Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management

The role of research and planning units in law enforcement organizations

Cory P. Haberman, William R. King,
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Research and
The role of research and planning planning units
units in law enforcement
organizations
687
Cory P. Haberman
Department of Criminal Justice, Temple University, Philadelphia, Received 11 August 2010
Pennsylvania, USA, and Revised 28 October 2010
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Accepted 27 November 2010

William R. King
College of Criminal Justice, Sam Houston State University,
Huntsville, Texas, USA

Abstract
Purpose – This paper seeks to empirically describe the role of research and planning units within
contemporary, local police organizations in the US.
Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected from a national survey of police
organizations, municipal police agencies and sheriffs’ offices in the US and analyzed using
univariate statistics.
Findings – The findings demonstrate that the task scope of research and planning units (RPU)
within local law enforcement organizations is heterogeneous. RPUs perform a range of tasks and these
tasks differ from one agency to another. When separate tasks are aggregated into broader categories,
the data reveal that, overall, RPUs focus primarily on administrative tasks.
Practical implications – These findings suggest that RPUs primarily focus on administrative
support tasks rather than research and planning projects. Thus, RPUs may be underutilized by law
enforcement organizations. These findings suggest that administrators consider how the task scope of
RPUs can be refocused to help law enforcement agencies achieve their goals.
Originality/value – This paper empirically updates the understanding of the tasks and functions of
contemporary police research and planning units.
Keywords Research and planning units, Special units, Police organizations, United States of America,
Strategic planning, Law enforcement, Business administration
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
Contemporary American police agencies face considerable pressure from various
constituents to become more focused and systematic in their use of information, all in
the name of improving organizational performance. Police agencies are exhorted to
become learning organizations (Alarid, 2000) or learning laboratories (Maguire, 2004),
or adopt evidence-based practices (Sherman, 1998) or more recently to implement an
intelligence-led policing business model and managerial philosophy (Ratcliffe, 2008). In Policing: An International Journal of
response to these mandates for change and earlier calls for community policing and Police Strategies & Management
Vol. 34 No. 4, 2011
pp. 687-698
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2010 annual meeting of the Academy of 1363-951X
Criminal Justice Sciences in San Diego, CA. DOI 10.1108/13639511111180289
 PIJPSM problem oriented policing, the field of policing has changed extensively over the last
30 years.
34,4 Although change and improvement are the order of the day, there are still great
strides to be achieved in increasing organizational effectiveness by developing
evidence-based policies and practices distilled from empirical research. Most of these
innovations rely, at least in part, upon improving the information gathering and/or
688 processing capacity of police agencies. Some of these innovations rely on systematic
empirical research. Empirical research, which is used to guide evidence-based policy
and practices within policing, may be derived from three sources:
(1) internal research conducted by police employees;
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(2) external research conducted by non-police employees (mostly academics); and

(3) partnerships between police organizations and academic researchers (Bradley
and Nixon, 2009; Engel and Whalen, 2010).
Police research and planning units (RPUs) potentially play an important role in two of
these three sources of research. Due to their potential for increasing the quality of
policing, this study focuses on the role of research and planning unit (RPU) within
contemporary local law enforcement agencies. Specifically, using data from a national
survey of local law enforcement agencies in the US, we explore the task scope of
research and planning units. While our study is descriptive in nature, the findings fill a
void in the literature as most writings on RPUs are dated and have not relied on
systematic data collection. We add to the understanding of RPUs by describing the
roles and tasks RPUs currently perform, and juxtapose our findings with the
normative literature on what RPUs “should” do.

