Security has found expressions in the different specialist industrial sub-sectors of Manufacturing, Maritime, Banking, Aviation, Information Technology, Petrol- Chemical and Electronic Security, just to name a few. Guyana, like other parts of the world where private guard services have taken root, the security industry grew out of the population explosion, or demographic change, that occurred without proportionate expansion of the state’s security apparatus.
With the advent of globalization and ease of access to technology, it has become very essential to change our entire strategy and thought processes in relation to existing safety and specialized security requirements at various industrial houses, such as schools and campuses, hotels, embassies, hospitals and public utilities etc.
Industrial Security may be defined as the safe and secure state of industrial undertakings from real or potential dangers to which they are normally exposed. It aims at securing and protecting industrial installations from damage, destruction, mischief, industrial espionage, industrial sabotage, subversion, and all other risks and threats to life, property and operations. Industrial security is concerned with the protection of five sub-sectors, namely: industrial plants, commercial operations, Non-Governmental Organizations, residential protection and the protection of key installations, which include public utilities.
Industrial security management comprises two fundamental components, namely: the provision of security services and an intelligence-gathering component, which constitutes the very foundation of an industrial security system. While its investigation and intelligence activities are more information oriented, its security activities are situational in nature.
Today, industrial security is one critical area which calls for unrelenting attention, as contemporary circumstances necessitate a highly strategic and tactical approach to security provision, if they are to be truly effective. The murder of a senior US Aid official in an upscale Georgetown, hotel, which remains unsolved to date  and the murder of the Chief Security Officer  of a key public utility during the course of duty, are  two cases in point.
Hence, the traditional approach of utilizing a potpourri of security skills which do not complement each other, cannot continue if the allied force of the private security industry it to be fully and effectively realized. The following important points support this assumption: (1) There is presently no general concept of what private security, or industrial security really means among Guyanese security practitioners. (2) The inability of most local security practitioners to fully grasp the importance of and contribute meaningfully to the process of security governance in Guyana has in effect identified a fundamental void within the local security industry. (3) The failure of the local security industry among others, to collaborate with the University of Guyana to review and upgrade the curriculum of the Security Diploma course, is also indicative of specific weaknesses within the local security industry, which ought not to be ignored.
Most Guyanese security practitioners are not able to participate fully in these important processes because they were never trained in the field of private security, and as such, are only partially familiar with its  historical evolution, guiding principles, technical terms, legal-ethical dilemmas, philosophy, ethos and sustaining culture which every field, occupation, or profession possesses. Unless Guyanese security practitioners seek professional training, they will continue to pursue tangential courses, while their collective efforts amount to mere projects of unproductive expenditure. The real reasons then, for their reluctance to date, to voice their opinions or publish their views is due to performance fear.
In September 1999, during a meeting with then Commissioner of police Laurie Lewis, I told him that while the public believes that his departure from the GPF would signal the end of all crime problems, to the contrary, the crime situation will deteriorate rapidly under his successor. He asked me to provide a justification for my thesis (position) and I did so. When we met recently we revisited that conversation.
While facilitating a training course, I told participants that they should always pay special attention to American interests in the country, because the American threat profile is about the highest in the world. During a follow-up course months later, participants were able to connect the pieces following the murder of the USAID official in a city hotel.
Prior to the 2006 general elections, representatives of the British VSO interviewed me and a colleague who is a senior journalist at his office. I told the VSO official that there will be serious violence before the general elections. One official said that the VSO have not seen much violence prior to elections in developing countries. Another enquired whether this violence was election related. I told her, while it was too early to make that connection, the violence will nonetheless, add to both pre and post-elections anxiety and insecurity in the country. We experienced violence in June and August of that year, indeed a testimony to good training, which resulted in a sound risk analysis.