There are all kinds of reasons why security is a major issue for businesses and sadly those reasons are likely to apply long into the future. With that in mind, here are four ways to up your business premises game.
Allocate time to undertake regular risk assessments
The first time you undertake a security risk assessment, it can be an eye-opening experience and it may highlight a lot of points you need to take action.
The second and subsequent times you undertake a security risk assessment, the results are unlikely to be as dramatic.
It is highly likely you will find that small changes in how you do business, may lead to you needing to adjust your security.
The changes in technology now make it possible to implement an existing control, in a way that is more effective and/or more affordable.
Access control systems will allow you to monitor each and every person who enters your building or even the car park. So, before a security breach even happens, you can understand exactly who is within your premises – and who shouldn’t be.
Think in terms of “who needs to be let in” rather than “who needs to be kept out”
Your external security is, quite literally, your first line of defense against intruders.
So, it makes sense to make it as secure as possible and to do your best to find the budget to invest in technologies. These technologies may include electric security gates, intercom systems, and CCTV.
If CCTV is out of your budget right now, fake cameras may act as a deterrent to some extent, but real ones are obviously better.
Not sure this would work? British Police have been using cardboard cut-outs of police offers in retail shops for years. This has proven successful against deterring thieves. There’s also talk that they may even be moving towards cut-outs of police vehicles to stop speeding.
Within your premises, think about which staff actually need access to which areas of your building and take steps to limit them to those areas.
In the old days, this meant assigning physical keys as appropriate. However, these days it is usually both convenient and effective to use proximity cards and/or fobs. This can act as an official identity for those who actually work in the building – or else how would they obtain this kind of access?
External security is also incredibly important to reduce the risk of vehicle thefts. If unwanted visitors try to access your site, certain types of security barriers will stop any thieves exiting your premises.
Remember health and safety is also a security measure
Although the main benefit of health and safety is that it keeps people healthy and safe, it also plays a role in security.
Health and safety incidents can be used to create a diversion which prevents people from noticing that unauthorized activity is taking place (or being too preoccupied to do anything about it).
Even worse, health-and-safety failings can be used as leverage for an attack. For example, if a business is known to have a potential fire hazard, this could be used as the basis for an arson attack.
Ensure fire exits, or any entry for that matter, into your building, is monitored. Whether by security cameras, an officer or separate secure pedestrian gate which can be locked from the inside. These options can help to ensure those on the outside cannot enter. This will help to deter any distractions when it comes to health and safety.
Having a solid health and safety procedure in place is un-measurable, especially if you’re in charge of a school, where the safety of children is in your hands. Ensuring the premises of school grounds are secure from strangers and unwanted parked vehicles will not only protect the children but also the staff.
Health and Safety management is essential for every business, no matter the size. Whether it’s to control hazards or monitor and streamline the time of your employees, ensuring your business has solid health and safety procedures in place will only benefit you.
Invest in a robust alarm system
Obviously you want to do everything possible to ensure that an alarm never needs to be raised, however, in the real world; hope is not a good strategy.
What’s more, the very fact of having a robust alarm system in place can make it less likely that you will need to use it as it is also a form of deterrent.
Ideally, your alarm system should not just respond to threats from outside the building (e.g. someone trying to force entry) but should be integrated into your internal access controls.
For example, if someone tries to access an unauthorized area or fails to secure an area when they leave it, you can investigate and decide what action, if any, needs to be taken.
Of course, depending on your business, you may have a large outside space in which you keep vehicles parked. Unfortunately, claims against stolen tools and vehicles continue to rise and so it’s never been more important to secure the exterior and interior of your commercial premises.
In Conclusion
To ensure you don’t have to make a claim yourself, a range of security measures, from CCTV to road blockers and security gates would benefit your business premises and perhaps even lower your insurance premium.
Having a more secure entry may even give you insight into the types of people that enter your premises daily – both visitors and employees. This type of information will allow you to ensure all staff are safe and that proper procedures are in place, should anything ever go wrong.
