Dedicating yourself to the emergency services field can be a strenuous, daunting and exceptionally difficult commitment. Working 24-hour shifts and stepping into life-threatening situations daily takes its toll.
So how are emergency services leaders and staff incorporating the principles of Our Community Listens into their lives? How is it improving departmental and community connections? How is it affecting the mental health of the staff?
To find out, Sarah Weisbarth sat down with Fire Chief Greg Bulanow of the North Charleston Fire Department in coastal South Carolina and Police Chief Cliff Block of the Midland Police Department in Michigan.
These two men have brought the Our Community Listens movement into their departments and are excited to share the results.
AI-generated dictation of the podcast audio
Please note that this transcription was completed using AI software. Occasionally, unanticipated grammatical, syntax, homophones, and other interpretive errors are inadvertently transcribed by the software. Please excuse any errors that have escaped final proofreading.
Adam Salgat:
Hello, and welcome to the Our Community Listens Podcast. My name is Adam Salgat. In today’s episode, we’ll listen to a conversation I’ve nicknamed the chief chat. Led by Sarah Weisbarth, we have the privilege of hearing from two leaders in their respective communities and how they have incorporated the Our Community Listens skills and principles into the emergency services environment. Chief Greg Bulanow is the Fire Chief of the North Charleston Fire Department, which provides fire protection to the city of North Charleston in coastal South Carolina. North Charleston has a population of approximately 120,000. But as a retail and commercial hub, it can double in population during normal business days.
The 250-member department is divided into three shifts that work 24-hour shifts every three days. The department responds to approximately 20,000 emergency calls per year, including fires, medical calls, rescues, and hazardous material calls. Our second chief is Chief Cliff Block, who is the Police Chief of the Midland Police Department which has 48 sworn and two civilian personnel. They operate under the core values of integrity, professionalism, and service to the community. They strive to be recognized as a committed and respected team of the most highly trained, protective, and community-oriented law enforcement professionals in Michigan. Midland, Michigan has a population of approximately 42,000 and covers approximately 36 square miles. It is recognized as a great place and safe place to raise a family. Let’s tune in to Sarah’s conversation with these two inspiring leaders.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Well, thank you both for joining us today. I’m excited to have Chief Bulanow with us from fire services in the North Charleston Fire Department out of South Carolina and Chief Block from the Police Department of Midland, Michigan. They’re going to share with us today how they’re utilizing OCL in their environments. I’m just really super excited and grateful that you guys have taken the time to share your insights with our listeners today.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
I’m glad to be here, thank you.
Chief Cliff Block:
My pleasure.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Chief Bulanow, I’m going to go ahead and start out with you. Can you start by giving us an overview of your journey with Our Community Listens within your fire department?
Chief Greg Bulanow:
So, back in late 2015, we became aware of the Our Community Listens training and that it was offered here in the Charleston, South Carolina area really through word of mouth. One of my staff members was having a conversation with someone at his child’s soccer game and somebody mentioned that this training was available and recommended it very highly. So, after that, I met with the chapter leader here in Charleston and asked her about the program and told her that I was very interested in sending some of our staff members to the training. She very wisely told me that the first step would be for me to take the training. I, somewhat arrogantly maybe, thought that I knew this stuff.
I knew how to listen to people. I knew how to communicate effectively. I didn’t need this. Other people needed this. And of course, it was very wise of her to ask me to attend, and I was willing to do so and went into it with an open mind for the most part, but I was blown away by the training. I thought I knew this stuff, I didn’t know. Until I took the class, I just didn’t know. I didn’t know how to listen effectively. I didn’t really even know what that meant. Through this training, I really came to understand that better and saw it not only as a resource for my staff, but a resource for myself, something that I needed to work on and things that I could learn to become a better leader.
Sarah Weisbarth:
It sounds like it had a really strong personal impact for you.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
It truly did. I learned quite a bit of. The section on behavioral tendencies right near the beginning of the class was very interesting, and I learned things about myself. I learned things about other people. And then the whole program on the value of listening, how to do that effectively and how valuable that is to other people. And then the part on effective confrontation was especially helpful as well. That’s something that I have to do in my role, and I can do it. I don’t like to do it, but the model that was presented through Our Community Listens is a better model than I had ever come across before. And it’s something that I now use on a regular basis.
