From Belfast to Wellingborough via Birmingham. For Jane McKenna, Chubb Security Personnel’s national training manager, it’s been a long road to an already successful career in the private security industry. One that this charming and intelligent professional feels has been well worth the journey.
"The security sector is full of challenges," states McKenna. "The animals that do well in this environment are those that love the cut-and-thrust of it all. As long as I continue to enjoy autonomy at Chubb, and am allowed to make things happen, then I’ll be happy."
Jane hasn’t always lived in such a seemingly perfect world, though. Born and brought up in Belfast along with her sister and two brothers, she had to endure ‘the troubles’ throughout her childhood and adolescence. "My father was an officer in the Royal Ulster Constabulary," adds McKenna, "serving mainly in the courts. I had to get used to him checking the underside of our car before any of us would be allowed to touch it. It was horrific."
Consequently, the young girl would often retreat into an escapist world by listening to her favourite singer – Elvis Presley.
Clearly scarred by the sectarian divide, Jane had to live with the bigotry engendered by being a Catholic in a predominantly Protestant part of Ulster. Of strong mind, she nonetheless determined to see out her education – graduating from Queen’s University in 1982 with an Honours Degree in English – before making a clean break.
"By the time I finished my degree I’d become increasingly dissatisfied with ‘the troubles’" says McKenna. "I was finding that the older I became the less able I was to tolerate it. I almost felt like I had to pretend to be from a different religious background. I no longer wanted to live in a city where I’d jump into a taxi and the first question the driver would ask me was what school I’d gone to" (which, in Belfast and other cities like it, immediately tells the questioner all about your religious faith).
Making the move into recruitment
Initially, the naive McKenna assumed that life would be like this everywhere, but was pleasantly surprised when – in 1983 – she was offered the chance to move to England and become a telesales girl. Grasping the opportunity with both hands, McKenna sold advertising space for the directories of the local Chamber of Commerce.
"It was pretty challenging," she opines. "Trying to sell space at 9.00 am on a Monday morning isn’t the easiest job in the world, but I really loved it. It was a fabulous introduction to the world of sales." Apparently, the newspaper Jane worked for had never before taken on anyone with a strong accent. Post-McKenna, it almost became the norm.
After two years of voice-to-voice sales and graduating to be a team leader of 15 disparate individuals, McKenna wanted a new challenge. She’d come round to thinking that face-to-face interaction was what she craved, thus a move into the recruitment industry beckoned. McKenna joined the Brook Street Bureau and, in her seven years with the company, moved from sales consultant to recruitment consultant, then onto branch manager before – in 1986 – taking up the challenging role of national training manager. In many ways, this was the precursor to her present role at Chubb.
"Becoming national training manager with Brook Street was fantastic," adds McKenna with obvious enthusiasm. "I conducted five-day induction training courses on the sales function, and assumed ultimate responsibility for delivering the company’s training programme throughout the UK". Clearly, this is one lady who’s not afraid of a challenge.
Sadly, in 1988 the Brook Street Bureau’s top brass decided the company’s future lay in the south of England – at least as far as the training function was concerned. Not wishing to leave her spiritual home just yet, McKenna was forced to move on once more. This time around, she let her fingers do the talking – and transferred to the Yellow Pages!
Working in both training and sales, McKenna feels this particular job offered her the best of both worlds. "You’re doing the job that you’re training others to do. It was ideal. Yellow Pages didn’t believe in having trainers who hadn’t sold anything in the field for the last ten years, and that’s an ethos I very much agreed with."
After the Yellow Pages, it was back to recruitment with the Office Angels – where McKenna managed a team of 11 consultants and, importantly, "learnt an awful lot about customer service" (a key concern for private security companies, of course). Her branch enjoyed a 250-strong client base, McKenna and her team placing an average of 575 temporary workers in the city of Birmingham every day.
"Looking back, the temps were really the equivalent of security officers," comments McKenna. "They were the public face of Office Angels. The managers like myself all recognised that we wouldn’t have a job if it weren’t for these people, so the temps were treated very well." As a consequence, staff turnover was low, with several of the ‘permanent temps’ staying at the company for a decade or more. Therein lies a lesson for many a private security company.
A spell back in the recruitment field followed. Adecco Alfred Marks was a deliberate new ‘home’ for McKenna, who had been head-hunted for the post by a former director of the Brook Street Bureau. Again, the job was based around sales and management training, although McKenna also touched on bespoke training provision for call centre and distribution personnel.
All was not rosy in the McKenna garden, though. With a tinge of annoyance, she states: "It was a very ‘girly’ world. Very plastic. It was all ‘Hi, how are you?’, and much too false for my liking. Unlike in the security industry, it was a female-dominated environment. I wanted to prove myself in a different world."
Training in the private sector
The move to Chubb and the world of training in the private security sector – a male-dominated environment if ever there was one – duly followed in February 1999.
McKenna joined Chubb in response to being head-hunted (yet again) by a female director whom she’d worked with in the past. She attended a couple of interviews, and had a good look at the company’s training department in Wellingborough.
Almost from the outset, there was a tacit recognition that change was needed. "Most of the training effort was concentrated at the security officer level, and many of the trainers themselves were ex-security people," adds McKenna. "I felt that was too restrictive a set-up. This was a chance for me to turn the status quo on its head. That’s what really attracted me to this industry."
