I know who to call. I'll call everybody who wrote the book. If I've got a question about corrections, I'm going to call Mike and Drew. Right, it's an amazing network and I think the ability for our folks in corrections to be able to do that is not because they don't want to do it, it's not because they don't want to do it, it's because they don't even know. It's an option.
Speaker 1:That's a hundred percent. We had the discussion at a and for those of you that don't know, ilita is the International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association out of St Louis. They have a conference every year. They have a journal Go check out their website, ilitaorg but this year was a big year for bringing correction not bringing them in because they've been there, but kind of making corrections a bigger part of Aelita.
Speaker 1:And so somebody asked me and I said you know, I never got invited. I was there, I did the membership but nobody ever told me that you know, it was law enforcement. You know, and I was there, I did the membership but nobody ever told me that it was law enforcement and I was corrections. Nobody said I was part of that. So I was kind of hung out on the edge and learned from the people but never stood up really. And so I think that is something I think corrections doesn't get invited to the table sometimes and we don't know that we can go. Invited to the table sometimes and we don't know that we can go. And I was absolutely intimidated completely by some of the people in this organization because I was reading in this magazine and that magazine and here they were, you know.
Speaker 2:So it was. Have you ever, have you ever met a nicer group of people who love to just talk and talk, training and help?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it was this year was the last conference. Of course I spoke there and you did also, and we did classes there. But it was amazing, jim Glennon, and I did stop him and I told him he runs Caliber Press, if you're, and that was the first outside training that I ever went to that I paid for on my own and when I was the only correctional officer there it was all cops and it was a leadership training and I got to meet him and shake his hand and thank him. I said you're the one that put me on this path as a trainer, because that was the type of training I was looking for, you know. And yeah, you get to meet those people, you get to see those people go to their classes. We'll put a link in the notes and be sure, and go check that out, because it's an amazing organization. If you're, if you're a trainer, you should be part of it, or what's the other? Tell me about the other one that you're a member of which, which one?
Speaker 2:I've got a lot of them I know, sorry, i-lets, i-delets so. I-atalyst.
Speaker 1:Yes, i-atalyst my fault.
Speaker 2:No, that's the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement, so that's very much the post and the TCIs of the world. They do a great job, especially at a state level. Obviously they're international, but state-level post directors or academy folks or training-related, as it appears, to standards and how the training works, and they are wonderful. They have a wonderful conference with great outcomes in learning and networking. I have just found that I've been to a lot of conferences, or I've been very lucky these past few years and it may just be my trainer's heart, okay, alita, just stands at the top. If you want to really meet people and network and learn from folks, I think it's amazing. I tell you to the point where you're talking about corrections, just not having a seat at the table, right, and I'll say this for any corrections folks out there that have number one, we're all leaders, right, by the very nature you're a leader in your profession and I'm not sure if it's the military structure that we have in corrections and law enforcement, even just the rank of such Constantly seek permission.
Speaker 2:Right, and I'm not saying, hear me, I'm not saying go outside of SOPs or go outside of research. We constantly ask for permission and in the training for disruption or death-driven training. One of the questions is do I need permission or who? Do I need permission from Right now to go to Alita I'm going to need maybe permission or days off or, you know, pay or whatever. But for other trainings or other things I'm trying to understand, I may not need to Right, I may not need to. Right, it wasn't until I got here that I discovered I could teach in services or that I could write. Now I know you've been writing for a long time. I could write for a journal because I didn't know the journals existed. Right, you know, or nobody ever told me, and I think a lot of times we seek that permission and I know one of the things that we talk about in my class when you're trying to think outside the box, you're trying to reframe problems and you're trying to think of innovative solutions, it requires a cunning mind, right, and part of that, you know, I always like the Rich Devaney quote Right, what are the rules, what are the boundaries and what happens if I break them?
Speaker 2:Right, I mean, it's as simple as that. It is. It's as simple as that and that could be something you know and that's not a bad thing. I'm not saying go outside SOPs or regional orders, but that could be all right. Hey, general orders, but that could be all right. Hey, on the firing range, this is probably the easiest example Prep your trigger, prep your trigger, prep your trigger. What happens if I don't? What happens if I just have a really good support side grip and I shoot like the other best shooters in the world who most of the time aren't prepping their trigger, and what you discover is that the trigger doesn't matter. You know, as long as my support side grip is good, there's only two rules to shooting a handgun your sights are aligned on target and the gun doesn't move outside of an acceptable zone before you break the trigger. Other than that, it's just preference. So we teach all these rules that really are contrary to performance that we're looking for.
Speaker 1:Right, but have we not developed over and I was a firearms instructor almost my entire career did we not develop all of that to get the worst shooter through the program, as opposed to teaching people how to shoot?
