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Since engaging an unlicensed firm or person exposes the customer to profound liability, additional information about police officers and security services is made available by the State at
www.bsis.ca.gov/customer_service/faqs/peace_officer.shtml.

SUPERVISION

Are all of the firm's security people supervised through full-time video monitoring? The ideal system involves the installation of cameras observing each and every protector who is assigned at a post.

This goal could be met by little effort: Simply having a webcam aiming toward posted personnel, and someone observing the images over the Internet. If the firm does not deploy this simple technology to observe and supervise their personnel, ask why not.

If they don't provide real-time supervision, ask what supervision method they do apply, and ask to review a log of Supervision Visits to a sample site.

LIABILITY

Ask if they have liability insurance that would extend financial protection to you.
After they answer (since anyone can say Yes),
ask to see the actual policy or Certificate of Insurance.

Though it is a legal requirement to have liability insurance, some firms have none. Other firms maintain merely the minimum required by State law: only $500,000.

CONFIDENTIALITY

Ask if they are a National Security service-provider. If they say Yes, ask them to demonstrate the truthfulness of their claim.

Ask about other clients they serve, and learn through a few questions how much information they reveal about these clients. Did they reveal information about clients that you would not want them to reveal about you?

Each of the five sample personnel files you review should contain an extensive Confidentiality Agreement signed by the employee and witnessed.

By requiring the prospective firm to demonstrate the accuracy of their answers you will gain valuable insight into whether you'd be comfortable with this firm as your service provider. At the end of your Due Diligence review, would you be comfortable opening up your home or business to them, comfortable with them knowing and housing confidential information about you, comfortable with them responsible for your safety day-to-day, and most significantly, would you trust them to be ready and able to manage an emergency or other substantial challenge to your safety and well being?

Your answer is contained within the scores of the 35 issues you considered as part of your Due Diligence Assessment.

Appendix 10

Got a Second? Boyd's Cycle -- OODA Cycle
by Ken J. Good, Director, Surefire Institute

Preface
by Sid Heal, Los Angeles Sheriff's Department

Because all tactical operations are dynamic, they are also time sensitive. Decisions and actions that are delayed are often rendered ineffective because of the constantly changing circumstances. When an adversary is involved, the operation is not only time sensitive, but also time competitive. Time or opportunity neglected by one adversary can be exploited by the other. Recognizing the importance of this characteristic, Napoleon said, "It may be that in the future I may lose a battle, but I shall never lose a minute."

A useful tool for understanding the importance of this concept is the OODA Loop. The OODA Loop, often called Boyd's Cycle, is a creation of Col. John Boyd, USAF (Ret.). Col. Boyd was a student of tactical operations and observed a similarity in many battles and campaigns. He noted that in many of the engagements, one side presented the other with a series of unexpected and threatening situations with which they had not been able to keep pace. The slower side was eventually defeated. What Col. Boyd observed was the fact that conflicts are time competitive.

According to Boyd's theory, conflict can be seen as a series of time-competitive, Observation-Orientation-Decision-Action (OODA) cycles. Each party to a conflict begins by observing themselves, the physical surroundings and the adversary. Next they orient themselves. Orientation refers to making a mental image or snapshot of the situation. Orientation is necessary because of the fluid, chaotic nature of conflicts makes it impossible to process information as fast as we can observe it. This requires a freeze-frame concept and provides a perspective or orientation. Once we have an orientation, we need to make a decision. The decision takes into account all the factors present at the time of the orientation. Last comes the implementation of the decision. This requires action. One tactical adage states that, "Decisions without actions are pointless. Actions without decisions are reckless." Then, because we hope that our actions will have changed the situation, the cycle begins anew. The cycle continues to repeat itself throughout a tactical operation.

The adversary who can consistently go through Boyd's Cycle faster than the other gains a tremendous advantage. By the time the slower adversary reacts, the faster one is doing something different and the action becomes ineffective. With each cycle, the slower party's action is ineffective by a larger and larger margin. The aggregate resolution of these episodes will eventually determine the outcome of the conflict. For example, as long as the actions of the authorities continue to prove successful, a suspect will remain in a reactive posture, while the commander maintains the freedom to act. No matter that the suspect desperately strives to accomplish, every action becomes less useful than the preceding one. As a result, the suspect falls farther and farther behind. This demonstrates that the initiative follows the faster adversary.

