In minutes I had five police officers, two sergeants and an inspector on the doorstep

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - You're a mum, you're a football manager, you're a police officer, you've had to face adversity and overcome them on a number of occasions.

PC Steph Meek - It's impossible to predict everything. When I joined Kent Police there is no way on earth I would have said to you ‘I'm going to end up a single parent, I'm gonna leave a very difficult home situation’.

There are elements of the job that stick with you, because they're not nice, but the support is there.

There's lots of positive stuff as well, I've got involved with the Kent Police Women's Football Team, that's probably the highlight of my season, because that's where work meets passion.

I think that would be my superpower, is, you know being able to get from A to B or find those solutions, very quickly and very efficiently.

We are a big family; we're all going through the same thing. I couldn't put a price on what that means. We can't be naive to the fact that there are many, many jobs that we go to that people wouldn't want to go to, people don't want to see, but somebody has got to go to them, you know that's why we joined the job.

I dealt with an incident when I was with my son, off duty. It was late at night; it was quite traumatic, thinking about it. It spiralled and within minutes I had, I think five police officers, two sergeants and an inspector on the doorstep. [Music]

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - Welcome to More Than the Badge, a Kent Police podcast. My name is Vinny Wagjiani and I am a detective inspector, and I'll be your host today. Our guest is PC Steph Meek. Steph is a police officer in the Desktop Investigation Team and has been with us for seven years, she's a mum, she's a manager of Margate Football Club. Welcome Steph.

PC Steph Meek - Thank you.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - What inspired you to become a police officer?

PC Steph Meek - I'll be honest and say it wasn't top of my career choices. I wanted to be an engineer in the Army, at one point. I had my little boy, and wanted to go back to work, and I realised I couldn't sit still I just, a desk job wasn't for me, which is ironic being in the Desktop Investigation Team now, but I needed something that was different every day, that I wasn't, it wasn't mundane, it was a challenge, at which point I'd already sort of started the process in the specials, I'd got an injury so I didn't carry on with that, I spoke to Recruitment and they said ‘just go and get your driving licence’. So I went and got my driving licence, I think I did my theory test one Tuesday, my driving test the following Tuesday, and then applied on the Friday [laughing] and by, three weeks later I'd been offered an interview, for Kent Police so, it was a bit of a spur of the moment decision, probably one of the best ones I've made, but it was never my initial intention to become a police officer.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - You know what, it was the same thing for me, having done loads of degrees and scientific courses, policing never really came into the agenda, and it was just morphed into it and ever since I've done it, it's just felt natural.

PC Steph Meek - I was just going to say I think that's it. Now if I speak to like friends and family, they say like ‘you were made for that job’, like that is, ‘if we were to put you in a job, it would be that’, but it wouldn't have crossed my mind, before, I don't think. I think, I was so set on, what I wanted to do out of school and that's it, I want to go and engineer planes and be in the Army and yeah that was such a fixation, but now I've done it, I couldn't see me doing anything else.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - So fast forward from when you first joined and now seven years on and you're with the Desktop Investigation Team.

PC Steph Meek – Yep.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - What does the team do, and on a day-to-day basis on your role within it?

PC Steph Meek - So it is literally what it says on the tin, really. So, we are an invest, investigative team, I always struggle with that word, and we deal, at the moment with, we're very new, only just established so, we deal with shopliftings all theft offences, so theft from person, theft from vehicles, vehicle theft and that's the main calibre of what we hold at the moment. So we will do everything, that can be done remotely, in relation to an investigation, so CCTV enquiries, speaking to victims to establish whether there's any witnesses, maybe Optica, which is going and looking at phones where they've hit the satellites, you know tracking people's locations that way, ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) so, the cameras on number plates and like, you know if this vehicle’s been stolen, where’s it been, has it passed through any cameras, do we know roughly the direction it's headed in. So, basically anything that can be done remotely from a desktop, [laughing] we do, and then once either a suspect's been identified or we've exhausted everything as far as we possibly can, then the report goes elsewhere so it'll either be filed until we get more evidence, or it'll be passed to a team where there's boots on the ground and they can go in, collect CCTV or arrest the suspect and interview a suspect.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and many of our viewers will probably be thinking of the sort of stereotypical role of a police officer going out and doing investigations, and this department and the role you do, just shows, a different way and how we're working with policing. So, before you got to the role that you've got to - share with us your sort of journey to getting where you've got to today.

PC Steph Meek - Where haven't I been [laughing].

