Benchmarking help

[HospitalOfc.]

I am in the process of presenting a new staffing productivity metric that I have designed, to our administration and was wondering if anyone knows of any benchmarks for either Security Department staffing levels or budgetary spending? My metrics are showing that based on our assigned duties and calls for service load our Department’s staffing is at approximately 60% of its ideal level, but I would love to be able to present some already established and published benchmarks that would show approximately the same information to prevent the inevitable questions of “why should we believe YOUR numbers?”


So far I have been able to find some based on spending per square foot, spending per building occupant, spending as a percentage of total revenue, and staffing per number of calls for service. All of these are fairly closely agreeing with my data, but I would like a few more to round out my presentation, so if anyone knows of any established benchmarks that might be useful let me know. Even if they might mirror something I have posted already have please let me know, as I’m sure that different organizations have most likely published similar benchmarks that measure the same thing would be useful in proving my point.

Oh, and wish me luck in preventing more budget cuts and manpower reductions!

[FireRanger]

If you go to the ASIS website you should be able to find a healthcare security benchmark study that was performed. I haven't acutally read through it, but it might help, especially since you are working in the healthcare field. Finally, CALOSHA put out a real nice WPV paper on healthcare employees, that might help you in justifying training, manpower or both. I haven't read it in a few years, so I don't remember much of the details other then it looked pretty good and like a lot of research went into it.

[Silva Consultants]

In addition to using published benchmarks, you may wish to consider contacting other hospitals in your area to see how their staffing levels and budgets compare to your own. In general, when making a presentation to senior managers, I find it to be much more persuasive to use examples from other institutions that these managers already know and consider peers rather than citing some obscure study.

However, benchmarks in security can be a two-edged sword: poorly run and chronically understaffed departments seem to be the rule rather than the exception. Just because everyone else is doing it poorly doesn't mean you shouldn't try to do it right. One analogy I like to use compares the diet of the typical American person with what is recommended by experts for good nutrition. A benchmarking study would probably tell me that other people eat lots of junk food and too much sugar, fat, and salt - but should I base my diet on what most other people are doing - even though I know it to be wrong?

When making your presentation, place emphasis on the things that your officers do to serve patients and contribute to the overall mission and profitability of the hospital. If possible, get input from the various departments that you support (such as the ED) reinforcing the vital role that you play in their operation and what impacts they would suffer if security staff levels were reduced. Often, organizations will attempt to save money by reducing security staff, only to find that additional employees in other departments will need to be added to perform the same functions that were once provided by security.

Good luck with your efforts and let us know how it works out.

[SecTrainer]

Joint Commission (JCAHO) and IAHSS would be two potential organizations for publications regarding accreditation standards, best practices and hospital security program metrics.

Such industry publications can cost hundreds of dollars because they cost a lot to produce and don't sell millions of copies. However, your hospital accreditation folks may well already have some of them because some would fall under the Environment of Care standards for JCAHO accreditation. (Caveat: When you run across the term "Patient Safety" in hospital literature, they are usually referring to protecting patients from treatment errors such as wrong medication doses or operating on the wrong leg, not what you or I might think of as "patient safety").

On a more general note, I recommend the book Security Metrics Management by Kovacich and Halibozek for a good overview of developing an SMPP (metrics-based security program). The most important factors are the organization's own specific business and security drivers. Although "best practices" or "benchmarks" have a role in developing metrics, there are many pitfalls in using these, as Michael has pointed out. One of the biggest problems is that there are enormous variances among hospitals arising from differences in location, the services they provide, their hours of operation, community public safety capabilities, homeland security profile of their community, etc. The staffing level that applies to one hospital may well be quite inadequate (or overkill) for another hospital, for instance. This means that you have to make sure that the benchmark you're using relates to a hospital that is very similar to your own in terms of many different community and operational parameters. Broad, unqualified benchmarks such as "X officers for every Y number of inpatients" or "...for every Y thousand square feet of facility space", etc. are fairly useless and won't carry much weight with your audience.

[HospitalOfc.]

However, benchmarks in security can be a two-edged sword: poorly run and chronically understaffed departments seem to be the rule rather than the exception. Just because everyone else is doing it poorly doesn't mean you shouldn't try to do it right. One analogy I like to use compares the diet of the typical American person with what is recommended by experts for good nutrition. A benchmarking study would probably tell me that other people eat lots of junk food and too much sugar, fat, and salt - but should I base my diet on what most other people are doing - even though I know it to be wrong?



The most important factors are the organization's own specific business and security drivers. Although "best practices" or "benchmarks" have a role in developing metrics, there are many pitfalls in using these, as Michael has pointed out. One of the biggest problems is that there are enormous variances among hospitals arising from differences in location, the services they provide, their hours of operation, community public safety capabilities, homeland security profile of their community, etc. The staffing level that applies to one hospital may well be quite inadequate (or overkill) for another hospital, for instance. This means that you have to make sure that the benchmark you're using relates to a hospital that is very similar to your own in terms of many different community and operational parameters. Broad, unqualified benchmarks such as "X officers for every Y number of inpatients" or "...for every Y thousand square feet of facility space", etc. are fairly useless and won't carry much weight with your audience.


Very good points and I heartily agree with both of you. In large part that is why I undertook to design our own metrics attempting to base our staffing levels on our approximate time expenditures for all activities that we are required to perform.

Regrettably I tend to believe that as soon as I present something showing that we currently have only 50-60% of the staff that we would need accomplish everything with which our department is tasked it will be written off “Security just looking for more money.”

Even with hard numbers our administrators are having trouble grasping the concept that it is the proactive activities that suffer from this situation, yes we are still able to answer all of our emergent requests, but without the proper staffing levels these consume all of the Officer’s time. Therefore buildings are not being patrolled routinely and static posts at entries are being left unmanned, contributing to an increase in thefts and other problems.

I believe that with my audience they will actually pay more attention to what they see as a solid number that “must be right because it has been published,” than to my numbers which come from careful and detailed analysis of our situation and staffing levels.

On a bright note I did find some benchmarks that do support my numbers and will hopefully help me plead my case. It did not have everything that I was looking for, but I found the Institute of Management and Administration's "Hospital Security: Best Practices, Benchmarks, and Compliance" to be an extremely helpful resource and would strongly recommend it to anyone who is in healthcare security industry.