Tips, advice, or what you would have done differntly

[cantue5]

It has been a long road but I finally got my letter from SBSO that I passed everthing and will attend the 166th Basic Academy Session on the 24th! I am a little excited and alot scared but here we go...any tips advice or what you would have done differntly when you went through?

[SlowDownThere]

Congratulations cantue5.

Take the academy seriously and learn all you can. But have fun too. You will make some good friends there. Enjoy and welcome to the job.

[Traffic_82]

The guys with more years on are better suited to give you advice. I was in your shoes 3 short years ago, and I did learn at least one thing the hard way...keep in mind everything varies from department to department.

Your new co-worker's are not your friends, don't engage in station gossip! It's hard to resist because it's human nature, but what you say WILL NOT STAY IN THE ROOM! Learn who you can trust and befriend before you become to comfortable.

Stay away from Dispatch. I've seen alot of Officers get burnt for chiming in on the "conversations" that go on in there. It's guaranteed that somebody will cross the line, then somebody else will be offended and that's when the games begin. Still be nice to them, their job is tough (and very important).

Don't know if you're married or not, but women who hit on you on-duty only dig the uniform and "Cop" persona, they don't like the real you. Women can make the badge dissapear quickly. Women and booze combined make it dissapear even quicker.

Have thick skin during FTO, you will get "dinged" on your DOR's after making mistakes. Just learn from it and move on.

Remember, somebody is always watching and you're always being evaluated now (glass bowl and all).

Congratulations, you're going to have a blast.

[Kieth M.]

^^^^^^^ All good stuff!

If offered a deferred compensation/401K plan, get in and max out as soon as you possibly can!

[cantue5]

Thanks for the good points Traffic...never thought about the friends thing. I will definately remember that one. On the plus side the dispatch is about 1 and a half hours away from the station I will hopefully end up at...never thought about the dispatch thing either. I usually don't get caught up in peoples drama but I do get the "what do you think" thing all the time. People usually like me until I tell them what I think so I keep my mouth shut as much as possible! ha! Once again I won't forget these tips. Another memeber on here gave some good advice when I was trying to decide which department to choose (I had to choose between a city and county dept.) and his advice paid off. The dept. I work for already has the 3% at 50 thing so I don't think they have the 401 K. I got a 401 K now with the company I work for which I will probably roll over into the IRA I already have (not that much in there). Anyone have any experience with rolling over 401 K's?