So when I started my little boy was 18 months, so I did obviously the six months at the college, studying, passed out just before Christmas, and went obviously straight onto response which is part of the natural process anyway, I know it's changed, slightly now, since I joined, but you would do about 12 months out on response policing - so that's, that's stereotypical boots on the ground, driving around with the blue lights on, going to immediate calls, what everyone pictures when you say a police officer. So, I did that 12 months, and in that time my relationship broke down at home, I found myself as a single parent, and I juggled the shifts for six months of that somehow, looking back I don't know how, but you just find a way to make it work, but it was too much, my little boy at home wasn't getting the best out of me, I was struggling at work because of the stresses trying to juggle everything, and a chief inspector offered me a lifeline and said ‘will you come and join the Case Review Team?’ So, I went over to the Case Review Team, which is primarily an auditing team. So, every case file that goes to the Crown Prosecution Service or the Court, would come through the team I was in, and we would do a tick box exercise, make sure that all the documents were filled out correctly, all the information was there, that we had all the evidence, and just basically make sure that, that quality assurance was there. So, I did that for, I want to say three years maybe, during Covid I worked from home doing that because it was a function that could be done from home, and then from there I went into the Community Safety Unit, as an acting sergeant. So, I managed the PCSOs, I led some County Lines operations within that department, did that for four months maybe, before I then went and acted as a sergeant in the Victim Based Crime Team. So, the Victim Based Crime Team is, ultimately what I'm doing now, in the Desktop Team but you've got the element of going and arresting suspects and interviewing them as well. So, I did six months of sergeanting [sic] there, before again, it was just too much, it was too much responsibility, work weren’t getting the best out of me, home wasn't getting the best out of me so, I went back as a PC, within that that role, so I took the supervisory element away and I went back as a PC. I dropped to part-time to try and get that flexibility at home again, but financially that's difficult, with being the only income into the house and then again, another lifeline was thrown my way for the Desktop Investigation Team. I think it was summer last year, and then I started in the December so, I'm now in a very flexible working environment, where I do a lot of my, a lot of my work from home which allows that home life balance.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and you shared with us lifeline and the organisation and particular people in Kent Police that have given you lifelines. What impact did that have on you as an individual?

PC Steph Meek - Yeah massively, because I think I was in a position where leaving the job wasn't an option, it is a secure job, we've discussed many of times you know outside of the podcast, there's pensions, there's a good salary, there are benefits to being in the police force, so leaving was never an option, but equally I had to consider home life, and the fact that I've got, he's eight now, but at the time, when I've crossed these bridges, two, four, seven year old at home that needs to be a priority as well, and so those lifelines just minimised the stress which meant work were then again getting the best out of me, because I could focus on work. My boy was getting the best out of me, because work wasn't impacting on home life, and it would just give that balance that wasn't there before.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and this work life balance harmony that you talk about, which is so vitally important to people coming into policing. Are you able to share, sort of the experiences that came out of almost the two lifeline points that you found really critical, and had they not been there, what you would have done?

PC Steph Meek - I'll be honest with you, I don't know what I would have done had those lifelines not been there, because I would say at both points, I was probably at rock bottom. I was probably at the point where I was thinking ‘I've got to make a decision here, and do I leave and struggle financially or do I stay, and maybe not be the best parent’, you know he wasn't neglected, but in terms of emotional needs at home, and those sorts of things, it was one or the other and I probably was at the point where I just didn't know where to turn or what to do, but I keep saying it, it's like a family here, and that if you're open and honest with your supervisors and your peers, people notice and people will do what they can to support you, and to help you, and as soon as those lifelines were thrown, it just opened a whole new lease of life and restored the balance should we say.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – So, if there were people who are viewing this, and they were thinking about joining policing, and they were in a similar situation to you are, or you might get into, what advice would you give them?

PC Steph Meek - It's impossible to predict everything. When I joined Kent Police there is no way on earth I would have said to you ‘I'm going to end up a single parent, I'm going to leave a very difficult home situation’. I didn't think I was going to be in any of those positions, and I think it's the same with a lot of things in life, you cannot predict what's going to come, and therefore you can't hesitate on what your decisions are, what you want to do based on a what might be.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - Certainly in my role, I've seen and noted that some, everyone's going through something, and being able to talk to people within the organisation like you say, we're a family, and I get that experience as well being in Kent Police. I'm inspired by the fact that, you know, you're a single mum, you're navigating schools, school runs, school clubs, work - Desktop Investigation Team. How does….

