Optimising business security and processes by implementation of smart reports

At what time of day do you have most people in your building? Do you have enough parking spaces for your employees? Are there always enough first aiders in the building to meet safety requirements? Security systems provide a wealth of data, which can provide the answers to these questions and more. By extracting reports from your system, you can gather valuable information to increase safety or improve business processes.  Wiebe Koopmans, owner of Linked Solutions, advises businesses on the implementation of smart reports. In an interview with Jeroen van Dormolen, Business Development Manager at Nedap Security Management, Wiebe discusses the added value reporting provides, and the possibilities it offers for optimising security, safety and processes.

See the truth so you can minimise risk

If your organisation’s security is a high priority, it’s important you have insight into the use and control of your security systems. Are people repeatedly trying to gain unauthorised access, for example? Are your gates working properly? How many unused cards are in your system? Do people have access to doors they don’t use? Reports can answer these types of question and prompt you to make necessary changes. 

A report providing insight into allocated rights compared to the entrances actually used, for example, will highlight where you need to tighten up your authorisation profiles. “You can increase your organisation’s security levels by limiting authorisations as much as possible,” explains Wiebe. “I often see organisations with allocated authorisations that aren’t in line with current needs. Additional rights are often allocated when someone moves department, for example. But the previous authorisations aren’t removed – often due to concerns about the cardholder being confronted with locked doors. A report can indicate whether such concerns are justified.”

Reports illuminate how you can save costs by using business resources more effectively or improving processes

Improve security and efficiency

As well as having a direct effect on your organisation’s security and safety, reporting can have an indirect impact too. “Your security system’s used by many different people each day,” says Wiebe. “For example receptionists, security officers and the facilities management department. It records which actions are carried out by which user, and reports can show which actions are sensitive to errors. So you can amend your system to reduce the number of errors and increase security. Reports can also highlight which actions users spend most time on, for example replacing cards or changing authorisations, so you assess which processes it would be worthwhile automating to save time.”

Use insights to optimise operations

“We’ve looked at how reports can help you to optimise security and safety for your employees. But the information from your security system is valuable to other areas of your business too. Your facilities information provided by reports to optimise processes or building utilisation,” explains Jeroen.

Wiebe agrees, explaining how information from access control provides insight into how your buildings are used and indicates whether you can realise efficiency gains. “Reports can show how many people are present in your buildings during each hour of the day, for example. And, if you expand these reports to include department, position and work place, you can divide office costs across various departments or apply a substantiated strategy for flexi or remote working. In this way, reports illuminate how you can save costs by using business resources more effectively or improving processes.”