How to Ensure Employee Safety in Multi-Site Business

Preserving employee safety can be a big challenge if you’re looking to expand your business to multiple locations. The security approach you used at a single site needs to evolve to protect more people in different locations while remaining accessible to use and most importantly, safe.  

Here are some tips for maintaining a strong security operation across multiple sites as you grow. 

Use technology and a partner that scales with you 

Let’s imagine your company is expanding from one physical location to three, with an equal growth in staff, equipment, and security obligations. Skimping on safety measures begs for trouble, but upscaling a security operation threefold may seem like a large task. 

It doesn’t have to be. 

Modern security technology is equipped with tools that make protecting a growing workforce more efficient and accessible than ever. 

• Features such as access control and live video monitoring give you the power to customize security at each location, based on the exact needs of the site. 
• New systems can also include centralized dashboards that can be controlled remotely, which streamlines the process of managing multiple locations at once. 
• You should also find a security partner that is experienced protecting business with multiple locations. It may seem like a pain to find a new provider, but will pay off in the long run. 

The security tech tools of today are built with scale in mind, and should be taken advantage of when it fits your needs. 

Have designated, on-site security leaders 

Technology can do a lot of the heavy lifting, but to best protect employees across multiple sites you need the help of a trusted resource: people. Unlike the club everyone put on their steering wheel in the 1990s, human staff will never go out of style when it comes to maintaining a solid security plan. 

Each location should have a security leader who:

• Understands the technology in use
• Can troubleshoot issues that pop up
• Is comfortable communicating information to the rest of the staff as well as to other locations 

In the event of an incident, such as a break-in or a triggered fire alarm, a security point person can take the lead on assessing the situation, making a decision on how to respond, and delegating next steps to the rest of the staff. This kind of leadership leads to faster, more informed decisions—and better safety outcomes. 

Adjust your expectations for each site accordingly

Identical spaces with identical square footage located in identical buildings? Sounds great, but it’s way more likely that a growing company has to make-do with a mismatched set of physical locations. And that’s fine!

Just be ready to adjust to the specific contours of each site. If the expectation is that location X has this many cameras and this type of burglar alarm system and therefore every site will be the same, frustration will follow. 

Use the technology to your benefit and trust your security partners and leaders to come up with specific security plans that work for each site.

Conduct inter-facility team-building 

Finding time to do anything extra is extremely hard, and scheduling team building opportunities that bring the entire staff together may seem impossible. But even if it’s just once a year, bringing staff together to increase familiarity and share security ideas and best practices can help in case of an emergency. Employees from different sites can share ideas, compare strategies, and get a larger security perspective that can make each individual site safer. 

Be on point with your compliance and permits

Expanding to more locations is an exciting signal of growth and new possibilities. Less exciting? That would be the increased compliance requirements.

Being responsible for additional locations means needing more permits, obeying more safety codes, and in general being adherent to more compliance details big and small. Failing to meet code at one site is financially risky and physically dangerous; multiplying that danger across numerous sites is a recipe for disaster and can undo the hard work that went into a company’s expansion. 

Your best bet is hiring a professional to help you navigate any codes and compliance requirements that come up. Especially if your locations are in different cities or counties, you won’t regret going with the experts. 

The security risks of expanding to multi-sites are real but manageable. Growing organizations can protect staff and property by utilizing the right mix of technology, preparation, and collaboration. Bay Alarm can assist companies that have outgrown their original location by providing services and experience in every facet of business security.

Contact us today to learn more about the support services we provide.