Sarah Weisbarth:
I’m so glad to hear that, thank you. Chief Block, what are your thoughts on your journey with Our Community Listens, either personally or within your department?
Chief Cliff Block:
Well, I have a similar story to Chief Bulanow. Ours actually started in 2015 in the spring. Our mayor attended the very first course of OCL here, Our Community Listens, in Midland and recommended it to the city manager at the time, Jon Lynch, who then shared it with all the department heads. I just had to go to the second session here in Midland. Again, as Chief Bulanow said, I thought I knew all this stuff already. I’d been to several classes on communications and confrontation and dealing with those kinds of issues and listening.
I walked out of that course thinking, wow, I really learned a lot, and it was a great value to me. I immediately saw the value I could use inside of our agency as well. Again, like I said, I thought I knew it, and I found out that the skills and the way it was all put together just made so much more sense. I’d had different courses on different ways of handling conflict, but the way this class brought it all together in that three days you were together was very powerful and had a lot of value. I saw that value both professionally and also personally, in your personal life as well as your professional life. I saw the importance of trying to get my staff involved and see the same value that I saw.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Can you tell us a little bit about how you then began to roll it into your department, maybe what inspired that?
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely. So, I decided that my command staff should all attend the important stuff, the communication skills that are necessary in being leaders and being supervisors and being command officers. I actually started to do it where only one command officer could go to each session. The reason I did that was, if you get a couple of officers together in the room with other people, during the breaks, they’ll go off and talk amongst themselves normally, not amongst the group. So I wanted to single out that only officer there at a time if possible so they got the opportunity to socialize and be in the class with other community members, which I thought was important as well. The community members that were there always had a great insight into law enforcement perspective too and our role and our jobs I think from that.
It made us real. It made us more human, humanized us in that role. It gave the community members an opportunity to see us in a different light than just being the officer that’s taking a complaint or maybe stopping you and writing your traffic tickets or whatever it may be. It gave them a chance to really get a more personal feel and knowledge of who you were and your DISC profile and those kinds of things as well. So, it was very important to me to do it that way. I’m still doing that now. The problem though of course by doing that, it takes time. I had a goal of getting all command officers through that process. That took me from 2015 in spring, and we didn’t get done until the summer I think of 2017. So it took time to get that process through, but I’m so glad I did it that way. It worked out well.
Sarah Weisbarth:
So quite an investment that you’ve put into your command staff-
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely.
Sarah Weisbarth:
… in your department?
Chief Cliff Block:
Yeah. So all the command staff has now been through it, and I’ve had several officers have been through it as well now. Another thing I have done recently in our department is, as they take different assignments, especially the assignments that are in public relations type fields, being a school resource officer, being a D.A.R.E. officer, a crisis officer, even Detective Bureau, part of the job posting states that you’ll be expected to attend Our Community Listens session.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Wow. It’s like almost a professional development that you’re using to serve the community with the roles that you have in public safety and law enforcement? But also, I can see it being an impact on how you’re interacting as a team and relating and connecting to one another.
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely. I’ve got a piece about that too that I can talk about either now or later, but the team aspect and getting the command group together and talking about our DISC profiles. And then we did a part of this process as well. It’s very powerful.
Sarah Weisbarth:
That’s great. Chief Bulanow, any thoughts that are similar from what Chief Block shared about how you’re utilizing Our Community Listens in your department and in the community?
Chief Greg Bulanow:
Yes. I think we’ve tried to take a very similar approach by spreading it out and not sending a large group of our fire officers to it all at one time. That could really interrupt the dynamics. We’ve tried to be very careful about that. We’ve limited the number that we send to three. Sometimes, it’s less than that, but it’s no more than three in any one class. For some of the same reasons that Chief Block mentioned is, there’s such a powerful bonding experience that the class members experience, that there’s great value in that when it’s members of the community with members of emergency services.
