Editors --- "Planning for the future" [2000] AUFPPlatypus 13; (2000) 67 Platypus: Journal of the Australian Federal Police, Article 6

• The AFP's role
• The Ayers Review
• The AFP's operating environment
• Other developments affecting the AFP's operating environment
• Team-based management
• Peak performing teams

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Planning for the future

As part of this edition's theme of looking at the challenges ahead for law enforcement, the AFP's Chief Operating Officer, James Kelaher, provides a personal view of the law enforcement environment he anticipates for the organisation in the next few years. Mr Kelaher was appointed in early 1999 to oversee the implementation of the Government's capability upgrade program for the AFP. He has held senior positions with the Defence Department as well as in industry and also founded and ran a Sydney-based property and investment business.

• It is appropriate, if not fortunate, that the theme of this article is about current and future trends which appear likely to affect the law enforcement environment. I say ‘fortunate' because I have been thinking about future developments in law enforcement for the past several months and had been considering how best to put some of these preliminary thoughts into circulation.

• Before beginning to outline these preliminary views I would like to emphasise that the range of possible future developments in law enforcement is, of course, enormous. Rather than trying to predict which of these is more (or less) likely, what I think we in the AFP need to do is adopt a planning framework which ensures that we are ready for, if not influencing, future developments generally.

• There are two perspectives to this approach: internal and external. Firstly, we need to be constantly assessing ourselves, and shaping and tuning our capabilities to maximise our effectiveness in the light of emerging developments. Secondly, we need to be thinking about the external factors that we can shape and influence to maximise our, and other agencies' effectiveness in the wider law enforcement (and criminal) environment. In this latter case, changes to the criminal law regime, relationships with federal and state governments and the community, relationships with domestic and international partner agencies, and access to international intelligence and technology, are examples of variables which must be embraced by our external perspective.

The AFP's role

• In the past couple of years there has been a major shift in the AFP's role. This has resulted largely from recognition at the federal government level that Australia's law enforcement priorities can only be addressed with the aid of an effective federal agency.

• The community policing roles of the states, and in fact, the Australian Capital Territory, are critical, though largely discrete activities, which operate according to state government priorities, resourcing and legislation.

• At the federal level, the Commonwealth has separate legislation, resourcing and priorities for protecting Australia's national interests and meeting Australia's commitments to the international community.

• While the AFP is the Commonwealth's lead law enforcement agency, it is also relatively small. The AFP must, accordingly, be very careful to apply its finite resources to best effect. This means, in particular, that we must foster high quality intelligence sharing, strategic targeting and joint operations among state, federal and international law enforcement agencies. In so doing, we must promote the effective use of our own and others' law enforcement resources. It is now recognised that the quality of the AFP's personnel, training and interaction with other agencies and the community must promote this at all times.

• It is therefore incumbent on the AFP to embrace and, where necessary, invest, in methods and systems to promote better practice in criminal intelligence and investigative activities.

• The federal government's support for, and recognition of, this role has resulted in, among other things, a significant increase in the AFP's resourcing over the past two years. This increase in resourcing, combined with a changed style of operating in conjunction with (instead of in competition with) law enforcement partners, has helped the AFP become much more successful and better recognised as an integral, enabling player in national and international law enforcement.

• As a result, the AFP's role in the foreseeable future is, in my view, clearer now than it has been in the 20 years since its formation; our strategic planning should proceed on the basis of the AFP being a well-focused, critical, enabling law enforcement organisation nationally and internationally. I believe we will continue to consolidate and optimise this role in the foreseeable future.

The Ayers Review

• Many would recall that the federal government commissioned a resourcing review led by Tony Ayers in early 1998. In accepting the results of this review, the federal government decided to increase the AFP's resource base (and implicitly staffing levels) for an initial three year period — through to mid-2001.

• One of Mr Ayers' recommendations was that, before the end of this period, a second review should be conducted to determine the extent to which the AFP's resource levels in subsequent years should be further adjusted.

• AFP management will be turning its attention towards the longer-term resource needs of the organisation in the second part of this year, in readiness for further discussions with government regarding the second-stage review proposed by Mr Ayers.

• While it may seem a somewhat brave statement, my belief is that, provided the AFP continues to demonstrate significant operational success, fosters more effective operational interaction between partner agencies, and actively contributes to the strategic development of Australia's law enforcement environment, the level of resourcing needed will be recognised and generally supported by government, with periodic injections of funds for specific initiatives.

