Development Of Leadership As An Element Of Public Security

Abstract

The article proves the need for developing leadership skills both for teachers who train public safety personnel, and for students in this area. The authors point to the specifics of the training of management personnel to ensure public safety. When ensuring public safety, we are talking about processes associated with an increased risk of harm and emergencies. Counteraction to these processes is often associated with the need for prompt decision-making in extreme conditions, when it is necessary to take responsibility and (or) organize the process of ensuring security in a non-standard situation. Not all active law enforcement officers are ready for such actions; many have mild to moderate degree of leadership skills. The inclusion of special training courses of novice teachers for solving practical pedagogical problems, meeting requirements for active learning on leadership skills development in the process of their training and retraining would significantly increase the level of effectiveness of their activities in this area. Professional development courses for experienced teachers who need to improve their knowledge and acquire leadership skills would be relevant for effective mentoring of young colleagues in the workplace. In this regard, a competency-based approach to the development of leadership qualities depending on the type and activities of various entities operating in this area is proposed. Besides, a number of techniques for the development of the future leaders’ personal potential is developed.

Keywords: Ensuring public safety, development of leadership qualities, leadership training courses

Introduction

In the modern period, the development of management, a component of which is leadership training, is mainly characteristic of the economic sphere of our society. Leadership training has been included in educational technologies quite recently. In addition, it concerns mainly teachers and students at different levels of school education. In universities, teacher-leader training is being developed only as a project. It seems that the development of leadership qualities among teachers who train specialists to ensure public safety should be part of this project. Teachers should have a number of specific characteristics and methods associated with the characteristics of this particular field of activity. In addition, both in the training of such specialists and in improving their qualifications, special methods of developing their leadership qualities are required.

Since the concept of leadership is ambiguous and there are different interpretations of it, this study is based on a fundamental approach from the standpoint of the social responsibility of a leader (De Hoogh & Den Hartog, 2008).

Problem Statement

Ensuring state and public security is the dominant direction in the activities of any state. In Russia, this process is indicated as one of the priorities in the National Security Strategy, approved by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 683 dated December 31, 2015. According to paragraph 42 of the Strategy, the goals of state and public security are “to protect the constitutional order, sovereignty, state and territorial integrity of the Russian Federation, fundamental human and civil rights and freedoms, preservation of civil peace, political and social stability in society, protection of the population and territories from natural and man-made emergencies”.

Thus, the most diverse spheres of public life and the processes taking place in it are subject to protection. As a result, security is ensured by entities whose activities and powers differ significantly. In order for their activities to be effective, it is necessary to implement several directions of the formation of leadership qualities among the representatives of these entities for protection of society and the state from existing threats. However, in order to train specialists who are able to make decisions in non-standard situations, work in a team, organize its activities or lead subordinates, teachers who can teach and develop their leadership qualities are needed.

The problem of modern training of specialists to ensure public safety is almost a complete absence of any special training of teachers in this area as teachers. Basically, for teaching in higher education, it is considered sufficient to have a specialist or master's diploma corresponding to the specialty or the subject taught. In other words, a cadet (listener, employee) is taught only a specialty, and not the methods of working with people. Often, such an employee, already working in law enforcement agencies, and having people under his command, does not know how to properly build relationships in a team, focus his employees on solving the assigned tasks, how to establish interaction and stimulate the development of the team and individual employees who are subordinate. Job descriptions and departmental instructions may not always help in these matters.

The structure of the subjects involved in ensuring public safety is arranged in such a way that in the implementation of this activity, an employee with a higher education is necessarily promoted and, accordingly, the number of subordinates or the need to contact with other departments grows. At the same time, it is obvious that the efficiency of such an employee and his team would undoubtedly be higher if he possessed at least the basics of management, or some methods of developing leadership qualities.

Research Questions

Thus, a number of questions arise:

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to prove the need for the development of leadership training courses, as well as the development of leadership training programs and methods within these courses for teachers who train specialists in the field of public safety and for students in this field.

Research Methods

The study used a number of general scientific methods (system analysis, synthesis, abstraction, logical and comparative method), as well as a number of special methods - a survey in the form of a questionnaire and content analysis, in particular.

Findings

In answering the first question, one should clearly indicate the urgent need for training in leadership in the field of public safety, as well as the development of leadership qualities among teachers who provide professional training and retraining of employees in this field.

The results of surveys, for example, of employees of internal affairs bodies, conducted during their retraining, indicate that most of the respondents had either a weak (28%) or medium (39%) degree of expression of leadership qualities. A similar picture is demonstrated by studies by other Russian authors (Osmanov, 2020). Thus, a significant number of existing employees have a low level of leadership qualities. However, the specifics of their activities require the development of such qualities, an increase in their level of expression to ensure effective reduction of new social risks.