The public can gain insight into who their first responders are. As the chief mentioned, it humanizes them. They learn about each other and learn about each other’s different perspectives and really that they all have the same concerns and they all want the best for their communities, but gain an understanding about how to work through issues I think better as a result of the training itself and then the experience of having gone through the class together as well.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). It’s almost like it serves the intent of the public servant side of police and fire, that there’s this underpinning of, we serve our communities. We relate to the people in our communities. And through this experience, we have a opportunity to formally connect with them through the training. But then based on the skills that we learn, it continues that connection with our community members.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
I think that’s exactly right. I think we experience that where members of the community and first responders form these relationships that then can I think have a lasting impact on their perspectives and how they relate to one another in the long-term.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah, that’s great. Thank you. Are there any particular stories or experiences, Chief Bulanow, that stand out to you either personally or what you’ve seen within your department utilizing the Our Community Listens skills?
Chief Greg Bulanow:
We’ve had about 65 people go through the class so far from our department, and we’re a 250-member department. And so, this has been going on now for about two or three years. So, it’s starting to permeate the department. We’ve heard individual success stories from members of our department from both home and work, and we’ve provided people with the opportunity to share those with other members of the department. It’s very powerful to have firefighters stand up in front of other firefighters and tell them that this program saved their marriage, or restored their relationship with their son or daughter, or that… Some will say, “My supervisor and I are getting along much better as a result of this training.”
So that’s very valuable, and I think those individual stories are really encouraging to hear. At the organizational level, I think participating in Our Community Listens has given us an appreciation for the differences between the various behavioral tendencies. I think one group in particular, the Ds. In the fire service, the fire service is very team oriented. We work together in small groups. We essentially lived together for 24-hour shifts, and we really value people who can get along with each other. That is an essential part of the job. Ds, because they speak up, they can sometimes get labeled as problems.
We had one member of our department in particular, a guy that I went through recruit school with, he was labeled very early on as angry man. What we’ve learned from this training and what I’ve probably known all along is that he’s not angry. He just comes across that way, because he cares about the department. It frustrates him when we’re not doing things as well as we could be doing them or as quickly as he thinks we should be doing them. But every organization needs people like that, needs people who speak up and say, “Why is this taking so long?” Or, “This is a problem and we need to fix it.” And so, I think we’ve come to value that voice and that person who is willing to speak up.
Another example of this I think, and this is a conversation that I had with one of my shift commanders just yesterday actually, one of our shift commanders was very frustrated with the leadership style of two his subordinate officers. He said that, “I thought of the way I did things as the right way, and I thought they were weak, because they could not handle things the way that I did.” That’s what he told me. That was his perspective. But he said, “After taking the class, I went and apologized to them.” He said, “I realized that they had strengths. They were strong but in different ways.” That’s just a tremendously powerful insight for him to have.
After that, if a situation required a different approach, he would send one of them to handle the situation, because he had learned to value and appreciate their leadership abilities, and even recognize that in certain situations, their approach was better than his. So, I think that shows the value of this training. It’s certainly a credit to him for being open to that type of change. But when I think about the alternative to that, there would have been a great deal of conflict and frustration if he continued to insist that his officers handle things the same way he did. If he had been successful in doing that, the organization would have lost the benefits of the strengths that these other members have.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Those are really inspiring notes about how this training, how this experience really can impact our personal lives. But then to see how it’s going to impact the way that we interact with the people we work with and those relationships, especially when we spend so much time with work. Truly, in the fire services, those 24-hour shifts, that’s some really committed time just spending with one another. The ability to grow in our understanding of one another and use that in such an inspiring way, I’m just really truly inspired is how I’m feeling right now, Chief Bulanow, by hearing your stories. Thank you for sharing that about your department members. Chief Block, I know that you did some real intentional work around the styles and the strengths with the DISC in your department. You alluded to that a moment ago. Do you want to go ahead and share some more about that now?
Chief Cliff Block:
Exactly. Yes, I would. So, in December of 2017, we actually got together again with faculty from Our Community Listens, and we had a session with all of our command officers and supervisory officers. What that was geared towards was taking all of our DISC profiles and sharing them amongst all of us, so now all of us understood where we were as far as on the profile, were we high D, I, S or C, or what combination were we thereof? And we’ve got it all mapped out in front of us, which is extremely powerful, because now we all can understand where we’re all coming from.
We understand effective communication techniques for each of us. We understand our strengths and our weaknesses and where we have to expend more energy to try to get things done, to do things a certain way. That’s extremely powerful to have that information in front of you. Hopefully, they all pull it out once in a while and look at that when they’ve got to have a conversation with somebody else, especially if it’s got to be some kind of confrontational situation, so you know the best way to approach that situation and to allow both of you hopefully to come out to a successful resolution.
