A professional standards system should be efficient, secure, and proactive—ensuring accountability while reducing administrative burdens. Use this checklist to assess and improve your processes.
1. Streamline action reporting
Ensure that all on-duty incidents, from use of force to pursuits, are documented quickly and accurately using structured workflows.
2. Ensure case security and confidentiality
Protect sensitive internal investigations and officer data with secure access controls and detailed audit trails that track every action.
3. Get real-time visibility into reports and investigations
Use dashboards that provide instant insight into case progress, report status, and key trends to eliminate bottlenecks and keep leadership informed.
4. Proactively address officer wellness
Track key stress indicators over time to identify early signs of potential burnout, helping supervisors provide the right support at the right time.
5. Integrate policies directly into investigations
Ensure all internal affairs cases align with department policies by integrating policy references into cases for easy reference during review workflows and adjudication.
6. Automate review and approval workflows
Reduce manual effort by automating multi-step review processes, ensuring that reports and investigations move efficiently through the chain of command.
7. Standardize reporting for consistency and compliance
Use configurable templates and structured data entry to ensure that incident reports, internal affairs cases, and early warning tracking follow a standardized format.
8. Enable secure collaboration across teams
Provide shared access to relevant information on personnel while maintaining strict permissions that ensure case integrity and confidentiality.
9. Simplify compliance audits and reporting
Generate reports that summarize operational metrics, policy adherence, and professional standards trends for accreditation and reviews.
10. Analyze trends to improve decision-making
Use data insights from reports and investigations to identify patterns, inform training initiatives, and enhance overall agency operations.
By following these 10 steps, your agency can improve Professional Standards processes and reduce risk. The Professional Standards Suite (PSS) from PowerDMS helps streamline each step by centralizing investigations, automating workflows, and providing real-time insights to enhance oversight and compliance.
