What is the Relationship Between Your Security Department Policy Manual and Your Training Program?

I received an email from a museum security director who asked me to clarify a comment I had made about the Museum Security Department Policy Manual being the basis for a museum’s security program. OK, here goes.

Several years ago, I came to the conclusion that the museums that I surveyed in my consulting business and that received my highest scores and my greatest praise all had qualify policy manuals and those who I rated lowest had no written policy manual or a grossly inadequate one. Most museums have a very poor manual that consists of nothing more than work rules and perhaps one or two policies.

What is a security department policy manual?

A security department policy manual is a collection of organized and well-written policies and procedures that collectively define the museum’s security program. It instructs the security department employees what the museum’s policy on various topics is and what they should enforce.

Does the policy manual instruct non-security museum employees?

The director of security and the security officers have no authority to make any employee or visitor do anything they don’t want to do unless that instruction is supported in official museum policy. Therefore, there is a process that requires the director of security to prepare a set of policies and procedures and have them officially adopted by the museum’s director or CEO. Once they have been blessed by top management, they become the law of the land so to speak.

Many museums prepare a smaller more abbreviated manual for employees that new employees are given in the onboarding process that defines the museum’s most important policies so the employees know what is expected of them. For example, if the museum has a policy that all outgoing parcels larger than a certain size will be searched by a security officer when the employee leaves the building, then that policy is in the employee version of the policy manual and the employee is expected to conform to the policy requirements.

What format does a policy take?

In a well-prepared policy manual only one topic is addressed per policy. For example, there would be many policies in the manual pertaining to access control. One would be for employees reporting to work, another for after hour access, another for contractor access and another for visitor access. These would never be consolidated into one policy and would each occupy its own sheet of paper and policy number in the manual.

A typical policy includes several sections, They are:

1. Purpose:
   1. The purpose of this policy is to define how contractors gain access to our building and what we require of them.
2. Policy: In this section we state the policy.
   1. Contractors requiring access to our property are to report to the employee entrance, show ID proving they are who they say they are, and sign in. They are issued a contractor badge and their host is notified to come and escort them to the job site.
3. Other Information: In this paragraph we define various miscellaneous aspects of this policy.
   1. Sign in occurs on a “Contractor Sign In Sheet”. A supply of “Contractor Sign in Sheets” is maintained at this post.
4. Responsibility: This section establishes responsibility for making sure that various aspects of this policy are performed as defined.
   1. It is the responsibility of the Security Officer on duty at the Employee Entrance Post to assure that:
      1. All contractors sign in and be properly announced
      2. That their ID is checked and it has been verified that they are authorized to work in the building.
      3. That they sign in legibly and completely.
      4. And that a supply of “Contractor Sign in Sheets: be maintained at the post and that when supplies run low that more are created and placed at the post.
   2. It is the responsibility of the Security Supervisor assigned to the area of the building that includes the employee entrance to pick up the Contractor Sign In Sheets daily and make them to the security office for processing.
   3. It is the responsibility of the clerk in the security office to properly review and file the contractor sign in sheets.

In addition to the above sections, each policy is numbered and dated. When they are revised, the date in indicated as “MONTH DAY YEAR (revised)”.

Policies are numbered in series. For example, the 100 series (100, 101, 102, 103, etc.) are in the Introduction section, 200, 201, 202, 203 all contain similar policies such as Daytime Access for Employees, After Hour Access for Employees, Access for Visitors, Access for Contractors, etc.

Why is this formality required?

The format above allows you to easily revise the manual. You can update I quickly and easily.

What do I have when I have a completed policy manual?

1. You have a manual that clearly and thoroughly defines your overall security program.
2. You have a document that instructs your security staff on to your museum’s policies and procedures.
3. You now have something to train your security officers on. MuseumDefender tells them their mission and how to achieve it and explains the concepts they need to now to do the job, but the policy manual fills in the details.
4. You have content for your Roll Call Training Program. Read or discuss one policy each day in roll call.

Isn’t preparing a policy manual a very difficult job?

Yes, it can be but we have made it easier. I took the time to prepare a comprehensive policy manual that we sell as the “Steve Keller and Associates Museum Security Department Policy Manual Templates”. It consists of more than 100 templates that you can use to complete your manual in a day or two at most.

Where do we get this policy manual templates?

You can buy them from us or if you are a member of Cultural Safeguard Alliance, you can buy them through their web portal. If you want more details call our sales department.