At Motorola Solutions, we know nothing can beat real-world experience in a control room when it comes to understanding our customers’ needs – which is why our Guardian public safety solution team is composed of so many ex-operators. To continue the International Control Room Week 2025 celebration, we interviewed three of them about their experience in police control rooms: the highs, the lows, and what they want the public to know about the role.
James Blackwell, Business Analyst
I was with Kent Police for 24 years: I started off as an investigator in the crime unit, then I spent a few years in the control room before being promoted to supervisor of operations. For the last seven years, I represented both Kent Police and Kent FRS on a project to replace their existing legacy control room systems.
One thing that surprised me when I started working with Fire and Rescue Services as a business analyst at Motorola Solutions is that police and fire control rooms work very differently. Police control rooms will have as many as 60 people on shift at once, whereas for FRSs that number is closer to four or five. Fundamentally, though, they’re trying to achieve the same thing – getting people dispatched to an incident as quickly and efficiently as possible.
I only joined Motorola Solutions six weeks before our 2025 UK Tech Summit, and I remember chatting to my old colleagues at dinner one night – they had a question about Guardian ICCS, and I managed to answer it there and then. It felt really nice to have that positive influence over my old Force by drawing from my experience. The feedback we get from all of our customers is that we really understand the way they work – they say, “you’ve worn the headset, you’ve done the job and you know what we need.”
What the public might not realise when they’re calling 999 is the sheer amount of demand we’re dealing with at any one time. It’s understandable that people want our help as quickly as possible, but we have to balance multiple competing calls simultaneously – some of which are extremely serious.
Similarly, the public don’t necessarily grasp that control room operators are getting younger and younger; in your hour of need, you might be calling someone who’s 18 or 19 for assistance. It’s a tough job, but International Control Room Week has definitely raised awareness of just how important the role is. People are definitely more cognizant of the stress and pressure operators are under – I see our role as using technology to make their lives as easy as possible, and supporting them as best we can.
Carl Warner, Business Analyst
I was actually a musician before I joined Thames Valley Police, but I got tired of the touring schedule so I decided to follow in my dad’s footsteps – he was a control sergeant, which meant a lot of the people interviewing me had also worked with him. Originally, I was a call taker, then I moved up to being a crime recorder, before finally becoming a radio dispatcher and an instructor. In my final role, I was training everyone on everything from incident management to firearms, but all from the perspective of a control room.
Fundamentally, you’re a human the same as anyone else. You have days where you’re tired, or you’ve not slept well, or you’ve had a fight with your partner – and you still need to hear some of the worst things anyone can hear. Working in the control room will change you as a person; the way you see the world will change. Because of the way the service trains people, you’ll be better prepared to deal with difficult situations, even when you yourself may not be firing on all cylinders. But it’s so hard not to take the upsetting incidents home with you in the back of your mind. I also struggled to accept that I couldn’t help and fix everyone; what helped me was my team, my peers and seniors, and knowing that even though I couldn’t help everyone, every time, I still made a difference to hundreds of people’s lives each week. I was there for them when they needed me: that’s what keeps you going.
Carl receiving a commendation for his work in the Thames Valley Police control room
Would I go back to policing in the future? I would never rule it out. I really loved the job and I miss it almost every day – but I feel lucky knowing that my current job at Motorola Solutions makes a big impact on lots of areas of the sector. From my time in service, I’m now a much more capable, responsible, and professional individual in society as a result of what I learned specifically in the control room. I found a place of belonging, and the fact I was able to work on some extremely successful policing operations is something that I’m very proud of.
Jo Quayle, Head of Services & Service Governance (UK Managed Services)
I joined Thames Valley Police’s control room when I was 25, after a few jobs in customer service, and stayed there for 21 years. My entire career there was in the contact management department, which is collectively what most organizations call the control room and call taking centers. I started off as a police control room operator, moved through to become a team leader in the control room, then a duty manager within the contact management center, and then finally returned to the control room as an operations manager. For years and years I wasn’t actually the person on the other end of the phone or radio, I was the person leading those people, and I saw firsthand the toll it takes on people. I think the International Control Room Week tagline, “heroes in headsets,” is completely correct – they have to be so versatile.
One thing that used to frustrate me is that there isn’t any closure for control room operators. After an awful call, you might learn that the perpetrator was arrested, but you don’t know whether the victim has received help, or what the eventual outcome of the case is. Call handlers hear all kinds of terrible things, and radio operators hear officers in distress, but we weren’t included on debriefs like the frontline officers were. I think mentally it’s really difficult just hearing really traumatic incidents and not knowing what’s going on, and then not knowing the resolution of the case. There’s definitely more awareness of mental health issues than there was before, but there’s still work to be done.
I love working in managed services and support because – having been on the customer side – I have experienced firsthand how critical all the products and services we deliver to our customers are. I can relate to what our customers are experiencing during technical issues, so I always do my best to ensure our teams work together to restore service as quickly as possible.
For more information about our control room solutions, please visit motorolasolutions.com/guardian.
