Is training really needed in today’s economical environment? our editorial board member Mark Hanna asks.
With continuous cuts in spending and a micro-management approach to budgets, does security and risk awareness training have a place in our industry, or can this now be carried out by the resident security managers or their equivalent business sectors such as facilities, and health and safety? Can we now dispense with an outside resource and associated costs, and transfer the spend to something more productive for the business? These are questions that have crossed the minds of many managers over the last couple of years. Some have reduced the training of their staff, or on some cases removed the need for training altogether, but does this in itself bring another issue to the corporate risk table? To answer this question, I invited three well-known industry colleagues to air their views.<br><br>Richard Diston spent seven years in the RAF before leaving to work in a variety of sectors of the security industry as a freelance operative. He moved over from the front line to deliver training and consultancy. Richard is a fully qualified Physical Restraint Coach (BTEC level three) and Handcuffing Instructor (BTEC level three). He is a Director of Safety Training & Risk Management Ltd (wwww.strm.co.uk) and is a speaker on the subjects as varied as self-defence and the law, staff development and staff motivation. With a little work, he says, we can all improve ourselves to make our futures brighter and more peaceful.<br><br><br>Anyone who has been to a major security show in recent years will have noticed that the emphasis of the shows are now firmly on the provision of systems and physical security. This year as I wandered the seemingly endless rows of CCTV cameras at one well-known show I tried my best to justify my attendance to myself. I found myself considering that if the show was representative of what the security industry wants, then perhaps the industry is losing touch with what is really important. I clarify this statement with a recent experience I had while undertaking NVQ assessments. I encountered a number of officers who could not use a radio properly, could not write a reliable report and in one case had no idea what their response to a fire alarm should be. Their basic industry knowledge was almost zero and most officers could not recall any of the core information from their licence-linked training. What was worse was that their managers were aware of the ‘effectiveness’ of their personnel and simply shrugged it off, instead dealing with it by taking more responsibility onto their own shoulders.<br><br>In conversation, it became apparent that the prevailing attitude was one of apathy. Training was something that would be undertaken only when a proverbial gun was placed against the head of the industry, or else if a huge amount of ‘free’ funding suddenly became available. Training is becoming a carrot and stick situation. It was mentioned that if the SIA do not require a licence holder to undertake any formal refresher training at renewal (despite three years and many legislation and threat changes after initial training) then there was no need for the company to pay for it. Introduction of physical skills training for door supervisors (long overdue and a step in the right direction) and the total confusion on what licence holders need to do to renew in light of this change just adds to the apathy.<br><br>It is worth at this point discussing the law – or ‘the stick’. The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 Section 2(2)(c) states that it is the “…duty of the employer to provide information, instruction, training and supervision as is necessary to ensure the Health, Safety and Welfare of staff whilst at work.” It is conceivable that security work can be high risk and a failure to train staff in an ongoing and appropriate manner could lead to enormous fines under the new Health and Safety Offences Act and Corporate Manslaughter Act. In terms of training becoming cost-effective, consider that a death resulting from an identified lack of training could cost the company a minimum of £500,000 or ten per cent of their turnover for the previous three years, whichever is greater. That is without mentioning the director actually facing jail time. We can make ‘the stick’ even bigger by discussing the possibility of the thousands of employment tribunals just waiting to happen because organisations have withdrawn training for their staff. If something goes wrong it is security staff who need to respond. However serious the situation might be, however expensive it might get, it can always get more expensive when the staff learn their legal rights.<br><br>It cannot be argued that there is a lot of ‘stick’ about, and what is mentioned here is really only the tip of the iceberg. Some are doing a roaring trade using ‘the stick’ to generate training business, however it should be worth considering the sheer size of ‘the carrot’. <br><br>The benefits of a trained workforce are far greater than simply meeting legal requirements and avoiding costly court cases. Staff who are engaged in an ongoing programme of training and development are considered to stay in an organisation longer, thereby limiting the costs of recruitment and training replacements. Trained staff should also be considered ‘bench strength’. When an organisation needs to expand and find supervisors and managers, the best and most cost-effective place to look are the current rank and file. A forward thinking organisation should consider their officers not just as officers but as potential managers of the future. It is always better for an organisation to grow the staff that they need because they can rarely hire them – have you ever heard ‘good staff are hard to find’? Having a strong team of replacements ‘on the bench’ can only benefit an organisation. In the security industry, the staff are our product. They are what the client sees. Try sending scruffy, ignorant and untrained officers to your best client site and see how long it takes your contract to be reviewed. Then try and argue a valid case for cutting back on training.