Retail Security Resource Allocation via Incident Scoring
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Solution Overview
Problem
Retail asset protection departments face challenges in optimally allocating resources such as personnel hours, leadership, and tools to prevent theft and ensure security, as excessive allocation leads to unnecessary expenses while insufficient allocation is undesirable.
Innovation Solution
The method involves generating incident and shortage scores for stores based on the likelihood of incidents and product shortages, which are then used to assign appropriate levels of security personnel and tools by categorizing stores into groups based on these scores, allowing for tailored resource allocation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If more assets protection resources are allocated to a store, then security and theft prevention are improved, but expenses increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by allocating different levels of assets protection resources to different stores based on their specific risk characteristics. Each store receives a customized resource allocation (personnel hours, leadership attention, tools) determined by its incident score, which reflects local factors such as historical incident data, store size, and product mix. This resolves the contradiction by ensuring high-security stores receive more resources while low-risk stores receive minimal resources, optimizing both security effectiveness and expense management.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses parameter changes by dynamically adjusting resource allocation parameters (personnel hours, leadership levels, tool assignments) based on the incident score parameter. The incident score itself is calculated from multiple parameters including historical incident frequency, store demographics, and product vulnerability. By changing resource allocation parameters in response to incident score variations, the system achieves adaptive security that balances protection needs with cost efficiency.
2Loss of energy
If fewer assets protection resources are allocated to a store, then expenses are reduced, but security and theft prevention deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by calculating incident scores and determining optimal resource allocations before security incidents occur. The system proactively identifies stores at high risk of incidents based on historical data and risk factors, then pre-allocates appropriate assets protection resources. This prevents the need for reactive over-allocation and ensures that resources are available when needed while avoiding unnecessary expenses at low-risk locations.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements feedback by continuously monitoring incident data and adjusting resource allocations based on performance outcomes. The incident score calculation incorporates historical incident frequency and trends, creating a feedback loop where past security performance informs future resource allocation decisions. This ensures that resources are maintained at levels that effectively prevent theft while eliminating waste from over-allocation.
3Ease of operation
If uniform assets protection resources are allocated to all stores, then management is simplified, but security effectiveness decreases due to varying risk levels
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies segmentation by dividing stores into different risk categories based on their incident scores. Stores are segmented into high-risk, medium-risk, and low-risk groups, each receiving appropriately tailored resource allocations. This segmentation maintains management simplicity through standardized protocols for each category while achieving security effectiveness through risk-appropriate resource levels. The incident score itself segments stores based on multiple factors including incident history, store size, and product mix.
Data Source
AI summary
Security personnel time is assigned to a store property by generating an incident score based on a probability of an incident occurring on a store property. A set of ranges of incident scores, each range being associated with a number of hours of security personnel time, are retrieved from computer memory. A range of incident scores in the set of ranges of incident scores that the generated incident score falls within is identified and an associated number of hours of security personnel time is retrieved. Security personnel time is assigned to the store property using a processor based on the number of hours of security personnel time retrieved for the identified range of incident scores.