PC Steph Meek - I don’t think inspired is the right word, it might be crazy …maybe.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - I mean how does that all get put together?

PC Steph Meek - I think it's about being disciplined, about being, I'm not someone necessarily needs routine, but when you've got that support and that structure at work, so I log in, I do my three hours, I walk him to school, I live closer to the school so it's a two-minute walk in the time it would take someone to make a coffee and have a chinwag with their colleague in the kitchen, I've walked to the school, I've thrown him through the gate, [laughing] well not literally, but pushed him through the door, and then I've walked back and I'm back logged on. You then do your six hours in between while he's at school, pick him up, you bring him back. Of course there's sacrifices that need to be made, I work every Saturday, I don't have him on a 12-hour shift to make up hours that I might not have on days where there's after school clubs and I'm committed to being out for longer periods of time. So, there's a degree of compromise should we say, and a degree of flexibility from me, in that there are 12-hour shifts, there are no child free and work-free Saturdays that exist, but then there's compromise from the job as well in that, I can work from home, and I have that option to walk him up to the school and back again, and split my shifts if I need to, to go to school assemblies or parents evening, so yeah there's compromise on both parts, and I just think it's about being disciplined and, having that routine and that structure if you know what you're planning your day out and knowing what the expectations are.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and before all of that you'd have gone through loads of policing experience from when you started to where you are now and doing some shifts on the Saturday like you said, is there been anything that you've experienced in policing for your career that stays with you?

PC Steph Meek - Yeah, that there's obviously the negative stuff, and there's the positive stuff. So, I say it to most people when they ask me what it's like being a police officer, I'd never seen a dead body, until I joined the job, and I think probably actually that's the case for most people. I was 23 when I joined, and I think although people have been to funerals, to have seen a dead body I don't think, that's everybody's experience of life and the first one I'd been to had been there three weeks, so it was like a baptism of fire.

There are elements of the job that stick with you, because they're not nice, but the support is there, and the, you know the processes are there if you need them, because something's affected you adversely, but there's lots of positive stuff as well and although I would say nothing necessarily sticks to me as, an incident that has been necessarily embedded in for a good reason, there are lots of little pockets of times where colleagues have done or said something funny or they've got you out of a bad situation or, something's panned out in a different way to what you would expect it to, and they're really positive things, they're really things that make you feel like I said, part of a family, part of a group of people that are all sharing the same experiences.

I think for me probably, I say after I've said that there's nothing positive that or no individual incident that's positive that sticks in my head, I remember being on an overtime shift at Bluewater one Christmas, and I'd picked it up for some reason, probably thinking about the money around Christmas that's what we usually do, [laughing] but I said “oh yeah I'll go and work Bluewater” having never worked Bluewater before, I've always been East Kent so a whole new ball game for me. I couldn't find the police station, because it's a tiny strange little police station off the back of Bluewater somewhere, I don't think I could find it again, and we went out and most of the day was just, you know walking around engaging with the public, which was really nice really, really good thing and a call came in to say that there was a, someone they suspected of being a, or wanted for a watch theft somewhere else in the country, so all the jewellers use sort of a system where they share images of people that have done things in different stores across the country, and so we attended the store, the security guard pulled up the image and said “I think this is this guy, he's wanted for a 30 grand watch theft in Nottingham” or somewhere like that, and my colleague said “yeah, that's him”. Maybe being a bit naive to the job at the time, I don't, I think I'd only been in a couple of years, I let my colleague crack on and I was just his back-up, and he placed the guy under arrest, but didn't get hands on, he was in a pretty enclosed space so it wasn't necessarily the wrong decision, but the phone that he had, that had been placed on the table next to him started ringing, now my brain went ‘well my colleague's tied up, I'm going to go and answer, I'm going to go and get the phone away so he doesn't grab it’ the suspect went to grab the phone, the colleague went to grab the phone, and with that the suspect bolted behind us and jumped out the, out the door, ran off. My colleague went to jump and grab him, missed him and got me instead, so within the space of about 30 seconds I'd hit the door of the jewellers, my hat had rolled out amongst all the Christmas shoppers, he was upside down smooshed [sic] into the cabinet of jewellery that is now rocking on the wall, in in just a mound. We did catch him, after I think we chased for all ten of the car parks at Bluewater and I arrested one in the middle of the crazy golf to which a family walked around and sort of looked a bit confused as to why [laughing] there was a police officer with a man in cuffs in the middle of the crazy golf and, you know it ended well in the end we, the suspects were caught and you know justice was served if you want to call it that, but the bit that sticks with me is the fact that I went back to the jewellers and they'd all been giggling at the CCTV because it was something off of like a cartoon sketch [laughing] where my colleague and I have both banged into things in the, in a heap on the floor and hats are rolled everywhere.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - It's so funny you say that because I've heard loads of officers share funny experiences, and I think it's one of the core attributes in policing that we need, just to get ourselves through, some of the stuff that we go through, and humour is so important when we're working.