The proliferation of special units

The adoption of special units has become ubiquitous among police organizations in the
US. It is estimated that nearly a quarter of all police employees are assigned to special
units (Sparrow et al., 1990), and the historical growth in the number of police employees
has been attributed to the corresponding proliferation of special units within police
organizations (Reiss, 1992). Organizational scholars refer to the extent that
organizational tasks are divided among specialized units as functional
differentiation (Langworthy, 1986; Maguire, 2003). Recent studies have demonstrated
that police organizations remain functionally differentiated despite police reformers’
push for police organizations to simplify their structures (Bayley, 1994; Cordner, 1997;
Skolnick and Bayley, 1988). For example, from 1987 to 1993, functional differentiation
increased in a sample of 236 police organizations employing 100 or more full time
officers (Maguire, 1997), and, from 1990 to 1997, a similar study found that 356 police
organizations employing 100 or more full time officers continued to exhibit high
degrees of functional differentiation (Maguire et al., 2003).
The adoption of special units is both pragmatically and symbolically appealing to
police administrators (Sparrow et al., 1990; Katz, 2001). First, special units concentrate
organizational resources in order to address specific issues. In other words, the creation
of a special unit ensures that the organization’s most qualified personnel are assigned
to address a particular problem while allowing commanders to more readily monitor
how successful the special unit is in addressing its mission. Second, the creation of a
special unit is symbolically visible and reassures institutional sovereigns, such as local
 citizens and politicians, that the agency is taking a task or problem seriously (Katz, Research and
2001). planning units
Thus, it is not surprising that some police organizations, increasingly under pressure
to become more efficient with evermore scarce resources while also being pushed to
become more effective by adopting evidence-based policies and practices, have adopted
RPUs. For example, the 2003 wave of the Law Enforcement Management and
Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) survey data for large municipal police agencies and 689
sheriff offices (those with 100 or more full-time sworn officers) revealed that 44 percent of
sampled agencies operated a RPU (United States Department of Justice, 2003). Although
RPUs are common, we know surprisingly little about their roles and functions.
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Research and planning units (RPUs)

Reiss (1992) described a police research and planning unit[1] (RPUs) as a specialized
unit that “seek[s] to shape their [organization’s] transactions with internal and external
environments” (p. 86). RPUs should focus on understanding how the police
organization behaves in order to implement internal, organizational changes and
subsequently evaluate the effectiveness of those changes (Reiss, 1992). Others have
suggested that RPUs have five broad foci:
(1) law enforcement administration;
(2) law enforcement operations;
(3) research and analysis;
(4) planning and strategy; and
(5) budget and finance (Cordner et al., 2010).

Overall the literature suggests that RPUs are an organizational unit tasked with
understanding the internal and external conditions and operations of the organization
for the purpose of improving the organization’s efficiency and effectiveness based on
evidence developed through empirical research as well as conducting critical planning
activities in order to prepare the organization for future demands.
The policing community has generally supported the adoption of RPUs by law
enforcement organizations (Reiss, 1992; Geller, 1997). Essentially, this support is based
on the recognition that, “[the] police have an enormous need to acquire strategically
and tactically useful knowledge (that is, to do research); to put that knowledge to use in
effective and efficient planning; and to reap the benefits of quality planning by
ensuring that the department’s plans are fruitfully implemented” (Cordner et al., 1991,
p. 333). In other words, a well-functioning RPU is the structural component to create
smarter, not harder working police organizations (Cordner et al., 1991). Furthermore,
Geller (1997) argued that the adoption of RPUs is vital in order for a policing
organization to become a learning organization; an organization that utilizes past
experiences and studies in order to improve the organization’s functioning (Alarid,
2000; Crank and Giacomazzi, 2009). RPUs can potentially be the internal component to
advance the evidence-based policing paradigm (Sherman, 1998).
Police scholars, however, have questioned the efficacy of the RPUs in practice. For the
most part, RPUs are believed to handle rather trivial tasks and focus more on
administration than research (Weatheritt, 1986). An early description of RPUs by
Weatheritt (1986) suggested research and planning units spend most of their time
 PIJPSM focusing on ways to increase administrative efficiency and making operations more
“businesslike” by performing task such as designing forms, streamlining administrative
34,4 procedures, and reallocating man power. It was also common for RPUs to take on the odd
jobs that the organization needed completed, but it was uncommon for RPUs to engage
in systematic empirical research. Reiss (1992) asserted that research and planning units
were merely statistical report units that very rarely drove organizational change. A more
690 recent opinion article by Dawson and Williams (2009) described the difficulties RPU
employees face when attempting to conduct meaningful research and they offered
advice on how to overcome this resistance. In sum, scant attention has been paid to police
research and planning units within the policing literature, and the work that does exist
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has commonly portrayed RPUs more as administrative adjuncts than learning and
sensing units which catalyze organizational change.
The present study aims to improve and update our knowledge of the tasks
performed by RPUs[2]. First, past studies of RPUs have rarely relied upon systematic
data collection, but rather have been based on either qualitative observations of a
rather small number of police organizations or the experiential knowledge of police
scholars. There is a need to learn more about the role of RPUs with different
methodologies. Second, the existing research on the task scope of research and
planning units is between 20 and 30 years old. It is reasonable to assume that the
day-to-day business of RPUs has changed since these studies were conducted. This
study increases the level of awareness about RPUs in general as; overall, the body of
research examining these units is scarce.