Speaker 2:I think so. You know, I think we you know a lot of times it is the lowest common denominator right is what you're going for. You know, obviously, and I think we share a shared belief on learning and exploring concepts and things like that.
Speaker 2:I give a big shout out to Billy Barton from Spectrum In the firearms world, ranked very highly in the world as a shooter. But I learned just as much from him in instructor development and he coached me for a while. I said I'm just not growing, like I think I should be growing, and he said how much are you exploring? And he's like wow, all right. Well, yeah, let me think on this right. And I was like well, you know, I do a lot of my shooting at the academy. You know you ever miss. Oh, not in front of a crew. Why would I ever miss? He's like well, then, you're going to stay the same forever? And I was like I am not exploring. We know, we know that adult learning I love that. We need somewhere around a 20% failure rate yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, if I'm only ever executing and not exploring, then I don't know those rules or limitations.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so, and we say that, hey, I want you to explore out on the range, but if you miss a target, every bullet has a lawyer's name attached Well then I'm telling you not to explore. Hey, 99% survival rate if you move while you're firing. But don't you dare ever move on this firearm slide. I know that's what I'm saying. Our objectives and the things we do very, very rarely match when we look at them.
Speaker 2:It just doesn't make sense, I'm sorry, I got off on it no, no, we look at it it just doesn't make sense.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry, I got off on a tangent there.
Speaker 2:I think getting corrections to the table is important. I believe there is nothing more valuable than getting folks to outside training, and I know that does have a limiting factor with the money.
Speaker 2:And it can with funds, but there are other ways. There are other ways to do that. There's always another way to solve a problem, and so you can invite those people in, you can send them out, you can look at different types of training opportunities. You can even look. I know one of our questions in our disruption is are there outside, out of scope, solutions? Are there people doing similar training or styles that we're doing? That I could get on.
Speaker 2:That might not be exactly in my lane and I think that's possible for corrections. Right, and we know that you wrote Power Skills. Yeah, you're talking about people in the emotional intelligence realm. Yeah, you're talking about people in the emotional intelligence realm. How do I take that and apply it here? How do I take and you know me, how do I take this theory of constraints from production and management and apply it to law enforcement, training and the choke points that we, that we see there, and I think I think it works in a lot of ways based based off our, our objectives.
Speaker 2:I think I think corrections, I think there are ways to do it. I hope it gets more and more supported that that is the case, I think, for better or for worse, sometimes it's going to come down to that individual officer seeing what can I do, what can I seek out. I think listening to these things and trying to make a connection and trying to learn and get out is part of that, and you can do a considerable amount in today's world of learning without money, absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1:And you know I picked up an article here and that kind of segues into it and I'm not I'm not throwing this on you, we haven't talked about it before, but I just saw this today and they started discussing micro learning and they called it snacking or snackable learning, which I thought was interesting and as I looked into it and thought about the way people can consume a lot of stuff these days it's done in these micro bits. A lot of stuff these days it's done in these micro bits, and corrections is always, you know, we're short of money, we're short of time, we're short of instructors, all this stuff. But some of the things they talk about in there were, you know, email, little bits and bytes. I want to focus, you know, this portion of the training, so I'm going to send an email out to everybody and get a response back from them. Or, when you've had an incident happen, why not attach an email or a memo or whatever that talks about the training points of that incident at that moment, while it's fresh in everybody's mind? And I thought those were pretty unique. What do you think about some of that?
Speaker 1:I?
Speaker 2:don't have a depth of knowledge in the microlearning. I do think there's some obvious reasons why I think. Number one we're shown that attention spans, especially even if we're invested. So I think the microlearning has a strong suit to that. So I think the micro learning is a strong suit to that. From an agency point of view.
Speaker 2:A lot of times it is easier to get that what we would call skill retention or learning you know from the book Make it stick that's a wonderful, wonderful book and what we know from that world, especially in relation to desirable difficulties and the recall that information we can do that with microlearning, both on the front end.
Speaker 2:And let's take the most boring a policy. Here's a policy easy read, took us five minutes to read it and discuss it and then, a week later, we take three more minutes to bring that back and discuss it. One simple guided discussion on hey, this happened. What policy does this work? Very simple and we recall that to memory until it becomes a working knowledge like any other skill development. And I think we know, we know we build skills that way, right, and we know we're better off doing that intentionally in those small segments, not to take it back to the firearms world again. Intentionally in those small segments, not to take it back to the firearms world again. But like going and shooting a handgun for 12 hours at a go is likely a good chunk of that is probably a waste of time.
Speaker 2:Dry firing for three to four minutes a day.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:That's a good use of time, right, and we know we can build skills that way. Good use of time, right, and we know we know we can build skills that way and so it makes sense to me that learning you know in any other environment is probably going to fit right along.
