Leading Groups Challenges - Research Paper Example

Leading Groups Challenges Introduction The criminal Justice Organization’s leading groups include the police responsible for law enforcement, courts, prisons and correction facilities. Criminal justice organizations face various challenges in leading groups. This has largely been attributed to the daily increase in the crime rates. Much attention should be paid on the challenges encountered by leading groups for justice to be administered, such as punishment, public policy, juvenile punishment, communication, victim services and recruitment. To ensure that this happens, criminal justice organization should recruit professionals that are qualified and well trained. These professionals should ensure that law is enforced and that the streets are protected. According to Shermerhorn, leadership is treated as a process by which people are influenced in order to understand and accept what should needs to be done, and the process by which individuals and their collective efforts are facilitated to achieve shared objectives (Shermerhorn, Hunt & Osborn, 2008). This paper will seek to elaborate on challenges encountered by leading groups in the administration of justice and possible remedies. Challenges Faced Many issues are faced by the criminal justice system leaders in their effort to keep the streets clean. They also face issues in the production of more educated skilled law enforcement officials. It is also essential for leaders to set good examples in professionalism and direct their employees towards success. Successful leaders should be model figures, and they should poses traits such as stress tolerance, intelligent, motivation, knowledgeable, achievement oriented, perseverance, confident, flexible and emotionally mature. Leaders should be able to reprimand their employees in case of poor performance. This is because this can lead to negative situations, which could cost one’s life due to the sensitivity of the law profession. Some of the challenges faced by leading groups include organizational goals, human resource management, organizational structure and achievement of oriented leadership. Any workplace requires organizational goals for better performance. A group leader should set down the goals he needs achieved by the organization. A goal is an organization’s future expectations. In order for effective achievement of the goals, they should be clearly stated, emphasized and made known to all employees. Well set goals ensure commitments from groups and individuals towards the organizations activities. They ensure purposeful behaviors and give a basis for reward and motivation system. Other than goal assignment and employee performance reviews, goal management enables all employees to develop their skills, talents, and experience which in turn is beneficial to the organization. The main challenge faced by the criminal justice community is the difference in information needs and the diverse users of information technology (IT). Hence, in order for the IT systems to handle their roles and objectives, they should work hand in hand with the mission and vision statements of their institutions. The diversity of the criminal justice system area calls for simplicity in adopting and evaluating issues. The IT fraternity has developed a number of fundamental strategies that will help in easing the development efforts. Currently, crime is taking a new face. Therefore, it is fundamental for different agencies to share information, and for the justice information to be incorporated at the state, federal and local level (Shermerhorn & Osborn, 2008). The criminal justice organization faces a threat from the law enforcement organization with its interoperability in various facets of society. The use of IT technology is fundamental in maintaining law and justice. This is essential in collecting evidence-based information, and connecting them together to keep the country from terrorism and intelligently pro-organized crimes. Violation of privacy is another key issue that is currently affecting preventive mechanism responsible for avoidance crimes. In all parts of the world, security agencies are involved in undertaking domestic spying programs that are illegal. Security agencies secretly deal with monitoring, intercepting email and phone communications for the general public without the required judicial approvals. This violates the data privacy and protection act. Despite the fact that their actions are justified by the dangerous crimes they are involved in, this action raises questions of ethics. The basics of just legal system principles are threatened by the undertaking of such programs. Every citizen accused by the state has a right to legal services that are confident and uninterrupted by the spy programs in the government (Carrasco, 1999). The main challenge that has always been faced by courts of law is passing fair judgments. This is especially on sensitive subjects, which may contradict the culture of the organization. The competence of various judges and magistrates in dealing with cases that are of public concern has increasingly been questioned by some human right activists. It has been argued that key individuals like politicians influence the performance of some of the judges and the magistrates thus making them incompetent in their rulings (Carrasco, 1999). The wake of terrorism also poses another challenge in the criminal justice organization. There is an increasing quest on how they manage to deal with the criminal cases. Judges and magistrates have been shown to be inefficient and ineffective in solving terrorist cases. This is due to the influence they get from powerful individuals in various governments. For instance, the Islamic followers have raised claims that they are being discriminated and accused of being terrorist, a fact that is not valid. There