Daily, jails are faced with just keeping up with the challenges of facility operations. Advocating that there is a need to actively expend a credible effort to keeping employees often falls between the cracks of the jail’s mission, vision, and value statements. Non-competitive salaries, often tough working conditions, absence of work-life balance, confounding organizational structures, and negative internal cultures collide to make it a daunting argument to keep staff. The community and stakeholders are often uninformed and oblivious about the jail’s role and needs of those in the jail’s custody. Retaining employees seems like just treading water; the difficulty compounded by a general lack of understanding or prioritization by jails’ hiring and funding authorities. (McCampbell, Core Competencies, and Jail Leadership: Become a Full Partner with Human Resources, 2016) (Stinchcomb, McCampbell, & Leip, 2009)

As giving up isn’t an option and waiting for others to act on the jail’s difficulties hasn’t resulted in progress, we advocate that jails shift the paradigm and devote resources to developing and implementing an employee retention plan. A retention plan envisions that jail leaders go beyond conventional thinking and questionably successful and unsupportable retention strategies. This planning and implementation process requires the involvement of both employees and the community’s stakeholders. Depending on the agency’s size, this initiative can be resourced by designation of a single responsible person, shared duties, or a team. The secret to success is the agency’s commitment to the value of keeping employees, and accountability for getting it done, implemented and overseen. This is not a “one-and-done” process, it must be integrated into the daily life of the organization.

A prerequisite to this new way of thinking and action requires a commitment from leadership and buy-in from employees. Who wants to continue mandatory overtime? How much longer can excessive overtime costs be justified? The safety of staff and those in the jail’s care, custody and control are paramount.

Dissect Human Resources Processes—Recruitment, Screening, Hiring, Probationary Year, and Retention

The critical and immediacy of jail staffing needs often fail to galvanize human resources practitioners to help. This part of the organization and these individuals are the gatekeepers to important processes of hiring—linked directly to jail safety and success. Some of those in charge of hiring, retention, and employee engagement subscribe to the “we’ve always done it this way” philosophy. (Russo, Woods, Drake, & Jackson, 2018) Respectfully challenging the status quo to improve processes, while not diminishing the necessary qualification of new employees, is an urgent need. Engaging in root cause analysis may help identify outdated, unnecessary, and counterproductive steps in the process. Critical is use of technology, such as online applications,, and frequent communication (via social media) with candidates is not an option. Accurate (current, realistic) job descriptions, identifying the means to reach the newest generation of workers (e.g. social media), and an organized, resources, and constantly reviewed recruitment plan is part of keeping employees. Asking recent hires how the process was for them provides insight. Many organizations have employee incentives to recruit new employees, and some provide means to keep the referring employee linked to the success of the new hire through the probationary year. New hires are often abandoned after the first hour of work so assessing how staff are “on-boarded”—that is—formally and informally welcomed into the organization warrants review. Whatever the outcome of these evaluations of the human resources functions, developing an action plan, with measurable steps and accountability is critical to making change happens.

In 2019 the Davidson County Sheriff’s Office prioritized keeping employee by creating the position of Officer Retention Specialist. Major job responsibilities included, but were not limited to:

• Increased employee engagement;

• Mentoring newly hired correctional officers;

• Addressing concerns of long-term staff;

• Meeting with officer regarding retention concerns;

• Assisting with employees whose work performance needs improvement; and

• Preparing a plan to retain correctional staff.

• As the position has evolved, the Sheriff’s Office reports that responsibilities have included, and outcomes are:

• Expedite the hiring process by examining the time between applications, the hiring decision, the first day worked and reducing the hurdle for the applicant.

• Use of a conditional offer letter to an applicant much earlier in hiring process.

• Implementation of job a shadowing program to bring employees in the door.

• Review if hiring standards to assure these match the agency’s actual needs? For example, is a physical agility test aligned with the current facilities, not a jail that is no longer in use?

• If applicants are moving from outside the area to accept a position, ensure they know where to look for housing; how to find local schools; and, how to find jobs for their spouse or partner.

• Increase in-house staff to support a new officer through expansion of our peer supporter program.

• More involvement with other law enforcement agencies for counseling staff.

• Created a mentorship program.

If you’re not sure a new strategy will yield the desired result, try a test group as a sample and run in comparison to your regular process. Review the results and see what worked (and what didn’t).