Business Concepts for the Security Sector: Benchmarking, Core Competencies, and Outsourcing

The 21st century brings tremendous transformation requirements for the typically industrial age, Cold War era defence sectors found in most countries. Asymmetric threats, joint and combined operations and shifting and ambiguous missions within multilateral security arrangements are just some of the challenges to be faced. The private sector offers several concepts, that when properly applied, can help defence establishments in their organizational and functional transformation for the realities of 21st century conflict. Defence policy makers have often attempted to apply business principles to the security sector with varying degrees of success. Great care must be taken in applying business models to military matters. Examples of mistakes in this process abound — ranging from U.S Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara’s use of body count metrics based upon business statistics and systems analysis during the Vietnam War to “just-in-time” supply concepts for military logistics operations. The application of any principle or practice from the business world to the security sector must be carefully considered as the goals, cultures, and organizational attributes of private companies and defence organizations are quite different. Naturally, a comparison between the business world and the military is at times imprecise, but some relevant crossover can be found given the generic fundamentals all organizations possess — structures, hierarchies, functions, processes, missions assigned and required outcomes. This article aims to show how the three business concepts of benchmarking / adopting best practice, focusing on core competencies, and outsourcing are relevant to national security organizations and that use of these concepts can benefit defence establishments. The article will highlight how a considered application of these three principles by military institutions can lead to enhanced organizational effectiveness.