Heewy ROSIE90, I did pass the Assessment Centre and pretty much just need to pass all the pre-employment checks. Hope much success with yours as well! They tend to take 10 working days (14 days including weekend). You will recieve a phone call if you've passed usually. How did you find the Assessment Centre?
well done! what was your feedback like? I've had mine and not really sure how to take it... but also feel like I'm reading into it too much. Thought the AC went alright, the role plays were tough, but thought I did ok! 14 days is looong, feels like forever.
My feedback was half washy, so like eveey single competency based, such as cultural awareness it said I was great at it or something but with every single competences had an improvement part at the end. Yes don't read too much into, and keep positive and always remember there is next year I mean even if you made it to this stage its excellent. It said within 14 days mine literally took 5 working day, so did on 15th and 22nd knew the results. You've got this!
My advice would be not to rush into anything and have a proper think about whether PN is the right thing for you.
PN is something of a legacy prorgamme and it isn't really clear to me why it even still exists, or what it's for now that almost all routes are graduate entry.
There are three downsides to the PN "Leadership" programme.
1.
You aren't guaranteed your choice of force. This could be really, really inconvenient. Let's say you live in Southampton, but Hampshire isn't in the scheme this year - you might face the choice of Wiltshire, Kent or Met - and relocating home.
2.
You are posted as a Neighbourhoods Officer for the lifetime of the PN programme (2 years). This might work for some people, but not for others. It does also mean that you may have significant experience gaps when you move forward. Most non-PN officers start in Response or do a rotation that includes Neighbourhoods, but it isn't too common to go directly to Neighbourhoods and stay there as PN officers do. It's unlikely that you will deal with domestic offences or traffic. This might not seem like a big deal now, but these are critical skills / experiences to have as you move on.
3.
PN training is quite intense and on an accelerated timeline. This means that you usually get sent pre-reads to do before you start the course. Essentially, you are not being paid for some of the study, which everyone else is.
My advice would be not to rush into anything and have a proper think about whether PN is the right thing for you.
PN is something of a legacy prorgamme and it isn't really clear to me why it even still exists, or what it's for now that almost all routes are graduate entry.
There are three downsides to the PN "Leadership" programme.
1.
You aren't guaranteed your choice of force. This could be really, really inconvenient. Let's say you live in Southampton, but Hampshire isn't in the scheme this year - you might face the choice of Wiltshire, Kent or Met - and relocating home.
2.
You are posted as a Neighbourhoods Officer for the lifetime of the PN programme (2 years). This might work for some people, but not for others. It does also mean that you may have significant experience gaps when you move forward. Most non-PN officers start in Response or do a rotation that includes Neighbourhoods, but it isn't too common to go directly to Neighbourhoods and stay there as PN officers do. It's unlikely that you will deal with domestic offences or traffic. This might not seem like a big deal now, but these are critical skills / experiences to have as you move on.
3.
PN training is quite intense and on an accelerated timeline. This means that you usually get sent pre-reads to do before you start the course. Essentially, you are not being paid for some of the study, which everyone else is.
Heeeey Trinculo,
I really appreciate all your warning and honestly this is something that I've wanted to do for the past 2 years.
1.
In terms of the force this year cohort is ONLY for the MET so people applying is or become aware of in the Assessment Centre if they get to that stage. Furthermore, this scheme is very very competitive at an acceptance rate of 5.5%.
2.
I do know what neighbourhood police officer involves as I have spoken to an PN person still in the force, and he's experiences on top of all my research.
3.
Honestly you get paid from day one of training, but yes you need to do work pre training which I am a final year student anyway, and don't mind doing it.
4.
I will be moving back home to London anyways, so I will not be paying rent other than keeping up with the bills. I think after graduating starting with nearly £37K is not that bad.
5.
I have been in the police cadet for 4 years, and have lots of ideas what they do and have actually assisted them couple times.
6.
It is always soemthing that I've wanted to do since I was kid for multiple reasons (I can write an essay)
I really appreciate all your warning and honestly this is something that I've wanted to do for the past 2 years.
1.
