The Metropolitan Police wants its new leaders at Inspector level to deliver the New Met for London objectives. This has led to a new promotion process for London!
Aspiring Sergeants in the Met (and potential transferees from elsewhere) are currently preparing for the next step in a challenging promotion process. Those who passed the gamified first stage must now face an assessment centre, involving a scenario-based leadership exercise and forward-facing interview.
I’ve received great feedback on my prior Met Gamification exercise guidance, and also my detailed podcast insights to the Met’s senior leadership assessment centre. I’ve even had officers approach me saying they were gutted to miss the boat on these supportive resources before the Met’s deadlines.
I’ve perused the Met’s guidance documents and decided to extend my published support as the process for Inspector promotion continues, and following many direct calls from candidates wanting support. So in this overview blog, I share…
- A bespoke infographic I’ve created for the essentials on one page
- My bonus premium podcast episode in which I dive deeper into some of the core concepts
- Pointers on dealing with forward-facing (aka future-focused) interviews and questions
- How to tackle the scenario-based exercise (with an example scenario)
- Examples of challenges facing the Met Police
- Original mnemonics for the Met’s Success Profile, Values, and Principles
- Further reading materials and more…
Take from it whatever you find useful. The Met Police are being bold and experimenting with ‘new’ approaches to promotion, which unnerves many cops. So as usual, I’m just a phone call away for free (30 min) support if you have further questions on potential scenarios, how to shape your evidence, or anything else you want help with. And if you’re in any other force using scenarios or forward-facing interview questions, you’ll likely find these promotion prep materials useful too!
A New Promotion Process for London
The Met Police says it is reforming its police promotion and progression processes to make things fairer and to change the culture of policing for London. This follows various reviews (e.g. Casey Report) and inspections, which has led to the stated ambition to transform its leadership as part of “fixing the foundations”.
Such grand plans couldn’t come without big changes to its promotion assessments. First came its “development centre” for Chief Inspectors through to Chief Superintendents. Shape up or ship out was the blunt underlying message. Those who found support to prepare effectively unsurprisingly shaped up and were identified for progression.
“I just wanted to say thank you. I’ve just come home from the Met’s Development Centre day & honestly, if I hadn’t heard your podcast & that blog, I wouldn’t be as comfortable as I was today, whatever the outcome. You gave me the tools. I went through everything, I listened a couple of times, wrote it down. I went through it. Spot on. An absolute godsend. I just wanted to say thank you.”
Second came a new gamified psychometric testing for Sergeants and Inspectors. In all, it’s a lot to comprehend for practical, aspiring officers who want to make a difference at another level. But fear not, Rank Success is again here to level the playing field.
The Met describes this assessment centre as just the latest in a “design cycle”. So expect more changes to come in future. But is it all that different? For those familiar with my comprehensive Inspector and Chief Inspector promotion toolkits, including the timeless role profile I outline there, or the myriad of promotion processes they’ve helped candidates through, it’s a case of ‘plus ca change’.
Given the range of free support I provide on the Met and other force processes, I hear that forces are increasingly signposting their candidates internally to Rank Success resources. Others conversely give bad advice. I’m increasingly noticing other forces still (and others in policing) simply copy or mirror my methods and guidance! I advise more of the former option, but if you do want me to give bespoke seminars or create tailored content in your force, please do get in touch!
Now let’s get on to more free support and make sense of that guidance for you…
Preparation Success on a Page
I’ve previously argued the case for you to have a ‘Plan on a Page’ for your police promotion prep. Here’s something for these scenarios and forward-facing interviews.
The infographic above is my bespoke tool you can print out and use to focus you on key points of preparation for this process. It’s the result of me having read, digested and summarised for you the main important points. Much of this is covered in my premium podcast, which I recorded before compiling this comprehensive aide memoire. So here’s some further explainers for the bits you might not understand right away…
The Met’s Principles and Values
I’m a fan of mnemonics, as many of my successful clients will testify. I like to make things easy and intuitive for you to understand. Filing and rehearsing are key steps often overlooked to remembering important information. And your Met Police Principles and Values are important to know!
Meet Chief Constable Fip, aka CC FIP. CC FIP represents the Principles of the MPS:
- C – Communities first
- C – Collaborative
- F – Frontline-focused
- I – Inclusive
- P – Precise
Promotion is often referred to as a race; I’ve previously likened it to the fable of the tortoise and the hare. With I-RACE, you’ll more easily remember the new Met Values…
- I – Integrity
- R – Respect
- A – Accountable
- C – Courage
- E – Empathy
Do you know these Principles and Values? Can you talk to how you will demonstrate these and contribute to a brighter future for the Met?
“We are here on Earth to make a positive difference, not to prove how smart or right we are.” – Peter Drucker
Inspector Success Profile
The Inspector’s Success Profile is another way of saying ‘role profile’ or ‘job description’. In it, the Met Police lay out the expected behaviours of the successful candidates they want. Again, I expand on this in my dedicated podcast (subscribe to access and support my ongoing work to continue creating the best free police leadership and promotion resources anywhere).