<br><br>Let’s take a step further. As the managerial workforce in the security industry ages, where are our replacements coming from? Who on your current team would you trust to perform a risk analysis, a planning operation and a briefing for the deployment of a high value staff member to a high risk location overseas? Someone can only perform this kind of high-level security management if they have been trained to do so and have a solid core competence. Certainly, it does not happen overnight. It takes years of consistent training. Some forward thinking managers regularly quiz their subordinates not just on the core knowledge they should have from their licence linked training but also on the ‘why’ of their on-site procedures in an effort to develop the depth of knowledge and analytical ability that the industry will need. <br><br>Any manager who fancies a challenge should implement a system of regular staff testing on core competencies. It doesn’t need to be long or time-consuming, and it will immediately become apparent where the weaknesses in your operation are, and what training is needed to overcome them. It will also highlight those in the role who lack the attitude to learn and develop into professionals in our industry. Can we expect an officer who cannot be bothered to maintain his own knowledge and improve his employability to respond appropriately to an emergency incident? In reference to my previous observations about the NVQ assessing: some client somewhere is paying for those ‘officers’. Without a training system for our front line staff, officers with no interest in their jobs will slip under the radar and continue to provide zero quality services to our clients – something that is extremely harmful not only to our businesses but also to the common perception of our industry. The less valuable we appear, the less we can charge.<br><br>I would also suggest the threat is greater now than at any other time in our cultural history. Those who wish us harm have more knowledge, more experience and more tools at their disposal. You can bet on one thing about the organisations out there that are planning harm against your organisation, client assets or service users – they are training. <br><br>With tighter budgets, thin margins and an increasingly aggressive marketplace it might seem cost-effective to invest money in all singing, all dancing systems that are a one-time investment and will remain operationally effective for several years. I would suggest that no matter how clever a system may be, it will always eventually require a response from a living, breathing security officer. Training of that officer will define their judgement of the severity of the situation, not to mention the potential loss to the client and their employer. It should all be about training. I find it hard to imagine what could be more productive for the business than well-trained, well-motivated officers, not just for the present but for the future of our industry.<br> <br>Ken Livingstone is the Director of Perpetuity Training. He served as an officer in the Royal Military Police before gaining an MSc in Security Management and Information Technology at Leicester University. He later directed the Scarman Centres degree courses in Security Management, before leaving to direct Loughborough University’s Security Management courses. Ken later retuned to Leicester where he was appointed Assistant Director before leaving to create Perpetuity Training. Ken is Fellow and Board Member of the Security Institute, a Visiting Lecturer at Leicester University, and an External Examiner at Loughborough University. <br> <br><br>Training whether internal or externally provided should always be driven by a desire for quality of customer service, quality of staff, and quality of company performance. Without these three elements the excellence, provision and market share of a company cannot be maintained, let alone developed, and it is in delivering these three elements that the value of training rests. Security training is no different, and in a competitive market, and one currently facing a particularly challenging set of economic circumstances, it makes sense to look to company spend and to rationalise budgets where possible. Traditionally the security training budget has been an area where managers have sought to make savings and the temptation to do so may be strong. Reviewing a company’s training programme and the individual courses that comprise it makes perfect sense and should be done on a regular basis. The focus should not, however, be on the ‘cost’ or ‘spend’ of security training but the ‘value’. By looking at the value of the training we can measure it against need, quality and cost rather than on cost alone.<br><br>The value of a training programme (security or otherwise) rests upon how well it contributes to the vision, mission, goals and targets of the company, and the right way to approach company training programmes and training budgets is to first look at the necessity of the provision and then the quantifiable quality of that provision in relation to cost. When reviewing the company training programme first look at the company’s vision and mission statements, then its goals and targets, then look at its policies, plans and procedures. A company’s training programme should be directly aligned with these and should contribute directly to achieving them. Every course of instruction comprising the training programme should contribute directly to delivering on specific goals and targets, delivering on projects and operations, and help in the realisation of the company vision and mission. If a training programme or course does not do this then there is a clear indication that it is not aligned to company needs, that it is not adding value and that it is probably an extraneous expense. Only once the security training programme is correctly aligned with the security strategy, and with the needs of the company, can the issue of internal or external training provision be examined. The basis for determining whether to use in house or consultant trainers, or a mixture of the two, once again rests on value rather than cost. There are five key questions that need to be answered when considering the value of using in house or consultant trainers these are my training five Cs.