Speaker 1:See, I love the way you frame stuff because that dry firing in front of a mirror for two or three minutes a day that's one of the skills that I first learned years and years ago to become a good firearms instructor and to improve myself so that I could go teach others, and but I never. I never connected that with micro learning, and you were the ones and you mentioned the power skills Miles was. I was sitting in his class and listening to him talk about emotional intelligence and that was really what put the thoughts in my head about emotional intelligence being a superpower and that's why I wrote that book. So you have a great way of framing stuff. You know I love listening to you.
Speaker 2:I appreciate it. The feeling's mutual, mike, and I appreciate that. I really do. I think some of that. And for any of your listeners out there that are like man I wish I could get sent to training I wish I could do that. I wish I could improve this that are like man I wish I could get sent to training I wish I could do that. I wish I could improve this. I would just beg them just think outside the box.
Speaker 2:Just think outside the box a little bit and I hope you don't get flooded with 10,000 emails after this. But it's like nobody says I can't email Mike Cantrell. Nobody says I can't email him. Nobody says I can't email Mike Cantrell, you know. Nobody says I can't email him on Scoop. Nobody says I can't do these things, and I'm really just thinking outside the box on how to frame it, just generally.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I think maybe one of the if we've got, I'll say I'd love to give an example. I think your listeners probably the most classic reframing example is the elevator and the elevator. The general story goes that you know the elevator's slow, you know with the house or whatever the hotel, and everybody's complaining and it's very expensive to make the elevator faster. It's going to cost $20,000 to make this elevator faster. Well, what is your problem? Your problem is I need to make the elevator faster. Well, that's not actually your problem. That's a solution disguised as a problem.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so, when you look at what the actual problem is, the weight sucks.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:And so I know a lot of times at conferences, if I'm talking about this, there's usually a slow elevator around and there's usually some kind of drinking social night attached to it, and so you'd always make a comment If they had the whiskey and a taco truck set up next to the elevator all of a sudden, the speed of the elevator doesn't matter so much.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so that's how elevator music came to be is to make it less boring. And I think just trying to reframe or look at anything you're doing through a different lens and there's some very unique ways to do that is a real power. And I think that's what me and you tried to do with the emotional intelligence piece. When we were doing that, the general lack of concern or lack of care about EQ training was because it was delivered in a certain way, in a certain style that was not framed that was palatable to most of us. You know, I know you agree with that, I've heard you wrote about it. But when you look at what emotional intelligence can do and how important it is, especially in a corrections career, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then you frame it for what it actually is, which is a superpower, you know, and it is the ultimate form of self discipline. Well now, ok, tell me more Now. Now, I'm very interested. Absolutely this is tough guy stuff Right, and so I think I'm very interested, absolutely. You know, this is tough guy stuff, right, and so I think just framing that correctly is probably a big piece yeah.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it. So what's up next for Miles Cook? What do you got going?
Speaker 2:We are just trying to do the best we can here at the Academy and improve as much as we can Every time, and we're constantly trying to question the objective in a lot of ways, whatever objective it is, and constantly try to improve. I can't remember who said success is a lousy teacher. Right, and so we've been very blessed here. But you don't want to rest. You don't want to rest on that, and so we're just trying to find anything we can to improve the product and the training we have here and the training we have here and in some ways that's reframing or redefining what success could even look like.
Speaker 2:You know what it's going to be, and so here we've changed our schedule. You know, the schedule here was the same forever and it really shortchanged the amount of sleep that the recruits get. We went back to the table and this is this is a reframing exercise, but like, what is the actual rule here? You know what? What is the rule? You know who says what time we have to start? Oh, we say that. Does PT even have to be in the morning? No, we said that. Right, you know where, where, where are the rules for these things? And so I think we're constantly. You've got to have the right team for that.
Speaker 2:I think that takes some training and we're constantly just questioning what we're doing. We're always trying to improve the physical training, deeply invested in the trying to continually improve the firearms training. It's an area where any training that we've got and so that's what's been going on in my home for the most part- that's cool.
Speaker 1:So if somebody wanted to reach out to you, how would they get a hold of you?
Speaker 2:I am on about any social media, I would say email is probably the easiest way and I'm sure you can link that, but it's milescook at wsedu and, yeah, that would probably be the easiest way. I'll return any emails or discuss anything.
Speaker 1:Excellent. Well, I can't thank you enough for being on here. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. Once again, I always enjoy our conversations and I'm very proud to have you as a mentor and a friend, and I appreciate you coming on the podcast.
Speaker 2:It was a pleasure, it was all mine. Mike, thank you.
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