Do any sizeable white-collar employers NOT have on-site security? (super-mild)

The BBQ Pit
1

( … getting tired of whipping out the badge all the time.)

The last place I worked without security personnel was a middle-of-the-road educational publisher. My office adjoined the warehouse and pressroom. I used to walk in the back door (needed a code to open it) and just mosey my way on over to my desk each morning. No muss, no fuss.

These days, I work in an office tower. We rent office space, so we’ve got our own security on all our floors, and building security elsewhere. Our own security turns over a lot, so they never remember anyone and you’re always having to flip your badge. But that’s only a small annoyance … not such a big deal.

The building security and our security have petty squabbles from time to time over stupid things – the latest is that building security doesn’t want to buzz people in or out after 6 p.m. weeknights or on Saturdays anymore, even though half our staff works off-hours. They did it for six months with a wave and a smile … now all the sudden “We can’t let you in or out – YOUR security has to handle that!” :rolleyes: Previous tenants were strict 9-to-5ers, and the building security (maintained 24 hours) got used to having chill time 16 hours a day – with us in the building, it’s more like 10 hours of chill time. Cry me a river.

On top of that, our own higher-ups, for a while, were resisting getting all the late-night/weekend guys building access passes so we could let ourselves in and out as needed. Their original plan was for a select number of managers to have them, and then the managers could let everyone in an out. Yeah … we get lots of work done when I have to ride the elevator down 20 floors four times an hour to let other staff into the building. All while building security is 20 feet away with a flippin’ open-door button within arm’s reach :mad: Eventually, we all got access passes, but for a while, we were like “WTF?”

Meanwhile, we’ve got another office an hour away. We’ve got the same badges that the office has. When their staff comes here, they can flash their badge while speedwalking and be allowed in without a problem. When we travel to their office, they make us present our badges within a foot of their faces – and you have to do this twice to get into the other office (once outside, once inside). Nothing is different or more sensitive in the other office … the security just likes that power trip, I guess. That is more than a minor annoyance to me.

I know, I know … it’s their job. And really small potatoes in a tight economy – "Hey, at least you’ve got a job. How can tiny security hassles even matter a little bit to you? Where are you priorities, man?!? :confused: "

…

So anyway, how does security work at your jobs? How many of us work in places without security? Would the sun still rise every morning if white-collar building security just went away? Would laid-off and fired people just cause mad havoc all the time on their ways out? Corporate espionage would spike up? What’s the deal?

2

Our office had two really big dogs. Seriously. That was it.

3

Were they sweethearts? :smiley:

4

Here in Qatar we have friendly, unarmed Company Security. I sort of miss the guys with the machine guns.

5

They pretty much sit there and rarely ask to see our badges.

When I worked at IBM, though, sheesh! You could have luch with a security guard, and on your way back in to the office, he’d demand to see your badge.

6

Universities. I mean, they have campus security, but it’s not like people are badging in and out of buildings. Probably on some campuses they are, actually, but it seems like mostly not.

7

I think 9/11 was the turning point. Some places had security, but it got out of hand after The Incident.

There was a guard at my last office gig who joked with me, chatted me up all the time, and I passed him every time I went out for a smoke. But he would NOT let me go out without my ID tag!

8

I have an RFID swipey thing I wave my wallet at as I go into the building.

9

**bordelond ** said:

Corporate espionage. I think that’s the biggest concern.

Or in my case, that the Chinese might steal our high tech info on how to write a form to process hardware. :rolleyes:

I love the posters they have to stress the need for security using a picture of Aldrich Ames. They talk about how important security is, and use a friggin’ spy selling CIA secrets. Right, that’s comparable. Besides, he was an inside man. That means he had the right badge to be let in every day. Stupid poster.

10

Same. Except we also have a biometric scanner that reads fingerprints. If you don’t match your print to the RFID badge, you don’t get into the building. Each floor only requires a badge swipe.

11

Damn! :eek: Double damn if that’s for regular ol’ office work and not at the Pentagon or something.

I’ll pipe down about having to flash a badge.

12

Card swipe here, too. When I was interviewing last summer, most of the office towers had security guys, and badge in/out requirements. Which makes sense, they know how many people are in the building, and probably even what floor they’re likely to be on.

The double layer the OP describes seems bizzare to me, I don’t see what benefit it would have to either group. Then again, the majority of security measures I see seem designed to make people feel safe, as opposed to actually protecting anything.

Maeglin fingerprints, not hand scanners?

13

We’ve got cards we have to swipe, plus a security guy in the lobby who doesn’t ask for ID unless its someone he doesn’t know who’s acting suspicious. I’m not sure what counts as suspicious, but it apparently works. Last month, he asked to see someone’s ID, and the guy bolted. Ran out the back (alarmed) door, and jumped into a waiting van that sped off. That was the third guy who’s tried to steal from my workplace that I’ve heard of, and the first guy who wasn’t successful.

So, I’m basically okay with the office security we have.

For the record, I work for a toy manufacturer.

14

Me too. I generally enter through the back door. After hours and on weekends you’re supposed to enter through the front door. We have security guards for overnight and weekends. I’ve also seen security camera feeds at the front desk.

15

I work on a corporate campus so it’s show the guard my badge on the way in and swipe to get in my building. No lobby security guy. If my swipe fails three times I go into sleep mode.

16

Our suite has a proximity badge thing that opens the door.

That’s for when the door isn’t propped open all day, which it usually is, especially if we’re expecting a lot of people that don’t work here.

17

I love finding new words to use.

badging
badging
badging

18

We’re a call center, and sometimes I think our security is way too lax. I don’t mind (for now) but supposedly a few times people have just wandered in and used our facilities (bathroom, breakroom, etc). Personally, I am thinking the psycho across from me is going to end up either a) bringing in a gun and killing us all or b) pissing someone off enough that they come in and kill us all trying to get to her stupid ass** and I would like to see a little more security. We have the RFID badge that we wave over the scanner and just walk in the back. A sign-in sheet up front and half the time, the warehouse doors are just propped open (no A/C back there).

**if scenario b ever happens, you can bet your ass, I will personally drag her out of her office and hand her over!

19

Yep- big loving Newfoundlands who would drool on people who stepped out of line!

20

I work for a multinational bank. Oh, heck, I’ll go ahead and say it. I work for CitiCorp, so our security is tight, tight, tight. Badges to get anywhere, no tailgating through the door, log out of your computer anytime you walk away from it, clean off your desk before you leave for the evening, and so on. And they have people who walk around the floors who make sure security is being followed. There are even concrete barriers to keep vehicles away from the building proper. Part of this is due to the potentially sensitive nature of the data. To be fair, though, I think I lot of it was mandated after 9/11, since keeping large banking companies operating is probably considered vital to national security.

A lot different than my previous employer with 10 employees.