Responsibilities and Duties
Abstract
In this chapter, we write about the responsibility of presenting to your SOC staff the importance of their duties when they arrive for their first day of work. This will include your mission statement, an introduction to their role as a security console operator (SCO), and why their job is important. We will provide a template SCO job description: staffing schedule, discuss their supervisory authority, and summarize the responsibility of the SOC staff. We will cover the basic duties you need to determine what they will do and discuss what they can do. For the sake of this writing, going forward, we will assume that your SOC is UL certified and requires two SCOs per shift.
Keywords
Security console operator; security officer; training program; customer service; security clearance; UL certification
Introduction
In this chapter, we write about the responsibility of presenting to your SOC staff the importance of their duties when they arrive for their first day of work. This will include your mission statement, an introduction to their role as a SCO, and why their job is important.
We will provide a template SCO job description: staffing schedule, discuss their supervisory authority, and summarize the responsibility of the SOC staff. We will cover the basic duties you need to determine what they will do and discuss what they can do. For the sake of this writing, going forward, we will assume that your SOC is UL certified and requires two SCOs per shift.
What does a security officer do? That answer can be summed up easily in three words “observe and report.” What does a SOC operator do? That question is answered as easily as the first question with the addition of one word, “observe, communicate and report.” When planning your organization’s responsibilities for your SOC, it is crucial to create your SOC operator procedures with the idea in mind that your operators are not there to make command decisions. They are there to observe alarms, observe video, communicate with both the internal and external customer and report that information back to the chain-of-command or other designated individuals such as facility managers, safety managers, or site security managers of any area as specified in the post orders.
Welcome to the SOC—You Have an Important Role
When starting a new SCO, you must ensure that they understand their role in the security of your organization, which is important to the entire team. They must know their role and the great responsibility that it carries. Their company depends on them to protect their property from burglary, fire, and many other dangers and threats. You need to have a dedicated training program, with a training checklist and updated post orders and site procedures, which they will utilize to perform their regular duties and daily tasks. Training will be covered in Chapter 8, Training Program.
Through diligent reading of the procedures and understanding of the software and equipment they use, they will be able to do their job. SOC leaders must make sure the SCOs understand that if they do not know how to do something or need additional training that they bring it to their supervisor’s attention immediately. That is the only way they and the team will continue to learn and get better at their job. No SCO should ever be made to feel bad about asking questions when they do not understand one of the tasks they are supposed to perform.
Through the monitoring of burglar, fire, panic, or HVAC alarms and camera systems, they become the eyes and ears of the company. Their alertness and ability to thoroughly perform their duties can help prevent the loss of life and damage to company property with a quick alarm response or observation of illegal activity on a camera.
Mission Statement
Mission statements are used to communicate the purpose of a team, department, or entire organization. Your SOC, if it is properly integrated into and utilized by your company, should touch the entire business organization. Create a SOC mission statement and hang it on the wall in an area where the SCOs can see it every day when they report for their shift, so they are reminded what their mission is on a regular basis. Create this mission statement to reflect your company’s business mission statement and core values. It should be a simple one-page statement that can easily be read quickly and highlights the most important goals the SOC is supposed to uphold. The vision and mission for your SOC are the two most important factors that should be written on your statement. Professionalism, customer service, and dedication should always be stressed. If you have room available for it on your mission statement, write a short list of services that the SOC provides to the entire company.
SCO Job Description
This is one of the hardest tasks of creating a solid SOC team. When you have two people working side by side in the same room for 8–12 hours a shift, they need to be able to get along at least on a professional level. They do not have to like each other, but if they are professional, they should be able to perform their duties and communicate with each other as professionals to accomplish the mission. All it takes is one sad sack energy vampire to suck the motivation out of the rest of the staff. The person who cannot carry their own weight and relies on their team members to help them through a shift, or the repeat offender who calls off shift if he or she stubs their toe will begin to drain the life right out of the entire team. “Why should I work hard when they don’t?” That will become the question and as a manager or supervisor you must not allow that to continue.
