New Paragraph

Some emergency response employees are exposed to Operational AND Organizational Trauma
November 3, 2024

Cover photo from www.tcsupfitting.com


In the emergency response context, there has been much discussion and research over the past 20 years regarding the effects of traumatic events of policing, fire and EMS operations on officers and some civilian personnel. It could be a single occurrence, several events or the cumulative result of many years of dealing with stressful incidents, but undoubtedly many personnel have suffered from varying degrees of mental health issues.

 

Police and other emergency responders are subjected to many horrific incidents 24/7 in their operational careers. Some of them involve grizzly deaths and untold exposure to danger and at times threats to their lives. In the policing world, making decisions around the use of deadly force and being subjected to assaults and attempts on their lives are not uncommon events.


U.S. police Captain and author Saul Jaeger, M.S. says that police officers “are exposed to an average of 178 critical incidents throughout their career, while the average person encounters two to three traumatic events in their life.”[i] EMS and fire service personnel would likely have similar stats.


Thankfully, the conversation is alive, given that in the past such discussion only occurred around the impacts of war on military personnel. Successful programs and proper resources are now largely in place to help uniformed and civilian employees (mainly call takers and dispatchers) and much has been done to try and break down the stigma that still does exist to some extent, resulting in employees being reluctant to self-disclose any symptoms of an Operational Stress Injury.


But what happens when the trauma that employees are exposed to isn’t related to operations, but to individuals, groups or cultures within the organization itself? Or in other cases, following an operational stress injury an individual experiences ‘sanctuary trauma’ from the organization they expect to be protected by, only to feel even more trauma and stress from unsupportive individuals or laborious HR processes.


Organizational stressors in the policing world, often fall into one of several of the examples below:


  • Inconsistent leadership style;
  • Leaders that over-emphasize the negatives (e.g., supervisor evaluations, public complaints);
  • Difficult co-workers;
  • An unhealthy organizational culture;
  • The feeling that different rules apply to different people (e.g., favouritism);
  • Co-workers seeming to look down on sick or injured members;
  • Dealing with difficult and/or weak supervisors (poor leaders);               
  • Excessive administrative duties;
  • Staffing shortages;         
  • Pressure to volunteer free time;
  • Unequal sharing of work responsibilities;       
  • Bureaucratic red tape/lack of decision-making;       
  • Promotional processes; and
  • Internal investigations.   


Some of those issues may be individual perceptions by some employees and I acknowledge that not everyone can be pleased, but often where there is smoke there is fire. Leadership is key at all levels, and must be consistent, fair, communicative and accountable to mitigate as many of these concerns as possible.


Organizational stressors, such as limited resources, interpersonal conflict, discrimination, and, significantly, ineffective leadership impact the mental health of police officers, much like operational stressors, which include traumatic incidents, risk of physical injury, and high consequence of error. (Simmons-Beauchamp, Sharp, 2022)[ii]


‘Sanctuary trauma’ is described by author Lisa Williams in her 2023 article entitled: Adding Insult to Injury: Sanctuary Trauma and Moral Injury, as:


…refers to the experience of trauma within a supposed safe or trusted environment. It occurs when individuals experience violations of trust perpetrated by members of their institution, or when an institution causes harm to an individual who trusts or depends on that institution.[iii]


In that vein, I recently heard of an incident under my watch, wherein a member who had been involved in a very challenging police operation that resulted in a death to a civilian and serious injuries to several officers, eventually approached a supervisor in our HR, and disclosed the mental health issues he was facing. The HR supervisor apparently replied with words to the effect of “Oh great, another (operation X) case.”


Obviously that disappointing welcome did not give the officer any sense that caring and supportive assistance would follow, which he harbored quietly within until he mentioned it to a retired senior officer friend years later. Here is a case where an officer is suffering from an operational stress injury and is brave enough to come forward following years of anguish, but was then subjected to sanctuary trauma by someone whose job it was to support the member. It made me physically ill to know that despite preaching that our members need to seek the help they deserve and that they will be supported, that such insensitive behaviour was exhibited under my command. How much more destructive conduct occurred at different organizational levels that completely flew in the face of what we were trying to achieve? Attempts to end the “suck it up” attitude exhibited by some supervisors and managers apparently fell on some deaf ears.


Of course, potential harmful internal environments (organizational and sanctuary failures) are not isolated to emergency responders. Companies and agencies of all sizes can be equally susceptible to ‘people’ – alone in or in clusters, at peer, supervisory and/or executive levels, that either inadvertently treat individuals in insensitive and harmful ways or are simply determined to make the lives of some others a living hell.