That to me was extremely powerful to see where we all were placed at on the DISC profile. I have pulled it out several times to take a look at it, so I have a better understanding of why someone may be doing what they’re doing, or how I have to utilize their strengths and their weaknesses and their certain strategies to communicate with them effectively, and hopefully get the results we want out of that. As Chief Bulanow mentioned earlier, we have to sometimes be involved in effective confrontations, and is part of the job is being a command officer and a leader of a department. Those are never fun conversations. But if you know where they sit on then DISC profile, and then you on top of it use the proper techniques, it can be very powerful.
That’s part of our success story I think, is having that group meeting, bringing all this together to understand our DISC profiles. I want to extend that now to all the officers as well, because we have several officers who’ve gone through this program as well now. We’ve got about 25 that have been through it, approximately, maybe a little more than that. We’re only a 48 sworn department. I did have one of clerical staff go through as well. We only have two clerical staff. So, I’m looking now at expanding beyond just commands officers, and hopefully, the officers would be willing to share that information.
I do want to ask them, “Are you willing to share what your DISC profile is before we just go out and do it?” I did the same thing with the command officers. I think that’d be a major benefit for them also to see what my profile is so they know what I need from them when they come ask me a question or they need something from me. They know that I’m a high C and a high S. That’s where I’m at, and they know what I need to maybe get what they’re looking to get. I’ll need a lot of facts and figures and data-driven and information. But I’ll listen to them, and I’ll be empathetic to them, but I need to have those facts and figures to me.
So to have that understanding I think is really critical in having good communications and good conversations and getting good results. So that’s one of the things I’ve seen that was a benefit to us internally. I think also though is having so many people involved in Our Community Listens now have been alumni. You’ll watch somebody else interact with somebody, and you’ll see that maybe the interaction wasn’t quite done the way that they should have done it based on an alumni to this great program. So you can then pull them aside afterwards and say, “Hey, did you think about this and this?”
And quite honestly, they’ll be like, “Oh, yes,” because we are creatures of habit, and this is not an easy program you just go to it and it just all becomes second nature. You have to remind yourself of these techniques. I’ve got a little cheat sheet card on my desk. I have the manual on my desk. I used it on my front of my computer for a while. I am the message was written on a sticky note on my computer screen, because you need that constant reminder to remember those kinds of things, because it’s not… It doesn’t come easy. You’ve done communication a certain way for so long that making those adjustments can be difficult.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah.
Chief Cliff Block:
But if you follow it, it’s very effective, very effective. I’ve seen lots of examples of that.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah. We’re all in this process of, what are the behaviors we know we want to change based on the inspiration we got from class and that motivation and that environment? But it is a process and it is a journey.
Chief Cliff Block:
It is.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah.
Chief Cliff Block:
I think the most important one to me as I mentioned just a little bit ago is the I am the message. I think it’s super important. I try to keep that in my mind at all times, because I know that I’m a High C. I am very task oriented. When someone comes to my office, I need to disengage from the task and give them my full focus and remember that what they see on my face and the way that my body is situated in my chair tells them whether I want to listen to them or I don’t want to listen to them, and I’ve got to be very aware of that. I sometimes fail. I’ll be honest. I don’t always do it right. So, I keep working on it.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Thank you for your honesty. I really enjoy hearing that people are quote-unquote failing in the skills, because it really points to the fact that we’re willing to try, and we see the value of making that effort. So I don’t see them as failures. I just really see them as opportunities to learn and grow. Thank you. One of the privileges that I have on being a member of the Midland, Michigan community is that I have this knowledge base of knowing that from the interaction with our police department, that the commitment that you have put into Our Community Listens has now inspired the entire city to develop a relationship with Our Community Listens in partnership. So, I just think it’s really great that you saw the benefit and you saw that for your department. From that now, it’s almost like feeding up into the larger organization as we partner with our entire municipality. So, thank you for leading that charge and seeing that potential.
