Last week, we have the good fortune to talk to Jorge Fernandez, Director of Special Services at Admiral Security Services about some real world security operations where our guard tour system is used. We got some useful insights from the conversation and I thought I would share them with you.

The Value of a Guard Tour System

We always wonder where our customers get the greatest value from our products. Jorge thought it was pretty clear, as he says, “the value is supervision.” Without a system like this, you simply are not keeping track of your operations as well as you could.

While, others have told us, there is competitive advantage, to using this kind of system, Jorge told us that most of his competition were using similar systems, “everyone uses them” he said.

We have found that many smaller companies are not using any security guard app, his opinion was that they could not grow without this kind of technology. When asked if they needed to embrace guard tour systems, he replied, “to grow yes, but a lot of those companies do not want to grow.”

Proper use of RFID checkpoints

Our customers use RFID tag checkpoints in a variety of ways. Jorge certainly thought that you should be strategic about placing checkpoint tags rather than just placing them everywhere. “If you put a lot of tags in the system, it becomes robotic. The security officer is not doing their job, just rushing from tag to tag to tag.”

So what makes a good strategic choice for a checkpoint? “You need to put them in a location where there is something that needs to be checked, something you expect in that area.” By placing the tags at these important locations, you make sure your officer will be doing his best to spend his time most usefully.

The Future of Security Reporting

While no one has a crystal ball, we are always interested how changes in technology will affect the security guard industry. One thing we have seen is how artificial intelligence is getting used to flag issues so people don’t need read through all the reports. Jorge however was happy doing just that, “I don’t mind reviewing the daily reports, it lets me know what they are doing.” On the other hand, some smart alerts would probably be helpful, particularly flagging missed tasks, “If it could tell me what they are not doing, I could get ahead of the problem.”

When asked about how robots and drones might affect his company, he did not think it would happen for quite some time, “we do a lot of customer service, technology can’t do customer service.”

At the end of the day, drones might be used for some large campuses, to reduce the number of fixed cameras but you always need manpower to back them up.

It’s always great to get feedback from a security professional out in the field and these insights certainly support some of our beliefs around how technology is affecting the security guarding industry.