Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD Transforms a Year After ‘CMPD Serves’ Launch

A Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police vehicle on the side of highway. Credit: Shutterstock

By Tammy Leytham

What does it take to rebuild relationships with a distrusting public? The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department of North Carolina responded by developing a customer service training program and curriculum called CMPD Serves.

CMPD’s customer satisfaction score jumped from 43 percent to 84 percent after launching CMPD Serves in 2021, according to a department press release.

The department released a 25-minute video documenting the journey. It started with the death of George Floyd in 2020.

“Looking at it from the community standpoint, it was very traumatizing,” CMPD Officer Jeffrey Joseph said in the documentary. “Every time you turn on the news, you see police in a negative light.”

CMPD Maj. David Robinson said the implications and ramifications of that summer were felt in Charlotte, “even when something happens in another jurisdiction. That’s true whether it’s in your own backyard or a thousand miles away,” he said.

Floyd’s death was a “shot to the gut” to everyone in law enforcement, CMPD Public Affairs Director Sandy Vastola said. The protests that erupted across the U.S., expressing distrust in police officers, prompted conversations in Charlotte on how to face that challenge. It didn’t help that the Covid pandemic was in full swing. 

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Johnny Jennings saw the value of developing customer service-type training. He could not, however, find another agency that had such an initiative, or even referred to policing as a “customer service profession,” according to the release.

So, the CMPD partnered with The DiJulius Group of Cleveland, Ohio, to help develop the training. “I knew from our very first phone call (with The DiJulius Group) that we were onto something big. It was an initiative we had to move forward with,” Jennings said.

Joseph and Robinson both completed the training, becoming the first sworn officers in the U.S. to do so, according to the video. “It teaches how to be a good human being and treat people the way they want to be treated,” Joseph said.

“Sometimes in policing we settle for just good enough,” Robinson added. “This was the first program in my entire career that I had seen that said ‘we want to take you and make you better.’"

Participants take one hour of online work and four hours in-person training. All 2,500 CMPD employees received both portions of the training. Incoming civilians and new recruits also take the training.

Some of the work CMPD developed for the curriculum includes:

• Modernized communication techniques between CMPD employees and their customers

• Creation of “a day in the life" customer/employee videos

• Role playing and engagement scenarios.

Body-worn camera tagging captures positive interactions, de-escalation, community engagement and life-saving efforts. CMPD used a total of more than 1,600 positive tags in 2022, the release stated.

CMPD Serves also gave 75 “Acts of Excellence” awards celebrating customer-centric work.

Jennings said he’s proud of the work CMPD’s men and women are doing in-house and in the community. "I want us to be the best part of someone’s worst day,” he said. “Our employees rise to that challenge time and time again, and I’m humbled by their hard work and dedication, day in and day out.”