As a rule, in specialized educational institutions, the training of future leaders for the departments providing public safety should be carried out by persons with strong leadership qualities. At the same time, a modern teacher must be a good leader, as he plans, organizes, motivates and controls the entire educational process. This includes assessing opportunities, setting goals and choosing ways to achieve them; structuring and designing teamwork, choosing tasks, assigning roles; monitoring the effectiveness of the selected techniques and techniques (Croft & Seemiller, 2017; Skarbaliene, 2018). Today, the teacher-leader is becoming an important strategic resource for all transformations, capable of generating and accepting innovations, ready to be active and creative, to act as a guide in improving teaching, bringing the education system to a higher level (Bicheva & Filatova, 2017; Grunefeld et al., 2015; Phillips et al., 2018).

However, such teachers need to be specially trained. At the same time, it is necessary to address efforts to train two categories of leaders in the field of education of law enforcement officials: teachers who carry out the main professional activities in an educational organization, and educational managers who carry out management functions in this organization. For teachers, leadership can work as a mechanism for professional and career growth (internal leadership) and a mechanism for social self-realization (external leadership) (Shamova et al., 2007).

It seems that leadership training programs for professionals in the field of public safety should not fundamentally differ from general courses in the educational field. But they should, in addition to general methods of developing leadership qualities, include special ones related to the formation of their professionally significant qualities.

To do this, it is necessary to use the method of management coaching, that is, the method of teaching people management, developing the skills of systemic communication between the manager and the team, to form students' holistic understanding of professional and social leadership and the basics of interaction in teams. They should know productive team building techniques and tools and be able to:

• manage a team of people united by one or more tasks;
• define roles for team members and rules for teamwork;
• interact with other professional and public communities.

Such a competence-based approach to the development of the teachers’ leadership qualities in specialized educational institutions will allow organizing training courses on leadership for both future and current law enforcement officers and colleagues, who also often cannot realize their scientific and pedagogical potential due to ignorance of the methods of developing their own leadership qualities.

A teacher with such knowledge can educate cadets (students, employees) to work in a team, organize work with subordinates or other people, and interact with other professional and public organizations when performing complex tasks to ensure public safety. Leadership educators should be equally proficient in both leadership development theory and leadership development technologies.

Among the theories of the development of leadership qualities necessary for training, the mentioned below are considered the most profound ones: the concept of the leadership continuum, two-dimensional leadership theory, theory X and Y, (Karlof & Sedeberg, 1996) the theory of "management grid" (Pevzner et al., 2019), theory “Leadership effectiveness” (Vikhanskiy & Naumov, 1996), situational theory, the “path-goal” leadership model (Malyshev, 2000), the normative model of styles (Meskon & Al'bert, 1996).

The technologies for the development of leadership potential should include methods of active learning (brainstorming, business and role-playing games, methods for analyzing problem situations, etc.) (Gruzdev et al., 2018), as well as the ability to conduct a reflexive dialogue and practice (Dautova et al., 2019), student-centered trainings, master coaching technologies in the educational process (Fel'ker et al., 2016).

In addition, it should be noted that the need to develop leadership qualities in subjects professionally involved in law enforcement is associated with its specificity. Since we are talking about processes associated with an increased risk of harm, emergency situations, counteraction to these processes often entails the need to make quick decisions in extreme conditions, when it is required to take responsibility and (or) organize the process of ensuring safety in a non-standard situation. Not all current security officials are prepared for such actions. Many shy away from the manifestation of initiative, which entails the need for responsibility for the decision, as a result of which social relations, the rule of law, and specific people can be seriously damaged. The inclusion of special training courses on the development of leadership qualities in the process of training and retraining of such employees, would contribute to a significant increase in the level of efficiency of their activities in this direction.

The similarity of activities to ensure public safety requires the presence of identical leadership qualities of managers and employees working in this area. Therefore, it seems that the methods of teaching leadership for different subjects (Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Emergencies, National Guard, etc.) should not differ.

Conclusion

With this knowledge, teachers, firstly, will be able to develop methods of instilling leadership qualities and forms of their implementation for employees of various subjects (for example, for the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rosgvardia, Ministry of Emergency Situations, etc.) undergoing training as part of training programs related to ensuring national security as well as for their colleagues who train them. Secondly, they will be able to teach such courses; thirdly, they will prepare the relevant educational and methodology literature for students. The implementation of such a project will significantly improve the provision of public safety by its subjects, teach them well-coordinated teamwork, the search for effective ways to solve the assigned tasks, the ability to interact with other divisions and organizations.

Acknowledgments

This work was carried out within the framework of the European Commission (EC) project "DeSTT - Development of Skills and Teachers Training for Leadership Project" (Reference Number: 609905-EPP-1-2019-1-IT-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP). The authors are grateful to the EC for financial support for the publication of this article.

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