Methodology and data

Data for the present analysis were obtained via a national survey of law enforcement
organizations employing 100 or more full-time sworn officers. A sample of 671 state
police agencies, sheriff offices, and municipal police departments were randomly
selected from the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ (United States Department of Justice,
2000) Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies. In the fall of 2008, one
wave of surveys was mailed to the RPU supervisor in each of these 671 agencies. A
total of 103 surveys were returned for a 15 percent response rate[3]. The current study
analyzes a sub-set of those data, survey respondents in 51 municipal police
organizations and sheriff offices that reported operating a full-time RPU[4].
RPU supervisors reported the percentage of time their unit annually spends on a
range of tasks:
.
compiling and analyzing statistics;
.
producing crime maps;
.
researching innovative equipment;
.
researching innovative strategies;
.
program evaluation;
.
budgeting;
.
strategic planning;
.
resource allocation;
.
updating the department policy manual; and
.
writing grants.
 Additionally, two blanks were provided for respondents to include any additional Research and
tasks the unit performed. Accreditation was a common response in the other category, planning units
so an additional task variable was created representing the amount time a unit spent
annually on accreditation. The remaining other responses were aggregated into one
variable representing all other possible responses. This created a total of 12 possible
task variables in which a research and planning unit director may have indicated his or
her particular unit performed[5]. 691
The first part of the analysis utilizes univariate descriptive statistics to summarize
each response variable in order to provide a broad overview of the tasks commonly
performed by RPUs. In the second part of the analysis the individual task variables are
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aggregated into four categories based on common themes derived from the RPU
literature. These four categories are: analytical tasks, research and development tasks,
administrative tasks, and other tasks. The analytical category is the total time research
and planning units reported spending on tasks that involved data analysis: compiling
and analyzing statistics, and crime mapping. The second category, research and
development tasks, was created by summing the amount of time research and planning
units reported spending on tasks that involved researching or evaluating
organizational innovations: researching innovative equipment, researching
innovative strategies, and program evaluation. The remaining individual response
variables were aggregated into the administrative tasks: budget forecasting, strategic
planning, resource allocation, writing grants, updating the departmental policy
manual, and accreditation. Finally, the fourth category was the total time a unit
reported in the survey’s blank “other” spaces.

Results
Individual task variables
Descriptive statistics for the individual task scope variables appear in Table I. The
most commonly performed tasks were strategic planning (80.39 percent; n ¼ 41),
compiling and analyzing statistics (80.39 percent; n ¼ 41), researching innovative
strategies (80.39 percent; n ¼ 41), and updating the departmental policy manual (74.47
percent; n ¼ 39), but there was not a single task performed by all responding research
and planning units.
These results suggest that the task scopes of RPUs are multifaceted, varying from
organization to organization. The individual task variables displayed in Table I
demonstrate that 10 out of the 12 individual task variables have a mean of less than
10 percent of a unit’s annual time and a corresponding relatively low standard
deviation value of less than 15 percent of a unit’s annual time; suggesting that the
majority of RPUs focus a myriad of tasks by allocating small proportions of their time
to range of different tasks.
Additionally, it was uncommon for any single RPU to focus predominantly on one
specific task. In particular, only 3 out of the 12 individual task variables accounted for
50 percent or greater of any RPU’s annual time, and only nine RPUs indicated spending
more than 50 percent of their annual time on a single task. Further, only three of those
nine units reported allocating 80 percent or greater of the unit’s annual time on a single
task. Specifically, one RPU reported that 80 percent of its annual time was focused on
compiling and analyzing statistics, one unit reported that 80 percent of its annual time
was spent updating the departmental policy manual, and one unit reported spending
 PIJPSM
RPUs
34,4 performing
task
Standard
% n Minimum Maximum Mean Median deviation

