One thing about working in a small town is that very few decisions stay at the office.

The person you dealt with this morning may be standing behind you at the grocery store that afternoon. The person you had to tell no may be sitting a few rows away from you at an event that night. The person unhappy with a decision may be somebody you’ve known for twenty years.

If I make a decision as police chief that somebody doesn’t like, there’s a pretty good chance I’m going to see that person again. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe at the gas station, a city event, the school, or while we’re both trying to buy groceries.

That doesn’t mean the decision changes because I know them. If anything, familiarity can make it even more important to make sure the relationship isn’t deciding the outcome.

I may genuinely like someone and still have to tell them no. I may know their family and still have to hold them accountable. I may understand exactly why they’re upset and still believe the decision I made was the right one. The opposite is true too. I may have a history with somebody I don’t particularly like, and I still owe them the same fair treatment I would give anyone else.

That’s where consistency becomes important to me. People don’t have to like every decision I make. But they should have some reason to believe who they are, who they know, or how I feel about them didn’t determine the answer.

The relationship doesn’t disappear after the decision either.

I can’t treat somebody badly on Monday and expect the title on my office door to make everything normal when I see them Friday. I may still have to explain the decision, listen to why they disagree, or have a completely unrelated conversation with them a few days later.

Sometimes people are going to stay mad at me. That’s part of the job. There’s a difference, though, between somebody being angry because they didn’t get the answer they wanted and somebody being angry because I treated them poorly while giving it.

That’s the part of small-town leadership I think can be easy to miss from the outside. The relationships are real. They aren’t something I can switch off when I walk into the office, and I don’t want to. I just don’t want a relationship deciding who gets a favor, who gets an exception, who gets the benefit of my judgment, or who gets treated differently because of a grudge.

Small-town leadership is personal.

The decisions shouldn’t be.