RFP Development

It’s often easy for company managers to spot holes in their security system. Sometimes it’s an unfortunate event that brings a security gap to light; other times it is just apparent that the company’s business and situation have evolved past the effectiveness of the security system. In recent years, the advances in technology have made it almost negligent not to upgrade a security system.

Regardless of the stimulation, mature companies periodically initiate a review and overhaul of their security measures, while young companies will reach the point in their development that the need to implement security measures becomes self evident. It is at this point that either updating or creating the company’s Security Criteria is in order.

The difficulty in creating or updating a Security Criteria is that only the very largest of organizations have a dedicated security organization with the skills and knowledge necessary to perform the comprehensive and objective assessment of their systems and protocols. Other companies must rely on the services of an outside consulting firm, though even Fortune 100 companies also rely on these consulting firms to “sanity-check” their internal conclusions.

Once the Security Criteria is complete, the next step is to develop a Request-for-Proposal (RFP) document that not only is specific enough to insure that all elements of the Security Criteria are met, but is also flexible enough to allow respondents to the proposal to be creative and inventive in their solutions.

FocusMicro security consultants have the experience from hundreds of recent security assessments and the industry knowledge of state-of-the-art security technologies and strategies. As a consulting company, FocusMicro delivers the depth, breadth and resources to customers that are rarely available from a single organization.

In the role of a security consultant, FocusMicro managers routinely provide Security Criteria development and assessment services for customers. The Security Criteria should be a highly specific document that details the customer’s security goals and objectives, and a roadmap of the steps necessary to progress through the logical phases to reach those goals. The Security Criteria should begin with the key elements of the company’s security Evaluation and Assessment, giving weight to each element as appropriate.

Goals and objectives that clearly and conclusively respond to the Evaluation and Assessment document must be established and delineated in the Security Criteria. These goals and objectives should include designed-in redundancies and overlapping responsibilities that reduce the likelihood of both probable and improbable events. Next, a comprehensive strategic plan for achieving the stated goals and objectives would then be created. The strategic plan will layout the broad elements required to achieve the goals and objectives, and include an implementation sequence of events.

The last and final element of a Security Criteria is the tactical plan that must be accomplished to enable the customer to support the strategic plan and achieve their goals and objectives. The tactical plan lays down a basic timeline for accomplishing these relatively detailed tasks, and assigns responsibilities to specific organizations and individuals for accomplishing them. With the completion of the tactical plan, all of the elements are in place to create an RFP.

FocusMicro will create a Request-for-Proposal document containing several components that are essential to the execution and implementation of a successful security strategy.

• A summary of the overall goals of the new security solution, such as improved employee safety, 24/7 access support, controlled inter-facility asset tracking, enhanced fire detection and containment capabilities, reduced theft probability, improved visitor controls, etc. These goals should be a distilled version of those stated in the Security Criteria, providing respondents to the RFP a clear vision of what bottom line results of the completed security solution should accomplish.
• An extensive overview of the technological components that will be required to meet the goals of the completed security solution. The technical components should be specified in both minimum and highly desired performance specifications that not only serve to qualify products, but that also allow respondents to invest creative and imaginative problem solving with their response. There is a fine line in an RFP between “too specific” and “not specific enough”. FocusMicro consultants understand that if respondents are given latitude in their approaches to the RFP, then a synergistic effect will occur that will serve to improve the finished solution.
• The range of supplemental products and services that respondents must provide. These include procedure documentation, product support packages, employee training, short term and long term help desk support, repair and maintenance requirements and any other requirements that will make the customer as self supportive as possible.
• A list of conditions that RFP respondents must adhere to. These conditions can include turnkey vs. shared responsibility project control, time tables, project management services, communication and interface requirements, shipments, invoicing and asset tracking protocols, manufacturers’ inclusion/exclusion from the solutions, and many others. Essentially, the conditions in an RFP should spell out how the customer wants the project to be completed.

One of the reservations that customers sometimes have in selecting FocusMicro as a security consultant for their RFP development is that the completed RFP could be biased towards FocusMicro and its products. “That will never happen”, firmly states FocusMicro’s Vice President of Sales, Steve Walker. “Aside from of our expertise and experience, one of the most important assets we bring to our customers is our credibility. We deliver objective and independent consulting that focuses on the needs of the customer and not an agenda to sell services and products. When we do a good job for customers, we achieve a position of trust in their decision making process. Our consultants work very hard to maintain and justify that trust. That’s why our customers call us “partners” and not contractors.”

FocusMicro’s expertise, experience and its commitment to product neutral solutions are powerful components in our security consulting qualifications. Our emphasis will always be on delivering the answers and solutions that best serve our customers. That’s why our tag line is “We Protect Your Bottom Line”.