School and hospital security officials expect the security systems they use every day to interact in a way that streamlines processes and brings consistency to emergency responses.

Consistency is especially important in this day in age, where protective actions such as timely warnings, lockdowns and evacuations are scrutinized endlessly by government regulatory agencies and the public alike.

This new landscape— and the consequences associated with it— has led to a change in the way campus officials prepare for emergencies.

“Competitiveness in the hospital and higher ed markets is driving the change to operate with customers (patients, visitors, students, parents) in mind,” Tim Bean, an ECS Building Technologies Sales Manager at Siemens, explains. “It takes one incident to change the minds of hundreds of people. If you are not responding appropriately or proactively today you are behind the 8-ball and there is enough competition that loss of revenue is almost guaranteed.”

Appropriate, proactive responses are much more likely if members of an institution’s security department are confident in their ability to leverage various systems and execute a coordinated response.

For instance, if a person with a weapon is spotted on a campus video surveillance system, will every officer in your department respond the same way? The answer is largely dependent on officer training and knowledge of campus protocols.

But there are other ways to empower your officers that complement training. Siemens PSIM solution, Siveillance Viewpoint, offers advanced workflows that guide operators through decisions, automatically prioritizing alarms and clustering them into events for officers to manage.

These advanced workflows can be customized to walk officers through each institution’s policy for any given situation and ensure everyone’s working from the same “playbook.”

With Siveillance Viewpoint, disparate systems can be merged into one intuitive, fully integrated platform, offering security managers a seamless experience to view a structured overview of events. And if officers want to dig even deeper, Viewpoint uses georeferencing to localize individual detectors, highlight affected structures and provide multiple visual representations on the same screen.

These features were designed to provide the maximum amount of situational awareness for the people making emergency response decisions. Subsystems are added to Viewpoint using an Open Interface Services module and standard interfaces, allowing for easy integration for institutions that aren’t trying to overhaul every security system on campus.

The benefits of SiVeillance Viewpoint in the heat of an emergency are obvious, but its value extends far beyond crisis situations. Rather than training officers on multiple systems or assigning different officers to different subsystems, Viewpoint allows campuses to train officers on one platform. Similarly, Viewpoint’s ability to provide standard operating procedures (SOPs) for any event type and location eliminates the need for officers to memorize dozens of emergency protocols. All of these benefits ensure greater consistency.

Additionally, Siemens’ drive to help customers improve efficiency doesn’t stop there.

“The installation of the system is only the beginning of the relationship,” Bean says. “We have so many aspects of our business that can complement what you do on a daily basis. Siemens does not operate on a one-and-done type of operation, but rather continuously improves the relationship to help drive your business.”

Partnering with companies can be important for getting the most out of your systems, but partnering with Siemens gives security officials access to a whole array of resources, including expert consultation, remote monitoring and continuous software updates.

“Siemens biggest advantage to improve your efficiency is the people we have at each of our branches,” Bean says. “We have the experience and industry knowledge to help drive you to efficiency. Top talented security executives, engineers, and operations teams really work together to make sure your expectations are met and help guide/ challenge your thinking to help you succeed.”

Overall, Siemens myriad solutions and services offer institutions an easy path to consistent security operations. It just comes down to how much consistency means to you.

If you appreciated this article and want to receive more valuable industry content like this, click here to sign up for our FREE digital newsletters!

Related Content