<br><br>The first is ‘capability’: who is the best writer and deliverer of the best content? Second is ‘capacity’: who has the time and resources to best deliver the training? Third is ‘confidence’: which training deliverer will most inspire confidence in you, your staff and customers? Fourth, ‘certification’:, beyond the content and delivery does the course have a formal value – who is underwriting it and certificating it? Final C is ‘cost’; bearing in mind the four proceeding Cs who can deliver the training most cost effectively.<br><br>There can be little doubt that staff training is an essential requirement one that can make the difference between a great business, a good business and no business at all. A study conducted by Cranfield University found that even beyond the value of the training itself, training staff made them more likely to stay with the business (reducing recruitment spend and expertise loss) with a third of companies reporting increased motivation and almost half saving money through training. Training then is a route to business success, the right programme with the right deliverer will take you there whether it is via in-house provision or the use of specialist providers.<br><br>Richard Stanley is the head of UK security for PricewaterhouseCoopers which employs 17,000 people and occupies 35 offices across the UK. He is responsible for all aspects of security including physical security, electronic security systems, risk assessments, investigations and global travel security for all UK staff. Before joining PwC he served for eight years in the British Army with tours of duty in the Falklands, Canada, Hong Kong and Brunei. He is a member of the American Society of Industrial Security (ASIS) and is an active participant in various security interest groups.<br> <br>In these challenging economic times it is almost expected that all budgets will be challenged. The training budgets in any organisation are always deemed as over specified or unnecessary and in most cases are the first to be reduced or withdrawn completely. As a buyer of security services including guarding, I am aware of the fine balance between reducing costs and exposing my organisation to unnecessary risks. The costs of training for security officers will always end up being paid for by the customer regardless of the type and duration. The corporate security manager has a responsibility to ensure the appropriate level of training is given to the security teams to enable them to deliver the agreed services. Most corporate organisation will insist that their security officers on site are ‘fully trained’ sometime with little clarification on what this means, consequently there is little justification for costs and the funding is withdrawn. This needs to be addressed and the definition of fully trained needs to be clearly identified and documented within the contract including types of training, minimum hours per man per year and the cost. The specified minimum standards for security officers are also important. From my point of view things like reporting writing, telephone manor, appearance etc. are not training issues they are core generic requirements of a security officer. Far too many security providers will acknowledge the minimum requirements documented at tender stage but fail to deliver in practice. <br><br>There are of course hundreds of different courses and training opportunities across the industry and it is important that the any training undertaken is relevant to the task being undertaken particularly as the customer is ultimately paying for the training. Training security officers in areas that are not relevant to their roles will of course be challenged and budgets reduced accordingly. There is an opportunity for security companies and customers to work together in ensuring value added training is maintained. As a customer it would be unrealistic of me to expect my guarding supplier to be accountable for delivering the services without any training. On the other hand there needs to be a balance of what is deemed as a core requirement of the contract, what is essential to the role, what can be self delivered and what specialist areas of training do we need.<br>From a personal perspective the delivery of all my training needs cannot be delivered from within the in house team neither do we have an unlimited budget to have specialist individual trainers on a regular basis. What we have is a security supplier that understands our business and our requirements and is working in partnership with us to deliver cost effective training solutions that mitigate identified risks.<br><br>The security company that can demonstrate a self-delivery training matrix that’s meets the customer’s requirements (or the majority of them at least) in a cost effective manor will enhance their standing in the market place and provide the elusive “added value”. <br>If an organisation purchases security guarding services on price alone then there is little margin for any sort of dedicated training. It is the corporate security managers responsibility to ensure their businesses and procurement departments are “bought in” to the concept of adding value as opposed to just cutting cost. A well-trained security officer will add value to an organisation and in some cases prevent litigation and negative publicity to brand reputation.<br><br>Mark Hanna sums up:<br><br>As we have read, there is still a need and a drive towards training, despite the in-house management constantly being asked to look at shrinkage wherever possible. This ‘requirement’ must be looked at from a much wider aspect than just individual needs, and placed in the correct category alongside other corporate risks. However not all business departments view training as a necessity and often analyse the differential between experience and qualification. This is clearly not the way forward as our ‘experiences’ are not always right for the business, the individuals and indeed the industry. Experiences are often based on our thought perceptions and not always reality and needs of others. This in itself is a risk to the business and there are many cases within the industry of neglect through perception, or probably more commonly known as the blinkered approach. Surely then, we must argue that training supplied by a recognised, qualified and authorised body needs to remain a focal point for us all, our business needs and the continuous reduction in corporate risk as in Ken Livingstone’s five Cs approach above. To quote Beverly Sills, the American operatic soprano: “There are no short cuts to any place worth going.”
