The class offerings and schedule concept were a fantastic way of meeting the needs of the learner, the security industry, and the university. •In-house and external event organizers or communication services that are engaged in public relations and media activities related to the executive and family are aware of security issues. The CEO of the company, who is sitting in a high-rise office building in Houston and who has a much higher rank than the field superintendent, may be under no protection at all .
The school should tell you where each instructor received their training and exactly what experience they have in protection and teaching. They don’t have the financial capital to expose their students to the latest in protection technology. So, they put their energy into quality training, networking opportunities, and affordability. These schools don’t have the benefit of the time-earned reputation. They tend to be smaller and newer organizations that haven’t had an opportunity to grow to a size where they can play in the big leagues with well-known programs.
Executive protection is a different arena from all of these scenarios and requires a specialized skill set to succeed and keep your clients alive and well. It can be a thankless job when things go well and a firestorm when there is a breach in the protection. One of the essential attributes of an executive protection agent is resourcefulness.
The empathy of good executive protection agents is controlled, not unrestrained. Controlled empathy enables the successful executive protection duties to temper warm compassion with cool calculation. We recognize how people are feeling, and we acknowledge those feelings through our actions without losing site of the overall program objectives. It’s not so much about being servile as it is taking ownership of the job and consistently adapting to the client’s needs. As I’ve said many times before, executive protection is a people business. The bulk of what we sell is agent hours, and the quality of those agents and how they work is what makes or breaks executive protection programs.
Persons of social importance such as entertainers, politicians, business executives, religious leaders, and other highly public and visible individual personalities rely heavily on the expertise of the security industry. Nonetheless, technology can and should be exploited by the security services industry—and this will require officers and supervisors who are well rounded in technology applications. Some of these applications are discussed in the remainder of this chapter, according to the primary functions they perform. This type of educational service demonstrates that the security organization cares about the company’s employees. Consequently, the service tends to build a foundation of respect and support for the department’s main objectives of protecting the company. All the concerns about working from home, IT security, and trash covers apply to the executive’s home and especially to his/her vehicles, aircraft, and hotel rooms.
Students will focus closely on site planning and coordinating communication plans with the client and additional security staff both private and public. Students will understand asset allocation for executive protection for a variety of travel modalities including aircrafts, maritime, and convoys. A greater focus on vehicle travel will be emphasized in this course including arrival and departure tactics for various scenarios, as well as, detecting counter-surveillance, evasion and egress when inside building or other locations.
At a lower level, protection might be afforded to persons of lesser rank who head up operations in areas where kidnapping and assassination are not uncommon such as in South America and the Middle East. When ransom has been paid or an assassination committed in the past, a company may mandate protection of its potentially targeted employees. Please contact us if you are looking into options for one of your clients regarding executive protection.
