Every security command center is tasked with improving security outcomes. This can mean different things to different organizations depending on their industry, facilities, corporate mandates, and compliance requirements. Measuring these outcomes can be difficult—some performance requirements are almost impossible to measure, while other incidents happen so infrequently that tracking them for performance provides no valuable data.
Ultimately, there’s a single core metric to gauge security performance and outcomes—response time. In our white paper Response Time: The Key to Better Security Outcomes, we explore the 7 essential steps to speed-up response time so that you improve your overall security outcomes.
Before we explore further, let’s nail down the definition of response time. Response time is “the elapsed time between an inquiry on a system and the response to that inquiry.” In the context of command center operations, response time is simply the lapse between when an event is raised and when an operator takes action.
Out of all the performance metrics your security team measures, why does response time have the greatest impact? Metrics such as dispatch time, assets lost, injuries, and others are critical for any successful monitoring operation too and are undoubtedly important. However, improving response time is proven to have a ripple effect on all other critical metrics.
The closer you get to achieving a “real time” response, the better chance you have of a positive outcome. For example, let’s consider a simple unauthorized after-hours building access incident. If it takes the operator 4 minutes to respond to an alarm, it will take longer to identify where the intruder actually is, which in turn means it takes longer for a dispatched guard to find the intruder.
However, if the operator responds within 30-seconds, the dispatching officer is likely to find them quickly because the person has had less time to get far from the point of entry. In this example it can be the difference between intercepting the person in under 5 minutes versus taking 15-20 minutes to find them. A lot can happen in 15 minutes!
