The life of a police negotiator conjures images of megaphones and SWAT teams. But discovers the subtle art of Suzanne Williams' job is more about listening

The country's leading hostage negotiator, Detective Superintendent Suzanne Williams, clearly has no ordinary job.

"This Nigerian hostage situation has been going on for months and it's all come to a head - can you call back later?" she says on one of her more busy days.

Last week, Ms Williams was presented with the Hertfordshire Woman of the Year Award - which she proudly added to her other accolades, including a Queen's Police Medal for Distinguished Service.

Previously head of the Metropolitan Police's Kidnap Unit, this top cop from Cockfosters, heads up the Met's Hostage and Crisis Negotiation Unit, where she literally takes charge of life threatening situations every day.

In such a charged environment, good communication skills are a vital ingredient. But, as she explains, much of her work is about training officers to listen, rather than diving straight into a crisis and fixing things'. It is these vital listening skills that help when training staff to deal with kidnappings in London on a weekly basis.

Fortunately, she says, nothing has gone wrong with these hostage situations, and her unit boasts a 100 per cent success rate for securing releases.

Ms Williams was senior investigator in charge of the kidnap unit between 2000 and 2002, and is restricted as to what she can reveal for security reasons. But she also has another reason for not talking too openly about her work.

She said: "I was on the radio once and had calls from hundreds of people wanting me to find their children who had been kidnapped and taken to Pakistan."

Instead, it is in the capital where the majority of her negotiating skills are put to use.

She said: "Most of them are criminally orchestrated. We try to buy time to negotiate, and by buying time you can get a plan together. It also helps to alleviate some of the tension - and then try to talk them out of doing something silly."

The unit was set up in response to the 1975 Spaghetti House siege' when gunmen held hostages in a London restaurant for five days, and the Balcombe House siege in 1976 when a shooting in Mayfair led to a man breaking into a flat and taking a couple hostage for six days.

Since 2002, Ms Williams has also headed up the department dealing with hostage situations overseas - and not just when British citizens are involved.

Countries prone to kidnappings include Nigeria, Mexico and the US, where she says anyone from a tourist to a charity worker are often targeted.

She said: "We play an advisory role, but have no legal powers overseas. The teams also work closely with the FBI exchanging ideas.

Currently Ms Williams is advising the Nigerian Foreign Office.

She said: "It's a common place for kidnappings. On this occasion it involves Malaysians, Indonesians and Romanians."

Another side to her work involves suicide prevention. She said: "The tops of cranes seem like a popular place to commit suicide at the moment. People think negotiators talk people down off window ledges, but we actually listen them down. You have to let them know you're there to help."

Although Ms Williams has had a 90 per cent success rate to date, she said: "Of course, you never know if they will go off and do it again somewhere else."

The most challenging cases are often those that involve people with mental health problems. She added: "You may get a situation where someone has barricaded themselves in and might have a knife."

Then, of course, there's the ten per cent of the cases that don't end in saving someone's life.

"I tell myself and my staff that it's never the negotiator's fault, but that person's choice to put themselves on that bridg," she said. "You have to respect that it is their decision to jump.

"I've been doing this for years, and of course it still affects you, but as a police officer you are used to seeing unsavoury things."

As Christmas draws nearer, is she expecting an increase in suicides? "We actually get more calls in the summer," she said. "People are drunk more in the summer. And New Year too.

"Fortunately, we've saved quite a few people. I don't mention examples because I don't want to give people ideas. If you say that 99 people have killed themselves jumping from Suicide Bridge in Archway Road, Highgate this year, there will always be someone who wants to become the hundredth."