Pauline Smith is recognised at call centres throughout the land as being one of the top bosses in the industry. However, the centres in which Pauline works aren't the advice lines and help desks we may associate with the term. They're the 999 control rooms that field our crisis-calls. Since November, Pauline's been overseeing Notts Police's control centre. Jennifer Scott meets her to discuss her work...

IN the early hours of the morning, Pauline Smith and her husband Stephen were awoken by a sound most of us would dread – the chatter and clatter of five male intruders in her kitchen.

Quickly and quietly, Pauline made her way to the bedroom phone in her Staffordshire bungalow and dialled 999. As she did so, the handle of her bedroom door began to turn.

The burglars, hearing Pauline's voice on the other side of the door, left the property. As they sauntered down the drive with studied nonchalance, she described what she saw to the operator.

Many of us would linger on the terror of the encounter; the slow-motion horror of the moving door handle. But, for Pauline, that night three years ago is a classic example of a job well done.

Thanks to her 999 call, the police arrived within minutes and picked up the criminals. Pauline can detail exactly how the case was proved against the men (DNA on a coke can one of them had carelessly chucked in her front garden). She knows how many other burglaries they had committed in her village that night (five) and how long the ringleader's prison sentence was (six years).

Would she advise people to keep a phone by their bed at night?

"Would I just?!" she smiles.

Pauline, 44, is one of Notts Police's most recent and revolutionary recruits.

She joined the force in November as the head of control centre operations – in other words, the woman who oversees the 330-strong team who respond to our phoned-in pleas for police assistance.

Pauline is one of recently-arrived Chief Constable Julia Hodson's most notable appointments so far. Pauline's post is normally filled by a police officer. There is in fact only one other control centre head in England and Wales whose name isn't prefixed by the abbreviation "Supt".

Pauline, however, is a police staffer – somebody who knows the work inside out and is respected within the industry.

She joined Staffordshire's control room at the age of 21 and, in 2005, was the first person from the force to be named European contact manager of the year by an industry magazine.

It is hoped her appointment will bring continuity to the role, as well as building trust and confidence between the public and the police during that first, vital 999 interchange.

Her manner is relaxed and informal, yet crucially to-the-point – precisely the approach all operators must perfect for extracting critical crime-scene information from callers who may be very traumatised.

"The importance of the first call and the action taken afterwards is crucial," says Pauline. "People need to feel comfortable talking to you. If you're speaking to a distressed person, you need to calm them down and empathise with them.

"You might be on the phone for an hour with somebody who is trying to commit suicide. Because you have a relationship with that person, you can't just break that off by moving on to something else. We get a lot of those types of calls every day."

Notts Police's control centre received approximately 251,947 999 calls last year – 97 per cent of them answered within 10 seconds.

The centre is split over two sites – one in Mansfield and one at Sherwood Lodge.

The room at Sherwood Lodge has the look of a typical, open-plan office, with rows of desks and people on telephones.

However, you soon remember the phone conversations contain details of traumatic incidents that may still be ongoing. Some computer screens show maps that pinpoint the location of such incidents, while others show CCTV pictures.

If police attendance is required, control staff will radio a patrol and an ambulance if necessary. Similarly, if there's a disturbance spotted on the CCTV pictures, the staff will radio a running commentary of the incident to the approaching patrol.

"We can swing into action in a moment," says Pauline.

Control centre staff come from a range of backgrounds – from kebab shops to bank cashiers.

"We normally get people from some kind of customer service background," says Pauline. "You need an inquisitive mind and an ability to organise dispatch teams and logistics. But the most important thing is to listen." Call centres, Pauline admits, have taken a bashing. "In the past they've had a bad press, the battery hen kind of idea," she says. "But it does require a high skill level. Call centres are the highest employment industry in the country – they employ two per cent of the population."

As you can imagine, the intense content of many of the calls can take its toll on the staff. However, the police are on hand to support them, via its occupational health unit which monitors staff.

The respect Pauline has garnered during her career has extended far beyond the reaches of the police.

Even the Queen has recognised Pauline's work. While advising Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary on 999 calls, Pauline was seconded to the Home Office for two years. There she was a specialist staff officer, reporting to Sir Ronnie Flanagan, who made his name as chief constable of the old Royal Ulster Constabulary.

She returned to her then-force, Staffordshire, as deputy head for contact and was then nominated for an MBE which she collected in November.

"I was delighted to be nominated – absolutely speechless," she smiles. "When I went to collect it, the Queen was asking which part of the service I work in. When I told her it was 999 calls she said it must be a job where it's very difficult to predict what might happen. I told her it was about careful planning."

That may be so, but control centre staff must also sort the wheat from the chaff.

Hoax callers are a daily headache although, says Pauline, the vast majority turn out to be children.

Non-emergency "emergencies" are another problem. "Do I need a license for a tortoise? How do I fill in a job application? Where can I buy milk at 4am?" says Pauline, reeling off some of the dilemmas people seem to class as worthy of a 999 call.

"But we have to be careful in case there's something behind it," she adds. "We have to investigate what that person's telling us before we conclude it's not an emergency. The person calling us may be vulnerable and we have to tailor the service accordingly."

Over the last 12-18 months, Nottingham's speed of answer rate for 999 calls has risen from 39th (out of 43 forces) to 11th.

In April crime recording will, for the first time, move to the control centre. All details will be logged officially at that first point of contact so defendants don't have to repeat themselves further down the investigation.

"We will log the details and then email them to the investigating officer's mobile," explains Pauline.

Other forces are sitting up and taking note of Pauline's appointment.

"It's become a bit of a national focus and I'm getting lots of calls from other forces," she says.

"There's a realisation of how important that first point of contact is in delivering confidence for the public."