By Dr. Danny L. McGuire Jr.
Formal count is scheduled to begin in minutes when an incarcerated man, secured in his cell, begins striking the door and threatening self-harm. A newer officer reports a possible sharpened object; from a different angle, another officer cannot confirm it. The man remains visible, and no injury is apparent. An officer maintains continuous observation from a protected position while movement in the affected area is frozen. Medical and mental health staff have been notified and are staging nearby pending a custody-coordinated safe approach. Unit control needs confirmation of the plan for door control, emergency access, movement and count. Other incarcerated people begin calling out. Staffing is thin, and several officers are being held over because relief posts remain unfilled.
The shift supervisor arrives visibly frustrated that the incident may disrupt the scheduled count. Before establishing what is confirmed, the supervisor publicly accuses the newer officer of overreacting, duplicates one assignment while leaving another critical function uncovered, gives conflicting directions about whether count will proceed and whether movement remains frozen, and promises command staff, without supporting evidence, that the incident will be resolved within minutes.
Staff begin talking over one another. The man in the cell becomes more agitated, and the rest of the unit reacts to the disorder.
Within five minutes, one difficult incident has become a leadership, credibility and security problem.
This hypothetical scenario illustrates how overlapping pressures can compound inside a correctional facility. The supervisor may know policy, post orders and emergency procedures. The intent may be sound. What is missing in that moment is self-command.
Pressure has an audience inside the walls
Self-command means remaining responsible for your conduct when fatigue, fear, ego or frustration are competing for control. It is neither emotional numbness nor passivity. Correctional supervisors work amid chronic vigilance, short staffing, mandatory overtime, interpersonal conflict and the knowledge that an ordinary exchange can become an emergency. Feeling pressure is human. Passing it unfiltered into the unit is a leadership failure.
Self-command is not hesitation, and it never delays an urgent or policy-required response. It keeps the response disciplined as it unfolds.
The operative question is simple: Will the next decision come from professional judgment or from a reaction the moment selected for you?
Corrections adds a distinctive complication: Pressure unfolds in a closed, continuously observed environment. A street incident eventually disperses. Inside a facility, the same officers and incarcerated people remain together after the radio quiets. A sarcastic order, a public reprimand or an inconsistent standard does not leave with the scene. It becomes part of the unit climate.
A National Institute of Justice summary reported survey findings from 329 correctional officers. Work overload, insufficient resources and lack of supervisor support were significant sources of perceived stress. MRI scans and stress-related biomarkers were collected from a subsample of 60 officers. In a preliminary comparison within that subsample, higher-stress officers appeared to need more cognitive effort to focus on relevant information and screen out conflicting information during simple tasks. Researchers cautioned that the operational implications require more study, but the practical concern is clear: Chronic stress may make it harder or slower to identify what matters during a confusing incident. [1] Protecting judgment under pressure is a security responsibility.
What the supervisor brings into the moment travels
Inside a correctional facility, pressure rarely remains contained within the person experiencing it. It travels through tone, posture, facial expression, radio communication, pacing and decision-making. Staff watch supervisors for cues about how serious a situation is and how they should respond. Incarcerated people notice those cues as well. When a supervisor becomes visibly impatient, reactive or overwhelmed, that pressure can spread across a housing unit or an entire shift.
Correctional pressure also rarely arrives one problem at a time. A delayed count, an incarcerated person threatening self-harm, an agitated housing unit, thin staffing, constant radio traffic and demands from command staff can converge quickly. Supervisors may feel compelled to act simply to demonstrate that the situation is under control. Self-command allows them to separate urgency from panic, verify what is known, assign responsibilities clearly, coordinate necessary resources and communicate upward without transferring anxiety downward.
This is not hesitation. Immediate threats require immediate action. But no situation benefits from allowing pressure to make the decision. Urgency deserves attention; it does not deserve control.
Unmanaged pressure becomes institutional climate
The National Institute of Justice has noted that conflict and lack of trust between supervisory and line staff, together with long shifts and mandatory overtime, may be particularly debilitating sources of correctional stress. [2] A systematic review reached a related conclusion: Among the organizational stressors studied, institutional structure and climate had the most consistent relationship with correctional officer stress and burnout. Better communication between management and officers was identified as a clear target for improvement. [3]
Institutional climate is created in moments that may never reach an incident report. An officer questions an operational direction on the housing unit, and the supervisor responds as though authority itself has been attacked. Staff see a legitimate question turned into humiliation, and people in custody see a fault line open. An immediate safety direction may need to be public; a personnel correction should ordinarily be private. Humiliation belongs in neither.
Other supervisors respond to pressure by over-directing a developing incident before the threat, medical concern or assignments are clear. Some move in the opposite direction, postponing an unavoidable choice until policy or higher rank can absorb ownership. One response chases control; the other chases escape. Reactive control is not disciplined command, and neither is avoidance.
Reliability is a security function
In my book, “Hard Reset: Reliability Under Pressure,” I define the target as reliability under pressure: not perfection, but professional standards that remain recognizable when uncertainty and emotion increase. [4]
Officers should not spend a shift reading the supervisor’s mood to decide whether a reasonable question is safe. People in custody should not experience basic standards as personal, retaliatory or dependent on who is working the unit. Predictability is not leniency. Inside a correctional facility, it is a form of operational control.
