Train your Physical Security Team like a Pro

Throughout my long career in the security field, I have created and managed a great number of physical security training programs. After building out many of these programs for the U.S. military and U.S. Intelligence agencies, I went on to deliver custom-designed programs for corporate security and large-scale tech companies such as Google, Meta, Fitbit, and GoFundMe. In a field as vast as corporate security, it is critically important to have a keen area of specialization. I specialize in creating and running highly effective corporate security training programs. If this is a hot topic for you and you want to know more, read on!????

Identifying the security problem you’re trying to solve

Before you set about implementing any organizational program, it is imperative to ask these two questions up front:

• What is the problem we are trying to solve??
• And what is the correct tool or action to solve it??

While training is a powerful tool, training alone cannot fix every problem you may face within your current physical security program. The skill sets of your current security team may be misaligned with the job and mission they have been given. Maybe your company’s policies and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) are poorly written and impossible to implement within the work environment you're trying to safeguard. Maybe you have the wrong security equipment and poorly written policies, or that equipment is poorly placed, or your policies are not being read. Training cannot fix those issues. However, appropriate training can address the following topics because they are all true behavioral and security operational process learning objectives:

• Security Officer and Help Center Customer Service Skills
• Security Awareness and Operational Security Mindset?
• Understanding of Security Protocol and Process
• Emergency Preparedness and Response
• Workplace Violence Detection and Prevention
• Professional De-escalation skills
• Objective Incident Report Writing?
• Executive Protection Operations and Nuances??

Of course, other hot security issues besides these can benefit from proper training. However, as you launch a security training program, ensure the training can realistically meet the operational security needs your organization may be facing.????

Tools and methods for security training program development

When an organization decides to build or improve upon its corporate security training program, the ADDIE method of instructional design is the optimal choice. ADDIE, or “Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, and Evaluate,” is an ideal work?ow model for security organizations to follow as they build out their security training program and all of their security programs.??

I'll walk you through the ADDIE process related to corporate security training program development.??

Analyze: Through a formal Training Needs Assessment performed by an experienced instructional designer, use qualitative and quantitative data to identify the programmatic security problems you're trying to solve and the security training gaps you wish to ?ll. This is the most important step, and if you do it correctly, your training objectives and priorities will become clear and justifiable.?

Design: As you identify your security learning objectives, remember that all learning objectives must be measurable and observable to be true learning objectives. And because you may need to justify any budgetary or resource request in the future, adding measurement metrics to your training program will help you prove Return On Investment (ROI).??

Develop: Assign experienced Instructors to design solid Learning Management System (LMS) training modules focused on enhancing the learner’s training experience. The training experience can end up being a elearning module, an instructive video, a classroom experience, or a combination of all three.

Implement: Deliver the learning experience in a set time frame. Be upfront on how long this training will take, and be clear about the expectations you desire from the security workforce after completing this training. When legal and compliance standards are required, ensure 100% of your security workforce takes a specified training. You must prove this when a regulatory inspector visits you or after a major security incident or breach. If a workplace violence incident occurs on site, it is not a good look to have no idea which security teammates have taken the workplace violence training and which have not. As you launch your training program, please be careful about programming your LMS to record what percentage of your security team has taken an assigned training at any given time.??????

Evaluate: Utilize the Learning Management System (LMS) and instructional designers to prove the Return On Investment (ROI) of your training experiences. If your current instructional design team (or vendor) says that cannot be done, have them retrained or hire a more experienced team or vendor. Some instructional designers need help with this task because it can be tedious and challenging if the data they are working with is not solid.???

Establish a corporate security training production lifecycle?

Once you determine that training is indeed the appropriate tool and action you require to improve your existing corporate security program, you should implement a training production workflow which may look something like this:

1. Training Request Intake
2. Instructional Designer Review of Training Request
3. Instructional Designer will Design the Training and Create the Learning Objective
4. Instructional Designer will Develop the Training Product to address all Learning Needs of the Requestor fully
5. The Final Training Product will be Reviewed and Approved by Requestor
6. Training Product Launch
7. Training Product Performance Evaluation
8. Training Product Redesign of needed to be Based on Performance Evaluation

If you follow your security training production workflow meticulously,? you will find that, over time, identifying learning needs, delivering effective training, and evaluating the effectiveness of your training will come naturally.?

A final note:?

I have been in the government and corporate security training building business for twenty years. If you have questions or want me to build a corporate security training program for your company or organization, you can contact me anytime to request my services.