JANITORS AGAINST TERRORISM

Feb 1, 2005 12:00 PM, By CORRINA STELLITANO

Each week, they walk the halls of hospitals, casinos, stadiums and food packing plants. They have access to the corporate offices of leading American companies — PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, Xerox and OfficeMax, Marriott Hotels and Verizon Wireless — often entering and leaving long after employees have departed for home.

Professional cleaning crews employed by leading cleaning franchiser, Jani-King, are more familiar with the 50,000 buildings they clean than most daily employees. This puts the cleaning personnel in the right place to watch for suspicious occurrences, say Jani-King corporate leaders.

To harness the power of this roving observation force, the Dallas-based company began introducing its Workplace Awareness Program to its more than 11,000 franchisees in December 2004. The training program is intended to teach employees to correctly identify potential workplace threats and to report those threats to authorities.

Advantage in the field

Although Jani-King employees are not instructed to provide security or to confront potentially threatening individuals, they are taught to be more aware of the surroundings they routinely monitor with brooms, mops and vacuums. The key is to optimize the knowledge Jani-King employees already gain in daily activities, says company President Jerry Crawford.

“We have tens of thousands of eyes and ears in (our clients') facilities — some of them 24 hours a day. All of our employees are familiar with the locations (they clean). They have keys to the offices, know which cars are supposed to be there; they even know the lights that are supposed to be on and off,” he says. “I compare it to a Neighborhood Watch Program.”

Because of this daily monitoring, Jani-King is “in a unique position…to enhance the safety and security of citizens around the world,” according to the Workplace Awareness training manual.

Jani-King requires the program for all corporate executives and employees and strongly encourages involvement by its franchisees. In addition, specific Jani-King contracts, such as nuclear plants or government buildings, will require certification of employees cleaning those facilities, Crawford says.

The task of training so many employees is a manageable challenge for the widespread company, Crawford says. “How are we able to clean more than 50,000 buildings on five continents in 18 countries? You have to (consider our) infrastructure. The infrastructure is in place for us to easily update and amend our training.”

The Workplace Awareness Program will be included in the six-DVD training series currently viewed by new franchisees. The franchisees then can teach the program to their employees. In addition to the DVD series, the program is communicated through a handbook for program trainers and a workbook for employees. The DVD produced by Jani-King shares footage of the aftermath of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, before proclaiming, “Jani-King is working to keep the world safe.” The large words float above images of the American flag and the Statue of Liberty.

Such patriotic images ring true for Crawford. He tells employees, “As an American, I feel an obligation to help keep our country safe against the threat of terrorism.” For him, the call for a training program in terrorism awareness came from the highest levels — “The President and the Department of Homeland Security have asked us (as citizens) to protect against terrorism at the ground-level,” he says.

Empowering employees

To endow the training program with an emphasis on Homeland security, Jani-King turned to a Tampa Bay-area franchise owner, Andy Bermudez.

A former San Diego deputy sheriff, Bermudez worked with the Department of Homeland Security to help federalize the nation's airports. Drawn to Florida by the attractive growth opportunities, Bermudez had owned his Jani-King franchise for a year when terrorists attacked on Sept. 11, 2001.

“I just felt compelled to do something,” he recalls. Like the work at DHS, helping with the Workplace Awareness Program at Jani-King was a chance to serve, and to combine his background in the cleaning business and in law enforcement.

The combination of cleaning and law enforcement is not a traditional union, he says. “Who would think a cleaning business has anything to do with security? But our people are in buildings every night in every nook and cranny. It's our wish that this will be an example for other companies. The protection of our country is no longer a spectator sport. We all must be actively involved.”

The program will empower cleaning personnel to use observation skills they may not realize they have, Bermudez says. “We tell them not to chase people or attempt arrest. What we are trying to teach is observation skills or recognition.”

In the training video, Bermudez instructs employees and franchisees in the skills of observation. Watch parking lots for suspicious vehicles, for vehicles riding low on four tires or oozing suspicious substances or smells, he tells them. He suggests noticing landscaping that may offer potential hiding places and urges them to report any lights that are unexpectedly dark.

Inside, employees are told to watch for unfamiliar people or unattended packages. Focus on “height, weight, gender and age,” Bermudez tells employees, explaining that characteristics such as hair style and color are easily changed. Notice what people say, he says, and observe the routines of co-workers, in order to more easily spot anything out of the ordinary.

Employee drills include turning off the lights and asking the employees to describe a fellow employee from memory; these sorts of activities sharpen their skill level, Bermudez says.

Other suggestions include the instruction to franchisees to always purchase the same brands of cleaning substances, thus allowing employees to quickly monitor cleaning closets for the introduction of unexpected substances. They are told to immediately report lost keys or key cards and to avoid listening to televisions or radios while working.

Any suspicious occurrence is reported to a designated supervisor, to prevent unnecessary calls to authorities.

Already, Bermudez' employees have begun to put the training to work. They discovered trash being removed from a corporate building by an unauthorized visitor and reported the intruder to the proper authorities. They followed smoke in a Florida warehouse and discovered an overheating generator simmering toward fire.

These are successful examples, Bermudez says. “Anytime there is a company where the employees have access to someone else's property, there is vulnerability. For example, airports have huge cleaning staffs that receive very little supervision. These people can be your best allies or a possible danger.”

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© 2008 Penton Media Inc.

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