The police service is witnessing changes in its approach to staff
appraisal, training and assessment, moving towards competence-based
assessment systems.
Dorset police is pioneering this change. Since 1998, we have
been an established NVQ Centre with the
Oxford Cambridge & RSA Examinations Board (OCR) and currently
offer the Learning & Development suite of NVQs.
NVQs are not training programmes, though the nature of them
clearly involves staff development. NVQs are an
assessment tool designed to assess an individual's competence to
perform a job role. Assessment is against standards that have been
written by industry-lead bodies, now called National Training
Organisations (NTO) or Sector Skills
Councils (SSC).
The Police Skills and Standards Organisation (PSSO) has
developed National Occupational Standards for the police service
and we are progressing ways to implement these for the benefit of
all staff and to improve the performance of Dorset Police.
Role profiles have been developed by the PSSO and
included in the National Competency Framework that has been adapted
in Dorset for appraisal, promotion and selection procedures. For
support staff, identification of a skills gap can lead to
programmes of development under the Admit Scheme - actively
developing staff to fill that skills gap.