The security services industry is a rapidly growing job market. With this growth comes an influx of inexperienced guards that often bounce from one security services agency to the next.
These so-called revolving-door guards can have a serious negative effect on your business. The best security guard companies take measures to avoid these bad hires.
As a property manager, it’s important to know the downsides of a security guard company that hires revolving-door guards if you want to protect your tenants and employees, and keep them happy.
Bad Qualities of a Revolving-Door Security Guard
As a quality security services company, OPS Security Group makes it a point not to hire revolving-door guards. When we see someone has gone from one security gig to the next, we know there are a few things we can expect:
They don’t have high-quality security guard standards
People with a serial history of security jobs often don’t have what it takes to work at OPS because they don’t have the high standards we do. This could mean that they don’t really know how to be a security guard, or simply aren’t great at getting the job done. They may be lazy, and prone to napping, using the phone, or watching TV rather than guarding the properties that they are in charge of.
There could also be several serious issues that prompt them to move around so often. They may have trouble following directions or listening to their bosses. They may be rude to the tenants or employees of the properties that they patrol.
Bad backgrounds that don’t surface in the interview phase
Many people that bounce from job to job often have issues that make hard for them to stay in one place for very long. They could have a criminal background, problems with drugs or alcohol, or other legal problems that don’t surface during the interview phase, but appear later when they begin causing serious problems.
There is a reason why security guard companies screen potential hires before ever assigning them to a post.
If you don’t follow the example set by security guard companies and do your homework before a hire, it’s likely that you’ll end up hiring a bad guard.
What Happens When You Hire the Wrong Security Guard Company
As a property manager, you are placing your trust in the security guard company you hire. Their hiring standards for their guards should be high to ensure you don’t have bad security staff placed on your property.
A bad security guard will affect you and your business directly. They can upset or even anger your tenants or employees, causing even more problems.
Here are just a few of the issues that you can expect when you hire a bad security guard for your residential or commercial building.
It Costs More
Quick turnover of any type of employee will cost your business money. Fast turnover of security guards is no exception.
Consider all of the tasks involved in hiring a new security guard and acclimating them to the job.
When you hire a security guard company, it is their responsbility to provide training for the guard. But you might still get stuck with answering questions from inexperienced guards that don’t know your property.
If you’re hiring a single security guard, rather than utilizing security guard companies that provide your with guards, you’ll need to post to a job board. As applications roll in, you’ll have to screen them and then contact potential hires.
Next comes interviews. You’ll need to have one or more employees there to interview each applicant. You’ll have to compare each option and choose the best fit.
Then comes paying for background checks, uniforms, and job training.
If you need to have another security guard train the new hiree, you’ll be paying both of them to be there at the same time.
If you don’t have a dedicated employee who handles hiring, you may need to work overtime yourself or pay someone to do so while you’re rushing to find a new hire.
If a security guard no-shows unexpectedly, you’ll have to accomplish all of these tasks while also figuring out what to do about that guard’s former hours.
You may choose to pay another of your security guards overtime to cover the absence. Or you’ll be forced to explain to your employees or your property tenants why there isn’t a guard present around the clock.
This can lead to a whole host of other issues.
Avoiding hiring revolving-door guards will prevent all of these problems. By keeping each guard for longer, you’ll save yourself tons of time, stress, and money.
Your Security Guards Affect Your Reputation
The presence of a security guard at a residential property is largely an illusion to help residents feel safer. While the presence of a security guard would certainly help to deter criminals, properties that feature a security guard often have other advanced security features, like cameras or gatehouses, that do so even more.
But the residents of those properties are often so focused on the statistics surrounding home safety that they never think current safety features are enough.
They hear that over 2 million home burglaries occur in the U.S. each year, and want to know what you plan to do to stop one from happening to them.
Having a security guard present around the clock can go a long way towards easing homeowners fears.
But an unprofessional guard who regularly gets caught sleeping on the job, wandering aimlessly, or being rude to homeowners will have the opposite effect.
Rather than seeing the property management as trying to protect them, homeowners will see these irresponsible guards as a threat to their security.
The same goes for security at commercial properties. Keeping your employees safe is important. But if you hire a security guard company with low standards for its guards, you’ll end up with disgruntled, unhappy workers, which can cause even more issues that the bad guard will.
Bad Security Guards Can Lead to Serious Issues
While going through the process of hiring a new security guard company or rebuilding your reputation among your employees, tenants, and the board is an annoying, complicated task, it’s nothing compared to dealing with a serious issue that a revolving-door guard could cause.
If an altercation occurs between a security guard and one of your tenants or employees, you could end up facing serious legal issues. These could cost your business money, hurt your reputation, and more.
Some security guard companies believe that simply running a background test on their security guard hires will help to prevent this.
But there are plenty of other issues that can foreshadow future problems, and that won’t show up on a background test.
High quality security guard companies understand this. Security agencies like OPS Security Group go to extremes to screen guards so that they can help ensure that you’re getting a great hire.
Another issue that you could experience with a bad security guard is a burglary or other crime that occurs on their watch.
Whether it’s caused by a lack of experience or a mistake on their part won’t matter to the tenants or employees that the crime affects. All that they will see if that you failed to protect them.
Your Tenants or Employees Want to Recognize the Security
Not all of the issues that a revolving-door security guard will cause are serious.
Security guards who stay employed in the same location for some time will come to be recognized by your tenants or employees. This will make them feel more comfortable in their home or workplace, which can help keep them there for longer and cause fewer complaints.
A positive, safe work environment is one of the easiest ways to keep your employees happy. The same goes for creating a safe living environment for your tenants and their families.
When you hire a security guard company that puts a new person on site every week, your tenants or employees will never build these relationships, and you’ll never reap this benefit.
Hold Security Guard Companies to High Standards for Their Hires
The last thing that you want to do when hiring a security guard company is to put your employees or tenants at risk.
That’s why it’s important to hold the security guard company to high standards.
Think twice before you hire a security guard company that makes it a habit to re-hire guards some other company’s fires.
Security guard companies you consider should have an employee retention system in place. Signs a security company is good at retaining its employees include:
- Career building training programs
- Pay that is a livable wage
- Specific employee management protocols
Quality Security Guard Companies Hire Quality Guards
If you want the security staff on your property to help build your brand image, start by hiring a good security guard company. Security services agencies that don’t re-hire guards with bad habits will deliver better value to your residential or commercial property.
