The Combat Operator

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.