Before You Go
Why leaving feels harder than it is, what goes when the warrant card goes, and the things to do before you resign rather than after.
Second edition · 2026
What changed, and what’s in it.
The first edition went out in 2025. Officers wrote back and said where it had stopped short, and this one was rebuilt from scratch on the back of that. Same price.
Back to home282pages, up from 129
15sector chapters, up from ten
11headings shared by every sector chapter
8parts, from before you go to your first ninety days
What changed
Five things, all of them from readers.
Five new sectors. Health and Safety, Emergency Planning and Resilience, Training and Education, Local Government, and Construction and Project Delivery.
Four new chapters. Networking, losing the warrant card, timing your exit, and a rebuilt CV Toolkit.
Every sector to the same eleven headings, so they can be compared rather than just read.
Salary bands for all fifteen sectors, each carrying the date it was gathered. Early 2026, and the book says plainly they will drift.
Corrections from readers working in those sectors — salary figures, reference procedures and qualification requirements.
Inside the manual
Eight parts, roughly in the order the problems land.
Where You Could Land
Fifteen sectors, pages 28 to 177. Each written to the same eleven headings, so you can compare them rather than just read them.
Do You Need the Qualification?
Hard gate, real signal, or decoration. A decision tool, two price thresholds, and the answer that is usually no.
Making Yourself Legible
Translation as a method: strip the jargon, add the number, name the constraint, state the outcome. Then CVs, applicant tracking systems, LinkedIn, networking and recruiters.
Interviews and Offers
STAR and CARL and when each fits, how to answer why you left without tanking yourself, references, vetting and clearance, and the offer.
The Money
Net monthly against net monthly, not gross against gross. A forecasting method rather than advice, including the pension question it refuses to answer for you.
The First Ninety Days
What actually surprises you, how to tell adjustment from a bad fit, and fifty pieces of corporate language translated back into policing.
Your Toolkit
Seven printable tools, none taking more than half an hour, including the rebuilt CV Toolkit — written so it cannot invent a figure you didn’t give it.
Part Two · Where you could land
Fifteen sectors, held against each other.
Every chapter runs to the same eleven headings: what the work actually is, why ex-police land there, the job titles to search for, who’s hiring in the UK, what it pays at every level, which qualifications you need against which are decoration, one line of your CV translated for that sector, your first ninety days, who struggles, an honest read on how hard it is to get in, and the bottom line.
Security
from £24k–£29kCorporate and in-house protection. Easiest door in the book, and the easiest to get stuck behind.
Fraud and Financial Crime
from £30k–£38kRegulated detection work in banks and payments. The strongest pivot if you liked investigation.
Compliance
from £33k–£42kSecond line of defence. Well paid, and gated twice — on qualifications and on sector knowledge.
Investigations
from £30k–£40kCorporate, insurance and counter-fraud. The investigative method transfers almost wholesale.
Trust and Safety
from £26k–£32kOnline harm at platform scale. Very high crossover, with real exposure at the moderation end.
Safeguarding
from £26k–£34kSchools, universities, sport, housing. Meaningful work and the lowest pay in the book.
Health and Safety
from £28k–£36kRisk assessment and incident investigation. One certificate is the gate, and you buy it first.
Emergency Planning and Resilience
from £32k–£42kPlans, exercises and incident response. The highest crossover here and the least well known.
Human Resources
from £30k–£38kEmployee relations casework. Qualification-led, and not the soft landing people assume.
Training and Education
from £27k–£35kColleges, assessing and corporate learning. Best working life, lowest ceiling.
The Railway
from £25k–£34kControl, incident response and driving. The popular route and the sensible route differ.
Local Government
from £26k–£33kLicensing, anti-social behaviour and enforcement. Statutory powers and a real pension.
Construction and Project Delivery
from £30k–£40kOperational planning under another name. Go in through project support or a PMO.
The Civil Service
from £25k–£29kBorders, counter-fraud and the regulators. People fail at the application, not the interview.
Cyber
from £32k–£45kGovernance and threat intelligence. The best long-term money, and certifications are mandatory.
Crossover is how much of your policing experience counts on day one. The figures are entry bands only, gathered in early 2026 and carrying that date in the book — a place to start your own digging, not a quote. Each chapter carries the full range, from the lowest rung to what the sector can become.
282 pages. Instant PDF download, yours to keep. Same price as the first edition.
Read it before you buy anything. If it doesn’t read like something you’d use, don’t buy the book. Or see the CV and LinkedIn rewrites if you’d rather have a hand.