Introduction
by Ken J. Good

Today's environment of accelerating scientific discoveries and technological change bring ever-improving hardware to the end user. In this climate is it easy to overlook and even abandon the core foundation of any weapon system, the interplay and perceptions of the human mind in a combative situation.

A man who understood this better than most was Col. John Boyd, USAF (Ret.). Col. Boyd was tasked with determining why American pilots in apparently inferior aircraft were consistently outmatching their Korean counterparts. Air to air combat takes place in a 360-degree sphere and represents the pinnacle of the man and machine relationship coupled with the man on man dynamic warriors dream about.

Boyd was an extremely accomplished pilot who had a standing bet with all students under his tutelage. $40-40 seconds. The student would be allowed to start in a position of advantage and if Col. Boyd could not maneuver his same type aircraft into a position of advantage within 40 seconds, the student could collect $40. I don't think any ever collected.

Col. Boyd developed and pressed forward a simple, yet deeply profound model now known as the OODA cycle or as it often called, Boyd's Cycle. The cycle of Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act is the essence of combat and present in any human conflict.

Col. Boyd considered and defined the nature of combat in terms of time. All engagements were a competition for time, a precious commodity not voluntarily relinquished by either party. Col. Boyd understood the importance and advantages of relentlessly forcing the adversary to deal with a rapid series of events in order to disorient and "get inside" the opponents OODA cycle.

Once "inside," time for the insider moves as it should, one event flowing to the next in a predictable pattern, the outcome virtually certain. On the other hand, the "victim" is stuck in time. He has no apparent opportunities to Observe and Orient meaningful events. Decisions and Actions are ineffective. He is pulled down and entangled in an unrecoverable death spiral. The laws of the universe somehow seem to have been In the battle of "mind-space" the goal is simple; get inside and stay there.

Observe, Orient, Decide and Act. O.O.D.A.

The acronym is easy to remember. The cycle itself is absolutely crucial to understand if one is regularly in harms way.

In order to consistently and effectively defeat opponents, you must sequentially move through the OODA cycle whether you are aware of it or not. It is model that can be used to dissect compressed time frames in a logical and sequential manner. All engagements whether they are air-to-air dogfights or an up close and personal, hand-to-hand confrontation, conform to this simple, powerful, and insightful model.

I have noted that by studying and learning to apply this cycle, one has an effective way to segment, analyze, and improve human performance in confrontational situations. It is a gemstone to be admired and constantly examined.

Recalibrating the Internal Clock

The first issue is our perception of time itself.

I often illustrate people's perception of the time by walking to the back of the classroom and then back to the podium while elucidating some tactical point. While the class is still trying to digest the point, I then ask several students, how long did it take for me to walk to the back of the room and return to the podium? Typically I get a few turned faces, questioning looks and frowns. They are non-verbally asking me, what difference does it make how long that took?

The answers I do receive will typically range from 2 seconds to 10 seconds, a substantial variance. Some will argue that I did not give them any preparation to ready their internal stopwatch. But this misses the point. No one in a rapidly developing engagement is going to stop and remind you to calibrate your chronograph. The point is, using recall alone, the same event witnessed by trained observers is perceived to have taken place in different universes where physical reality moves at different speeds.

The other interesting thing to note is that I will never get an answer like 3.345 seconds.

Why is this so? True sometimes I get an answer of 31/2 seconds, but that's as fine a gradient ever expressed. Our everyday existence does not require a division of time any closer than seconds for most events, in terms of verbal articulation. But in the world of close quarter engagements, using only full seconds to measure time is like using a sledgehammer to fine cut a diamond.

Tremendous and significant changes can happen in one second. A proficient adversary can fire three rounds out of a semi-auto shotgun while passing by an open doorway, horizontally and vertically changing position in relation to you in under a second.

To further illustrate the calibration point in the classroom, I ask someone to stand up and I give this volunteer a "red gun," an inoperative hard plastic replica handgun. I tell them to put it in their waistband, and I do the same. I tell them that they are now part of a futuristic new game show that pits one man against the other in a six-foot gunfight. The participants face each other, winner to receive one million dollars. Both are wearing metallic braces on their wrist and ankles and are held in place by a strong magnetic field. Both will actually be using real, perfectly functioning firearms. When the green light is observed, you will be free to access your firearm and dispatch your opponent as required.