Atea „r 52+4 EN

Customer case
IT for the sake of security
Securitas is much more than just howling alarms and taciturn uniformed guards. Securitas now
wants to invest more in service, emphasise friendliness and become better at communicating with
customers. In short, the general public is to feel calm and secure with Securitas guards nearby. The
key to success is clear strategies and strong IT-solutions.
The Securitas Group is one of the world’s bestknown
security companies. It now offers protection
for homes, offices and organisations. In Finland
there are four independent businesses: Securitas Oy,
offering security services; Securitas Tekniikka Oy,
supplying security systems; Securitas Arvokuljetus
Oy, supplying cash-handling services and Securitas
Direct Oy, supplying alarm solutions for small
offices and homes. Altogether there are over 3,000
employees, and the different businesses work in close
collaboration, both externally and internally, e.g.
with regard to IT-services.
Jarmo Mikkonen, managing director of Securitas
Oy, explains about the company’s thoughts and plans
for the future:
“Since Securitas is basically a service company, we
should focus more on good service, though this should
naturally go hand in hand with security. We must
show that we are a friendly company which inspires
security, but also offers good, high-quality service.”
BETTER SERVICE, DAY BY DAY
Securitas sees its employees as its most important
resource. “If the staff feel good they will also provide
a good service for our customers”, says Jarmo. “We
currently work in accordance with a model we call
‘Toolbox’. This includes all the tools we need for set-
ting up targets, maintaining them and doing consistent
and organised work on our services.”
Good growth is the most important future challenge.
Thanks largely to our strong IT-solutions, we
can rationalise and standardise the systems. “We must
always listen to our customers, understand their
requirements and maintain a high degree of flexibility,”
says Jarmo. “By beginning from inside the organisation,
e.g. with cost-effective IT-solutions, we do a
great service both to ourselves and our customers. If
we offer our staff an efficient, organised working
environment we also attract skilled new staff – and
this is something which in the last resort naturally also
benefits our customers,” says Jarmo with a smile.
HATS OFF FOR THE LONG-TERM APPROACH
Jarmo believes that efficient IT-solutions will play a
big role in the company’s success, both now and in
the future. But how should one proceed?
“Keeping up with today’s rapid technical developments
is a big challenge,” says Jarmo. “But I’ve
noticed that keeping up with the long-term development
process is better than launching into everything
new which crops up. The risk of making wrong
investments then drastically decreases. IT-developments
have given us all a number of useful office
tools. However, it is always a challenge to keep users
26
updated in order to increase the use of the various
applications. Another advantage of IT-in particular
is that reporting and follow-up have also become
much simpler.”
THE CATCHWORD IS ‘TOGETHER’
Securitas began collaborating with Atea about four
years ago. This began as a major migration project,
and after that the collaboration continued, also in
other areas. Securitas now buys much of its hardware
from Atea, and uses Atea’s local IT-support, thus
helping Securitas staff in their daily work.
“It seems that Atea puts the customer first, just as
we ourselves do. We hope that in future we’ll be able
to develop the various solutions together and build
an even more efficient business. Instead of seeing
this as a separate project, we should actually see it as
a continuous process. I think we’ll then achieve the
best results,” says Jarmo.
Brief information
Name: Jarmo Mikkonen
Age: 39
Family: Married with two children.
Lives: In the country 50 km outside Helsinki.
Hobbies: Likes being outdoors. Hunts – preferably elks.