After working with the Marietta Police Department for almost 15 years and attaining the rank of Lieutenant, I still had not identified my long-term career goals.  Frankly, I only thought about my next promotion.  In my case, I was trying to figure out how to get promoted to Captain.  Outside of that thought, I was clueless. Until I met Chief Bobby Moody. Chief Moody took over the Marietta Police Department on July 1, 1996, as our police chief and my life changed forever. For the first time ever, a supervisor asked me about my plans for the future.  Chief Moody actually sat down with me and pressed me about my future career plans until I finally figured them out and answered him out loud.  I want to be a police chief!  I actually said it out loud and there was some relief in actually having a goal.  (I will discuss more about my talk with Chief Moody in future posts) My enthusiasm was short lived.  Reality set in. As I gathered information and conducted research about how to best prepare myself to be selected as a police chief, I found there were few resources available. I was very fortunate in…