Tim Garrett is president of digital security company AURA US. Opinions are the author’s own.

Facility managers are responsible for ensuring buildings operate safely, efficiently and reliably. Yet as portfolios expand and security operations become more complex, a challenge is emerging.

Facility managers are increasingly accountable for security outcomes across multiple sites, even when the systems responsible for delivering those outcomes remain largely outside their control. This disconnect is becoming a significant operational risk for the profession.

When an alarm is triggered at a facility, most people assume a straightforward process follows: a monitoring center assesses the alarm, dispatches a responder and the issue is resolved. But in reality, incident response is often fragmented.

Multiple guarding companies

Particularly for facility managers responsible for multiple sites across states, a portfolio might rely on multiple guarding companies, local response providers, monitoring centers and dispatch procedures that are spread across regions. Inevitably, standards and quality vary. Yet when something goes wrong, it is typically the facility manager who is expected to answer questions about response times, incident handling and operational effectiveness.

The challenge is that many of the systems underpinning security responses were designed for a different era, one where individual buildings operated largely independently and portfolios were smaller, less complex and easier to manage manually. 

Large facility management organizations often oversee dozens, hundreds or even thousands of sites across states and regions. These facilities contain valuable assets, critical infrastructure and employees who expect safe working environments. At the same time, facility management teams are under pressure to demonstrate measurable and reliable security performance.

Rising pressures

In most areas of operations, organizations have responded to this increased complexity through technology and centralization. Incident response, however, has often remained localized.

In many cases, when an alarm is triggered, facility teams have limited visibility into who has been dispatched, when they will arrive or what happened once the incident has been resolved. The result is that responsibility sits with facility managers, while operational control remains distributed across multiple providers.

The pressure is being amplified by external factors. Across parts of the United States, municipalities have introduced strict policies around alarm management, including fines for repeated false or unverified alarms. The objective is understandable: emergency services and law enforcement agencies have finite resources and cannot afford to respond to large volumes of false activations.

As such policies become more common, organizations are expected to demonstrate that alarms are being properly verified and managed. Simply installing a security system is no longer enough. There is increasing emphasis on proving that appropriate action was taken and that incidents were handled effectively.

At the same time, the private security industry faces significant workforce challenges. Security companies report difficulties recruiting and retaining personnel. Labor shortages, high turnover rates and increasing demand for security services are creating strain throughout the sector. Even capable providers can face staffing challenges that affect availability and response consistency.

For example, a facility manager overseeing a portfolio of retail, commercial or industrial sites might discover after incidents that the response process varied from one location to another. At one site, an alarm might have been quickly verified and a responder dispatched within minutes; at another, communication gaps between the monitoring provider, security vendor and internal team might have delayed the response or left stakeholders uncertain about what actions had been taken.

While each provider might have fulfilled its role, the lack of a unified system makes it difficult for the organization to understand performance across its portfolio or identify where improvements are needed.

Central management

Consider a facility manager responsible for a national portfolio of commercial sites where each location uses different security providers and response procedures. When an alarm is triggered overnight at one facility, the monitoring provider might identify the activation, a separate dispatch company might coordinate the response and the facility team might have little visibility into who is attending or how quickly they will arrive.

Through a centralized response platform, the organization can instead see the incident in real time, verify that the appropriate responder has been assigned, track progress through resolution and review the responder’s performance. This creates a record of what happened and ensures that the facility manager is no longer relying on fragmented updates from multiple vendors to understand whether a security incident was handled effectively.

For facility managers, this creates another layer of uncertainty. A response plan might appear robust on paper, but its effectiveness ultimately depends on whether personnel are available when an incident occurs. The result is a widening gap between responsibility and control.

This would be considered unacceptable in most other areas of business operations. Few organizations would willingly rely on a patchwork of disconnected vendors to manage their financial systems, IT infrastructure or supply chains. Leaders rightly expect centralized reporting, consistent standards and real-time oversight across business functions. Security response is beginning to move in the same direction.

Rather than managing response through a collection of local vendor relationships, many organizations are starting to view it as a function that should be managed centrally across a portfolio. Increasingly, organizations are looking to centralize oversight of incident response through technology that provides greater visibility, coordination and reporting across distributed portfolios.

The value extends beyond efficiency. Centralized visibility enables organizations to measure performance, identify trends, standardize procedures and demonstrate compliance. It makes incident response less reactive and helps facility managers assert greater control over the security processes on which they are ultimately judged.

Using these kinds of centralized, tech-based platforms can also be a strong way for facility managers to supplement response operations and ensure high standards are maintained, regardless of the performance of individual vendors on any given day.

Future responsibilities

Facility managers will always be responsible for protecting people and property. That responsibility is unlikely to diminish. If anything, expectations will continue to rise as organizations become more focused on risk management and operational resilience.

The question is whether the systems supporting those responsibilities evolve at the same pace. The future of facility management is not simply about managing buildings but about overseeing dynamic, complex operations in real time.

The organizations that recognize this shift early will be better positioned to manage risk, improve performance and meet rising stakeholder expectations. As accountability for security outcomes continues to increase, facility managers will need more than trusted local providers. They will need the control required to manage security response as a portfolio-wide operation.

Those that fail to make that transition might find themselves accountable for outcomes they never really controlled.