This four-hour presentation introduces a six-step process to help crisis negotiators systematically assess and manage the risk of violence posed by a subject during a critical incident. The course provides a framework for evaluating violence risk factors, applying strategic active listening techniques, and connecting those risk factors to specific verbal intervention strategies. Participants will learn to identify and articulate which risk factors are being targeted, understand the tools available to Emergency Response Teams (ERT) to support negotiator interventions, and recognize when verbal strategies alone are unlikely to be effective and tactical measures are required. Serving as a condensed overview of a three-day workshop, this session emphasizes the importance of collaboration between negotiators and tactical teams, as well as the need for negotiators to document and defend their approach in a clear, systematic manner for use in court or at a coroner's inquest.

Cinda Mackoff recently retired from the Vancouver Police Department after serving as a police officer for 30 years. Over the course of her career, she worked in general patrol, narcotics enforcement, and mounted operations. For the past 20 years, she dedicated herself to crisis negotiation, where she developed and held the role of full-time Crisis Negotiator Coordinator for six years.

She has responded to more than 500 critical incidents and served as the CNT team leader for over a decade. In addition, she was a senior instructor at the Canadian Police College, where she developed curriculum and taught Crisis Negotiation Courses as well as the Critical Incident Commander's Course.

Cinda's expertise has been recognized through the Blue Line National Police Leadership Award for her contributions to crisis negotiation. She has also presented at Police Crisis Negotiation Conferences across North America. She is a graduate of both the FBI and UK National Crisis Negotiation courses and earned her bachelor's degree in psychology from Simon Fraser University.

Dr. Randy Mackoff served as a police officer with the Vancouver Police Department from 1979 to 1992. He completed his doctoral degree in psychology at the University of British Columbia in 1992 and has since built a distinguished career in clinical practice, consulting with police departments across Canada and the United States. His areas of expertise include crisis negotiation, undercover operations, suspect and witness interviews, recruit selection, psychological assessments, and critical incident stress debriefings.

Dr. Mackoff is a long-standing instructor at the Canadian Police College in Ottawa, where he teaches both negotiators and incident commanders on national courses, as well as the National Undercover and Witness Management courses. Over the past 30 years, he has served as the psychological consultant on more than 1,000 critical incidents involving barricaded suicidal subjects.

In addition to his operational work, Dr. Mackoff has made significant contributions to police wellness. He has developed and taught wellness programs for police recruits, trauma teams, and was among the first psychologists to deliver specialized wellness training for child exploitation investigators. He currently provides mandatory wellness debriefings to over 250 Vancouver Police Department members and extends these services to the RCMP and other municipal agencies.

Dr. Mackoff also serves as co-chair of the Psychology Division of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.