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Security Training Amidst COVID-19
COVID-19 has changed the way we live and work. Many things we took for granted at G4S in our everyday routines have been affected. Like other areas of the business, training, has been forced to adapt and change to our new reality as well.
Before COVID-19, training was conducted face-to-face. As the severity of COVID-19 became apparent, G4S’ National Training Unit (NTU) was tasked with delivering a completely virtual version of the Basic Assessment Program (BAP). This virtual program needed to achieve the same level of quality and consistency as the in-person version in order to staff our business’ rapidly expanding requirements for COVID-19 related coverages. The number of staff required to meet these coverages was fluctuating hour-to-hour as clients were deemed essential services by the government, reducing staff or completely shutting down their business.
The NTU convened a virtual meeting and reviewed the task of how to effectively meet the changing staff requirements. Two members took on the task of virtualizing the BAP. They broke it down into its essential components, re-wrote the training presentation and had it ready for delivery by March 20th. The first virtual BAP on March 23rd had more than 32 participants and 3 instructors, all simultaneously learning the new program’s format and timing.
“The feedback from clients was that there was no noticeable change in the knowledge or capability of our staff.”
Three other members of the NTU took on the scheduling of the programs for the following four weeks, contacting recruiters and managers to organize training that could accommodate schedules across four time zones. In the first week, fifteen programs were conducted across Canada using Virtual Instructor Led Training utilizing five instructors - two per program.
Over the next 35 training days the NTU would run 119 training programs, and train roughly 1,400 individuals in the BAP, Crisis Management and Deescalation, Walmart CSR Training and Officer Safety.
The NTU is now entering phase two: to deliver a Management of Aggressive Behaviour (MAB) program in a way that meets the needs of our frontline staff at our higher risk locations, while also meeting the federal and provincial guidelines for social distancing, group interactions and safety. Gord Hurley, Director, Talent Development & Training Fortunately, the NTU has shown a knack for out-of-the-box thinking and collaboration skills. Both the Officer Safety and MAB programs had their theory redesigned for Virtual Instructor Led Training, ensuring that the programs reduced duplication of content while still meeting the NTU’s mandate of creating training that is legally compliant, tactically viable and medically sound.
The resulting program concept was presented to Toronto Public Health by our National Health and Safety Director Paolo Cotungo, leading to an entire weekend of discussions with Toronto Public Health, the Public Health Agency of Canada, and several physicians in order to get our program approved. Approval was granted on Sunday, May 3rd, 2020.
We are proud to say that this program provides the greatest consideration to both limiting group numbers and physical distancing measures, while maximizing the amount of defensive tactics skills that we can train for in this environment.