PC Steph Meek - It is and I couldn't put a price on what that means like, we've touched on before, there are so many things in this job that aren't nice, we can't be naive to the fact that there are many, many jobs that we go to that people wouldn't want to go to, people don't want to see, but somebody has got to go to them you know, that's why we join the job, we do those bits that other people maybe wouldn't want to or, couldn't. We're there for the public when they need us most, that's that is the deaths, whether they're elderly, whether they're children, that's the RTCs (road traffic collisions) that aren't very nice, and those elements of humour, not in those moments obviously, but the little glimpses of the nice jobs, the camaraderie with your colleagues, the humour, that's what gets you through it, and it reminds you you’re human because we do have to desensitise to things. Sometimes that's difficult, there'll be things that affect one person more than another person, it won’t necessarily be griefy [sic]. I was going through some troubles at home so I was going to jobs that were similar in nature, and then I was getting affected with, by those more than maybe something that was traumatic, because I could relate to it from home.

I'm quite good at switching off, from work and work is work, but you have to be empathetic, and you have to still be compassionate, and if you lose that and become a robot then we're not doing our job as Kent Police. The public need us to be, have that compassion and empathy when we're going to a family member that's died, or we're delivering bad news from an RTC (road traffic collision), it's really important that we don't become a robot.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - I remember being a newly qualified detective, and it really hit me, certainly and that's the one that stayed with me, where I'd had to respond to three child death calls on the same week, and they were all based at hospital, and having conversations with the family, having conversations with the coroner, and just finishing one incident, coming back home, very short time to decompress it, then going back in and something similar happens, then going back home, trying to decompress it and then something else happens again. A huge amount of emotional energy I think, I must have been the most shattered out of that week, than any other time that I've been in policing.

How do you manage sort of the emotional impact of the day-to-day stuff of policing?

PC Steph Meek - I think like I said before I'm quite resilient so, it doesn't tend to impact much on my home life obviously like you say you're going to be emotionally shattered sometimes, you will go home and you just don't want to talk about your day, not because it's necessarily been bad or it's been good or you know not for a reason, but sometimes you just haven't got the energy to talk about your day or like you say sometimes when you go to things like that, you don't want to relive your day either, you just want to put it to bed, but I think, you know every person gets affected by something different as we touched on before, and the first death I ever went to didn't affect me at the time, but two years later I went to a call that came in with a similar circs (circumstances) on the radio so, suspicious death, male, we think he's been there a while, and immediately hearts pounding, sweating, like I couldn't, it was an involuntary reaction, it wasn't something I had control of, I started to panic, not enough that I couldn't go and do the job, but I was panicking and my colleague turned to me and he said “are you all right?” and I went “no, not really this is why it's bothering me” he said “okay, then. I'll take the lead I'll go in first, you be there in case, any but I'll go in first, I'll make sure it's alright and then you can come in, we'll deal with it together, let me take the lead, we'll handle it” and I think that's it, it’s the fact that we are a big family, we're all going through the same thing and although one thing might affect me that doesn't affect you, and vice versa, if I was to get in the car after something that seemed quite trivial and burst out crying, my colleague would be fine with that, they’d probably done it themselves for something else, it's about going through the motions, and knowing that your colleagues aren't going to judge you for going through those motions, because they've been there, they've done that, they've seen it, whether that's an older colleague in service, a younger colleague in service, everybody's on different journeys.

