Woodsville Guaranty Savings Bank’s Post

The UK retail industry is currently facing a dual crisis: a steep rise in theft and anti-social behaviour, paired with an apparent leadership vacuum in the security sector. In a time when effective strategies are needed to combat increasingly brazen criminal activity, many of the so-called leaders in retail security seem more focused on self-promotion and personal branding than tackling the industry's escalating challenges. [Read More Below] #AssetProtectConsulting #Disconnect #RetailSecurity #LossPrevention Colin Culleton

There are pros and cons to SCO. Data analytics can help you mitigate your losses. EBR is critical in today's world. #EBR #assetprotection #prescriptiveanalytics

The UK retail industry is currently facing a dual crisis: a steep rise in theft and anti-social behaviour, paired with an apparent leadership vacuum in the security sector. In a time when effective strategies are needed to combat increasingly brazen criminal activity, many of the so-called leaders in retail security seem more focused on self-promotion and personal branding than tackling the industry's escalating challenges. [Read More Below] #AssetProtectConsulting #Disconnect #RetailSecurity #LossPrevention Colin Culleton

"Join Wells Fargo for the Grand Opening of their River North Branch" Read the full article below..

I guess the merchandise recovery model opposed to detention didn't work after all. If the Loss Prevention Manager is held accountable for low internal numbers... If the Undercover is held accountable for low external numbers..... ......then who is being held accountable for this and cases like it? Did the Store Director provide resources for Loss Prevention to help mitigate theft at self-checkout? I doubt it. Did Sr. Loss Prevention Leadership adjust the strategy based on the conditions or did they stick with it saying talent is the reason it's not working? You know the answer. What can we learn from this failure? 1. It's a toxic culture to only blame talent and not the strategy 2. Adjust strategy as operations unfold. Every plan looks good until Murphey's Law strikes 3. Accountability is not just for Middle Managers and below #securitymanagement #lossprevention #leadership

Last week, I met with the first full cohort of the UK government's new Counter Fraud Leadership Programme. I spoke with them about their passion for fighting fraud and their expectations and aspirations for the programme. This new qualification has been designed by the Government Counter Fraud Profession in collaboration with industry, academia, and counter fraud experts. It blends the latest practices and techniques with insights and practical experiences. It is important that those of us who lead counter fraud activity challenge ourselves to be the best we can be and make time to cultivate our expertise, and the expertise of those we work with. By continuing to build counter fraud capability through training like this we can strengthen our organisations, practitioners, and the broader counter fraud community - enabling us to increase our ambition in understanding and reducing the impact of fraud.  #fraud #counterfraud #fraudmanagement #fraudprevention #publicsector #government

Life at Mitie moves at pace and if there’s one thing we know how to do well, it’s onboarding new colleagues…lots of them…all at the same time… Our partnership with Landsec is critical to our ongoing success in the retail space and we were thrilled to be awarded the bundled contract for four additional iconic shopping destinations recently – Gunwharf Quays, Bluewater, Clarks Village, and Braintree Village. This saw us welcome 321 new colleagues across security, cleaning, management, and guest services to the Mitie family. Welcome onboard, I’m super excited to watch how your careers grow and develop at Mitie. Retail is in interesting and challenging space to work in right now and crime is an issue that our new and existing colleagues on the frontline of security have to tackle every day. Especially within the shopping centre environment. We heavily invest in training and development, and our intelligence capabilities enable us to identify and challenge the behaviours and trends that drive criminal activity. But we’re also aware of the need to create better sector and government links to stamp out the problem once and for all. I was really heartened to see Rishi Sunak visit Horsham last Wednesday to meet the Sussex Police Crime and Commissioner, Katy Bourne, and Chief Constable, Jo Shiner, to launch a crackdown on retail crime. Legislation is going through to make assaulting a retail worker a standalone criminal offence and this MUST also extend to security professionals. The PM has also proposed the increased use of electronic tagging to monitor prolific offenders as well as the use of facial recognition technology and CCTV to catch and apprehend offenders. A positive step forward for our industry. #Welcome #Newcolleagues #Retail #Security #Timeforchange

