EP 250: A Different Kind of Justice. How Leadership Culture Shapes Corrections
What if some of the biggest challenges in corrections are not simply about programs, policies, or training—but about the way we lead? In this episode of The Criminologist Podcast, filmmaker, author, and organizational culture expert Dara Barlin joins the show for a wide-ranging conversation about human-centered leadership, correctional culture, staff well-being, implementation, and the ripple effects leadership can have throughout a justice organization. Dara is the Executive Director of the Center for Transforming Culture, author of A New Kind of Power, and filmmaker behind the documentary A Different Kind of Justice. Her work asks a provocative question: What happens when correctional organizations move away from rigid, top-down leadership and create cultures where information, ideas, and accountability can move in multiple directions? The conversation explores: • Why great training often fails to translate into sustained practice—the "knowing-doing gap" • The relationship between organizational culture, officer wellness, morale, retention, and performance • Why emotionally intelligent leaders may be hiding in plain sight inside correctional organizations • The importance of listening to frontline staff and people with lived experience • How leadership practices can create either a negative or positive cascade throughout an organization • Why accountability and human-centered leadership are not mutually exclusive • The parallel process between how leaders treat staff and how practitioners ultimately engage the people they serve • What these ideas mean not only for prisons, but also for probation, parole, and community corrections • Why meaningful organizational change requires much more than a one-time training event • How A Different Kind of Justice uses storytelling to help correctional leaders see what a different model of leadership can look like This episode challenges listeners to look beyond individual programs and interventions and consider the environment surrounding the work itself. Because culture matters. Leadership matters. And how people are treated inside justice organizations may ultimately shape how those systems treat everyone else. Learn more about Dara Barlin, A Different Kind of Justice, upcoming Watch Parties, and ways to get involved: https://www.humansfirstproductions.org/ Contact Dara directly: dara@humansfirstproductions.org