On this episode of the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast, Craig Johns speaks with Craig Semple about The Cop Who Fell To Earth, working high-risk law enforcement and advocating for increased awareness of PTSD in the workplace.

We also dive deeper into the key things people need to look out for to prevent burnout, the importance of social interaction and connection, and developing healthy coping mechanisms and help-seeking behavior.

Craig Semple –  The Cop Who Fell To Earth

Craig Semple was a career Detective within the NSW Police Force for 25 years and is a Master Instructor with Mental Health First Aid Australia and the founder of Mentality Plus Pty Limited. He specialized in high-risk law enforcement areas such as drug investigations, outlaw motorcycle gangs, and homicides. Throughout his tenure, Craig led professional teams in an environment characterized by elevated stress levels, heavy workloads, and the potential for occupational burnout, depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Since joining the Black Dog Institute in 2015 as a mental health educational presenter, Craig has traveled extensively, reaching over 20,000 individuals with his positive presentations on Mental Health, Wellbeing, and Resilience. In 2016, he was chosen as an inaugural Mentor for the NSW Police Legacy program “Backup for Life,” leveraging his experience to contribute to the development of a program supporting injured Police Officers and their families. 

Craig talks about:

• Wanting to be a marine biologist growing up because of his love for the ocean and environment
  
• Being capable of at times having to use violence to bring bad people in
  
• Discovering that he was good at negotiating good communication
  
• Being more of a lover than a fighter as a young fellow
  
• The camaraderie and bond that he shared with his fellow colleagues
  
• Having not enough focus on preparing cops and educating them about death stress and  the whole fight or flight response
  
• The Cop Who Fell To Earth
  
• Not having enough emphasis put on doing a little bit of social work outside of the workplace
  
• Being a mentor and coach to younger cops and future detectives
  
• Craving social connection during the pandemic
  
• Pushing the boundaries of his stress tolerance
  
• Having post-traumatic stress disorder while being in the line of duty
  
• Talking about his lived experiences to advocate and increase awareness about PTSD in the workplace
  
• The problem with burnout in workplaces
  
• Key things people need to look out for to prevent burnout from occurring
  

Tweets

“The Street Smart is so important. You can’t just rely on a textbook and kind of, you know, here’s the procedure. It’s like, well, the things are happening at like speed and you need that preparedness. You need exposure to make better informed, instinctual decisions in a way, the intuition really kicks in when things are moving at a fast pace.” Craig Semple talks about the importance of having street smarts on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

“Have a wellbeing gameplan. So that’s a really important thing is , rather than wait till it’s broken like I did, is to learn strategies to help live with stress.” Preventing burnout with Craig Semple on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

“One of the reasons I do so many lived experience talks now is to try to increase it. This is workplaces all over the country, not just emergency services, but try to increase the levels of help-seeking particularly the earliest possible warning signs, because it definitely makes a difference in outcomes that I did.” Advocating for awareness of PTSD in the workplace with Craig Semple on the Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast.

Resources Mentioned in this show:

Craig Semple www.mentalityplus.com.au
Craig Semple Linkedin
Craig Johns www.craigjohns.com.au
Craig Johns craig@nrg2perform.com
Craig Johns LinkedIn
Craig Johns Facebook
Inspiring Great Leaders Podcast
NRG2Perform www.nrg2perform.com

Book

The Cop Who Fell to Earth