692 Compiling and

analyzing statistics 80.39 41 0 80 19.40 12.5 19.87
Crime mapping 39.22 20 0 25 4.35 0 6.23
Researching
innovative equipment 68.38 35 0 50 6.81 5 9.52
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Researching
innovative strategies 80.39 41 0 35 7.52 5 7.58
Budgeting 41.18 21 0 40 5.36 0 8.92
Strategic planning 80.39 41 0 30 9.22 10 7.66
Resource allocation 50.99 26 0 12.5 3.23 2 3.89
Writing grants 64.71 33 0 50 8.97 5 11.80
Updating department
policy manual 74.47 39 0 80 17.74 10 19.76
Program evaluation 49.02 25 0 20 4.72 0 6.58
Table I. Accreditation 15.68 8 0 50 3.86 0 10.07
Descriptive statistics for Other 41.18 21 0 85 8.35 0 15.01
the annual percentage of
time research and Notes: n ¼ 51; The individual task scope variables are measured as the percentage of annual time a
planning units allocated research and planning unit indicated spending on the particular task for the past year
to the task scope Source: 2008 National Survey of Law Enforcement Research and Planning Units conducted by the
variables authors

85 percent of its annual time on an “other task”, developing and conducting training
seminars. Nonetheless, it is fair to say that it was uncommon for any unit to specialize
on a particular task.

Aggregated categories
Descriptive statistics for the four aggregated task categories, analytical, research and
development, administrative, and others tasks, can be found in Table II. First,
univariate statistics of the aggregated analytical category suggests the RPUs in the
present sample cannot be viewed as simply statistical reporting units (Reiss, 1992). In
fact, some (17.62 percent; n ¼ 9) of the units did not allocate any time to analytical
tasks and most (70.59 percent, n ¼ 36) spent less than 50 percent of their annual time
performing analytical tasks. In sum, only 11.76 percent (n ¼ 6) of the RPUs focused
50 percent or more of their annual time on analytical tasks. While Reiss’ assertion was
most likely accurate 20 years ago, the present finding can likely be attributed to the
proliferation of computer crime mapping (LaVigne and Groff, 2001) and the diffusion of
separate crime analysis units whose primary function is to collect data and generate
crime maps and statistical reports (O’Shea and Nicholls, 2003).
Research and development also does not adequately characterize the task scope of
RPUs. Although most units (92.19 percent; n ¼ 47) allotted at least some time to the
aggregated research and development category, the level of commitment to these tasks
was minimal. Most units (58.82 percent; n ¼ 30) spent between 6 percent and 25 percent
 Research and
RPUs
performing planning units
tasks
Standard
% n Minimum Maximum Mean Median deviation

Analytical tasks 82.53 42 0 80 23.75 20.00 22.04 693

Research and
development tasks 92.16 47 0 65 19.05 20.00 14.45
Administrative tasks 98.04 50 0 90 48.25 50.00 21.00
Other tasks 41.18 21 0 85 8.35 0 15.01
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Notes: n ¼ 51; The aggregated task scope variables are measured as the sum of the percentage of
annual time a research and planning unit indicated spending on each individual task included in the Table II.
aggregated category for the past year; Analytical tasks: compiling and analyzing statistics, and crime Descriptive statistics for
mapping; Research and development tasks: researching innovative equipment, researching innovative the annual percentage of
strategies, and program evaluation; Administrative tasks: budget forecasting, strategic planning, time research and
resource allocation, writing grants, updating the departmental policy manual, and accreditation planning units allocated
Source: 2008 National Survey of Law Enforcement Research and Planning Units conducted by the to the aggregated task
authors scope variables

