Manual Tasks
Our research indicates that up to 80% of security officers time across industry is taken up by minor administrative tasks such as responding to clearance application related questions and queries from applicants.
Overburdened Security Officers
As DISP gains importance in the Defence industry landscape, so too do the governance and monitoring duties of Security Officers. This is especially the case with the higher levels of DISP, which require more stringent processes, drastically increasing the volume and complexity of work required from Security Officers.
Administrative Overhead
The security clearance application process requires the completion of multiple detailed paper forms, requiring staff to print, manually fill out, and scan documents or for staff to have access to expensive PDF editors, creating a huge administrative burden on an already complex process.
Multiple Unintegrated Systems
Data on cleared staff is currently kept on multiple disconnected systems ranging from staff utilisation platforms, HR databases, Custom manually managed databases (such as excel), email systems, leave and timesheet platforms, and document management systems.
Information Volume Requirements
Security clearance applications require a large volume of information to be provided and often information to be procured from relevant government agencies which can be overwhelming and difficult for staff engaging in the process.
User Experience
Currently there is a challenging user experience for both security officers and cleared staff in navigating and managing the clearance application and vetting process. This includes double handling of data, complex processes, and time-consuming manual tasks.
Potential Security Breaches
Utilising multiple systems including emails for cleared staff management can result in a variety of avenues for security breaches and non-compliance to occur. This can be compounded by staff being required to scan secure documents on unsecured systems in the event of not being able to access one of your secure offices.
Non-Compliance Risk
Often drastically underestimated, the risk of non-compliance in the event of an audit by DISP. Many companies with DISP membership would find it difficult to pass the rigors of an audit by DISP itself which requires the presentation of information such as; Staff training compliance reports, Security Register (log of transactions related to the management of staff clearance and physical security), off-boarding of security cleared staff, and physical security standards and policy.
Complex processes
The processes involved in applying for and managing clearances can be complex and difficult to learn and navigate for new staff interacting with AGSVA for the first time. This complexity can lead to delays in application submission and processing and an increase in questions being directed to the security officer and line managers of staff undertaking the security vetting process.
Progress Tracking
Security Officers have almost zero overview of the progress of staff clearance applications and are often required to report on this by company leadership – resulting an additional increase in work communicating with staff to receive manual updates on their status and relying on the validity of their information.
Cleared Staff Management
Presently industry often utilises multiple systems to track cleared staff, and there is no purpose-built cleared staff workforce management application. This means business leadership has poor visibility of the utilisation of their cleared assets which ultimately results in the loss of work and revenue from Defence industry contracts.
Status Reporting
Due to the other challenges outlined Business leaders often struggle to get a definitive and authoritative view of the health and status of their clear staff workforce. When they are able to get reports it takes a considerable amount of time and effort on the part of Security officers and administrative staff to generate.
Multiple communication channels
Security officers need to manage communications across multiple channels ranging from emails, forms, phone calls, and in person chats with no way to record and consolidate these communications for reporting and tracking.