This year, I am celebrating 30 years in loss prevention. Laws, technology, and the sophistication of crime have changed in 30 years, but I have not. I’m a loss prevention professional through and through. I am passionate about where we came from and where we are now. When I started, we were playing cops and robbers. Today... ➜ LP is a profession ➜ There are LP certifications ➜ There are LP college courses ➜ LP reports to the C-suite I started as a store detective at Montgomery Ward (which shut down its retail presence in 2000!). I moved up the ranks from the store level to the regional level. Over the years, I worked with Bloomingdales, Family Dollar, and Pep Boys. I was exposed to many different retail segments. The bulk of my career was at CVS Health - 18 years. And in the last 10-15 years, I leaned heavily into organized retail crime at CVS and Ulta Beauty. In addition to my day job, I was always involved in the industry. I attended conferences and shared my stories, perspectives, and knowledge to advance the LP industry. Three years ago, I joined ThinkLP as the VP of Retail Risk Solutions. Instead of waiting for the next conference, I work day in and day out to evolve the industry into the future. I talk with prospects and customers every day. I have the perspective of 200+ global retailers X 30 years. I share that 360 perspective and insights back to the LP industry. It’s an exciting time in loss prevention. While the crime is more sophisticated, the technology is even more sophisticated. Never before have LP professionals had visibility across all facets of the business AND interoperability across systems. The future is already here; it’s just not distributed evenly. But I’m here to bring it forward for everyone. Who’s coming with me?  P.S. I will be sharing many more of my ORC and LP stories here on LinkedIn. Give me a follow and ring the 🔔 in my profile to hear about the industry’s past, future, and present. #lossprevention #organizedretailcrime #assetprotection

There are pros and cons SCO!

Sentenced to prison for 5 years and 4 months. My last 11 years have been interesting. I sat in this exact Starbucks approx 4 years ago with a gentleman (I’ll call KC) that I was trying to help. Or perhaps I was seeking some degree of help from him. I’m not sure. At that moment in time I was in litigation, which started as result of, I believed, being owed well into 8 figures. I was facing a monster in a client/opponent as it related to both size and reputational behaviors. KC was struggling financially. He was going hard after it though, trying hard, selling hard, and so on. He was extremely intelligent, one of the most intelligent I’d met, was an incredibly hard worker, had a lot of the right ingredients……but he lacked experience in business, had none as an entrepreneur. For entrepreneurs, for business owners, the struggles are real. They wear on you physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally. They can rip you to shreds. They can take you to the bottom and spit you out in worse shape, in every category. A SMALL sampling of the stresses: the litigation I was involved in was approx 3 years. Very early on, my opposition submitted to ISNetworld that I had a fatality on their project. But I hadn’t. ISNetworld is a rating and reporting agency that provides this service to a segment of the construction world. Because it dropped my rating to the bottom, this prevented me from bidding work for anyone or from receiving the jobs that I had bid and might have won. Thus it stopped all cash flow or possibility of cash flow. Hard to continue litigation with no ability to bid work and or pay attorneys. This was eventually corrected (ISNetworld sent me notice, I responded, there was a process for rebuttal and to get it reversed….but a certain amount of short and long term damage was done). It was distracting, stressful, and only one of many challenges to come. Is there any world wherein that’s fair or right? Yet, business owners deal with these type things, that are out of their control, that are often unfair or “below the belt”, all the time. I met KC in early 2020 in this Starbucks and a few months later he was intercepted by the police with bombs and guns in his car after he made threats of blowing up the treasury building in PA. Just previous to that I watched his slow mental demise as the stress and unfairness of business ripped him apart. I saw the slow train wreck happening but could not stop it. There was a Mental Health warrant issued for his arrest but in the end KC got 5 years and 4 months in prison for that mental breakdown that came in large part because he was chasing the dream. Business isn’t always fair. If entrepreneurship chose you, if it’s in the fabric of your being, if it’s who you are and not what you do, then it makes it a bit easier to swallow. Janis Joplin sang “freedom is another word for having nothing to lose”. But don’t lose your freedom in the name of trying to obtain freedom.