I remember coming back to the college, you come back for a little bit further training then you go back out again and, I worked in a very busy area of Kent and I came back and I said “oh yeah I've been to eight deaths, I've been to this, I've been to that, a murder, a this or that” and everyone looked me like ‘oh my gosh, like I haven't been to anywhere near that’. I don't think any length of service dictates what you have or haven't been to, it's just luck of the draw of what comes out, but there are always, there's always somebody that's been through something similar, has had a similar emotional reaction to what you're struggling with, and they won't hesitate to give you a hug if you need a hug, make you a cup of tea, say “come on, let's go get a walk, five minutes out”, and that goes for supervision as well, if a supervisor sees that someone's you know struggling “come in here, go home, spend the rest of the shift at home because you're no good to me if you're like that, and you're no good to yourself if you're like that, go home, go recoup, recover” and I think that's a massive thing that gets a lot of people through, it's just that camaraderie and that support from everybody else.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - Do you know what, I’m getting goosebumps listening to that [laughing].

You’re absolutely right, and you know the best moments you look back on, where you felt supported, is at the times where your colleagues, the people around you have just come on, just given you a pat on the back and said ‘it's all going to be okay, you're going to get through this, we're going to help you get through this’ and you know we've heard countless times you know, in campaigns and stuff like that it's okay not to be okay, and when you sort of start seeing that, being lived, in reality, it's so comforting. So much so like even in, I've recently transferred, I say recently, two years in Kent Police, and we've got a new chief constable, and one of his most powerful statements that I've seen is part of his pledge, where he's put staff, their health, well-being and safety right at the forefront of his pledge, which for me, I think is one of the most powerful things of support and wellbeing that a person from right at the top, is saying this is important to me, and it matters, and I want it to matter to everyone else.

PC Steph Meek - So important, how can we deliver a top-level service to the public if we're broken ourselves. Of course we, you're always going to need feet on the ground, you're always going to need an element of you've got to go to this, or you've got to, but if we're all broken, we're not going to go with empathy, we're not going to go with compassion, we might be dealing with some stresses in our heads and switching off and then not, doing 100% of the things we should be doing. You forget the small details because oh god I didn't get that victim's phone number because your mind's elsewhere so, 100% I think it's, that support is so important, and for me there's two times that it really stood out, that it's, it was okay not to be okay, one on shift and one off shift.

I was in custody, must have been about three, three and a half years in the job, was in custody on a constant supervision so, that's where we watch an offender who's at risk of whether that be concealment, harming themselves, you know there's lots of reasons why we might be watching a suspect. On this particular occasion it was an open-door constant, so doors open, myself and my colleague are sat outside the cell watching the individual, who subsequently after a lot of faff ended up forcing his way out the cell, he slammed me up against the wall in custody, tried to push the door on my colleague, he headbutted me. I was shaking, managed to get him on the bed, a colleague came in, actually a sergeant came in from custody in a flash, and he went “you get out of this situation” I said “I'm alright” and he went “no, you're not, off you go” and taking, like taking that control and telling me to go, and saying you're not alright and it's okay stop putting the front on, off you go I'm here now, I needed that, otherwise I could have potentially come to more harm because I was shaking, I was switched off, I was hurt, putting myself in a position of vulnerability, potentially with a suspect that's clearly got an issue with me as an individual on that particular occasion for whatever reason, and the other, the other occasion was when, so this one's outside of work, where it was just re-instilled and I think probably when you're off duty it maybe means a little bit more, because it's easy to support your colleagues when they’re stood by you in uniform, it's sometimes easy to forget that, I think, or forget that level of support when you're off duty.

