Feral Jundi

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Guatemala: Private Security Is Good Business In Guatemala

Filed under: Guatemala,Industry Talk — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 1:25 AM

     “The guards and the guns they wield — pump action shotguns and old revolvers — mark the front doors of businesses and the guard gates of wealthy neighborhoods. They have become accepted members of a culture numb to crime,” Fieser writes. Professor Ungar says: “Can you imagine walking into a Guatemala City shopping mall and not seeing a guard? People wouldn’t know what to do…. Guards have become a social phenomenon. They are part of the fabric of urban life.”

*****

     Wow, sometimes you stumble upon some really cool statistics that just give you a pause.  This article is filled with those kinds of statistics, and this thing delves into South African and Brazilian statistics on security guards as well.

     My take away on all of this, is that the main theme I see repeated over and over again throughout the world when it comes to guards or security contractors is that if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. Also, without standards and some kind of a regulatory body with teeth, you will have problems. And what do you know, our industry is coming up against these same issues, and I just don’t get why these lessons are not learned and applied? Well, I do know why–because security is a luxury in most folks minds, until someone gets hurt or killed, and regulating an industry takes effort and leadership. Most folks in charge in these countries are poor leaders and lazy or the government organizations tasked with monitoring and regulating, have no money or resources to do that job. (or they just don’t think it is a worthy expense)

   Well, on the plus side, at least all of these security industries throughout the world have access to the internet.  They can actually research what works and what doesn’t work, and the information is there for anyone interested in applying Kaizen to their industry. There are folks in these countries who care, and who are trying to do what is right, and bravo to them for keeping up the fight. Maybe the folks in Guatemala will be reading Feral Jundi and get a feel for the best industry practices?  Who knows, but I have to think that everyone’s learning organizations will only be enhanced by what is currently out there.  All they have to do is grab that information and ‘build a snowmobile’ out of it. –Matt

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Private security is good business in Guatemala

22 March 2010

In the United States there are 1.09 million private guards — that is, one guard for every 280 people; in Guatemala, a country of 13 million people, there are between 100,000 to 150,000 guards (the exact number is not known since many of these companies do not bother to register with the authorities); this is one guard for every 85 to 130 residents; the combined number of state and federal police in the United States is 883,600; Guatemala has roughly 22,000 active police officers

When it comes to crime and lawlessness, few countries could match South Africa. Just one example: The United States has a population of 307,000,000. South Africa’s population is 49,000,000. The number of murders committed in the United States between April 2008 and March 2009: 16,204. The comparable number in South Africa during the same period: 18,148. The murder rate in South Africa is 38.6 murders per 100,000 citizens. The world’s average for murder is 5 per 100 000.

The prevalence of crime, especially violent crime, is one manifestation of lawlessness. Another manifestation is the health of the private security industry. The business of private security thrives in countries on which the government does not offer sufficient protection to the people at the same time that it does not do enough to fight crime.

Two countries in which the private security sector thrives are South Africa and Brazil. There are other countries, too, in which offering private security services is a lucrative business.

Ezra Fieser writes in GlobalPost that Guatemala is one of these countries. Security guards employed by private companies in Guatemala outnumber police seven-to-one. Throughout Latin America private security guard forces dwarf police rolls (note that even the United States has more guards than police — 1.09 million to 883,600, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Fieser notes that this is about one guard for every 280 people).

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Thursday, March 11, 2010

Kaizen: FPS Using Covert/Overt Inspections For Contractor Security Posts

Filed under: Industry Talk,Kaizen,Leadership — Tags: , , , , , , , — Matt @ 12:34 PM

     FPS officials said in a statement that it has increased both overt and covert inspections of security posts, as well as its oversight of contract guards. 

*****

   Hmmm, I wonder if FPS is reading Feral Jundi. lol Actually this practice of overt and covert inspections is pretty common in a few agencies out there.  The Postal Service even uses mystery shoppers to get a real feel for their customer service and inner workings of offices, so this is nothing new for federal agencies. Mystery shopping is very common in other industries as well, and I have covered that here before.

    But what boggles my mind, is why haven’t more private military companies used this concept?  If you truly care about what is going on with your company, you should be fully involved with collecting intelligence on the inner workings of your company. That means sending folks out to your sites and talking with the contractor on the ground.