Self-command is not a staffing plan. No breathing technique can create relief officers, eliminate mandatory overtime or repair a toxic culture. Supervisors still have a duty to document risk, elevate unsafe conditions, advocate for resources and address systems that are harming staff. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health emphasizes that effective public safety wellness efforts must address organizational factors and engage multiple levels of the agency, rather than relying solely on individual resilience. [5] Individual regulation and organizational accountability must coexist.
With that balance in mind, here is the short sequence I teach for the moments when pressure starts to narrow judgment: RESET.
Reliability is rehearsed in routine operations: briefing, post assignment, count, movement, report review, delayed relief and the personnel conversation everyone would rather avoid. The RESET framework provides a short sequence for protecting professional judgment when pressure begins narrowing the field of view.
R |
Step 1
Recognize your pressure signature
Catch the earliest signal: jaw tension, clipped speech, sarcasm, white-knuckling the keys or radio, increasing volume, or preparing your rebuttal before the report is finished. Recognition creates the first point of choice. |
E |
Step 2
Establish what is confirmed
Build a verified picture. Distinguish what someone observed from what everyone assumes. Ask yourself:
|
S |
Step 3
Stabilize your internal response
If safety, policy and time permit, use available discretionary time for a personal reset while required operations continue. Use the 90-Second Reset Protocol from Hard Reset:
This is never a 90-second operational stand-down. Observation, notification, emergency response and all policy-mandated actions continue. The protocol protects the next choice for which discretion exists.
|
E |
Step 4
Execute the next responsible action
Choose and communicate the most responsible immediate action. Establish the priority, assign ownership clearly, confirm the message and reassess as new facts arrive. One accurate direction is worth more than five confident orders that do not share a verified picture. |
T |
Step 5
Take stock and repair
When immediate risk is controlled, examine policy, reports, video, use-of-force decisions and staff performance — then examine your own effect on the incident. Did your presence organize the response or complicate it? If you undercut an officer in public or allowed emotion to shape the exchange, own it away from the incarcerated population when operationally possible: “The expectation has not changed. My manner of addressing you was wrong, and I am correcting it.”
Repair demonstrates authority that can survive accountability. |
This is a practice, not a personality trait
In a 2024 cross-sectional study of 799 correctional officers in Puerto Rico, fatigue had the highest mean score among the operational stressors measured. Officers whose operational stress scores exceeded the sample median had about eight times the adjusted odds of meeting the study’s burnout criterion compared with those at or below the median. Because the study was cross-sectional, it does not establish that stress caused burnout, and its findings should not be generalized to every correctional setting. [6]
No supervisor permanently acquires this capacity by reading an article or attending a briefing. It becomes dependable through repetition, feedback, realistic practice and honest review. Begin with low-stakes friction: a challenged post assignment, late relief, a critical email or disagreement at briefing. Rehearse the separation of verified facts from assumptions before a major incident makes that distinction harder and more consequential.
The challenge for every correctional supervisor
A correctional supervisor’s most demanding command responsibility may be self-supervision.
For seven shifts, conduct an end-of-shift audit: Did my presence reduce noise, establish priorities and help staff perform? Or did the team have to regulate me while regulating the facility?
Follow with a tougher test: If my behavior became the model for every officer on this shift, would I trust the facility during its worst hour?
Rank identifies the person with authority. Conduct reveals whether that authority increased safety for staff and people in custody.
Shift briefing discussion
Use these questions for a brief supervisor or team discussion:
- Which physical or behavioral cue tells you first that pressure is reducing the quality of your judgment?
- During which routine or discretionary correctional decisions could you safely use the 90-Second Reset Protocol? Which situations require immediate action?
- What is the most credible way to correct your own poor response while preserving the standard and the officer’s authority?
References
- Martin E. Emerging relevance of neuroscience in corrections. National Institute of Justice. Published March 6, 2023.
- Martin E. The importance of addressing organizational stress among corrections officers. National Institute of Justice. Published March 25, 2021.
- Finney C, Stergiopoulos E, Hensel J, Bonato S, Dewa CS. Organizational stressors associated with job stress and burnout in correctional officers: a systematic review. BMC Public Health. 2013;13:82. doi:10.1186/1471-2458-13-82
- McGuire DL Jr. Hard Reset: Reliability Under Pressure. Crosstown Coaching LLC; 2026.
- Kiederer M, Tiesman H, Gerard D, et al. Tackling mental health challenges in the public safety sector: implementing and evaluating mental health programs. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Published May 9, 2024.
- Laureano-Morales L, Saldaña-Santiago N, Malave-Velez N, et al. Work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study. PLOS ONE. 2024;19(10). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0304886
About the author
Dr. Danny L. McGuire Jr. is a second-generation law enforcement professional and retired Chicago Police Department sergeant with decades of experience in law enforcement and public service. His background includes service as a special agent with the Cook County Sheriff’s Department’s South Suburban Drug Initiative, where he was assigned to NEMEG, a long-term undercover narcotics task force. During his career with the Chicago Police Department, he served in Patrol, Special Operations/HBT and SWAT support through the Weapons of Mass Destruction Safety and Support Team, and as a chief hostage/crisis negotiator.
Dr. McGuire is the founder of Crosstown Coaching and author of Hard Reset: Reliability Under Pressure. He serves as executive director of the Public Service Institute at Calumet College of St. Joseph and director of First Responder Wellness for Jacquelyn Augustine & Associates. He is an ICF Professional Certified Coach (PCC) and an Illinois licensed professional counselor (LPC). Contact him at danny@drdanny.com.