have been increasing concerns, since the attack in September 11th, on how terrorism cases are being handled by the judicial system (Shermerhorn & Osborn, 2008). The rise of such confusion is brought about by the existence of structures that are concerned with terrorism. Such regulations need to be reviewed in order to avoid loopholes. The law court culture, however, does not support any variation of the judicial system. The court of law also faces a challenge in trying to transform the juvenile offenders from engaging in other unlawful activities. The juveniles, mostly the teenagers, are continuously engaging themselves in activities that are questionable. They stand a chance of being criminals in the coming days. Such activities may include substance abuse, robbery, rape cases and immature marriages. Such unacceptable conduct cannot be blamed entirely to parents. The courts of law have the duty of coming up with other modes of punishment. These modes should be acceptable when dealing with juvenile criminals. The court has failed to attain this culture since unfairness in dealing with the young ones has been witnessed, for example, keeping them in custody for too long or freeing them illegally. The laws that govern the juvenile delinquency are ambiguous, and this does not foster fairness and justice. The courts are also condemned for using common punishments that fail to hold people accountable for their behavior; thus, rendering the process of justice administration illogical. For instance, the courts have failed to protect the witnesses from the dangers they face due to revenge after they have testified in court. The courts, through the prosecutors, have also been reported to harass witnesses during case hearings. Therefore, some of the key witnesses have shied off from testifying due to this fear. The issue of punishment has also been a significant concern. Questions have been raised with regards to the type of punishment a criminal offender should face. The courts of law have been accused of enforcing laws which do not cope with the current world. For instance, rapists, murderers and robbers should not, by any chance, be allowed to enjoy their freedom, rather be sentenced to death. The law court should come up with reasonable charges for those offenders, who are found guilty (Gobert 1994). Recommendation for the court effectiveness The courts of law should shift their role from that of passing judgments that are fair to that of acting as agents of change to the criminal offenders in the country. The court’s culture in carrying out its proceedings should be encouraged. It is imperative for the court of law to act and make decisions independently without manipulations from the powerful figures in the governments. The criminal justice organizations have the challenge of defending their general public by passing fair judgments and protecting the individuals’ rights and liberties. As a consequence of the worldwide increase in population, criminal activities are also increasing. The leading groups have the responsibility of ensuring that the whole society is well protected. They should also ensure that the society is coping well with the changes caused by changes in the culture of criminal justice organization. The courts have a responsibility of executing their duties perfectly especially with the long delays caused by the increasing crime rate due to the growing population (Bandura, 1997). Recent surveys show discrepancies in the ratio of professionals in the criminal justice to citizens, hence difficulty in dealing with the growing rate of crime. This calls for improvements in recruiting qualified, competent and willing judges, magistrates, policemen and other employees needed in this organization and also setting up more court rooms. The government should be more concerned in reforming the criminal justice organizations through participation in law making; which will bring a change in solving challenges faced by the society. The government should also be more involved in setting up rehabilitation systems such as that of juveniles which will help in reducing the crime rates in the society. The justice system should also reinforce laws that will fully protect witnesses before during and after trials. The use of current IT should be adopted in maintaining law and justice especially in collecting evidence-based information and connecting them together to keep the country from terrorism and intelligently pro-organized crimes (Bandura, 1997). Conclusion The crime rate over the recent past has increased to various factors such as increase in population, poverty, drug abuse, power rivalry, terrorism among others. Much attention should be paid on the challenges encountered by leading groups for justice to be administered, such as punishment, public policy, juvenile punishment, communication, victim services and recruitment. Many countries have established laws that pass judgment to the offenders without cruelty. The challenges facing the leading groups in the world are so many that they cannot be all tackled in this discussion. It is essential to understand the cultures of any organization of criminal justice in order for their goals to be attained effectively and efficiently during operational activities. It is also imperative for leaders to set good examples in professionalism and direct their employees towards success. References Bandura, A. (1997). Social learning theory. NJ: Prentice-Hall. Carrasco, C. (1999). Challenges facing criminal justice organizations - America. Criminal Law Review, 46-56. Gobert, J. (1994). Corporate criminality - new crimes for the times. Criminal Law Review 7 (22), 123-136. Shermerhorn, J., & Osborn, R. (2008). Organization behavior: Management & leadership, business. New York: Elsevier. Wilson, J., & Richard, J. (1985). Crime and human nature. New York: Simon and Schuster. Read More