of their annual time on research and development tasks with the average equaling
roughly 19 percent of a unit’s annual time. Only 2 units (3.92 percent) reported
spending more than 50 percent of their annual time on research and development and
only 15.59 percent (n ¼ 8) spent between 26 percent and 50 percent on research and
development. Clearly, researching innovations and evaluating programs are not a
priority for RPUs.
On the other hand, RPUs reported being heavily involved in carrying out
administrative tasks for their respective organizations. Almost all (98.04 percent;
n ¼ 50) of the units conducted administrative tasks. The majority of units (54.9 percent;
n ¼ 28) spent at least 50 percent of their time on administrative tasks with four units
(7.84 percent) allocating more than 75 percent of their annual time on administrative
tasks. Another 15.69 percent (n ¼ 8) of units spent between 40 percent and 49 percent on
administrative tasks. Simply put, 70.59 percent (n ¼ 42) of units spent at least 40 percent
of their time on administrative tasks with a large percentage of units primarily focusing
on these tasks. These findings mirror Weatheritt’s (1986) findings, over 20 years ago,
that RPUs concentrate predominantly on administrative tasks.
The box and whisker plot in Figure 1 visually depicts the sampled RPUs’ annual
allocation of time to the four aggregated task scope variables and provides a useful
visual method for comparing the raw percentages described in the preceding
paragraphs. First, the length of the plot for each aggregated task scope variable can be
used to visualize the dispersion of the annual time allocated to the four categories
across RPUs. The stark contrast is obvious between the research and development
variable and the analytical and administrative variables. Simply put, the short plot for
the research and development variable demonstrates that research and development
are not a focus of nearly all of the sampled RPUs In contrast, the longer plots for the
remaining two categories (analytical, and administrative) suggests that the sample
RPUs allocated a substantial amount of time to those two tasks.
 PIJPSM
34,4

694
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Figure 1.
Box plot for the annual
percentage of time
research and planning
units allocated to the
aggregated task scope
variables

Discussion and conclusion

The present findings suggest that there is considerable heterogeneity in the task scope
of RPUs from organization to organization when examining their allotted time to
individual tasks. RPUs focus small proportions of time on a number of individual
tasks, but aggregating those individual tasks into broader constructs reveals that the
majority of RPUs predominantly focus on administrative tasks, with some time
allotted to analytical tasks, and the least amount of time focused on research and
 development tasks. Overall, descriptions of RPUs’ task scopes from past studies have Research and
been both refuted and supported by this study. While police RPUs do much more than
produce statistical reports intended for internal consumption (Reiss, 1992), the majority
planning units
of what RPUs actually do in practice, as has been suggested in past research
(Weatheritt, 1986), involves addressing the administrative needs of the organization
rather than research and development.
These findings are likely discouraging to members of the policing community that 695
view police RPUs as analogous to research and development units in profit-based
organizations. The conceptualization that RPUs would be utilized most effectively by
conducting rigorous empirical research, such as evaluating which strategic
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innovations (King, 2000) work best through randomized controlled experiments, in