I dealt with an incident when I was with my son, off-duty, it was late at night. It was quite traumatic thinking about it, although it didn't feel like it at the time, and I called it in, because I thought I'm not, I wouldn't deal with an incident like this on my own if I was in uniform, so I'm not going to deal with it on my own out of uniform, so I called it in as a member of the public would through to control and I said “look, I'm an off-duty police officer, this is what I'm dealing with, can I have some support please?” It spiralled, and within, minutes I had, I think five police officers, two sergeants and an inspector on the doorstep helping me deal with the incident. They took everything out of my control, they dealt with it, I said “do you need me to do a statement? do you need me to do this? do you need me to do that?” “no, no, no you've got your little boy with you, he's your priority, get home, we can get this in the morning, it's not, we don't need it right now, let's think about what's important” so I said “okay” and as I got in the car I said ‘I'll see you tomorrow boss’ and he went “what do you mean?”, I said “I'll see you tomorrow boss, I'm on shift” he went “no, you're not” I said “I am, I'm coming into work, I’m on shift” and he's like “you've just been involved in a traumatic incident”, I said “oh no, I'm alright boss, I don't mind, it's fine, hasn't really bothered me that much” and he said “as your mate, I'm telling you, you don't come in tomorrow, you stay at home, you've seen a traumatic incident, you're staying at home, and you're spending time with your son and you're doing what's right” he said “as your boss, I'm telling you if you come into the office I'll be pulling you into my office and telling you off and sending you home” and that was when it, really instilled in me that actually these people care, this is a family, and 100% he made the right call. I didn't feel like it was traumatic at the time, did it in the long run really bother me, no I don't think so, but was staying at home off of work, and making sure my son was alright, the right thing to do then, 100% and would I have made that decision off my own back, no, I wouldn't have done, I would have gone into work, I would have sent him to nursery and I would have gone into work and that's, it's moments like that that you realise that, the support is there, and it's okay not to put a front on, and it's okay to just be human, I suppose, like we said about you know it's easy to become a robot when you switch off that empathy and that compassion, to not get affected by things, it's easy to forget that you can have emotion and you can feel things and yeah taking that control out of my hands and saying actually no this isn't right for you, this isn't right for your son, it isn't right for anybody, you're not coming in, was massive and that was when I thought actually I'm valued here as a person, I'm valued as an individual, but I'm also valued as a colleague.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and that's that type of leadership and conversation often involves the softer skills of communication which are often the hardest skills, and I've seen it, on sort of a public level, where officers have, you know attended an incident, a serious incident, and they've had the dreaded role of being on a cordon for example, at the middle of the night and it's raining, and every time they come back or something happens, the things that they remember is there was a member of public from number so and so house, that took their time to come out and offer us a cup of tea, a coffee and then access to toilet facilities and you know were able to take away the stress and the anxieties of we're in a really bad role position, and someone in the public is actually helping us, and that really lives some of the Peel principles, you know the police are the public and the public are the police, and I think, Kent Police are in that sort of journey of getting it right, and I think the more we see this type of relationship with, police officers and the members of public, I think the closer we're going to build trust, we're going to get that empathy, we're going to get that compassion, that we're going to be able to deliver that policing service that they expect, but we're going to be able to deliver it where our officers are being looked after.

PC Steph Meek – Yeah, like you say, sitting on a scene for those lengths of time are not, are not nice. In terms of, there are worse, certainly worse things to be going to in the job, it's an easy one if you want to call it that, sitting on a cordon, but it's mundane, and it does grate at you, and it does eat away when it's like you say 3 o’clock in the morning, pouring with rain, it's cold, it's miserable, and you're stood there on a cordon, that maybe you're not doing a lot for three or four hours, it's like you said, the members of the public that come and offer that cup of tea or yeah or equally the supervisor saying or acknowledging actually you've been on that for three hours now, I'm going to rotate you, now let's get someone else in there, let's get someone for their stint and you can go and do something else, you can still be a help, you can go do something else, just change the scenery.

I remember being on a cordon next door to my Nan's house once, by complete fluke, she didn't know it was me and she came out and she said “bacon sandwiches” I was like “yes Nan, please” [laughing] but it's little things like that, yeah, like you say it builds those relationships as well …

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - Makes such a difference.

PC Steph Meek – It makes you feel more valued, but it also builds relationships with the public.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - You talked about switching off from work, and one of the things I've learnt about you whilst we've been doing some work is being a football manager for Margate FC, tell us more about that role and how it helps you switch off from work

PC Steph Meek – I think switch off is a strong word, it's been a roller coaster. It's definitely my happy place, if you want to call it that, it's my solace at the side of the pitch on a Sunday afternoon, just nothing else matters for that 90 minutes and it's quite special.

I've played for Margate for ten seasons, or I was first signed in 2014, and I never in a million years thought I'd be managing, it wasn't something that crossed my mind when our manager left in February last year so 14 months ago I said “I'll take it over in interim because I'm qualified coach, so you know I'll take it over in the interim till you find someone that's suitable for the job”. I took them for their first game and by the Tuesday I was like ‘I quite like this, I'm not aching on a Monday morning, I'm still involved, I've still got the bug, but I'm you know, I'm not risking injury which again impacts work and home, I quite like this’ so I applied like everybody else, I interviewed like everybody else and then I got offered the position the following Tuesday I think it was. So yeah it wasn't something I saw myself doing initially, but got a bug for it and it's definitely my home away from home should we say.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and has leadership in sports helped you with leadership in policing?