At Chubb, McKenna manages a team of seven trainers spread the length and breadth of the country. Her team looks after the security officer and supervisory training regimes – encompassing CCTV monitoring, retail security and conflict resolution, etc – while McKenna administers tuition for line managers. She freely admits that her team is much like any other.
There are times when she feels everything is alright with the world, others when she has to be a "pretty hard taskmaster". Stresses McKenna: "I think my team would say I’m firm but fair. I’m deliberately strict in my management style. Why? I’ve put so much effort into getting this team to where it is that I will not let anyone drag it down. No member of the team is bigger than the overall objective." Strong (and very wise) words.
SITO, of course, has just launched a training course for supervisors (see page 59 of this month’s edition). At last November’s NTO National Conference, those who attended the manned guarding workshop – an event chaired by McKenna – felt that management (in particular supervisory) training is something that the industry has still to get a handle on.
"The problem with any course, whether it be SITO’s or indeed one of our own, is that it’s not going to be the panacea for all ills," stresses McKenna. "Exclusively, we can be very blinkered and say that all management training should be classroom-based. That’s not the right approach though. Modular training offers an opportunity to ‘return to the shop floor’, where managers can put into practice those skills they are currently learning."
McKenna feels the industry may be guilty of training knowledge at the expense of skill. Supervisory training must be right, she asserts. "After all, supervisors are the first individuals who come into contact with the officers and the client," adds McKenna. Quite so.
"In truth, it all points to the recruitment process," states McKenna. "We need to look more at people skills. The so-called ‘soft’ skills" – skills appreciated by McKenna largely thanks to her penchant for photography and painting. Hobbies where patience is a virtue. "Gone are the days when line managers can bark at their staff," adds McKenna. "The SITO course may help, but I suspect the industry might need to look at supervisor training in other sectors for a clue as to how it should be done."
In McKenna’s view, a good deal of coaching is needed. Training and the passing-on of knowledge must be from the top down. That said, there is a certain amount of abdication going on. "A supervisor will come back from his or her SITO course and their manager will feel they’ve completed all of the necessary training and send them off to site. That’s not right."
She adds: "If someone does something wrong, managers are too quick to criticise. Coaching should be about catching officers or supervisors doing things the right way."
What does this coaching entail, then? "It’s about listening," states McKenna. "Active listening. Men and women listen in a different way. Women are very good at mirroring the behaviour of others. Men will listen with a deadpan expression. It’s also about managers cushioning staff problems, and giving their officers an opportunity to air their feelings."
According to McKenna, too many security managers lack ‘bottle’, and will not confront a member of their team even though they have a problem with them or their standard of work. "There are what I call task managers out there. Those who get things done. Then there are people managers. Those who officers like working with because they can walk all over them. The balance is to finish a task through your people, and that’s where the coaching skills come into their own. Officers will do the job well because they’re happy in their work."
Education and training in focus
Just now, Jane McKenna is busier than ever. She’s the first-ever female chair of SITO’s Education and Training Forum (ETF), and is heavily involved with both the British Security Industry’s Manned Guarding section and the Bishopsgate Crime Prevention Police in the City of London. McKenna’s ETF responsibilities include being a conduit for taking thoughts and suggestions about training for manned guards and supervisors back to the NTO. Inevitably, this means regular contact with most of the other major players in the guarding sector – Reliance, Securitas and The Shield Guarding Company included – but also the smaller concerns.
"The smaller players have a very different agenda, and I make it my business to give them a voice," says McKenna. "The guy from the smaller contractor who turns up to our ETF meetings is often the recruiter, trainer and area manager rolled into one. It’s difficult for them to comprehend SITO changing Basic Job Training from two to three days as they are struggling to cope with two."
In 2002, McKenna will continue to put forward the views of the smaller contractors. The impression is that their voice will be listened to and acted upon.
In the years ahead, 41-year-old McKenna wants to see the industry’s ‘stars’ isolated early on in the development chain. That said, a great officer will not necessarily make a superb manager. In addition, old habits die hard. To this end, McKenna is very much in favour of due promotion from within – on merit – rather than taking on managers from other contractors who are perhaps set in their ways. "Some companies actively encourage line management recruitment from other industries," adds McKenna. "I too believe that’s the way forward for this industry."
McKenna is certain that, in the next two to three years, the security sector must learn to focus on the quality of person recruited before training even comes into the equation. Client education is also key. "Assertive client negotiation is something that this industry is not particularly good at," says McKenna. "Security companies must learn to say ‘no’ to clients who want manned guarding on the cheap. If they don’t, this industry will never improve its image." A view held by many.
One can’t help but wonder what McKenna’s stance might be on another thorny issue. That of women and their role in the security industry. Surprisingly (for what is a male-dominated world), McKenna is upbeat and, as ever, full of emotion.
"Women are loyal and are prepared to work hard. Yes, any female newcomers to security would be challenged by the masculine presence that prevails, but once that’s overcome it’s a great industry to work in. I feel that men are beginning to welcome the female skills set." More women managers are needed, states McKenna, such that any given security team has a balance of – as she eloquently puts it – "feelers and thinkers".
By her own admission, McKenna has always been a doer rather than a thinker. To this end, she has bold plans for Chubb’s management training in 2002 in terms of diagnostic work, benchmarking and the often-overlooked area of succession planning. She’s also intent on doing more work out on site with Chubb’s ever-strong blue chip client base.
A tall order? Of course, but this is another lady that’s not for turning. That’s the wonder of Jane McKenna.
