Picture if you will this scenario: Your senior donor arrives at your compound somewhere in Central Africa, for a key meeting to assess the efficacy of your delivery programmes, and you are out to impress. She arrives in the midday heat at the main gate and is met by a suspicious looking security guard wearing flip flops and a frown. After giving her name, the guard disappears for several minutes before lethargically opening the side door and beckons her into a scruffy guard room where she is made to fill in a visitors’ book. Phone calls are made. You can’t be reached, and eventually she calls you on her cell in frustration to say she has arrived and is keen to get the meeting underway...
Sound familiar? Do you imagine the right tone has been set to press for that vital funding?
Sadly this is all too familiar when operating countries blessed with the tags ‘complex’, ‘chaotic’, or ‘post-conflict’ environments. Organizations are often too ready to accept the prevalent norm of standards, rather than insisting on better. There is currently an almost universal problem with the general demeanor of security officers, and one that fails to reflect the positive goals and outlook of the NGOs, their mission and values. The person at the main gate is the first a visitor meets, and sets the tone from the onset. This is frequently overlooked when selecting a security provider, which is often considered a grudge purchase; an unpalatable necessity.
At Archer International, we argue and firmly believe that security service providers can add real value to an organization by providing a shop window for the way you position and operate. Smart, polite and friendly security officers (for let us give them a title that reflects their status and responsibility) overtly reflect your organization. Your visitors will immediately feel welcome and secure, and treated with dignity, whether they be senior donors or people seeking employment. Similarly we are acutely sensitive to your staff, whom the security officers are also there to protect and patrol compounds by day, and more importantly residences at night. There is an intimacy here that needs to be acknowledged. Your security officers control access to your compound at night and are often entrusted with keys in the event of emergencies. Consequently clients need to rely on security officers who are highly trained, vetted, trusted, and who project both a friendly and reassuring aspect.
Every day Archer International aims to change general impressions of the security service industry to those of proactive and positive outcomes. On the ground we achieve this by developing a highly motivated workforce, through training, mentorship, and professional development. A motivated, well-adjusted security officer is the person who can project your own organization’s ethos, beliefs and values on to the outside world. Archer is an Affiliate of the International Code of Conduct for private security providers (ICoCA) that strives for best practice within the industry, with a particular emphasis on human rights.
John Davies
Director
Archer International Ltd