I propose that even in the policing realm, some of those negative experiences can have an even greater impact on the mental health of those on the receiving end than those exposed to severe acts of violence and threats to their lives. From a ‘career-risk’ perspective, disclosing such environments or seeking help because of their affects, can become even more threatening to hurting individuals.


A 2022 study conducted by Daniela Acquadro Maran, Nicola Magnavita and Sergio Garbarino, entitled: Identifying Organizational Stressors That Could Be a Source of Discomfort in Police Officers: A Thematic Review, stated the following:

Analysis of the included articles revealed four main themes in organizational factors, the presence or absence of which could influence police officers’ well-being as follows:


  1. Social support from the organization;
  2. Leadership;
  3. Organizational culture;
  4. Bureaucracy.[iv]


Given that ‘leadership’ is my raison d'être, I noted that the report went on to say, “In a previous study by Russel, it was found that there was a lower perceived level of burnout in the group with a leader who exhibited high levels of transformational leadership. This type of leader is able to mitigate perceived burnout, especially when stress levels are low.” In my view this is an important statement.


I’m a firm believer that effective leadership is paramount to building committed employees; strong and united teams; productive and trusting relationships (inside and outside of the organization); high morale; elevated levels of productivity and professionalism; and most importantly: inspiring people to do and be their very best.


Administrative, bureaucratic and cultural challenges employees face that cause them organizational stress, can be identified by leaders that know, understand and listen to employees. Good leaders model caring, supportive and communicative leadership for all supervisors and managers, and they monitor and mitigate unfair or oppressive actions among them. They do all they can to improve working conditions for the betterment of the team when specific failures become apparent. Unfortunately, such wrongs do not always rise to a higher level out of fear of disclosure by the individual(s) affected, or so-called leaders higher in the food chain burying them due to a lack of their personal support or fear that reporting it up might jeopardize their career aspirations.


As always, leadership is a must. In the operational realm, true leaders will guarantee that meaningful trauma support programs are in place; that members understand what is available and how to gain access; and that a continuum of positive organizational dialogue occurs at all levels regarding program criticality. It can’t only be about posting a pamphlet and a contact phone number and then ticking off a box on a ‘To Do’ list. They need to do all they can to ensure that any impediments to members accessing those programs and the help that they deserve, are mitigated and detractors appropriately dealt with.


It's important to note that sadly, having all the effective programs humanly possible will not persuade some employees to self-disclose trauma they have experienced. That remains a reality.


Leadership failings can exacerbate employee operational, organizational and sanctuary trauma in several other ways and the frequency of personnel reporting same, including:


  1. Failing to create a positive culture of understanding, support, respect and trust;
  2. Neglecting to effectively address problem employees and supervisors that impede that culture or violate established processes; and
  3. Failing to develop a supervisory and management team that consistently strives to build employee trust through the best and the worst of times, 24/7, 365 days a year.


Law enforcement leaders cannot prevent members from seeing, feeling, hearing, smelling and experience the very worst situations society has to offer. They can only provide exceptional leadership, offer the best in training and equipment and listen to the suggestions of employees on how to lessen the gravity of some of these occurrences and their impacts. But traumatic operational events will still occur.


However, leaders can and must provide the finest in programs and support to help them deal with such tragedies when they do happen.


Conversely, organizational and sanctuary trauma can be prevented – through best-in-class leadership. Law enforcement employees need and deserve nothing less.


 [i] Jaeger, Saul: The Impact of Life Experiences on Police Officers, FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, 2023, https://leb.fbi.gov/articles/perspective/perspective-the-impact-of-life-experiences-on-police-officers

[ii] Simmons-Beauchamp, Bonnie and Sharp, Hillary: The Moral Injury of Ineffective Police Leadership: A Perspective, Frontiers in Psychology, April 15, 2022, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9051365/#:~:text=Organizational%20stressors%2C%20such%20as%20limited,of%20error%20(Schafer%2C%202010%3B

[iii] Williams, Lisa: Adding Insult to Injury: Sanctuary Trauma and Moral Injury, Fit Responder, 2023, https://www.fitresponder.ca/post/adding-insult-to-injury-sanctuary-trauma-and-moral-injury

[iv] Acquadro Maran, Magnavita and Garbarino: Identifying Organizational Stressors That Could Be a Source of Discomfort in Police Officers: A Thematic Review, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2022, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8951201/

 

