Brivo surveyed 159 security professionals in August 2020 and compared its findings to the same survey conducted in December 2019 to find out how needs have changed in 2020.

According to the report, loss-prevention has replaced executive buy-in in the top three challenges to security professionals. Security breaches and compliance still rank at first and second, respectively.

Lack of budget is listed as the top barrier to upgrading physical technology and has only increased. This is followed by ‘unknown solutions,’ with ‘no ROI’ taking third. 

Additionally, the 2019 survey revealed that cost savings and increased convenience were the two most important benefits and were equally ranked. However, the 2020 survey revealed a 20 percent gap between those benefits, with 42 percent of surveyors reporting increased convenience as the most important benefit and 22 percent listing cost savings as the most important benefit.

The 2020 survey revealed that the majority of data professionals are unsatisfied with the data they get from physical security solutions, with 62 percent reporting they get too much data, too little data or don’t know how to use their data to get insights for informed decisions. Improving physical security policies and procedures based on analytics and investigating suspicious behavior patterns remained the top two most beneficial uses of physical security data for respondents.

For integrations, 27 percent of respondents said that their access control, video surveillance and alarm management system were all integrated and accessible via one interface. Similarly, 51 percent of respondents said an integrated physical security solution is in their technology roadmap.

The survey found that mobile app and credential use is growing, with 85 percent of respondents using work-related mobile applications, a 12 percent jump in the last eight months.

Facility management and identity management are the two most important integrations, according to the survey. Additionally, 58 percent of security professionals agree that cloud-based access control improves overall security.

Read the complete survey online.