Small Business Security Solutions

Man­ag­ing a small busi­ness is all about mul­ti­task­ing. We know it’s a con­stant bal­anc­ing act of what is the cur­rent pri­or­i­ty. We also know that secu­ri­ty some­times takes a back seat to seem­ing­ly more press­ing prob­lems of the day. So we’re here to help with a few sug­ges­tions to ensure all your hard work is pro­tect­ed. Small Busi­ness Secu­ri­ty Solu­tions are not just about detec­tion but also about PROTECTION. It’s essen­tial to be proac­tive and for your cus­tomers and employ­ees to know you have tak­en sol­id secu­ri­ty mea­sures. And be assured that not all secu­ri­ty fea­tures are expen­sive to imple­ment or can be done in phas­es as the bud­get allows.
1. If you run a store­front office or retail oper­a­tion, intro­duce a “Clear Zone” pol­i­cy. To achieve this, you must cre­ate clear sight lines from the street to your front desk or counter. You are much safer if Police and passers­by can eas­i­ly see your point of sale. So take some time to remove a few posters from a win­dow, and don’t use blinds on all your win­dows. This can be enhanced with the use of cam­eras and mon­i­tors.
2. If you have employ­ees that open and close your busi­ness and have key priv­i­leges, think about intro­duc­ing a high-secu­ri­ty key sys­tem with key con­trol. Know­ing how many keys you have in cir­cu­la­tion and who has them is impor­tant! This sim­ple switch to a key con­trol sys­tem means that keys can­not be cut at the local cor­ner store. Only when autho­rized by you by at a licensed lock­smith com­pa­ny.
3. When your busi­ness is in an indus­tri­al area that becomes “aban­doned” at 5:10 pm every day, you can be vul­ner­a­ble to a “smash and grab”. A busi­ness can be cleaned out of office equip­ment and inven­to­ry in min­utes with no wit­ness­es. Those win­dows that make your office live­able when you are there make it vul­ner­a­ble when you are not. To reduce this vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty con­sid­er secu­ri­ty win­dow film or win­dow bars to secure your glass.
4. We hear many front-line work­ers in offices and retail oper­a­tions that fear con­fronta­tion from rob­bers or angry clients. So how do we pro­tect with­out cre­at­ing a prison feel and look? Some sim­ple design changes or con­sid­er­a­tions can make a world of dif­fer­ence. While “open con­cept” is preva­lent in many spaces, you may want to think again at your front entrance. Cre­at­ing a front foy­er with a counter, wall and door (lock­able) leads to small busi­ness secu­ri­ty solu­tions that pro­vide you with some phys­i­cal pro­tec­tion. A bar­ri­er like this pre­vents an intrud­er from rush­ing into your busi­ness while still being wel­com­ing if done taste­ful­ly.
5. Many small busi­ness­es can some­times have few employ­ees on-site at any giv­en time. Or you may be hand­ing valu­able inven­to­ry over the counter. How do you make your staff feel safe? If you already have a mon­i­tored bur­glar alarm sys­tem, it’s not a dif­fi­cult upgrade to install an under counter or under desk pan­ic but­ton. This allows you or your employ­ee to acti­vate an alarm (it can be silent) by insert­ing your fin­ger into a pan­ic switch. This noti­fies the mon­i­tor­ing sta­tion that you are in imme­di­ate dan­ger, and they can instruct the author­i­ties accord­ing­ly.
Of course, there is always more that you can do, but these five tips will go a long way to mak­ing your busi­ness a safer and more secure place.