Chief Cliff Block:
Truly, it wasn’t my intention to make that happen, but I’m glad it’s happening. So yes, I am aware that the city has taken on this and really turned around with it and making it available to all city employees. So, that’s great.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah, it’s very exciting. We’re also seeing a common language. You mentioned your growing alumni pool. I know that we’re making relationships with our Domestic Violence Shelter, and their entire staff has gone through Our Community Listens and are creating this environment of, how are they utilizing the skills within their organization, but then how are they serving their clients? And some of those clients that they serve are probably same clients and community members that our public safety officers serve. I just threw that question at you. Any thoughts on that kind of interaction or relationship with community agencies?
Chief Cliff Block:
No, absolutely. As I mentioned before, just the fact that we were in the class with these different individuals from different parts of our community is very important and powerful. But on top of that, the fact that I think our officers have been going through this class, the ones that have gone through it, I think it would really, truly assist them in their investigations of such situations like domestic assault and sexual assault. I think it’ll help in all investigations. They actually just sat back and had the time to just sit back and listen. We don’t always have the time. [inaudible 00:26:04] calls for service, what’s going on.
Somebody’s got to be a little quicker than sometimes. But I think if you just take the time and have the ability to listen, you’re going to be able to, first of all, make the person feel like they were valued. You’re going to give the individual the opportunity that you listen to them intently, and you’re going to do your best you can to solve their crime or to assist them in some manner. But it’s very powerful to take that time to truly listen to people. Certainly people that are going through very traumatic events, domestic assault, sexual assault, those kinds of things need someone that’s just going to be there and just listen to them.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah. [inaudible 00:26:41] and again inspiring just to the like cross agency opportunity for that common language as well that we can be serving those clients with our best intent and working to collaborate using the skills and using that base of common language as we seek to support to our entire community.
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely, I agree. It’s very exciting.
Sarah Weisbarth:
It gets me very excited. Chief Bulanow, let me give you a little insight into me. I have family members that are in both sides of emergency services. My husband is a retired assistant fire chief here from the city of Midland. I’ll tell you, as he went through Our Community Listens, and I obviously have gone through and facilitate the program, we’ve had discussions at home. We’ve had those moments of, sometimes the rules are just the rules. We have a standard operating procedure, emergency services, things happen hard and fast. You just need to do your job and you need to do it the way it’s expected to be done. I’m throwing this question at you too. How do you necessarily see that balance of command and chain of command related to Our Community Listens skills of how we connect and empathize with people and still be able to serve?
Chief Greg Bulanow:
That’s a very interesting question, and I’ve thought a lot about that. Even as a very busy fire department, only about 10% of our time on average is spent in emergency situations. We train very hard on communicating effectively on the fire ground. We begin that training in recruit school. We continue to train on the Incident Command System and how to communicate effectively over the radio. Communications is critical to operating effectively in emergency situations, but that’s only 10% of our time.
So, Our Community Listens is really about the other 90% of our time where it’s really all about interpersonal relationships, groups of people working together in very close quarters having just dealt with very stressful situations, working together, training, debriefing very stressful situations and preparing for other ones that will inevitably come their way. The training that Our Community Listens provides is ideal for this 90% of the time that we didn’t have effective training on before we found this program.
Sarah Weisbarth:
I’m just pausing with the impact of that statement. 90% of what you do, you did not have effective training on before Our Community Listens. I just feel like that’s an incredibly profound statement when you think about again the time that we invest with people we work with, and in particularly, how emergency services feed into the communities that they serve.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
I’m sure Chief Block would agree with this. First responders are under enormous stress these days, and I have great empathy for law enforcement and the work that they do in some of the active shooter events that they’re having to respond to. In some cases, law enforcement is specifically targeted in those types of situations. So, I can’t imagine the stress that law enforcement is going through, but firefighters have to respond to those situations as well. Call volumes are increasing in the fire service significantly in recent years, and all of this is just placing more stress on first responders. First responders are taking this stress home, and in the fire service, we’re seeing significantly higher rates of substance abuse, divorce, domestic violence, and suicide. There’s a lot of unexpressed pain that our first responders are experiencing. When I say there are at significantly higher rates of these things, it’s like two to three times the general population.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Wow.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
So it’s critically important that we develop these skills to be able to talk with our people to help them by listening to them, by listening so we understand their needs and can refer them to get assistance that’s available to them. It’s just very important that we have this training so that we can take care of our people.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Wow. So I’m hearing it’s even beyond about working well as a department and serving our communities, but also, it’s creating a whole environment of support and encouragement and resourcefulness for the professional and then personal demands of the job.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
That’s right. I think fire officers, they all care about their people, and they would do anything for them if they needed help. But I think too often, because the fire service is such an action-oriented culture, we don’t think of listening as doing something. But in fact, it can be very valuable to listen to our people, to debrief a stressful situation, listen to them so we can refer them to help that’s available. We can do all of that, but we need to understand that listening is valuable in and of itself. I think once firefighters gain that insight, they will do it and they will do it to help one another.
