In Depth

Fear Factor

In the months following September 11, prescriptions for antianxiety medication climbed 23 percent in The Big Apple. Does your security strategy put your employees in a New York state of mind?

By Daintry Duffy

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However, the fastest way to lose employee cooperation is to set the security bar either too low or too high. CSOs will find that most employees pay close attention to security changes. They parse communications from the security group looking for signs that something may affect their physical safety. As a result, CSOs need to make sure that the security they employ is appropriate to the level of risk.

They also need to ensure that security measures, once put in place, are well maintained. Studies by social psychologists show that if a window in a building is broken and remains unrepaired, the rest of the windows will soon be broken. That one broken window serves both as an invitation to hooliganism and a message that no one is paying attention. The same holds true for corporate security measures. One sidestepped security measure and respect for the system will quickly erode. "When you see that somebody's propped a garbage can against a magnetic door or that the video camera has been broken for weeks, then it defeats the whole purpose," says Kaiser Permanente's Dea. "The trust starts to fade that you are serious about securityor that security was ever there in the first place."

CSOs should feel like they are fear-mongering when they talk to employees about scary things. The CSO is probably the closest thing to a security expert in most people's daily lives, he can decipher what all the security news on a corporate, local and national level means for employees in their work and family lives. "If people have a plan in their minds, they're less anxious," says Dr. Robert Butterworth, a psychologist with International Trauma Associates.

In a study titled "Effects of Fear and Anger on Perceived Risks of Terrorism," conducted shortly after Sept. 11, Baruch Fischhoff, professor of public policy and social and decision sciences at Carnegie Mellon University, tracked respondents' feelings about different policy measures that the government could take in response to events. His study concluded that the government should provide people with honest, accurate information, even if it worries them. "People want to be treated as adults. They want you to level with them even if the truth is uncomfortable," says Fischhoff.

In order to get good feedback from employees about security, CSOs have to give good information, thereby creating a trusting relationship. But that's one place the typical Joe Friday stoicism of the security team can be a barrier. "These guys are not known for their interpersonal alacrity," says The Impact Group's Siegel. "Security sometimes operates like a quasiparamilitary organization, and they see themselves as detached from the businesspeople and the employees they are supporting."