Most security integrators find success only after getting it wrong…a lot. These business leaders are faced with a daily barrage of difficult choices. Some are based on data while some are purely centered around intuition. Either way, there’s only one guarantee – the plan will succeed, or it won’t. According to Forbes, CEO’s spend 15-20% of their time focusing on strategy and planning, which is largely determining the right path for their business and what could ultimately become expensive failures.
2021 had security integrators scrambling to adapt to rapidly changing market conditions brought on by a wave of pandemic-fueled crime surges and supply chain disruptions. Balancing this new normal with their customer’s life and safety systems added to an already strained operation – things did go wrong, and mistakes were made. Henry Ford said it best, “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” Some hard lessons were learned – here are the winners and losers:
Underestimating scope of work
Sizing a project can be difficult, particularly if the business, whether it be a retailer, restaurant, or service facility, is unsure of their exact needs. This is a perennial challenge for security integrators as they aim to satisfy their needs to both grow the business and deliver on customer expectations. 2021 saw numerous dissatisfied customers as under-resourced security integrators took on projects with eyes wide shut, putting profitability and reputations at risk. However, these hard lessons proved beneficial for some security integrators, such as Security Source with a deep nationwide network of technicians and project managers to handle even the most complex projects. Bruce Rogoff, CEO of Security Source, said it best when asked about security proj