Leadership involves risk, especially in policing

By Chris Lewis • March 28, 2026
Leadership is inundated with risk, every hour of every day, in all sectors. In policing, legislative authorities and established policy are the ever-present guideposts, but occasionally policy just doesn’t apply. At times someone has to just make a decision to do something, or not, or they will fail the public they serve and the personnel it is their duty to lead. If it goes bad, time to own up, do damage control, learn from it and move forward. It always frightened me when I saw some at the senior executive level in policing think that supervisors and managers operate in a pristine little bubble where nothing should ever go wrong. Then when it did because some supervisor tried their best to make something work for all the right reasons, they wanted to pigeon-hole the person that took the risk. There were times during my own career when executives were not encouraged to take any risk either. In fact, taking risk was career risk in itself. Despite the best of intentions, if it went bad, the one ‘responsible’ be forever labelled as having failed. Even if the gamble went well, the jaundiced eyes from above would still forever look at them as being a potential liability. It became the “Oh, him. He’s the one that...” At times the daily decision making of high-level commanders would be second-guessed by those in the executive suites – some of whom had never really commanded anything. My buddy retired Chief Wayne Frechette used to describe these folks as: “They’ve never been out after dark on company time.” I know this same concept was alive in many other police services. Some at executive levels actually did serve in operational roles at some point but they never took a risk. Somehow, they were fortunate to skate through difficult situations through sheer luck as opposed to good decision-making and never developed any scar tissue along the way. They didn’t learn from failure – they survived by luck. They also were viewed by weak executives above them as being golden because there was never a milli-second of negativity around them. They were Teflon. But those that worked under their “command” (for lack of a better word) had no respect for them. They simply watched them walk around with coffee in hand, never leaving the office or making a decision. It wasn’t leadership, but it did pave the way to stardom from on high, for some. True leaders do take risks at times. Many I worked with and for did it all and did it well. They did so in the best interests of those they served and those they led, because it wasn’t about themselves, but was done in the service of those that placed their trust in them. Policy simply doesn’t fit every situation. It is most often a guide that anticipates most circumstances that employees will face, particularly the more common (high-frequency) ones. But it cannot predict every possible scenario. When that happens in policing, it can occur in very unlikely situations (low-frequency) that are incredibly high-risk. Supervisors cannot say “Sorry folks, the book doesn’t cover this one” and run away crying. They also don’t have time to tell bad guys, “Hey big fella, sit tight. We need to take a pause here and get the whiteboard out so we can have a group-think about how to stop your murderous rampage.” I think that many pseudo-leaders – far too many, are afraid to make risky decisions out of fear that an error will jeopardize their career. Instead, they risk their careers by not making decisions. Or as I like to say: “their fear of career-risk, risks their careers.” This can be fatal in the policing world. When a police supervisor shirks their responsibilities or quivers, sucks their thumb, and prays for the situation to go away, thankfully constables will come forward and do their best to get their teammates through it. Sometimes that ends well and when the supervisor emerges from their fear-induced coma, they will more often than not take credit for the success. But when the situation goes to hell-in-a-handbasket – despite best efforts, the pseudo-leader will document the risk-taking employee and add another bullet-point to their list of things they’ve done to “hold people accountable.” The panel at their next promotional interview will likely hear the false rendition proudly told. I hear examples of this practise from serving police officers across North America on a much too frequent basis. True leaders develop a culture of trust among those they lead that their suggestions and feedback are encouraged and valued. Their confidence that the leader wants their input encourages them to constantly analyze situations and give thought to what policy says and the options available when policy says nothing. That is good for the employee’s development and may save the leader’s hind-end and the continuity of the team on occasion when an employee steps forward in a crisis. Having said that, there will clearly be situations where there isn’t time for the whiteboard, and a decision needs to be made by the responsible “leader.” When it doesn’t work out, the real leader will step forward and be accountable. But when it does go well, the true leader will allow the light to shine on the team they have the honour to lead. In my view, we’re not seeing enough of that in North American policing. We need more genuine leaders at all levels of law enforcement organizations. Developing and promoting real leaders that can manage risk effectively is a must. Anything less fails everyone.

Why Joint Forces Operations Are No Longer Optional

By Chris Lewis • March 26, 2026
They used to be simply a "nice to have."

Police investigating police: Is there another option?