In terms of the force this year cohort is ONLY for the MET so people applying is or become aware of in the Assessment Centre if they get to that stage. Furthermore, this scheme is very very competitive at an acceptance rate of 5.5%.
2.
I do know what neighbourhood police officer involves as I have spoken to an PN person still in the force, and he's experiences on top of all my research.
3.
Honestly you get paid from day one of training, but yes you need to do work pre training which I am a final year student anyway, and don't mind doing it.
4.
I will be moving back home to London anyways, so I will not be paying rent other than keeping up with the bills. I think after graduating starting with nearly £37K is not that bad.
5.
I have been in the police cadet for 4 years, and have lots of ideas what they do and have actually assisted them couple times.
6.
It is always soemthing that I've wanted to do since I was kid for multiple reasons (I can write an essay)
Hi
If you know for a fact you're going to Met, and that's where you want to go - then that's probably the biggest obstacle out the way, and probably the biggest issue with PN.
My question would be though - why not just join via a normal DHEP route? If you're only going to go to Met anyway, why not get the longer training and actually get paid for all the pre-reads, rather than do it for free? I understand that you "don't mind", but surely if there's no downside to doing it, then why not? This is what I mean about how I don't really understand what the point of PN is anymore, if there are other routes that achieve the same thing?
I actually have been a Neighbourhoods officer in the past, and it's one of the two key frontline roles (the other being ERPT), but I think one that is often done very badly because the role varies so much depending on where you are. Neighbourhoods in Harrow is completely different from Neighbourhoods in Westminster, which again is completely different from Neighbourhoods in Tower Hamlets - whereas ERPT is pretty much the same no matter where you go.
There's two Neighbourhoods roles that new people are likely to go to - either DWO or TCT. DWO is the traditional ward officer where you're assigned a ward and essentially have to look after it. The key to this is balancing sorting out the ward priorities, keeping on top of Airspace (Antisocial behaviour) and doing other policing including routine patrolling. With the amount of aid that SNT officers have to do nowadays, this can be quite tough. If you have a suburban ward, there's probably going to be a lot of ASB to deal with and patrol areas can be enormous. With the inner cities, the areas are smaller, but you can end up being a defacto gangs unit. It's a job which carries enormous responsibility and also freedom from day 1, so you kind of have to be ready to be thrown in at the deep end and work out what you have to do. A lot of the problems that people come to you with are basically impossible to solve with the resources you have and your shift pattern. If someone complains that there are people riding motorbikes noisily in their estate at around 8pm a few times a week, there might only be a couple of nights per month you could even be there.
TCT (Town Centre Team) is a much easier role, and probably the better posting for brand new people. Essentially you'll be in a small team led by a sergeant and just go out in a bus all day getting on top of whatever the day brings in the area. Some of them are very proactive with stop and search, others deal with Night Time Economy and some just go around arresting people all day long.
The danger with Neighbourhoods is that as a DWO you can sometimes lose your way with what you're trying to achieve. It's not like ERPT where everything is very simply laid out for you - you go to whatever call is in front of you, and that's that. With SNT, there isn't any clear direction and it's largely up to you how you tackle it. As I said, you can also get a deficit in terms of skills and experience and you'd probably have to really work to ever get a traffic stop, and you could easily end the programme without ever having done a domestic call. As you progress, those are skills that you will really need and the only way you're going to get them is probably to do a stint on ERPT, which sort of defeats the object of the PN programme.
I mean, good luck. It's a great job, I just tend to think that a lot of these different programmes uneccessarily complicate things and sometimes people join on the wrong pathway and it can set the back a bit.
I've known and worked with a few PN officers, and for most of them, it's been fine, but it doesn't seem to have benefitted them at all, and one guy joined PN because he just thought that was how you joined the police. He wanted to do all sorts of things that were completely outside the programme's remit (like TSG) and it kind of set him back as he was doing things he didn't really enjoy.
Sorry mate, I haven't been online but hopefully you've passed it all. If you did then Day 2 assessment centre, vetting and references for a July start. I unfortunately did not pass my medical, but have deferred to next year which would ensure me to pass definitely. Therefore, next year I would be joining in July 2025 and honestly bit later than I would've like but everything is a learning curve. Anyways, tell me about your journey thus far?
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