The SOC needs employees who understand the role of security for an organization. They must be able to communicate both verbally and in writing with people on a professional level. They should have the computer skills to monitor alarms, perform programming of physical access control system, document in an electronic daily activity report, email internal and external customers, and write quality incident reports that can be used in a court of law. To be considered for hiring, SCOs should have experience in at least two of those three very important categories: security experience, customer service experience, and computer skills. Previous central station alarm monitoring experience could be equal to previous security and customer experience. Security experience could include working as a security officer, law enforcement officer, any prior military experience or even a receptionist where security was stressed by documenting all visitors and reporting security incidents. Customer service experience should include any type of experience in communicating with people on a regular and daily basis such as working in retail, fast food, or any job that has you interacting with customers on a regular basis. Security and customer service can be taught but basic computer skills are a must. It is better for the whole team if you don’t have to train them in both security and customer service. The new hire candidate must be able to handle the basics of email, documents such as Microsoft Word or Excel and various software packages for access control, various alarm monitoring, and camera systems that are in your SOC. There are other factors depending on your business that could be crucial to hiring such as the need for the applicant to acquire a security clearance with the Department of Defense (DoD) or the Department of Energy (DoE).
Leadership experience is also a plus and that will be discussed more in supervisory authority related to larger companies. When hiring, do not be afraid to hire potential leaders for the future. They often become peer leaders within the team and when the opportunity presents itself they will be ready and eager to step into a leadership role.
Sample SCO Job Description
The following SCO job description can be used as a template for your SOC. Tailor it to fit your needs within your organization.
Position Summary
The SCO is responsible for processing fire/mechanical/panic/intrusion alarms and video monitoring systems, to include basic programming of each system, performing basic clerical duties to include data entry and filing. SCO will provide outstanding customer service and satisfaction by handling customer inquiries and concerns regarding security incidents, alarms, site and personnel changes, system and equipment problems, and other questions/notifications regarding service provided by the SOC through various forms of communications. SCO shall adhere to all post order standards and follow policies and procedures set by the company. SCO shall follow up with information and research regarding assigned projects, events, and requested services accurately and in a timely manner. The SOC is a 24 hour/365 days a year operation with a minimum of two SCOs working each shift on a rotation schedule.
Duties and Responsibilities
• Successful completion of New Hire and SCO Level 1 and 2 training programs.
• Successful completion of mandatory On the Job Training (OJT), Continuing Education Program (CEP), and UL monthly training requirements.
• Monitor and maintain the fire, card access, intrusion, mechanical, and panic alarms systems while responding accordingly and professionally in a timely manner.
• Monitor various site camera systems and conduct after-hours site tours using video surveillance.
• Perform system checks on equipment and software applications, recognize and correct minor problems, and accurately report concerns and problems with equipment to customers, business partners, vendors, corporate security personnel and/or SOC management.
• Record pertinent information from site/field personnel and enter accurately into reports and in a timely manner notify the appropriate personnel.
• Solicit pertinent information from potentially emotional callers and relay complex facts and details accurately and concisely to the appropriate personnel.
• Prepare, complete, and process necessary reports to include SCO stats, work orders, daily activity, and incident and condition reports.
• Monitor and maintain all forms of communication to include email, phones, cell phones, hand-held radios, pagers, fax machine, and/or personal contact with customer while responding accordingly and professionally in a timely manner.
• Act as liaison between various law enforcement and government entities.
• Act as after-hours supervisor for all field security officers in the absence of other management.
• Assist the SCO supervisor with required shift coverage to meet daily contractual requirements and activity.
• Perform other duties as assigned by the client and/or management personnel.
Qualifications
• High school education or equivalent. Two-year degree or higher preferred.
• Minimum of 2 years’ customer service, central station monitoring, and/or security experience, or an approved combination of all three.
• Strong teamwork and communication skills. Must be flexible/adaptable to a constantly changing environment.
• Ability to make verbal and written presentations relating to SOC operation.
• Intermediate to advanced level keyboard and computer skills.
• Ability to coordinate multiple assignments, actions, and direct others to locations and tasks.
• Ability to use sound judgment in stressful situations and capable of staying alert during periods of inactivity.
Physical Demands/Environmental Conditions
• Works primarily in a climate-controlled office environment that is often cooler than normal to keep computer equipment cool.
• Ability to perform finger and hand manipulation and performing repetitive motions to use office and various security equipment.
• Ability to exert up to 10 lbs. of force when moving items such as computer printout paper, notebook ledgers, office equipment, and so on.
