POLIS
Technology, Research, and Training to Build Public Trust and Safety
®
Who We Are
Polis Solutions was founded by the creators of a $40M Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) effort to develop innovative methods and technologies for training social interaction skills. We are a technology, research, and training firm that specializes in creating custom evidence-based programs that build public trust and safer communities.
Dr. Jonathan M. Wender
Co-Founder, President & CEO
Dr. Brian Lande
Co-Founder and Chief Scientist
Jonathan Wender is a twenty-year police veteran and interdisciplinary social scientist. His area of expertise is face-to-face social interactions in critical situations where risk is high and trust is low. Jonathan has broad experience developing and implementing training programs that integrate social and tactical skills, and is lead developer of Polis Solutions' T3 - Tact, Tactics, and Trust training system. Prior to co-founding Polis, Jonathan helped develop and launch the Strategic Social Interaction Modules (SSIM) Program at DARPA, and served with the program as senior advisor. Jonathan previously served on the faculty at the University of Washington in the Department of Sociology and Law, Societies, and Justice Program. Jonathan is widely recognized as a subject-matter expert on police-community interactions, police use of force, officer decision-making, police training, and other related topics. He holds a Ph.D. in criminology from Simon Fraser University (2004). Jonathan is the author of Policing and the Poetics of Everyday Life, a multidisciplinary analysis of police-community encounters.
Brian Lande has ten years of police experience and holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of California at Berkeley. Brian is still an active-duty officer with a police department in the San Francisco Bay Area. He previously served as founding program manager for the DARPA SSIM program, and has extensive experience integrating social science research and technology to develop training systems.
As Polis' Chief Science Officer, Brian oversees a range of research and development projects that provide the scientific foundation for the Polis Patrol Expert digital training system and T3 - Tact, Tactics, and Trust curriculum. He previously served as an expert on the psychology of decision-making during critical incidents for the State of California Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission (CA POST). Brian supported the training developments "Edge of Chaos" and Initial Response to Critical Incidents (IRCI).