By Chris Lewis • March 18, 2026
The March 17 th announcement by the Toronto Police Service (TPS) regarding the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) investigation into allegations by an Ontario Justice that three TPS officers colluded and lied during a 2024 murder trial against a man that ran over and killed TPS Constable Jeffrey Northrup in 2021, has further inflamed the debate over who should investigate alleged police wrongdoing. This instance combined with the recent arrests and ongoing police investigation into several TPS officers for their alleged involvement with organized crime, has brought this discussion to a boiling point. I appreciate the public perceptions around this investigative model given that the average citizen doesn’t necessarily understand the professionalism and commitment of police investigative teams like the recent OPP Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB) group. I have all the confidence the world in that team, but I also personally know the ability and integrity of the OPP Detective Inspector in-charge. So, if these investigations aren’t carried out by police, who will do them? They do not fall under the mandate of the Ontario Special Investigations Unit (SIU), which by the way is largely comprised of former police criminal investigators and forensic identification experts, many of whom investigated homicides in police services. For SIU to assume a larger role, they would have to grow exponentially and expand their team of ‘former cops’. These cases generally do not fall under the purview of Ontario’s Inspectorate of Policing either. They would loosely fall under the oversight role of Ontario’s Law Enforcement Complaints Agency (LECA), who is responsible for receiving, managing and overseeing public complaints against police, but frankly they don’t have mandate or the horsepower to conduct complex criminal investigations. They oversee the “public complaints” that may lead to a criminal investigation, but the investigation would be the responsibility of a police service to conduct. An expansion of the LECA would require a tremendous amount of funding and human resources, most of whom would also be former police officers. Hiring and training civilians to conduct such investigations is an option, but largely an incomprehensible one. Police criminal investigators are trained officers that generally start out as uniformed officers responding to occurrences and investigating more routine and less serious crimes, i.e. minor assaults and property crimes. They build investigative expertise over time, including in interviewing and interrogation; gathering and securing physical evidence; legal processes like obtaining judicial authorizations; presenting evidence in court; and various investigative strategies. They learn how to work with special police units that provide specific investigative skills, and more. All of this doesn’t happen overnight, but over a period of years and with the tutelage of more experienced investigators along that journey. Trying to turn a group of young and well-educated civilians – no matter how intelligent and well-intended, into a team of elite investigators, would be a complete disaster and unfair to the public or to the officers being investigated. Over my many years as a member or as the Director of the OPP CIB, my colleagues and I investigated criminal allegations against cops from other agencies. Before the SIU was formed, we investigated officers from many Ontario police services – large and small, who had used deadly force. Many were cleared and a number were arrested and charged. We also investigated criminal allegations against police chiefs in Ontario. Again, several were appropriately cleared, and some were brought before the courts. Municipal, provincial and federal elected officials were similarly investigated and some charged. Our members also investigated police officers in other provinces, including high-ranking ones. I personally investigated two Royal Newfoundland Constabulary officers that were involved in an arrest that result in the death of a suspect. They were properly exonerated, but I would have charged them in a heartbeat if they had wrongfully killed than man. I arrested an OPP Sergeant for sexual assault. A CIB colleague investigated and arrested two different OPP officers for criminal offences. Both of those officers had been personal friends of mine and years later committed suicide. There are tons of similar examples that I can refer to over my career. All of these involved the oversight and legal analysis of a Crown Attorney, sometimes from another province. The interesting thing, and what most of the anti-police folks will never believe, is that in every single one of those investigations, the dialogue that I was involved in with other officers that I worked with or supervised, involved doing what was right. In other words, “If the allegation is substantiated, we will put the case together, arrest them and put them before the courts.” Not even once, did we think about or do anything that would give an officer a pass when they committed a criminal offence. Never. I have every confidence in the world that the vast majority of municipal and RCMP colleagues across Canada would operate under the same guiding principle. Has the occasional officer worked in conflict with that approach? Undoubtedly. Were some investigators not as committed or capable as they should be and perhaps did a poor investigation accidentally or deliberately? Quite likely so. But I truly believe those cases are the exception, not the rule in criminal investigations. Where I more often believe poor investigations or deliberate attempts to inappropriately give a colleague a break continues to occur, is in Police Act investigations, where policy or employee harassment wrongdoings are suspected. I like to think that the focus on that continues to improve, but not fast enough in some cases. Sadly, I know now that unbeknownst to me at the time, it happened under my watch. A focus for my next article. The public and police deserve the very best of investigators to ensure that bad cops are effectively put out of business and good officers are cleared. If there’s another effective option that would appease the doubting public – aside from using current officers from other agencies or creating a new and costly entity that would be staffed by former police officers, I’d like to hear it.