Contractors Role In Nation Building
Oct 27, 2009 Uncategorized
Thanks to Matt at Feral Jundi for digging this one up. Dr. Thomas Barnett is a former Pentagon analyst and advisor who has some pretty compelling points to make about the U.S. ability (or lack of it) to conduct nation building in our current mindset and configuration. Pay special attention to the area he calls ‘Systems Admin Force’. Hope you enjoy and leave a comment letting me know what you think.
Tags: Barnett, nation building, TED
The Long Arm of Perception and Negative Publicity
Oct 25, 2009 Jake's Posts
As I noted earlier this week there has been a significant reduction in the coverage of private security in the mainstream media of late. This is most likely due to the fact that in the U.S. at least it’s all-hands-on-deck to cover the impending health care reform legislation. But, the lack of negative headlines can also be attributed in part to the general lack of incidents worthy of reporting as well. For that, everyone across the industry can take a piece of the credit. Well done.
An interesting story has developed recently outside of San Diego, California where a local college has decided to end their contract to utilize a local training facility owned by U.S. Training Center, formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide.
The college’s governing board voted unanimously to stop using the ‘Blackwater facility’ in direct response to public criticism, presumably of the facilities affiliation to Blackwater, now Xe. Local activists have protested at Southwestern College board meetings for months in an effort to halt the college’s arrangement with U.S. Training Center and it now appears that those efforts were successful in changing the minds of the governing board of directors.
Earlier this year Southwestern College had entered into an agreement which allowed U.S. Training Center to use rooms on their campus in exchange for time at the U.S. Training Center’s firearms ranges which are only a short distance away.
The question remains is the decision to cancel the agreement just politics and are the cadets of the police academy which Southwestern runs getting short shrift because of it? In other words what is best for the cadets who later go out into the world to enforce our laws?
I see this as a prime example of how a company’s brand is affected widely across sectors. Anyone in-the-know understands that Blackwater Worldwide’s international operations in support of the WPPS contract for the U.S. Department of State has nothing to do with their domestic firearms range businesses outside of their Moyock, North Carolina facility.
If a picture is worth a thousand words then an uninformed sound-byte must be worth ten-thousand in today’s culture. It’s a shame that the governing body has caved to political pressure instead of standing their ground on the merits of the original question and decision making processes which must have been: What facilities best prepare our cadets for a future in law enforcement? Unless a better location has magically materialized in recent months it now appears that cadets will receive inferior preparations all because the facility is ‘owned by’ Xe.
The lessons to be learned here for all PSCs is the importance of protecting your brand at all costs. What you do in one aspect of your business can easily negatively affect the public’s perception of you in other parts of your portfolio of services.
Tags: Affiliates, Blackwater, contracts, services, training
Mean Time Between Stupidity
Oct 20, 2009 Jake's Posts, Uncategorized
By Jake Allen
Is it just me or has there been very few security contractor related news stories over these past few weeks? I am not complaining mind you, actually it’s quite nice to have the industry off the front pages, the blogs, C-SPAN and the nightly news. It makes you wonder how long we can keep it that way.
Matt at Feral Jundi is often talking about the application of quality systems in a manufacturing environment and how they can be useful in our own industry. This got me to thinking about a tool called Mean Time Between Failures or MTBF. Basically it’s a way of measuring the time that transpires between a system failure. It’s useful when looking at machinery for example to measure how many hours, days or months transpire between breakdowns. An low MTBF is indicative of a system which is not functioning properly. Conversely, a high MTBF is good because it illustrates that you can have long runs between breakdowns.
Here’s how the calculation works: If for example you have a system that runs for 15 days then fails, runs again for 10 days…fails, 5 days…fails. Then you would have a mean (average) time between failures of 10 days. (15 + 10 + 5 = 30 divided by 3 =10).
It might be useful to see how long our industry can go without a significant event which draws a lot of negative attention. Of course we don’t live or work in isolation, and there is an active insurgency bent on attacking and killing our members, that of course we have little control over. But we do have control over our own self inflicted wounds such as the Danny Fitzsimons case.
Bottom line gang is keep up the good work, take it one day at a time and police each other. It only takes one stupid event to bring the heat down on everyone. Focus on the mission, provide a quality service and avoid you are likely to avoid any headlines. This is the recipe for longevity in this business.
Arrival of dead security expert’s baby eases fiancee’s pain
Oct 15, 2009 Uncategorized
The fiancee of a security contractor who was shot dead in Baghdad spoke yesterday of her joy and sadness after she gave birth to the couple’s first child on the day he was due to return home for good.
Paul McGuigan, a former Royal Marine Commando, died in the Iraqi capital’s fortified Green Zone in August with Australian colleague Darren Hoare.
The 37-year-old was caught up in an attack in the city’s International Zone.
A British national, Danny Fitzsimmons, has been charged with the murder of both men and is being held in custody in Baghdad.
Mr McGuigan’s fiancee, Nicci Prestage, gave birth to the couple’s daughter four weeks early, on October 4 – the same day he would have returned permanently to the UK.
Ms Prestage, 36, who lives in Manchester, said her baby, who weighed 5lb, was “the image of her father”.
“She is gorgeous,” she said. “I still can’t believe that Paul is never going to see her.
“The last few months have been an emotional rollercoaster.”
She added: “I know I have to face up to life without him but it is so very hard to. We were looking forward to being together as a family and bringing up our baby together.”
Mr McGuigan, 37, originally came from Peebles in the Borders but left in 1990 when he joined the Royal Marines.
He started working for the security company ArmorGroup Iraq in 2003, and became a personal security detail team leader. It is understood that his father, who now lives in Ireland, and his mother, Corinne, who ran a travel agency and has moved away from the area, have also seen their granddaughter.
A spokesman for the family said: “Paul’s family have met their granddaughter – a very moving experience, especially as baby looks so like their son.”