Hiring and Interviewing Your SCO Candidate
Background checks are a must and we will assume that your company conducts a background check on any potential new hire. When bringing the candidate in for an interview, start off with a tour of the SOC, so they see what type of environment they would be working in. Describe to the applicant the various SOC duties that are required, the hours they would be working, what a typical shift is, and what an extremely difficult shift could be. You should accentuate the fact that during a shift it could be very quiet and boring one second, and then become extremely busy with alarms and phone calls happening all at once. This allows the applicant to see firsthand that the ability to multitask is something that is crucial to the success of your SOC and should be asked about when interviewing a candidate. Each company is different and may have their own required questions to ask for any position. We have provided a short list of questions that we have found to be helpful when conducting interviews with SOC applicants. Be sure to document their answers carefully for your review later.
Sample Interview Questions for a SCO
Tell us about what you are currently doing and/or have done in the past for employment?
What was it about the SCO position that interested you?
What do/did you like most about your current/last position?
What do/did you like least about your current/last position?
Tell us about a time you had to deal with extreme adversity with another person, how did you handle it and what did you do?
Tell us about a time that you do not get along with a coworker. What was the problem, and how did you handle it? Were you able to resolve the problem?
Please describe what you believe it is to be “professional?”
What is your greatest strength?
What is your greatest weakness?
Getting the job done involves gathering information and input from others. How do you do this?
Please describe your computer experience and abilities?
What operating systems are you familiar with?
Are you familiar with MS Office suite (or whatever your company uses)? How would you rate your knowledge of that software?
What security-related software systems are you familiar with such as access control, alarm monitoring, and video surveillance? How would you rate knowledge of these systems?
Please describe your customer service experience and abilities?
Please describe what you believe to be good customer service?
In your opinion, how does customer service relate to the security industry?
What have you done that shows initiative and a willingness to work?
When short-term projects clash with long-term ones, which one takes priority and why?
How would your supervisor get the best out of you?
How do you establish a working relationship with new coworkers?
What are your long-range goals?
What is your idea of the best job you could have and what would you do there?
Staffing and Schedule
At a minimum, a fully functional SOC should have one fulltime salaried SOC manager, one salaried SCO supervisor, eight fulltime hourly operators, one to two part-time or flex SCOs, and two to three members of your security officer staff (if applicable) trained as backups and possible replacements when the fulltime employees leave the SOC. This level of staffing will meet any UL required code of having at least two SCOs on duty per shift. They must be fully trained SCOs and the managers should hold onto their training records for UL inspection.
| Shift | Title/Wage | Monday through Friday |
| Day Shift | SOC Manager (Salaried) | 0730–1600 (Varies regularly) |
| SOC Supervisor (Salaried) | 0900–1730 (Varies regularly) | |
| SCO (Hourly) | 0700–1500 8 hours | |
| SCO (Hourly) | 0800–1600 8 hours | |
| Evening Shift | SCO (Hourly) | 1500–2300 8 hours |
| SCO (Hourly) | 1600–2400 8 hours | |
| Midnight Shift | SCO (Hourly) | 2300–0700 8 hours |
| SCO (Hourly) | 2400–0800 8 hours | |
| Weekends (Midnight and Day) | Saturday and Sunday | |
| SCO (Hourly) | 2300–1100 12 hours | |
| SCO (Hourly) | 2400–0800 8 hours | |
| Day | SCO (Hourly) | 0800–1600 8 hours |
| (Day and Evening) | SCO (Hourly) | 1100–2300 12 hours |
| SCO (Hourly) | 1600–2400 8 hours |
Why two members of management you ask? Always think about succession in case the SOC manager leaves or “gets hit by a bus” as we used to say often. The supervisor should be a strong enough leader to immediately step in and fill the role at least on an interim basis until the position can be permanently filled. If your SOC becomes fully integrated within in your company, you cannot allow your service to decline if the SOC manager leaves abruptly. The SOC manager should train his or her supervisor to be as knowledgeable and capable of doing the job as they are. Any manager who keeps everything to themselves in the hopes of making themselves feel more valuable, important, or because they think they cannot get fired if they hold all the data is a weak leader. A manager and a supervisor can also take turns being the after-hours on call referred to as “SOC On Call” in this book. This allows both time to decompress if both leaders take turns being the SOC On Call every other week.
