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Tuesday, July 17, 2018

Crossville Police Chief David Beaty's Management Style Blamed for 33 Percent Turnover in 13 months

Since the previous story published about Crossville Police Chief David Beaty's employment probation, a copy of the employment performance appraisal was requested under open records procedures.

In the document, Crossville City Manager Greg Wood took Chief Beaty to task for his “outdated management style” referring to it as “draconian” and blaming it for the high level of turnover in the Crossville Police Department.

Chief David Beaty

The full copy of Beaty's employment evaluation dated May 2, 2018, and signed a day later, rates Beaty at 2.73 out of 5, placing it in the category of “improvement needed.” The 90 day probation period is up on August 1.

In 11 categories of general employment factors, 4 factors are ranked as “Needs Improvement” with scores of 2 or 2.5 and 7 are ranked as “meets expectations. The highest score was 3.5 for job knowledge. In the comments for that item, Wood remarked, “Good knowledge of police, but management style outdated. Good street cop, but not an investigator.”

Under the category of Personal Leadership, Wood rated Beaty as a 2 out of 5 with the comment, “Many complaints of 'my way or the highway' and leadership by intimidation. This is reflected in a significant increase of turnover that cannot be attributed to just pay issues.”

Leadership Ability received a score of 2 with a comment by Wood saying “Needs to bring supervisors more into the decision making process to get both buy-in and training in leadership. Promote and encourage succession within the department.”

One of the issues when Beaty initially resigned was that there was no one ready to take over the operation of the department leading to the hiring of an interim police chief.

Adherence to policy was rated at 2.5 score with comments “Need to stay within personnel policy guidelines and not freelance. Turn paperwork in, in a timely fashion.”

Under interpersonal relationships, a score of 2 was given and the comment indicated that the turnover rate of employees in the department for the 13 months was 33 percent.

The performance review concludes with a narrative by Wood on the 90 day probation period and the specific areas that need improvement:

“Negative comments made referring to staff as 'The inmates are running the asylum' are completely unacceptable and show a lack of respect for staff. If comments like that are made to me, what is being told to the officers? Retention rate lowest in years. Review of retention rates of surrounding areas, and by Chief Shoap point to the current leadership being the issue. Exit interviews all negative and many fear retaliation. Paperwork not submitted in a timely fashion or at all. Human Resources having to find out about personnel actions by word of mouth. Complaints about morale and draconian management style being received by myself and Council Members. Initiating at 90 day probation period, if retention, moral(e) and paperwork continue at unacceptable levels, termination may be considered."

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