    I am not talking about just talking with the managers either. I am talking about getting feedback from the backbone of your company, and that is the contractor doing the work. These are the folks who represent the end result of all of your company policies and training, and a lot depends upon them.  These guys and gals are the ones your customer sees on a daily basis, and makes their judgements about your company based on the actions of these contractors.  The managers are there to lead and to implement company policy and training, and the best gauge for seeing if they did their job, is to study the contractors they are in charge of.

   Also, it is important to note that this is not a witch hunt, or undercover gotcha stuff.  It costs money to fire and hire folks, so ideally, this information is used to tweak policies where it makes it easy for contractors to do the right thing.  It also helps in identifying inefficiencies or identifying key training points that need to be reworked or re-emphasized in order to get a better outcome.  That is what you use this intelligence for.  Of course if you catch criminal activity within your company, you should act upon that information pronto.  But all in all, the idea behind obtaining feedback is to feed your Kaizen machine and make your company a top performer.

   The mystery shopping or covert employee thing is something I have mentioned before, which is just one tool to gain that kind of information about the workings of your company.  It is an extra cost, but it is the kind of investment that will pay for itself handily down the line. Because you can ask folks what is going on with your company, and they might give the straight scoop. Or they might not, partly because they don’t think you will do anything about it or they don’t trust the idea of giving you information that may or may not cause reprisals (thats if your company has a culture that does not support feedback, and if that is the case, you need to fix that by actually acting upon feedback and showing you care).

     You could also use customer or employee feedback software to mine that information gold.  Either way, if you are not doing these things, and actually acting upon that information to make your company better, then you are certainly headed down a road of uncertainty and peril.  You are just gambling at that point, with the hopes that nothing bad will happen to your company and that everything is just rosy with your people. pfffft.

   I guess my point with all of this, is that don’t be the company where the head does not know what the tail is doing.  Seek that feedback gold, and invest in the necessary measures to make that happen.  Start by just asking honestly what the issues are (and be responsive to those issues!!!), and if that doesn’t work, do surprise inspections, use software to gain employee and customer feedback, and finally, use mystery employees and get a solid read on what is really going on with your company. –Matt

Edit: Also check out this article about Best Buy and how they used ’employee feedback’ to their advantage.

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Use of private security guards at government buildings comes under scrutiny

By Ed O’KeefeThursday, March 11, 2010

There’s a saying among some private security guards in the Washington region: “There’s no security in security.”

Poor job security and the potential dangers that come with protecting government buildings make it a risky line of work, said guards interviewed this week.

Unlike officers with the Pentagon Force Protection Agency who gunned down shooter John Patrick Bedell last week, most security guards at federal buildings in the Washington region are employed by private firms that have contracts with the Federal Protective Service.

The FPS, part of the Department of Homeland Security, provides security at more than 9,000 federal buildings across the country and uses about 15,000 contract security guards to support about 1,200 officers, inspectors and administrative staffers, according to agency officials. A House hearing Tuesday will focus on the FPS’s future and its response to a 2009 Government Accountability Office investigation that exposed security gaps at 10 major federal buildings. The GAO report also faulted the FPS for inconsistent training and poor oversight of private guards.

Next month, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) plans to introduce legislation that addresses the agency’s future and broader threats and security measures at all civilian and military facilities, aides said.

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Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Publications: Report From GAO On Nuclear Private Security Forces

Filed under: Estate Security,Industry Talk,Publications — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 12:28 AM

     Efforts to more uniformly manage protective forces have focused on either reforming the current contracting approach or creating a federal protective force (federalization). Either approach might provide for managing protective forces more uniformly and could result in effective security if well-managed. Although DOE rejected federalization as an option in 2009 because it believed that the transition would be costly and would yield little, if any, increase in security effectiveness, the department recognized that the current contracting approach could be improved by greater standardization and by addressing personnel system issues. 

