The philosophical and operational significance of security awareness programmes

Implementing a successful security awareness programme is an essential step in enhancing security within any organisation. Therefore it is important to understand that all employees, to a greater or lesser extent, need security awareness training, since each employee must act in a secure manner and in the best interest of the organisation. Recent global events have led to an increased awareness of the contribution that can be made by security, which has translated into increased risk awareness, including that relating to physical access, cyber crime and even overall business integrity. It is being recognised that security is more than just managing security officers, doing investigations or security assessments and calling on the security people after an event has occurred. The challenge for security departments is to respond pro-actively and to come up with holistic solutions. They should then effectively communicate these solutions by means of security awareness programmes that are implemented throughout the organisation. In this article the author takes the view that an effective corporate security policy is fundamental to protective security and effective loss prevention, and emphasises the importance to adherence to the social contract and the reason/s for training employees in security awareness. Such a policy should comprise of the following components, namely the company's security procedures, an effective communication strategy, and the presentation of the security policy across the organisation. Even the most sophisticated policy may have very little effect on security risks faced by an organisation, if those who are affected by it do not know of its existence, or understands its contents. This is why security awareness is an equally critical element in a successful security programme.