PC Steph Meek – Yeah, I think it comes hand in hand. I think there are things I've learned from sport that has helped in policing and vice versa in terms of leadership anyway. I definitely find leadership in football harder, and I think some of that comes from having played with the players. So, I've built up playing relationships with players for six, seven years and then I'm stepping into a leadership role which is very difficult to embed to discipline and should we say sanction at times, players that you've that are in your friendship circle is really difficult, whereas I think in the police force because it's a structured organisation and there is that rank structure that's there from the off, even if you're managing colleagues that you've worked with, there's that level of respect all that, not that I'm not saying the players don't respect me, but there's that understanding that you know this is what happens when someone promotes and we follow the rank structure and we respect that, so I certainly think leading in policing is better, easier than leading a team that you've played in, but there's definitely interchangeable skill sets for sure. Communication this podcast for one, I was saying you know 14 months ago before I'd ever done a football interview if you'd had asked me to do this podcast I would have fumbled over my words and probably cried in the corner, but there are certainly interchangeable skill sets across them both.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and what's one of the most proudest things you've achieved in football?

PC Steph Meek – Oh my goodness, that's really tough. This season's been full of those so, I don't know I'm going to have to tell you a few, I'll have to really sell the team here. We've reached the first ever final, that the team's ever got to, in its 10 years of existence. We've reached the furthest that the team has ever got in the FA Cup, so we reached the third qualifying round, and where we faced Millwall obviously we lost that, but we faced Millwall. We for the first time ever introduced match day programmes for the girls, tickets so you have to pay to enter. We pulled a pre-season friendly against hashtag I'm being mentored by Spurs under 23's manager so, there's loads of really, really high points.

Maybe away from Margate probably is the fact that I've got involved with the Kent Police Women's Football Team that's probably the highlight of my season, because that's where work meets passion, and I know it's not always good to cross those lines, and it's sometimes good to have the differentiation between home and work, but for me I never felt like my role in Kent Police would complement my passion and vice versa so, being involved in a way where I'm promoting the initiative of violence against, violence against women and girls, I'm bringing in football and bringing in my CSU work, so community safety work unit work, and that all compiling into one and doing something I absolutely have a passion for which is football, but from a Kent Police perspective, that's massive, that for me that's probably the highlight in terms of footballing as opposed to just specifically Margate.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - We're going to off the cuff here now and start looking at some questions that are slightly different. What is your go-to snack on shift?

PC Steph Meek – Oh here we go. I don't tend to eat on shift, which is a really bad habit, I don't advise it to anybody, especially when you're doing long shifts, but certainly through my tutorship period, my tutor, always knew that I'd have a bag of Maoams and a Red Bull, in the bag, and we would sit at 3 o’clock in the morning on a night shift when you get five minutes down time, picking out our favourite flavour of Maoam out the bag [laughing]. So, not the healthiest of snacks, but that would probably be what I'd take on a response shift with me.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - Well, it's one of those things where, you know either if someone new joins or someone's leaving or something's happened in policing, snacks are always gonna be…

PC Steph Meek – It's always cakes isn't it? [laughing]

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and you know donuts are the sort of the prescribed,

PC Steph Meek – It might be worth warning anyone that's thinking of joining and if you do something wrong there's a donut fine [laughing].

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - but we get ourselves into some of these real crazy snack type habits, but Maoams where did Maoams come from then?

PC Steph Meek – I've got a really sweet tooth. I don't think it was particularly, anything, they're not, they're not my favourite. I think just one shift it started and then it just didn't finish, it just became like a routine.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - I recently did some stuff at in primary schools and they were doing this thing on not all heroes have capes. So, if you were a superhero, what would your superpower be?

PC Steph Meek – Oh gosh! Again another tricky one, not something I really, think about. I had a, and he'll love that I've given him a shout-out. I had a supervisor who, so, I'm going through the process of an ADHD diagnosis, and he thinks that all people with ADHD are superheroes.

I said “what made you think that?” he said “because if I want to go from 1 to 10, I have to go 1, 2, 3, 4 all the way through to 10”, he said “if you want to go from 1 to 10 you go 1, 2, 10, and you're there in half the time” I said “oh yeah”. So, I think that would be my superpower is you know being able to get from A to B or find those solutions very quickly and very efficiently, without having to go through all the mundane processes, but it's not always a superpower though because sometimes I do go 1, 2, 10 and then realise I've forgotten something really crucial at 4 or 5 and I have to go back, and it takes twice as long, but if I could effectively go from 1 to 10 without the steps in the middle I think that would be my super power.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani - and do you know what that highlights something quite important and certainly something I've seen in Kent Police, where it's embracing neurodiversity, and supporting their staff. So when you're not working at home, and you're on a shift, if there was a celebrity that you would take on a shift, who would it be and why would you choose them?

