Sir – The subject of outsourcing has cropped up in recent editions of SMT, and rightly so.

In view of regulation devised by the Security Industry Authority, it is now a major decision for clients as to whether they should contract-out their security or employ some form of in-house provision.

While thinking about that dilemma, I was most interested to read the recently-published Deloitte research on outsourcing and supply management which highlights the distinctly worrying (and yet not altogether surprising) fact that “two thirds of UK businesses do not even ask for detailed reporting” from their service providers. Why is that, exactly?

The simple truth is that companies are choosing to outsource specific functions – security included – and, in most cases, have no-one internal employee capable of understanding the reports produced by service providers. Even if the chosen manager does understand the service provider’s report, they’ll either file it and forget about it or simply become increasingly frustrated because they cannot rectify the perceived problem of poor performance due to contract restrictions.

If no-one can understand ‘the answer’, then why bother asking ‘the question’? All of this is leaving client organisations in a very dangerous position. One which could so easily have been avoided.

At the contracting stage, clients must insist on a frank negotiation with their service provider in relation to how performance will be measured on site. Most importantly, clients must never assume that, once they have chosen a security service provider, the contract will take care of itself. It will not.

It is vital for clients to remember that outsourcing is the easy part. It is living with the procured services for the next X number of years that they need to focus on.

Allen Knight, Director The Berkshire Consultancy

Source

SMT