Protecting Your Business in the Modern, Mobile World
The security practices of the past are no longer enough to protect modern businesses. There was a time when typically only large businesses created security policies around visitor management, but now that practice is widely considered essential to businesses of all sizes.
To help protect your business from today’s increased threats, you need a security solution that works the way you work: It has to be timely, mobile, and reliable.
With employees and customers coming and going – not to mention delivery and cleaning services – businesses are vulnerable at all hours of the day. An integrated access control solution can help safeguard your business against the threat of crime.
Who Needs Access?
Regulating and tracking access on a daily basis can help improve security to your business. With access control, you can quickly and easily allow or restrict access to members of staff, IT, cleaning crew and visitors.
Assess Your Unique Needs
- Do you need to receive after-hours deliveries or allow access to a regularly scheduled cleaning or maintenance crew?
- Will you want to grant temporary access to visitors?
- Are you concerned about preventing employee theft?
Next, consider the areas you need to secure.
- Do you want to monitor multiple locations with one application?
- Are there high-risk areas at your facilities, such as offices or stockrooms, that need
What to Look for in an Access Control Solution
Knowing your specific priorities is vital to choosing the access control solution that is right for you, but every business should look for the following features when choosing an access control provider:
Ease of Use: Capabilities alone are nothing but potential; when a solution is easy to use, those capabilities are put in motion.
Serviceability: You rely on your security, so it’s important to choose a provider with a proven reputation and the ability to reliably and knowledgeably service your products.
Flexibility: Your business is growing and technology is changing. The right solution must have the ability to grow with your business and adapt to new technologies.
Mobile Integration: Today’s business leaders are no longer virtually strapped to a desk or chained to a computer. Look for a security solution you can use across mobile platforms and integrate with any other technology you already have
Do You Need Visitor Management?
In addition to granting authorized access to staff, many businesses need a secure way to permit temporary access to a certain area for a short period of time.
If you receive unattended deliveries or need to schedule unsupervised repairs or other visits, a visitor management solution can help. You can create a temporary access badge for a visitor or simply disarm your system for a specific time, to receive an unattended delivery, for example.
- Visitor management runs an automatic background check when you initially request a temporary access badge for a visitor.
- Unattended deliveries can be scheduled, canceled and rescheduled quickly and easily, even without advance notice.
- With the bypass zones feature, you can deactivate the alarm only in one specific area while maintaining an armed perimeter around any high-risk areas for added security
Is Cloud-Based Solution Right for You?
When choosing an access control solution, you’ll need to decide whether to use a “hosted”, cloud-based solution that’s managed for you or a tailored solution you manage manually.
| Hosted Solution | Manually Managed Solution |
Technology Upgrades | Automatic Everything is managed for you and stored in the cloud, saving you time. | Manual You must set aside time to update your system manually. |
Backup Plan | Very reliable A hosted solution is also more robust and reliable because of the various ways in which your the security system is backed up. | Reliable
Your system’s backup plan isn’t as layered or robust |
Customizability | Partially customizable You can choose from a selection of options, but are somewhat limited by the capabilities of the host. | Reliable
Your system’s backup plan isn’t as layered or robust |
Access Control vs. Door Control
To properly secure your business, it is crucial to understand the available options anddetermine which solutions fit your unique needs. When it comes to controlling access,it’s important to draw a distinction between solutions that offer complete access controland those that provide door control, which is essentially a replacement for traditionallock-and-key security.
Design Deep to Stay Better Protected
In-depth security design is the best way to help ensure the safety of your business. By layering solutions such as access control, intrusion detection and video surveillance, you will help safeguard your business against system failure.
Each system backs up the others so that, no matter where the failure occurs, your business remains protected. For example, if your access control system fails, your intrusion detection and video surveillance solutions continue to help ensure the safety of your business until the failing system is rebooted or serviced.