PC Steph Meek – If we're talking like a celebrity in their own shell, I'd probably pick Stacey Dooley. I think she is very knowledgeable; she knows a lot about a lot and if you watch her documentary she interacts with people really well. I've got no doubt she'd be able to defend herself, if needs be, if it came to that, but I don't think it would come to that because I think she's got that calming influence and she would be able to be empathetic and understanding to whoever we might cross paths within the shift.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – What's the one thing you wish the public knew about the role of a police officer?

PC Steph Meek – I think it's really easy to forget that we're human. We've got a family outside of work just ‘cause we wear this uniform, and we do this job, it's just a job. I'm here to protect the public, I'm here to do what’s needed of me. It's important for us to remember too we can't become the uniform and again be a robot and, we need to have that human value when we're talking to the public as well, but I think it's a two-way-street, and sometimes that gets forgotten.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – I think you're so right, I think the occasions where I've had it and I've seen officers do it where they've had the human-to-human conversations, has resulted in the best outcomes, whether it be a serious incident or whether it just be someone that you're supporting, so that they can get from one place to another, that human contact is so important.

So, for those that are thinking, our viewers that are thinking about joining the police, what advice would you give them?

PC Steph Meek – So, I think again a word I keep using is ‘naïve’ maybe because I was probably a little bit naive when I joined the job. Those looking to recruit if you watch the Kent Police recruitment video, it's a fantastic tool, a really good tool, but it is predominantly specialist roles in Tac Ops (Tactical Operations) so, you watch the recruitment video and there's a boat, there's firearms, there’s CSI (crime scene investigation) - all fantastic roles within Kent Police and all fully achievable, 100%, but there are processes and steps you've got to go through to get there, but don't be shielded by the fact that you've probably going to have two or three years before you can even think about those sorts of things, but also that recruitment video isn't the be-all or end-all. So, there's lots of specialist teams and Tac Ops involved in that recruitment video, but that might not be for you, there are Investigative teams, there's teams like the ones I've been in Desktop, Local Victim Justice, CSU (Community Safety Unit), there's still town beat officers, there's loads of roles within Kent Police that maybe aren't featured in there, because it would be impossible to put every Kent Police role in a short recruitment video, just because it's not in that video, doesn't mean there isn't something for you in this job. I think that's really important to remember.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – You're so right, it takes me back to my interview question that I got asked almost 22 years ago now, 23 years ago, where you get that question where ‘why do you want to be a police officer?’ and I just remember just looking back and going ‘it's a career, within a career, when you look at it,. So, policing is a career but within policing is loads of other different careers and like you mentioned the Tac Ops, the investigations, and until you get in you don't realise what's available to you, and I think my longevity, in policing has been as a result of all of those different career options that I've had within the career of policing, and I think it's such a great opportunity to do and get involved in.

PC Steph Meek – You have, you have to have an open mind, you have to, because if I saw the recruitment video and I joined, and if you had asked me the day I walked through the door, I would have said ‘I drive fast cars in blue lights and chase after bad guys’ and you know that was, my vision for Kent Police. If I'd have been close-minded like that and focus solely on that, I wouldn't have had the journey I've had in Kent Police, and keeping that open mind I have not followed the path that I thought I would follow when I joined, but I've learnt such a skill set and I've met good colleagues and I've had such an experience and every role I've gone into, if you throw yourself into it you get something out of it. It's not always fast cars and firearms and boats and, but it is something and it's something really special, and it's definitely a journey worth being on, it's just you got to be open-minded.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – Steph it's been an amazing conversation and I think more of what I've learned and hopefully the you've shared with the viewers, is you know you're a mum, a single mum, you're a football manager, you're a police officer, you've had to face adversity and overcome them on a number of occasions and you're still sat here able to sort of stabilise and share your experiences and still say you enjoy policing.

Thank you really so much for sharing all of that today, thank you.

PC Steph Meek - Thank you for having me.

Detective Inspector Vinny Wagjiani – Thank you for listening. If you've enjoyed this episode, you can follow us on Instagram, X, Facebook and LinkedIn. Don't forget to watch this episode by subscribing to our YouTube channel.

Find out more about the variety of careers and opportunities available to you by searching Kent Police careers. [Music].