• A current such initiative is the government's desire for the AFP to make an ongoing contribution in East Timor (for at least another two years or so), accompanied by continued input to UN and regional peacekeeping activities.

The AFP's operating environment

• There are two aspects which need to be addressed. The first is the way in which the AFP responds to its priorities, and the second is the culture and employment environment which underpins and shapes our operational performance.

• The AFP has, in recent times, made a significant transition from a response-driven organisation, to an intelligence and strategy-driven organisation. This has major implications for our future.

• The AFP now looks to allocate its resources and capacity according to pre-determined priorities. This capacity prioritisation framework is very important in ensuring that the organisation is forward-looking and that its objectives are shaped by intelligence and strategy.

• This places significant new demands on our communications and planning systems.

• In particular, it requires us to protect our operational capacity from being spread too thinly across the myriad of lower impact demands which could, in a perfect world, attract an AFP response. We are sometimes unable to meet some of these demands because of the need to specifically direct our capacity to the intelligence, planning, monitoring, resolution and prosecution phases of major, high impact operations — according to priorities set and funded by government.

• An important aspect of the prioritisation of our capacity is the mobility demanded of our workforce — if high impact work arises in Sydney and additional capacity needs to be made available from other locations to meet these demands, then that is what must happen. A number of recent successes in the breaking of major organised drug and money laundering syndicates have resulted from this flexible, national application of resources.

• The AFP is becoming a systems-driven law enforcement agency. The key aspects of this are the increasing application of our PROMIS investigation and intelligence management tool to all aspects of law enforcement and, relatedly, the AFP's adoption of the Management of Serious Crime (MOSC) methodology for all major investigations.

• The combined effect of PROMIS and MOSC is to give the AFP enormous mobility and agility in the investigation and management of crimes around Australia and, in fact, around the world, through our networked information and resource management systems.

• When combined with the AFP's use of other information technology applications for data sharing and analysis, I believe the AFP is at the forefront of e-law enforcement around the world.

• The increasing interest being shown in the AFP's intensive MOSC training program, from law enforcement agencies around the world and, in particular our region, underlines the interest generated by the AFP's approach.

• Opportunities for international law enforcement partners to see our systems and methodology in action, are increasingly being generated by the joint international investigations in which we are becoming involved.

• The AFP's Law Enforcement Assistance and Law Enforcement Cooperation programs have been extremely useful in exposing senior overseas partners to the AFP and also in expanding the AFP's range of international collaborative partners.

• The recent changes to the AFP's employment environment, including increased external advertising and recruitment, combined with substantial increases in base remuneration, and the introduction of performance bonuses and merit based advancement, will enable the organisation to attract and retain the high calibre professionals needed to work in e-law enforcement.

• A critical decision, on which many of these other initiatives are founded, was the AFP's abolition of rank as the basis of authority and remuneration several years ago. The AFP's adoption of a team-based approach to investigative and management activities, where leadership is determined by skills, merit and situational factors has generated enormous benefits for the organisation.

• Intentionally, the combined effect of these technology and people management initiatives, is to create an organisational culture which is much more flexible and less prone to the biases and insularity which still, today, hold back many law enforcement organisations.

• I am very confident that the fruit of these initiatives will be increasingly obvious over the next year or so — as younger women and men, with diverse backgrounds, take on some of the major leadership roles in key areas of the law enforcement community. I know this will happen because it is already clear that the AFP's middle management and senior investigative areas are beginning to swell with younger, post-graduate educated, multi-lingual talent — just as a large number of our more senior executives are approaching retirement or, in several cases, contemplating the attractive offers being made by other public and private sector organisations.

Other developments affecting the AFP's operating environment

• In the past year, major strides have been made in improving the effectiveness of joint operations and intelligence sharing with the National Crime Authority. The AFP and NCA will shortly combine to upgrade their present (largely incompatible) telephone interception capabilities and the collocation of both agencies in virtually all Australian cities is now being actively explored.

• The AFP is taking a much more active role in law enforcement intelligence strategy and coordination and, in addition to fostering a closer relationship with the Office of Strategic Crime Assessments and collocation with the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence in Canberra, the AFP now works much more closely with other related intelligence agencies.