*****

     So why is it that we federalize airport security, yet privatize nuclear security?  I think this GAO report pretty much answers that question as to what direction they think security should go for nuclear facilities.  The folks at DoE and GAO probably had visions of TSA style security as soon as someone brought up the federalization of nuclear facilities, and that probably shut down the idea right then and there. lol

   Any way, I thought they had some interesting conclusions in the report.  Harden up the forces and make them more like the military (training and such), provide one set of standards and pay for all the sites (no brainer there), and insure the contractors are getting taken care of for retirement stuff (so they have incentive to do well, and stay with the program). Sounds good, and I hope this is implemented. –Matt

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Nuclear Security: DOE Needs to Address Protective Forces’ Personnel System Issues

GAO-10-275 January 29, 2010

Summary

The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks raised concerns about the security of Department of Energy’s (DOE) sites with weapons-grade nuclear material, known as Category I Special Nuclear Material (SNM). To better protect these sites against attacks, DOE has sought to transform its protective forces protecting SNM into a Tactical Response Force (TRF) with training and capabilities similar to the U.S. military. DOE also has considered whether the current system of separate contracts for protective forces at each site provides sufficiently uniform, high-quality performance across its sites. Section 3124 of PL 110-181, the fiscal year 2008 National Defense Authorization Act, directed GAO to review protective forces at DOE sites that possess Category I SNM. Among other things, GAO (1) analyzed information on the management and compensation of protective forces, (2) examined the implementation of TRF, and (3) assessed DOE’s two options to more uniformly manage DOE protective forces.

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Sunday, January 17, 2010

Pakistan: Security Companies In Pakistan On Rise But At Risk

Filed under: Industry Talk,Jundism,Kaizen,Pakistan — Tags: , , , , , , , — Matt @ 7:18 AM

     Low pay, long-hour duty and no training negatively influence the morale of the guards who fail to satisfy the clients.

    “I am continuously paying private security companies and changing guards, but now I feel obliged to arrange personal employees instead of hiring from a company as it failed me,” said a business man. 

*****

   I read through this report on private security companies in Pakistan, and my first impression is that these companies are in dire need of some Jundism. But really, this puts into perspective why so many blog reports and fears were being stirred about foreign security companies in Pakistan.  I think that propaganda was fueled by competitors who fear a foreign company coming in and doing a better job of security.

   But back to the rise of private security in Pakistan.  The company that figures out that treating your employees well, and providing kick ass customer service and satisfaction, will be the company that wins the most contracts.  The best guards will gravitate towards your company, because you are doing all the things necessary to attract quality people and maintain your contracts.  Companies that apply Kaizen to all aspects of their operation and employee/contractor development, will certainly enjoy dominance in the market place. –Matt

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Security companies in Pakistan on rise but at risk

by Imdad Hussain, Yangtze Yan

    ISLAMABAD, Jan. 16 (Xinhua) — As the demand for private guards in the terror-torn Pakistan especially in Islamabad is on the rise, many of the private security companies in the country are focusing more on making money than providing adequate services.

    Clients in the capital city complain that the private security companies are ignoring the quality of their employees, adding that some companies are not well qualified and their employees not well trained while several companies even enter into illegal operation for profits.

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Saturday, January 16, 2010

History: Private Security Contractors And Disaster Relief–2005 And Now

Filed under: Disaster Response,Haiti,History — Tags: , , , , , , , — Matt @ 1:13 AM

    I wanted to bring up some recent history about our group.  David Isenberg just posted a great story about contractors and disaster relief, with a mention of Feral Jundi, and I figured I would give that audience coming over a little something extra to chew on.

   Although I would like to briefly expand on David’s post with some history. Companies have done pro-bono work for disasters, and Blackwater was a prime example of that.  They saved 121 people by plucking them off of their roofs with their helicopter during the mad early days of Hurricane Katrina, as well as hauling 11 tons of life saving supplies.  That was done out of pocket, and serves as just one example of a company trying to do the right thing and providing ‘pro-bono’ services.

   Then there are the hundreds of individual contractors that have medical skills, search and rescue skills or dog handling backgrounds, who are joining teams to go on over to the island in order to help.  Or there are the contractors that are going over with church groups or other NGO’s, who are doing what they can to help out and serve.  Then there are the contractors who are on contract right now, in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, that are sending money online.  We have a heart, and we do care, despite what some might say about us.  We also have a ton of pertinent skills for these kinds of disasters.