Here’s how I would list and organise the MPS Success Profile behaviours (against which you will be assessed) in a more memorable way: TRIPPED Triple-C. Sounds like a cocktail to me, and it is indeed: A cocktail of competencies…
- T – Trust (Builds Trust)
- R – Resilient (Being Resilient)
- I – Inclusive (Leads Inclusively)
- P – Planning and Prioritising
- P – Public (Customer Focus)
- E – Engagement (Drives Engagement)
- D – Decision-Making and Judgement
- C – Courage
- C – Collaborates
- C – CPD (Developing our People)
As you might notice, I’ve taken some creative license. If it’s not exactly as the Met describe, I’ve put that in brackets afterwards. In any case, the magic thing with mnemonics is you can arrange them as you wish to aid your memory.
Role-Specific Leadership Exercise
In my premium podcast, I discuss potential scenarios and tools on how to approach them in depth, including effective prioritisation and decision-making. But as an overview, you will face five scenarios. The MPS guidance states these will be different depending whether you’re going for Uniform Inspector or Detective Inspector roles.
It’s important for you to know the challenges facing the Met Police and then think about your contribution. This will help you anticipate potential scenarios, which are predictable from all the information about the Met. You need only read the New Met for London for a ready-made preview. I share a key screen grab from and the document itself below…
You might also want to listen to my recent PESTLE podcast for a ready-made analysis of key issues facing policing generally. Here’s some more potential scenario themes specific for Inspectors in the Met…
- Investigation Quality & Performance
- Wellbeing & Retention Issues
- Critical Incidents & Response
- Vulnerable Victims & VAWG
- Increasing Digitisation & AI
- Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee & Partnerships
- Protests & Legitimacy
- Financial & Resource Pressures
What else can you anticipate? What about professional standards and complaints? The Casey Review is another source for the Met’s challenges and therefore potential scenarios. Here’s my comprehensive video summary if this seismic 300 page report passed you by:
Note: The aim of these leadership exercises is to put you under pressure and overwhelm you (if you come unprepared). Scenarios may also overlap, and the emphasis is on frontline. With the prioritisation tools I describe for you in the podcast, you’ll be ready to tackle these scenarios effectively, as many of my prior senior officer clients have fed back.
“Hi Steve, Good you are the first to cover this. Assessor was lovely & said I had done well. I await formal feedback. I must say assessors were very professional & all experienced ex senior leaders from industry. Your preparation plan definitely helped. Thanks again.”
The Future-Focused Interview
The Met calls this ‘future-focused interview’ assessment a shift away from the CVF, because it asks questions about the future, not the past. It says it wants to know about your potential, not your priors, so to speak.
As long-term followers will know, I’ve long assisted clients to know the difference between forward-facing and rear-facing interview questions. Whether something is future- or past-focused is a completely different spectrum as whether it’s CVF or non-CVF.
Forces are strongly encouraged to map any local frameworks they use against the CVF. The Met Police guidance shares indicators of potential, many of which could be aligned to CVF behaviours (e.g. ‘Self-Awareness’ maps to ‘We Are Emotionally Aware’).
“Where a different force [recruitment, assessment and development] framework is used, it is recommended that forces conduct a mapping exercise to ensure the behaviours in the CVF are appropriately represented.”
In any case, the guidance to candidates is clear: You will be assessed against the ‘Success Profile’ (aka Inspector role profile) competencies and bespoke Met Values. Specifically, these are the behaviours the questions will be assessed against over the 45-minute interview:
- Integrity
- Leads inclusively
- Being resilient
- Planning and prioritising
- Drives engagement
What questions might you anticipate for each of these behaviours? Here’s an example forward-facing interview question aligned to ‘Being Resilient’. For this specific one, you might want to also read my free blog on providing stability in a sea of change…
“As Inspector, how would you lead your teams through turbulent change and uncertainty?”
Of course, I provide many more practice questions in my Interview Success guide, along with further insights on this step in my brand new podcast on this Met promotion process (Season 6, Episode 12).
And to avoid a scattergun approach to your answer, my bespoke ENAMEL conversational response structure has stood the test of time and proved a winning formula for many successful candidates. I also provide more details on effective structure and example evidence in my detailed Inspector Toolkit.
I hope you find these resources and links to further reading/content helpful. If you have time, you may also find my timeless description of the Inspector’s role useful, along with much Met-specific content over recent years. Remember, strategic thinking is key to stepping up from Sergeant to Inspector.
Let me know how you get on, I’m always interested to hear!
Kind Regards, Steve
Seeking police promotion? Want a MASSIVE head start right now and a focus on what matters? Hit the ground running with my great value digital promotion toolkits, and/or my market-leading Police Promotion Masterclass, seminars and CVF explainers. There’s nothing else like it to effectively prepare you for success and level the playing field of promotion. Any questions? Get in touch for a free call or to arrange more personal coaching support. Tune in to my extensive podcast for regular powerful leadership CPD and promotion insights.