• In the Australian Capital Territory, the recently signed purchaser-provider ‘contract' for provision of community policing services in the ACT heralds a major new development in Australia: an accountable, community-driven, flexible service contract for community law enforcement.

• This development is consistent with the AFP's desire to promote ‘best practice' in law enforcement, including community policing. The Australian Capital Territory is an excellent location for an initiative such as this.

• It appears that the AFP's contribution to international peacekeeping will continue to place significant demands on the organisation. Planning is proceeding towards putting the AFP's role in peacekeeping on a more formal organisational and financial footing. It is important in this regard that future arrangements accommodate the intense and somewhat unpredictable demands of this activity and minimise the disruption of the AFP's commitment to other high impact domestic priorities — particularly the black triangle of drugs, organised crime and money laundering.

• The AFP's ethical standards must be second-to-none. We must display the highest standards of fairness, trust, accountability and integrity in all our activities. Compulsory financial disclosure and random drug testing are part of the AFP's integrity framework.

• Another element likely to be added to this framework in the next few years, in my view, is the polygraph, or similar device. This tool would be particularly effective in vetting proposed new employees and employees being considered for promotions to positions of trust. Optional use of the polygraph to assist in resolving allegations of sub-standard performance, as part of the internal inquiry process would also be advantageous. However, of greatest advantage will be use of such a tool in conducting major investigations. While, in most countries around the world in which it is used, polygraph testing is voluntary, and the results generally inadmissible, such investigative tools are extremely useful in quickly eliminating fruitless lines of inquiry and significantly increasing the effectiveness of the investigative focus.

• DNA testing, now an increasingly important adjunct to investigations, spurred along by the federal government's CrimTrac project, is a further example of how the law enforcement landscape is quickly changing.

Team-based management

• The AFP has been at the forefront of team-based law enforcement — being one of the first law enforcement organisations in the world to abolish rank based on seniority.

• The AFP recruits its staff at all levels based on merit, and recruits externally where feasible.

• As a result, the AFP deploys and manages its people in a similar fashion to major legal, accounting or consulting firms where team leadership depends on the particular assignment and all members of the team have particular talents which may result in leadership being shared or reassigned depending on the activities required at the time.

• There has been considerable contemporary research on high performing teams and there is no doubt that the AFP's model is very much in keeping with the latest thinking in how best to motivate and manage high performing individuals in an environment requiring very high levels of cooperation.

• This model is also very useful in fostering improved outcomes when working with domestic and international law enforcement partners.

Peak performing teams

• I have been reading a fascinating book recently about 10 of the world's elite sporting teams and what they and their backing organisations do to sustain peak performance over a prolonged period. It is very clear that top teams spend several years consolidating their skills, perfecting their team work and identifying and correcting weaknesses, before they can sustain a dominant position in their chosen sport.

• Teams such as the Chicago Bulls, Williams Formula One, the Australian Netball, Cricket and Women's Hockey Teams, the Atlanta Braves, San Francisco 49ers, the NZ Black Magic yachting team all worked very hard to get to the top of their field and then set about working even harder to stay there.

• In reading about these teams and comparing what made them supremely successful, the three things which stood out for me were:

• The teams set themselves very ambitious goals and were prepared to work intensely towards that aspiration over quite a few years.

• The teams placed tremendous emphasis on being very good as individuals and on the importance of team members seeing their job in terms of its relationship to the jobs of other team members (such as: “I play midfield and it's my job to move the ball from defence into offence so that our strikers have the best opportunities to score goals”).

• The teams spent a lot of time analysing and perfecting their performance: working on their strengths, identifying and compensating for weaknesses, and while they thought about how they would beat opponents, they tended to focus much more on exceeding their personal best.

• We in the AFP are very fortunate. After several quite difficult years the organisation is now in a good position to consolidate, and from this position, build over the next couple of years a peak performing organisation. This is an objective I find very appealing.

• Colleagues in the AFP will, hopefully, respond to the adoption of some of these ‘peak performance' themes over the coming 12 to 18 months as we bring together the enormous number of successfully completed initiatives over the past few years and consolidate the organisation's performance at a new, higher level in order to very successfully perform the role required of the AFP by the Australian Government and community and deal with the issues canvassed in the early part of this article.