Creating Resilience
Security & Resilience Trends Every Company Needs to Address
March 11, 2022 5 Minute Read
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In our interconnected world, a company's security profile extends beyond gates and guards. An integrated approach to security encompasses resilience, risk assessment, in-person guarding and business continuity management in the areas of response and recovery.
By staying ahead of trends in these four areas, CBRE helps companies drive cost savings and improve the workplace experience.
By staying ahead of trends in these four areas, CBRE helps companies drive cost savings and improve the workplace experience.
1. Everything begins with resilience.
Wellbeing programming that helps people develop resilient mindsets makes the workplace safer. People who develop resilient dispositions through training have a better likelihood of maintaining their mental and physical wellness in the face of unexpected challenges. CBRE leverages the subject-matter experts on its Global Safety & Wellbeing team to continually improve safety outcomes and ensure our global workforce is healthy, resilient and thriving.
2. Risk assessment sets the baseline.
A company's critical assets can expose their operations to risk, so leaders must determine whether to focus on avoidance, reduction or transfer of risk to a third party through insurance or outsourcing.
Different industry sectors have different degrees of risk tolerance. A retailer might accept a certain amount of theft or “shrinkage” in the ordinary course of business, but a life sciences company engaged in confidential research would need far more serious anti-theft protocols in place. Companies engaged in financial services and technology require rigorous cybersecurity protocols while logistics companies might prefer to upgrade fencing systems.
These choices vary by industry sector.
AI-powered camera alarms could benefit a company that warehouses goods and needs to reduce in-person guarding costs, but these same alarms might cause irritation and reduce trust on the busy corporate campus of a company eager to retain its top talent. Robotic security has made advances, but many robotic devices remain susceptible to workarounds by savvy trespassers—methods as simple as tossing a sheet over the robot to obscure its camera. And given the cybersecurity risks presented by the ‘Internet of Things,’ systems like these need to be implemented by a company that understands not just security but facilities management in a broader sense.
CBRE's subject-matter expertise and global reach enables us to assess risks across all aspects of a portfolio. We partner with over 400 organizations in 68 countries to provide physical and remote solutions that span the entire security ecosystem.
CBRE provides an integrated, globally consistent solution to all these challenges.
3. Procurement delivers savings in security spend.
Security suppliers have found themselves in a "war for talent." To hire the workers they need, they now spend more on recruitment and salaries and pass those costs to clients. CBRE Procurement, spending just under a billion dollars annually on security suppliers, can reduce client security spend by anywhere from 5-30% by implementing remote monitoring, setting market-relevant wage rates, managing overtime correctly per local regulations and introducing new technologies such as AI sensors and biometrics.14. Crisis and continuity management requires region-specific solutions.
The location of a company's facilities impacts the business continuity challenges it faces. A company based in a country experiencing political upheavals could direct much of its security budget to in-person guarding. A company in a region prone to adverse weather events might focus on emergency response programming.CBRE provides an integrated, globally consistent solution to all these challenges.
As Security Director, I tailor security approaches across an entire region while engaging with all other aspects of our global operating platform. I can bring in the appropriate subject-matter experts to address safety issues, coordinate an integrated response to an emergency event or deliver the appropriate wellbeing programming to foster organizational resilience. And I interface with my counterparts across the industry sectors and clients we support, gathering intelligence to increase my knowledge of security issues throughout the region.
CBRE has designed security programming and disaster planning for portfolios with assets in high-risk areas around the world by combining global operating reach with teams of subject-matter experts familiar with the challenges of the regions where they operate.
1 Source: CBRE Strategic Sourcing, 2021.
Take This with You
Issues related to security and risk have never existed in a vacuum, and the need for globally consistent and fully integrated solutions to this ongoing challenge looms larger than ever. Successful security service partnerships require consultancy approaches, category management expertise and the ability to see the security suppliers’ and clients’ points of view. CBRE’s approach to security and client advocacy drives global consistency, while also drawing on local and subject-matter expertise to implement appropriate building technologies, improve workplace experience and maximize regional operational efficiency.1 Source: CBRE Strategic Sourcing, 2021.
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Contacts
Ramsay Mcauley
Regional Security Director