Sarah Weisbarth:
That just has a really strong sense of that brotherhood feel that probably lives within fire services. Chief Block, I have to imagine that lives as well within public safety officers?
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely, it does. One of the unique situations though for us is that we’re normally not in such a team environment like they are, like fire services are. We respond to calls sometimes with one or two officer units, unless it’s a very critical situation. So, we spend a lot of time actually alone in a patrol vehicle doing our jobs throughout the day. We’re a single officer units. We don’t have a two-man unit, so you’re a lot of time on your own. But as Chief Bulanow mentioned that we still deal with a lot of stresses. Just watch the social media right now, and you add that to the stress of law enforcement and then some of the negativity that we see on the social media spectrum as well.
It’s important for us to have the ability to listen to our officers when they’re struggling with those kinds of conversations that happen, because they happen quite frequently nowadays. Even though the appreciation for law enforcement is actually very high, you wouldn’t know that based on what you watch on social media and what you watch on the news sometimes either. So it does have a tendency to [inaudible 00:34:29] get you down. One of the things that I’ve been focusing on for the last couple of years, we’re trying to really get it and focus on it now is officer wellness. Certainly, I think Our Community Listens fits into the whole officer wellness perspective as well.
As it was mentioned, the ability to listen to people, figure what they need, effective communication. In that of course does go, like we’ve mentioned the debrief, having a debrief. We’re very conscious of that now, and we use what’s called Critical Incident Stress Management Systems as well to make sure we get the proper counseling and debriefing. But it starts with paying attention to your staff and listening to your staff and the issues and problems that they might be having. If you do the reflective listening, you can really dig deeper. I hope that all my command officers take the opportunity to do that and dig deeper, because I think you can really help out, and this officer wellness thing can really be beneficial with Our Community Listens.
Sarah Weisbarth:
As a family member of both fire services and law enforcement, I really appreciate knowing that there are departments that are willing to invest in their officers and all of their staff in such a way that allows them to be able to vent, to be able to do those debriefs, especially with people that can relate and understand the situation. Because I know what comes home, and that stress also comes home. I can imagine that this has an impact in that professional environment, in that brotherhood and that supportive environment.
But I will tell you as a family member, I feel that impact at home as well knowing that there are people in the work environment that are going to listen, and they’re going to understand, and they’re going to empathize, and they’re going to know enough about one another to be able to connect and relate. It just really has a significant impact. So, I’m just going to say thank you to you both for really setting that example in emergency services to inspire other departments to consider, how are we going to utilize these opportunities and these skills in order to support our departments, our communities, and those family members of those officers? Thank you both.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
I feel grateful that we’ve discovered this resource that we can make available to our people and offer this type of program to them.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Well, we are truly grateful for the gift that has been provided to us and the communities that we’re able to share it into.
Chief Cliff Block:
I just want to add one thing to that too. I guess it’s important you mentioned that, I know from the police perspective, it’s a difficult challenge to get past the, “I’m okay, and I don’t need assistance. I’m a strong officer. I don’t need to have someone listen to me and to reflect on all of these feelings.” That’s why I think it’s so critical that they are given these tools and that we have the opportunity to listen to people, because there was a lot of that, the stigma, of the law enforcement officer that may need some assistance or to tell how they’re truly feeling.
