The program, which debuted last year, has so far published research reports on preventing gun violence in the workplace, security for tall buildings, detecting and preventing workplace dishonesty, and laptop theft.

Barbara Buzzell, the ASIS Foundation's Alexandria, VA-based research and development project manager, says the goal of the CRISP reports is to provide practical, research-based resources to help security professionals deal with specific issues.

"We felt by working with academics we could provide a trusted and reliable source of information," she says.
ASIS wanted to model the program on the U.S. Community-Oriented Policing Services, which hosts an extensive library of research papers on single-issue topics for law enforcement.

COPS, which is affiliated with two American universities, provided ASIS with the templates it uses for its research papers, says Buzzell.

ASIS hopes to publish three to six research papers a year. The reports have proved popular so far, with more than 3,000 downloads over the past six months.

Although sometimes academics write from a purely theoretical, as opposed to practical, perspective, that hasn't been the case so far, Buzzell says. Even so, the foundation hopes to attract more interest from practising security professionals.

"We hope practitioners will write for us but we do have some pretty stringent standards because we would like for these to represent the definitive word on a topic," she says.

Plus, she adds, many security practitioners are great speakers and educators, but not all can write reports. "Writing is a very a unique skill."

The process for writing a report involves submitting a proposal, which goes to subject matter experts for evaluation. Once the proposal is approved, ASIS provides the writer with a contract, and the writer submits a 20-30 page report.

The reports must follow a specific formula in terms of the approach and the presentation of the content.
Two peers - an academic and a practitioner - review the report and make recommendations. The writer follows up on the recommendations, and a committee reviews the final product.

And while the reports represent months of work for the writer, there is the satisfaction of knowing you've contributed to increasing the professionalism of the security industry - and a cheque that averages $10,000 US, says Buzzell.

Glen Kitteringham, director, security and life safety at Brookfield Properties in Calgary, had been researching laptop theft for several years when the foundation approached him to write a CRISP report on the topic. From start to finish, it took about two years.

"We were just in the beginning stages of getting these published, so there was a big learning curve for everyone," he says.