“Luck is when opportunity meets preparation.”
Anonymous
Many believe in luck, yet woe unto them. What does lottery winners and widows have in common? Opportunity without preparation! Let me explain:
Studies abound where lottery winners, raking in millions of shillings run aground back to ground zero faster than they knew what hit them. Then there is Brian Tracey, my all-time favorite personal development guru through his writings, trainings and power talks. Listening to one of his audio recently (which I love to bits), the guru shared some stuff which caught my undivided attention. Underscoring a point, he illustrated an example of statistics detailing widows in the US and Canada who upon inheriting billions from their late husbands soon grounded the once-upon-a-time thriving empires (fortunes build over a lifetime, or even through family generations!) So these statistics set me aghast, wondering aloud what I wasn’t getting right. It’s then I recalled the above quote.
There is nothing like being lucky with regard to creation and ultimate sustenance of wealth or value proposition. To replicate success follows in certain programmed best practice approaches mastered over time. It boils down to ‘aspiration’ and ‘perspiration’. Yes, you can be lucky to get into some windfall, but such luck can’t take one far without upfront and adequate preparation of what it takes to replicate the success over longer-time.
So preparation shall entail envisioning (aspiration) based on wise choices made. This then moves on to prudent and diligent execution of the strategy or road map deliberately designed to realise such a vision. It’s not easy, but there are no two ways about it. The option is only that – perspiration. It’s what Dr. Scott Peck refers to as “the road less traveled” in his classic book going by the same name.
But what is this concept of opportunity? Contrary to popular belief that opportunity only knocks once, the truth is that opportunity abounds and is ever knocking for those prepared. You only need to keep vigilance and be ready for any desirable eventuality as was preached by Jesus Christ in the tale of the three virgins waiting for a suitor; or as said by the scout’s motto: Be Prepared. That’s aka. serendipity and synchronicity – those unrelated events that appear to conspire and bring one some unexpected fortune. But behind such chance happenings as unknown to many are prior planning and preparation so subtle to be discerned.
But yet others become beneficiaries of goodwill based on extraneous factors, just the way a father may bequeath a child, or as alluded to by Brian Tracey, a widow suddenly inheriting a fortune upon demise of a partner.
Survival in all these instances shall be contingent on first fast adaptation to such a reality and how soon one shall move forward with confidence. For those in similar situations but without upfront preparation, quick learning mastery suffices in the least.
And this is the unfortunate situation of our local policing. Some lady luck smile our way though we don’t leverage and build on. Although police do a relatively good job, most of the time, and at times even get out of their way to offer exemplary services under difficult conditions, nonetheless more can be done in such circumstances and within available resources. Let me explain further:
Constitution: It’s a bragging reality to state without any fear of contradiction that Kenya possesses the most ambitious and progressive constitution the world over. This supreme law is overly generous in many respects, and with an unrivalled bias towards relevant issues of policing (reforms and structure, etc), human rights, criminal justice amongst others. Democratic issues of rule of law and the due-process criminal justice are given prominence. All these factors give policing a greater and superior legal advantage to reform and move forward the police agenda consistent to modern aspirations. Can’t we surely take advantage?
Abounding public support: Kenyans are perhaps the most accommodating beings in the world. It doesn’t matter what wrongs are visited upon them even from the police quarters. They complain today and move on tomorrow. Such goodwill is good for local policing. We can build on such goodwill and generosity especially in this community policing era to build mutual partnerships beneficial to local police designs. Yes, we can.
Governmental goodwill: Kenya police is older than the Kenya government as it is known. We as an institution have been around since the creation of the protectorate under the imperialists and survived the country’s history to date. But never has police enjoyed more political goodwill and resource support than as with the Jubilee administration. I don’t have to belabor on this point as evidence abounds: better terms of service, more efficiencies through resource mobilisation and facilitation like the lease cars facility amongst others. Police and general security are some of the president’s pet projects. Can we leverage on such high level advantage strategically?
Leveraging power of increased knowledge base: Every evening officers are sharing classes at local campuses. Constables and DIGs alike share class notes and assignments. And all in the name of knowledge acquisition. The bottom-line here being a learning organisation based on personal mastery of individual and collective officers efforts. But what matters here more is how such knowledge is harnessed through proactive knowledge and talent management processes and how it is eventually deployed. And to the benefit of overall policing. Hope it’s being done for greater police utility.
Leveraging power of ICT: ICT is the backbone of current organisational processes and going forward, especially in this era of big data. It is well-known that police is a generator of big data from diverse quarters. Is it well-managed? Is ICT central to such a policy and practice if any? We are in the age of intelligence powered policing, a paradigm contingent on analytics of big data to inform realtime meaning to phenomena. Such meaning also enables more efficiency to good managerial decision-making rights. As such, more value shall be afforded towards effective service delivery.
Tapping into international policing framework: The sleeping giant of policing is international policing collaboration. This is the aspect of policing that networks global policing effort well beyond the framework of interpol which has bureaucratic limitations. Police operate better in a fluid environment of personal police-to-police contacts than hierarchical collaborations. This generates faster realtime intelligence outcomes to power international and transnational crimes investigation especially in crimes such as terrorism, drug and gun dealing, illicit smuggling of persons and ivory, white-collar frauds, etc. Going through international legal and diplomatic frameworks is very laborious especially in instances where intelligence need only be shared. That’s basically why all global defense forces and intelligence agencies have escalated their strategic operations to diplomatic levels so that they may mine more from international intelligence fortunes. Local policing is left behind on this initiative as most progressive agencies such as the FBI and Germany’s BKA benefit globally. Can we follow suit especially given that we are targeted by most international crimes? Methinks it’s a worthy investment with a quantifiable ROI.
These are some of the available opportunities that we in the police can leverage on to build a more proactive and dynamic organisation well positioned to serve better and more confidently into the future. This requires a deliberate strategy to be well thought out and sold to key stakeholders for buy in. But as already observed, such an effort shall be an easy sale given that the politics are on our side.
But should we not leverage on the opportunities through upfront preparation, then we shall miss on the luck factor.
We have no choice.
SMARTPolicing 