order to create more efficient and effective police organizations is far different from
tasks that RPUs reported actually performing. Although RPUs have a unique position
to catalyze organizational change from within the organization, it appears that the
tasks these units perform are not directed towards organizational innovation, and, as it
stands, police RPUs are underutilized.
These findings likely reflect the fact that research is not an institutionalized part of
police culture. Researchers and police have different perspectives as to what “evidence”
is needed to validate a policy or practice. Police organizations toil with limited
resources to provide quick results to the latest newsworthy issue and often do not
believe they need empirical research to validate the strategies they have been using for
years (Buerger, 2010). In other words, long-term research projects with benefits which
may not be reaped for years are not viewed as fruitful in resource strapped
organizations that emphasize short-term success. Additionally, the political backlash
that could occur if an “experiment” is deemed a failure could possibly have serious
consequences for the careers of any of the project’s key decisions makers.
Most police organizations probably believe their RPU is functioning as intended due
to the negative connotations of research within policing organizations and the fact that
the administrative tasks performed by RPUs are certainly still beneficial to the
organization. If that is the case, then senior police officials may have no problem with
their agency’s RPU functioning like the RPU in the present study. On the other hand,
many agencies may envision their RPU as doing more than just the administrative
tasks that have been found to characterize RPUs in this study. In that case, police
organizations should begin assess whether their organization’s RPU is performing
tasks that will improve the future functioning of the organization, and if not, then begin
thinking about how to better utilize their RPU.
We suggest that in the future, the tasks performed by an organization’s RPU should
be more aligned with the organization’s strategic plan and future goals. RPUs should
be working towards answering questions that will help the organization improve its
long-term operations rather than focusing on the organization’s administrative tasks.
One option may be for an organization to assign administrative tasks to other
employees or units within the organization that may be more appropriately trained to
accomplish the task. For example, a police department could assign a task such as
updating the department’s policy manual to an ad-hoc task force of commanders as the
need arises. The police commanders’ experience enforcing police policy could lead to
more robust policy development and provide the RPU with more time to focus on other
tasks that will lead to substantial organizational improvement. Unless, new empirical
evidence is needed to develop policy, it is likely that these police commanders will
 PIJPSM develop more robust policy than the organizations RPU. Of course, this is only one
34,4 example and an organization assessing the functioning of its own RPU will likely find
additional tasks that can be reallocated in order to create more time for their RPU to
focus on organizational innovation.
Police organizations should also ensure that RPUs have an adequately trained staff.
This is not to suggest that the current staffs of RPUs are inept, but academics spend
696 years learning how to correctly design, conduct, and analyze empirical studies.
Because the results of empirical research may have profound impacts on police policy
and/or operations, any RPU that is conducting research must ensure that the research
is conducted properly. As most academics should not be thrown into a patrol car and
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expected to safely police a violent drug market, non-academically trained research and
planning unit employees should not be expected to conduct academic-quality research.
A RPU with a staff of both academically-trained researchers and sworn officers would
have the practical experience and academic skills necessary to conduct research that is
both practically useful and methodologically sound.
The bottom line is that RPU have vast potential to drive continuous improvement and
innovation for police organizations, but, as it stands, this study revealed that RPU in
large law enforcement organizations perform a wide range of tasks that are more
directed towards the administrative functioning of the organization than the research
and evaluation that is needed to facilitate organizational innovation. Currently, RPUs
represent a limited avenue via which police agencies can develop and evaluate evidence
based policing innovations. Police administrators should begin working towards
creating RPUs that are more actively involved in addressing research questions that
help the organization improve its functioning and achieving long-term goals.

Notes
1. Reiss (1992) used the term research and development units.
2. We do not focus upon crime analysis units (CAU) in the present study. CAUs are a different
type of specialized police unit charged with performing analytical tasks to aid the agency’s
overall tactical strategy (for a more detailed description see O’Shea and Nicholls, 2003).
Although in some agencies there may be some overlap in the analytical tasks that the RPUs
and CAUs perform, CAUs are distinct from RPUs in terms of their location within a police
agency and their mandate and function. In fact, the survey instrument for the 2003 LEMAS
survey distinguishes between RPUs and CAUs (United States Department of Justice, 2003).
Simply stated, crime analysis is more tactical and directed at transitive goals, while RPUs
are more strategic and focused on reflexive goals (Langworthy and Travis, 2008,
pp. 204-205).
3. The authors were unable to administer a second wave of surveys, as originally planned, due
to their inability to secure additional funding.
4. The percentage of the sampled agencies that reported operating a RPU in the present data
was consistent with the percentages from the most recently available LEMAS data. For a
discussion on the LEMAS data in general, see Langworthy (2002). For a discussion on the
reliability of the LEMAS data see Walker and Katz (1995) and King (1997).
5. The final 12 individual task scope variables include: compiling and analyzing statistics,
producing crime maps, researching innovative equipment, researching innovative strategies,
program evaluation, budgeting, strategic planning, resource allocation, updating the
department policy manual, writing and managing grants, accreditation, and other tasks.
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About the authors

Cory P. Haberman is a second year doctoral student in the Department of Criminal Justice at
Temple University. His broad research interests are police organizations and the geography of
crime. He is currently working as a Research Assistant on the Philadelphia Police Department’s
SMART Policing Initiative for Professors Jerry H. Ratcliffe and Elizabeth R. Groff. Cory
P. Haberman is the corresponding author and can be contacted at cory.haberman@temple.edu
William R. King is an Associate Professor of Criminal Justice in the College of Criminal Justice
at Sam Houston State University, in Texas. He received his PhD in Criminal Justice from the
University of Cincinnati in 1998. His research interests include studying police organizations
from a theoretical perspective, and exploring the management and organization of forensic
processing systems, and homicide investigations.

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