Direct political pressures may be brought to bear on the police organizations as a whole or on individual officers. Fellow officers demand much from their colleagues. Their safety and lives depend on the support and backup they receive in encounters. It determines what the law is in action, as opposed to the law the legislatures, local councils, or judges made up. The pressures focus on each officer and are interpreted by that officer.
Officers are human beings, complete with life experiences, when they join a police force.
They have opinions, values, ideas, and emotions which they bring to the job. Each officer, over the course of time, develops his or her own operational style. A pattern of attitudes, techniques, and approaches found useful in the past becomes the arsenal of tactics which make up an operational style. This is indicated by the feedback loop in the diagram. The operational style resolves the role demands which impinge on the officer and allow him or her to function at all.