Sudden Impact

Stern, who was once a consultant, has seen a lot of companies and is now a true believer in Bennett's work-hard - play-hard philosophy. "There are a lot of great jobs in the world, but few great companies to do those jobs in," he says. "I love what I'm doing. I think the company is going places. And I'm having more fun in my career than I've ever had before. I think that feeling is pretty universal."

The Insider
Melvin Wearing, chief of police, New Haven, Connecticut
Melvin Wearing's first day as New Haven's top cop was, at best, bittersweet. Sure, he had finally gotten the position he'd been dreaming of for 28 years. But his moment of glory was largely overshadowed by the flagrant misdeeds of his predecessor, Nick Pastore. Flamboyant and controversial, Pastore had just resigned after fathering an illegitimate child with a convicted prostitute. The scandal was so salacious that Wearing's ascension became a ho-hum postscript to the big story.

"I remember seeing the ceremony for Chief Wearing on the local news, and everybody focused on the fact that Nick Pastore had gone out under this cloud," says Lieutenant Bryan Norwood, New Haven's chief of detectives. "Nobody mentioned that Chief Wearing had been a cop here for almost 30 years."

When Pastore stepped down, Wearing stepped into a huge challenge. The department's credibility had been trashed. Morale was terrible. And communication between the chief's office and the cops on the beat was often conducted through union grievances.

Pastore, a tough, hard-charging former police officer, had earned a national reputation for bringing community policing to New Haven, a city of about 120,000 whose criminals were so brazen that drug dealers once staged a gun battle on the courthouse steps. During Pastore's seven-year tenure, the crime rate dropped by 34%, and the department was featured on 60 Minutes. Pastore was popular in the community and prided himself on being "the people's cop."

But the chief was widely disliked by the department's rank and file. When the story of his resignation hit the papers, says one officer, "people cheered. It was like, 'Ding, dong, the witch is dead.' " Indeed, many suspected that a disgruntled cop had tipped the media to Pastore's paternity problems.

Wearing had been Pastore's assistant chief, and while the two men shared a belief in community policing, stylistically, they were complete opposites. Even Pastore's supporters use terms such as "contentious," "eccentric," and "anticop" to describe him. Wearing they call "compassionate," "humanistic," and "a source of inspiration and pride." On February 24, 1997, his first day on the job, Wearing moved quickly to telegraph the changing of the guard.

First up: a visit to each of the day's four lineups (the roll call of officers that begins each shift) -- a practice that Pastore had shunned. Although he's partial to sharp suits, Wearing donned his dress blues for the occasion. "It was important for him to send a message that he's proud of police work and that he supports the work of the rank and file," says Carolyn Bove, assistant police planner of the NHPD's Planning & Research Unit. "He knew that people felt that the prior chief had demeaned police work."

Lest anybody think that this was an occasion to get rambunctious, however, Wearing had another message, delivered in his typical low-key fashion: Don't even think about messing around. For Wearing, it wasn't just a matter of restoring the force's credibility. As the department's first black chief, he knew that he too would be under special scrutiny. "As the first African-American in this position, I knew that everybody wanted to see whether or not I could cut it," he says. "I knew that I could do the job. I wasn't going to let anyone cause me to fail."

For four years under Pastore, Wearing had been a dutiful number two, faithfully executing his superior's plans and keeping his mouth shut about what he didn't like. So when he was handed the reins, he didn't have a secret agenda that he was itching to implement. "It happened so quickly -- in the run of a week," he says. "I didn't have time to think about what I would do."

Still, he had seen enough to know where the force needed help, and he quickly moved to fill the gaps created by the full-tilt drive toward community policing. Wearing upgraded the department's vintage technology, installing air-conditioning and laptops in cruisers, rolling out crime-mapping GIS across the department, and upgrading office equipment. He raised the standards in the training academy to exceed those mandated by the state of Connecticut, so that people couldn't accuse him of lowering standards to get minorities in the department.