What’s the best way to improve your company’s internal security department? Is it updating your security cameras? Streamlining the guard hiring process? While such actions can certainly lead to significant improvements, one often-overlooked area can often have an even greater impact: the collection of data.
While data collection may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of on-site security, collecting and analyzing data will ultimately be your best solution for identifying potential threats, mitigating security risks, and improving guard performance.
Here’s a closer look at how collecting data can make a difference for your internal security department.
Better Data, Better Decisions
In reality, every aspect of your security can and should be subjected to careful data analysis. Having all pertinent security information stored in a single, easy-to-access location makes it significantly easier for management to identify recurring issues. With the right data, you are more likely to come up with appropriate solutions that actually resolve the challenges you face.
Naturally, the first area where data can make a difference is in mitigating your business’s current security threats. For example, a look at historical data collected from guard patrols and incident reports could reveal that a certain part of your facility is more likely to be targeted by thieves or vandals. Collected and organized historical information ensures that such a problem won’t be overlooked or neglected for long.
Data collection can also be used to monitor and improve guard performance. It is essential that you know which guards are completing their patrols as expected. There’s always room to become better, even with your highest performers. As the saying goes, “When performance is measured, performance improves.” Data analysis gives you the ability to identify where your guards can make improvements so they are better equipped to respond to future incidents.
How Can You Improve Security Data Collection?
But how do you ensure that you actually collect helpful data in the first place? It all starts by taking advantage of the tech tools that are now available to internal security departments. Long gone are the days when security managers needed to sift through paper reports to have any idea of which threats their facilities faced.
With modern guard tracking software, the process of collecting and analyzing data has been streamlined like never before. Real-time map displays allow managers to visually identify where a particular incident has taken place. When overlaid with historical information, it can become quickly apparent which areas are most incident-prone.
Regardless of whether the source of the trouble is a security threat or a recurring maintenance issue, this visual mapping allows management to correctly identify which problems should take top priority.
Similarly, guard tracking software adds much-needed transparency in evaluating personnel performance. With automatically recorded checkpoints, GPS tracking, and more, managers get a clearer picture of how a guard approaches their work. This allows for more direct and focused feedback that will lead to greater improvements. The automatic tracking of this information also reduces much of the workload typically associated with data collection.
Current security software delivers customized reporting for the above types of data, allowing you to look over the information in a way that will be most beneficial for your team. From text-only lists to graphs and charts, this adaptability ensures that you’ll have no trouble learning from your data.
Conclusion
With the right data in place, your internal security department will be better equipped to make proper personnel adjustments and other needed upgrades. By using the modern tools available to today’s workforce, this information will be more accurate and easier to analyze. This in turn improves your team’s ability to strategize and plan for the future, ensuring more efficient results than ever.