There’s a lot of that that goes on, hence the reason that we do see a high suicide rate in law enforcement officers as well, and then the same things. You get the domestic assault situations or abuse situations in law enforcement too, because they bottle up all that stuff and they can’t leave it all at work. It travels with them. I think this is definitely a tool that we can use to help in that whole process. There’s more to it than just this, but I think it certainly is a critical opportunity to utilize the listening skills and the engagement that you can get from Our Community Listens. So it’s very important, very impactful.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yeah. Well, and that we can also resource family members of those officers, and that they can attend class and become that supportive listener. Because honestly, the stuff that emergency services brings home, sometimes you just don’t know what to say. There’s nothing to say that’s going to make it any better. There’s a great relief on my part to just be able to sit and listen and understand.
Chief Cliff Block:
Absolutely.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Yes.
Chief Cliff Block:
Yes.
Sarah Weisbarth:
We are approaching time for our episode today. But before we wrap up, I would just like to open it up. Is there anything else that either one of you would like to add that I haven’t asked or we haven’t touched on in our conversation?
Chief Greg Bulanow:
I’d like to echo what Chief Block was talking about. I think attending the class can create high expectations that you’re going to do things differently. I think we experienced that in our department where we were sending people to the class and other people were watching to see how they were going to do and if they were really going to do things differently. I think that sometimes, it’s hard to live up to. Because no matter how seriously you take the material, you’re still going to slip back into old habits and make mistakes, but that doesn’t mean the class doesn’t work. It doesn’t fix every relationship all at once, but it does give you the skills to use to make relationships better one conversation at a time. I would just encourage anyone who’s taken it, it’s something I remind myself from time to time is I make mistakes too. Be patient with other people. Be patient with yourself and keep trying, because the program is powerful and it works.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Thank you for that endorsement, Chief Bulanow. I agree. I agree.
Chief Cliff Block:
I’d echo almost the same thing. When you’re 50 years old, you know you have your certain tendencies. You do things a certain way, and it’s certainly important to reflect back and do the best you can to utilize the skills. I obviously saw a value in it very early on, and I’ve been trying to get my staff through it. I don’t want to force anybody into it, although I did force my command officers to go the first time through. But I would say, the vast majority of people I’ve spoken to after they’ve gotten done had thought that the opportunity of the skills that they just learned was very powerful.
Of course, there was a session in the class when you first go that you’ve got to take some of that stuff home and give it a try. Most of the folks that I’ve spoken to did that and they saw how powerful it was in just that little simple exercise that you do when you take it home. The problem is remembering to do that after the class is done, after the course is done. I think they are trying to have an OCL refresher classes that are being offered here in Midland. I don’t [inaudible 00:41:38] being offered elsewhere as well. It’s a great idea for [inaudible 00:41:42] to go back again and to realize those skills and see maybe where they slipped, where they could pick themselves back up and start using those again.
But it does take time. I think that it’s an extremely powerful, valuable opportunity that I certainly want all my staff to attend if they’re so willing, but I’m not going to force them to go either at the same time, because you don’t want someone who’s been forced to go. You want them to be open-minded and accept what they’re hearing and accept what they’re seeing and a proper I think thought process at the end of the course. I can’t give enough kudos. It’s a fantastic powerful, powerful program.
Sarah Weisbarth:
Thank you. Thank you. We are seeing change in so many areas and in people’s lives. Thank you both for the stories and the examples. Chief Block, you kind of teed me up to just talk about our alumni resources and the continued support that we do offer to alumni throughout all of our chapters. We have six chapters across the nation. We’re just talking to two of our chapters today here in Michigan and then in South Carolina. Our podcast is nationwide. I know a lot of our chapters have Facebook groups and Facebook pages where they can connect with other alumni. We have in-person continuous learning in our local areas.
And then, actually, our chapter leader down in South Carolina started doing webinars this year that any of our alumni can attend and tune into across our six chapters. So, to be able to build that community across chapters, across our nation really starts to realize that vision that we have that we are all leaders and everyone matters, and that through practicing this truly human leadership, we’re going to start to change the world. So, thank you both again for being those examples in your communities and spending your time with us today to start to draw those connections across communities and how Our Community Listens is feeding into our environments.
Chief Cliff Block:
My pleasure.
Chief Greg Bulanow:
Thank you very much. I enjoyed it.
Adam Salgat:
Thank you for listening in to our conversation with Chief Bulanow and Chief Block. If you’d like more information about Our Community Listens, visit us at ourcommunitylistens.org. And don’t forget alumni, you are the message.
