Securitas: Driving Success Through Client-Centric Security Strategies

How do security businesses adapt to ever changing client needs? In this episode of Security Connected North America, Helena Andreas, an engineer turned security business expert, shares her journey of transformation. From weaving client centric values into operations to the life lessons that shaped her career, Helena offers actionable insights for embracing security. If someone had told me at twenty something years when I graduated as an engineer that I would be sitting here, you know, many years later, in in a security business and in a in a functional role, I would've I would've laughed. I would not have believed them. So I had to the opportunity to try different companies, different cultures, different roles, and really been able to identify what do I enjoy. So for me, that learning experience has really been a step by step process to identify where I really want to be. If I was gonna advise someone else, I would say two things. The first one is don't be afraid to try. Because if you don't try, if you don't, you know, step forward and do something, even if it might be a little bit scary, a little bit outside of your comfort zone, the worst thing that can happen is that you back out and go, hey. It didn't work out, but I got an experience. Because if you try many different things, you will also learn what is it that you really enjoy and where do you fit. The second one is for me, and this is particularly about being a woman in in a more male dominated environment, it's about communication. It's about being able to to get your point across. It's being able to understand others. You're having a different type of communication, but often you just genuinely do not understand each other. But sometimes you think you're getting your point across, but people, although they're listening, maybe they just don't understand it. So really try to understand how different people around you communicate, adapt your own communication, and get your point across. In its simplest form, being client centric for me is really about asking one question. How does this, whatever it is that we're going to do, benefit our clients? New product, new messages, those sorts of things. And they're really important, but the same question can be applied to all kinds of things. You know, in my people role, for example, How does helping our people learn and develop benefit our clients? How does actually being cost conscious, help our clients? Developing our leaders, for example, that helps our clients through providing better people, you know, better services, and so on. You can always ask yourself, how does whatever I'm doing today benefit our clients? And if the answer is no, then you probably should think really hard, about, you know, why you're actually doing that thing. Well, the world is always evolving. I think we have a really great advantage in Securitas that we do have a client centric culture. We are a helpful organization, and we do want to to genuinely help our clients. Sometimes, however, we do it in a reactive way, and I believe that the best way to stay on top is really for us to have the confidence to be a client advisor. Because we have such an amazing portfolio of offerings. We have deep expertise in many, many, many different areas that often our clients do not. So even though our client might come to us and ask for a specific service, if we just take the time and have the confidence to really ask follow-up questions, what are really the client's needs, what is it fundamentally that they need to deliver on in their business, Then we can actually advise on whatever the best possible options for them are given their constraints and their need. I'm here at the GSX expo, and I've looked at everyone else's values. And I can see that integrity and vigilance, they're really common across security companies as they should be. Right? But what really sets us apart is the helpfulness. And that is really key to continuing to work with our clients and to support them. One of the ways that we look at this is through our toolbox where we have the wheel, which puts our client in the center, and it puts our combination of services around it. We also have, our loop, which symbolizes how we constantly work together with our clients to partner and to develop our relationship longer term. We have a leadership framework, which is also about making sure that we are client centric in everything that we do. Because if we can instill that knowledge and that behavior in all our thousands of leaders around the world, that is really going to work through at all levels and make sure that we deliver that helpfulness, that client centricity also every day when we face our clients. I have a great example from one of our large global clients where we're currently working on a pilot where their need is not only to have security, but also to have some technical help or some technical support. So we are training and up scaling our people to be able to provide and help with a lot of other different services as well. And that is really a a win win win situation. Right? It helps the client because it makes it simpler and better value for them to use people they already have around. It's better for our people because they get more opportunity for career development, progression, learning, just a more interesting job and a higher salary. And thirdly, it's beneficial for secured tasks because we then provide something that no one else can provide and which increases our partnership and our client loyalty. I dream of a world, and I'm hoping we will get there, where we will also have all our people incentivized in some way on client satisfaction. So just imagine, you know, there's a big Christmas bonus or a big reward to the team that created the biggest client satisfaction. Would that be great? What I really love about Securitas is the people. I've worked in many different organizations, in many different types of functions, departments, and roles, but what really stands out is just the genuine niceness of people.