Criminal justice professionals
Criminal justice professionals work with people who are in distress and might need psychological, mental, or legal help. These professionals who frequently work with law enforcement agencies require high skills in crisis intervention. Different situations that criminal justice professionals face every day need special abilities. This paper aims to describe the unique characteristics the criminal justice professionals require to be effective in mental health delivery and crisis intervention.
Self-Awareness
Many times, a client may stir up painful memories from your past. Competent criminal justice professionals are aware of their triggers and have had experience in delivering effectively. An excellent criminal justice practitioner can empathize with clients without becoming personally involved or emotional when subjects that have personal meaning come up.
Nonjudgmental
In their profession, criminal justice professionals come across persons who may have committed crimes. These people can shut down if they realize the professionals are judgmental. Ideally, a competent professional is willing to listen without casting judgment on those in crisis.
Nonreactive
Criminal justice professionals face highly emotional persons, and they need to act professionally to avoid unnecessary chaos. A competent professional shouldn’t react to clients’ outbursts or threats. If they witness strong emotions, they need to be able to be utterly supportive without getting involved, lest they cause the client to refuse to reveal any more information to them.
High Tolerance
Criminal justice professionals encounter chaos regularly, and there is a need for them to show high standards of tolerance. They are mostly placed in intense, stressful situations, and they shouldn’t allow circumstances to build up in their own lives.
Specialized Training
While they may have covered necessary skills in their profession, criminal justice personnel require specific training in mental health and crisis intervention in preparation to react quickly during crisis intervention. That may include knowing how and when to call in law enforcers, use of force, or when to involve other human health practitioners. In mental health and crisis training, they are exposed to how to deal with different criminal and legal issues that may arise, how to develop boundaries, and what ethical practices are to be followed.
The above characteristics are required by criminal justice personnel to attain the professional goal in mental health and crisis intervention. However, these unique characteristics may differ from other human service delivery practitioners since criminal justice entails offering such services as law enforcement to persons convicted by legal judgment or under correctional facilities. This paper has achieved to describe unique characteristics.