One of the UK’s largest security companies, Cordant Security, part of The Cordant Group, recently opened their new National Control Centre, a state-of-the-art communications facility in which they deal with scheduling, incident management and intelligence updates. Infologue’s Chris Lanchbury visited the West London based site which is in operation 24/7, and staffed 365 days a year, to ensure that incidents and updates are dealt with swiftly and efficiently.
With 20 members of staff working during the day, and numerous tasks, such as administrative work, incident reporting and accident logging, for them to undertake, there is a busy atmosphere within the centre. Nearly 30 different types of incidents can be logged and this typifies the detail that Cordant delves into when dealing with safety and security. Incident reporting is carried out through Cordant Services Incident Reporting which allows for transparency throughout the whole logging process. Issues are assigned to a specific colleague, who logs it within the automated system, and it is escalated from there.
Cordant’s designated Helpdesk service allows their clients and site-based employees to raise concerns at any time, and the incident is handled accordingly by schedulers or managers in the centre. Schedulers may also find themselves arranging cover for site-based employees or undertaking maintenance work. Though numerous external sites are run throughout the whole day, they are not necessarily managed during all of that time. In contrast, the Control Centre is overseen 24/7 and this permits management support to be articulated to sites from there. March saw Cordant combine separate aspects of this operation. Prior to this, there were two different teams with one focussing on the retail side and the other on the corporate side. This has been a productive move and is testament to Cordant’s forward thinking.
Chris Kenneally, CEO at The Cordant Group, said: “When employee welfare is at stake I believe it is vital to act quickly, and getting timely information is key to this. To facilitate this we took the decision to centralise the reporting of all health and safety incidents through our National Control Centre, utilising a sophisticated database. The system compiles a report of all the previous days’ incidents at 1am and sends it to each Director so that they can view it first thing in morning. This means that any actions needed can be taken swiftly.
“The National Control Centre handles a wide range of issues such as reporting children split up from their parents, shoplifting and weather conditions such as high winds that might be making scaffolding or signage unsafe. We have also taken calls about some high profile national events, such as the helicopter crashing after hitting a crane in London and the Bin Lorry that lost control in Glasgow.”