If additional training is needed or if there is a problem on an after-hours shift, the supervisor or manager can adjust their schedule accordingly to work with that shift and still have a leader available during the day to respond to upper management or customer’s inquiries and requests. Two supervisors also give you the flexibility of being able cover open shifts if several employees give their notices all at one time. You must be ready for that because a SCO position is not something people with ambition tend to stay in for more than a couple of years if you’re lucky. Hopefully you’re fortunate enough to have a couple of work horses that are quite eager to pick up any open shifts for the overtime pay.
All shifts should be staggered so you don’t have everyone coming and going at the same time. When one operator is being relieved, you will still have one operator logged into the systems. Your two permanent day shift SCOs should be two of your best operators on the staff and work Monday–Friday. Most businesses, especially the Fortune 500 companies, will conduct the most activity during the daytime hours and they will need to be skilled, fast, and experienced on a large variety in the ongoing tasks in the SOC such as completing badge access requests and performing simple programming tasks such as new card readers. Your three midnight and evening shift people will take turns rotating on a regular basis through a fixed 3-week rotation. Do not rotate staff from midnight to evening and back. Studies have shown that bouncing around from shift to shift is unhealthy and from our own experience we have found that to be true. Some overtime will be required to vacation and sick days, but there is no way to avoid that in any schedule.
All SCO’s should be instructed to arrive at a minimum of 5–10 minutes prior to the start of their shift to allow time, put personal belongings in their provided locker, food in refrigerator, or utilize the restroom prior to their start at the workstation and receiving pass-on information from the SCO being relieved. You should have procedures on what to do if a SCO is not relieved from duty on time. The entire staff should be made to understand that in the event of emergency they may be required to stay past the end of their shift to assist with the emergency or write the incident report. There should also be a policy that states a SCO is not allowed to remain in the SOC after the end of their shift for the sole purpose of socializing because that is a distraction for the SCO’s duties that are now on shift.
Schedules should be posted for operators to review and initial at least two weeks prior to the start of the work week. If you are putting out a schedule less than a week prior to the actual start date, you are a not doing your job as a manager or supervisor and making your operators lives more difficult than they need to be. Paid time off (PTO) or vacation requests should be required to submit at a minimum of 30 days in advance. This should give the SOC management team ample time to talk to other SCOs about covering for the operators on PTO. SOC management should not be so rigid to not allow SCOs the opportunity to swap shifts if the shift swap does not create additional overtime and is preapproved by the manager or supervisor. If both parties understand that they must report for their new shift and if one fails that they will both receive verbal or written counseling.
Sample Three-Week Rotation
In the following pages is an example of a three-week rotation that we created and used in the past. This is a schedule that allows the midnight and evening shift operator a 5-day break with one weekend off every 3 weeks, which helps make up for the fact of working weekends on a regular basis.
| Example SOC Schedule I Midnight Shift | |||||||
| 06/01–06/07 | MON-1 | TUES-2 | WED-3 | THUR-4 | FRI-5 | SAT-6 | SUN-7 |
| 2300–0700 1 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | 2300–1100 SCO 2 | 2300–1100 SCO 2 |
| Start Sunday | Start Monday | Start Tues | Start Wed | Start Thurs | Start Friday | Start Saturday | |
| 0001–0800 2 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 |
| Day Shift | |||||||
| 06/01–06/07 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 0700–1500 1 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | NOTES: | |
| 0800–1600 2 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT |
| Evening Shift | |||||||
| 06/01–06/07 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 1500–2300 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | 1100–2300 SCO 2 | 1100–2300 SCO 2 |
| 1600–2400 2 | SCO3 | SCO3 | SCO3 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO3 | SCO3 |
| Example SOC Schedule II Midnight Shift | |||||||
| 06/08–06/14 | MON-8 | TUES-9 | WED-10 | THUR-11 | FRI-12 | SAT-13 | SUN-14 |
| 2300–0700 1 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | 2300–1100 SCO 1 | 2300–1100 SCO 1 |
| Start Sunday | Start Monday | Start Tues | Start Wed | Start Thurs | Start Friday | Start Saturday | |
| 0001–0800 2 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 |
| Day Shift | |||||||
| 06/08–06/14 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 0700–1500 1 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | NOTES: | |
| 0800–1600 2 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT |
| Evening Shift | |||||||