   As for the security related responses, that is a little different.  During the Katrina disaster, and certainly during this disaster, all the news agencies contract with individuals and small companies for security.  That is the hypocrisy of the MSM. They will write scathing articles about the larger contractor companies, and then turn around and contract with smaller companies and individuals for their security when they go galloping around the world. They do the same thing in war zones, and it has always kind of rubbed me the wrong way.  Ironically, these same security folks they hire, usually do work in the big companies like Blackwater or Triple Canopy as contractors. Why, because they have to feed their families too, and work is work.  Oooooh, the horror……pfffft.

   But back to Private Security Contractors and Disaster Relief.  The response in Katrina was amazing.  Companies responded quickly and they got boots on the ground, armed and ready to go.  Some companies went in heavily armed in the beginning, and then graduated to a lesser security posture as the threat level decreased.  I remember this shock that people had, that war zone contractors were in New Orleans, and that they are walking around with guns.  Those in the media that were contractor haters, really drummed up this image that BW was running around out of control in New Orleans.  Of course that was crap, and all they were trying to do was bringing order to chaos.

   What happened in New Orleans, was a total break down of law in that town, and a total failure of the local leadership to provide order. (sounds like Haiti? huh)  Private security contractors were brought in, along with the military and numerous other law enforcement agencies, to stop the looting and to protect the aid workers and people from any threats.  And the security response to that incident was excellent.  I am positive that if we did not have that kind of response, there would have been more crime and more lives lost. Aid workers and rescue folks would be more fearful for their lives, as opposed to rescuing people, and that is why security was so vital in places where there has been a complete breakdown in society.

   Now with Haiti, that place was a failed state already.  Now with the earthquake and all the death and destruction, those people are going to be even more desperate and irrational. Disasters like this, bring out the best and worst in humans, and security professionals are essential to provide order to the chaos.

   That is why security is going to be vital in Haiti, and why all types of security are going to be necessary there.  Send in the Marines, the Army, the UN, and PSC/PMC’s, all with the idea of keeping the peace and protecting the innocent.  As we speak, there are hundreds of security contractors already contracted individually by the media or aid groups, all managing the security of those groups. Hell, there were already contractors there, providing services before this disaster, complete with offices and licenses.

   I also want to mention the contractors that will be assisting in the rebuilding effort.  The same warzone contractors that build and support there, will no doubt be answering the call for Haiti.  PAE has an office in Haiti, and from what I have heard on the forums, they are still accounting for people.  There were also the folks supporting the UN effort there, so contractors are already there.  My heart goes out to those victims, as well as the UN victims, and all of the Haitian victims of this disaster.  Everyone has lost people in this deal.

   Hopefully, larger companies will assemble teams to provide security and logistics for larger operations there. The irony with that, is a journalist being protected by some retired SF trooper, will probably write a scathing article about warzone contractors in Haiti, terrorizing the locals and causing all sorts of problems.  Bottom line, security contractors are sheepdogs, and they will do what they do best in this disaster. They will find a way to help, to protect, to give and to serve, just like everyone else who cares about helping the Haitians. –Matt

Edit: 01/16/2010 – It sounds like all the PAE folks are accounted for, and everyone is ok.  I also heard on the forums that they are looking for folks for long term work in Haiti for the rebuild.

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From the Virginian Pilot

Bill Sizemore

September 15, 2005

“Anne Duke, a Blackwater spokeswoman, said Wednesday that the company has about 200 personnel in the hurricane-ravaged area. The vast majority – 164 employees – are working under a contract with the Federal Protective Service, a division of the Department of Homeland Security, to protect government facilities. The 30-day contract can be extended indefinitely, she said.

Under a separate contract, the company supplied an airplane to the Coast Guard, Duke said, and also provided a helicopter at no charge to support Coast Guard rescue missions. As of Monday, Blackwater air crews had moved more than 11 tons of supplies and rescued 121 people, she said.”

Read the rest of story here.

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Private Security Contractors Head to Gulf

By Griff WitteWashington Post Staff WriterThursday, September 8, 2005

Companies in the Gulf Coast area hit by Hurricane Katrina are turning to an unusual source to protect people and property rendered vulnerable by the storm’s damage — private security contractors that specialize in supporting military operations in war-torn countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan.

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