| 06/08–06/14 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 1500–2300 1 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | 1100–2300 SCO 1 | 1100–2300 SCO 1 |
| 1600–2400 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 |
| Example SOC Schedule III Midnight Shift | |||||||
| 06/15–06/21 | MON-15 | TUES-16 | WED-17 | THUR-18 | FRI-19 | SAT-20 | SUN-21 |
| 2300–0700 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | 2300–1100 SCO 3 | 2300–1100 SCO 3 |
| Start Sunday | Start Monday | Start Tues | Start Wed | Start Thurs | Start Friday | Start Saturday | |
| 0001–0800 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 |
| Day Shift | |||||||
| 06/15–06/21 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 0700–1500 1 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | NOTES: | |
| 0800–1600 2 | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | SCO | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT | PART TIME OR SPLIT SHIFT |
| Evening Shift | |||||||
| 06/15–06/21 | MON | TUES | WED | THURS | FRIDAY | SAT | SUN |
| 1500–2300 1 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | SCO 2 | 1100–2300 SCO 3 | 1100–2300 SCO 3 |
| 1600–2400 2 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 | SCO 3 | SCO 3 | SCO 1 | SCO 1 |
Supervisory Authority
All SCOs should understand that the SOC manager and the SCO supervisor have the authority to make changes to their schedules and the post orders as necessary to meet the company’s goals and provide the appropriate shift coverage to maintain UL certification. SCOs should also be given in writing who else within the company or in the chain-of-command have the right to give the operators orders outside the scope of their post orders such as site security, safety, or facility managers at the locations they are monitoring. The SOC staff should know that at any time in the day or night they are allowed to contact the SOC manager or SCO supervisor for guidance or further clarification duties and objectives.
Any company that has their SOC monitoring multiple locations that also have security officers at several locations and utilize a centralized security department, we recommend that the SOC be your depository of all the security officers location post orders and hold the rank of Sergeant. This authority allows the SOC to dispatch services without question especially during an emergency event and provides the SCOs with the ability to require incident reports be written by the security officer when something happens at their site where they are stationed.
Staff Responsibility
You must make it a requirement through policy and training that all staff members hold the personal responsibility to know and understand the duties, policies, and procedures in place for your SOC. Through the course of time, staff may discover through their regular shift work that requirements have changed and procedures or post orders need to be updated to reflect the latest information or deleted altogether due to the fact the action is no longer required. All staff members should feel free to approach the management with ideas for improvement and point out to SOC management when a procedure has become outdated and needs to be eliminated from the site procedures or SOC post orders. The SOC leadership needs to work hard to ensure that the procedures stay as up-to-date as possible to ensure that all operators have the latest information at their fingertips and they cannot do that without the help of the rest of the staff.
Historical Lessons
Your training and procedures must be thorough and easy to find for future reference. Jarpey hired one charming operator who basically pretended to “read” the post orders and charmed his way through the training period. A couple of weeks into working shifts, his coworkers began to say, “this guy doesn’t know what he is doing.” Jarpey should have listened, because a few days later an emergency event took place at a site and a mass notification was needed per the procedure. Prince charming didn’t know what to do and the SOC ended up looking bad. Jarpey states:
When I sat down with the SCO to talk about what had happened, I first made sure he understood the importance of situation which he stated he did. I then asked him why he did not follow the procedure for sending out the mass notification.s His answer “I couldn’t find it.” This blew my mind because everything was electronic and only three clicks away. That was one of those moments where you sigh, rub your eyes and shake your head. He didn’t last too much longer after that.
Treat your people right because you need them. There was a time we had five SCOs who left for various reasons within a 6-week period. We had one operator who worked 90 hours one week and 86 hours the next in a 2-week pay period. Think about that for a second. That is 96 hours of overtime pay. That operator did not have a day off for over a month. There was one day toward the end of the month-long overtime when he came into work and looked like death warmed over. Fearing for his well-being, Jarpey asked him “are you alright?” His reply, “Hey can I get more hours? I want to buy a new truck.” You need to appreciate those people who work those extra hours for you. Get them a gift card, buy them lunch, or give them a company appreciation award to show that you recognize their commitment to the team.