A.L.I.C.E. in Wonderland: Getting Real About Workplace Security

We have all heard the acronyms ALICE (“Run, Hide, Fight”) or ALERT (“Escape, Evade, Attack”) Training when it comes to often referenced business and school “Safety/Active Shooter Preparedness” courses. 

To be quite frank, any critically-thinking person that actually reviews the contents of these programs will soon realize that neither program offers any actual protection from dedicated armed violent actors as the key components of their program, “FIGHT” (ALICE) or “ATTACK” (ALERT) has no inclusion (or even a suggestion of) building responsibly-armed good people through firearms training and use of force education to stop said bad actors.

Do these courses offer any valuable info? Sure. Imagine a beautiful symphony written where the composer simply stopped caring just as the music was entering the final lines of music; Regardless of how beautiful it started, it still ended a train-wreck.

Like said wreck, the final stage of these programs suggests some form of aggression towards the violent criminal actor like duking it out with fire extinguishers, grabbing for enemy weapons, engaging with buckets of rocks or hockey pucks, and want unarmed people to wait for responding armed law enforcement to save them (even though that could take over an hour as highlighted by Uvalde, TX recently.)

Both of these programs simply omit the all-too-obvious yet not politically-correct simple solution that “Good people with guns have the best chance of stopping bad people with guns.”

Why is that? Sadly, we live in an age where many (people and companies) find it politically convenient to promote a victim mindset and put their defense on the shoulders of others. These courses also simply “check a box” for a lot of organizations to say they, “did something” so a bean counter somewhere can say that they trained their staff all in the name of insurance and/or liability concerns.

What is the consequence? As documented by far too many current unfortunate events, barricading in place, armed only with a fire extinguisher will not do much to thwart a truly dedicated criminal with awful intent. Traditionally, not willing to have an armed component of a security plan has less than stellar outcomes when actually opposed.  

In response to the path many organizations have taken with the above “plans,” we respectfully offer this alternative:

GETTING REAL

First and foremost, if consideration for having an in-house armed defense is not even on option, please choose one of the above plans and think happy-happy-joy-joy thoughts. The conversation and debate about “getting rid of guns” or “making sure bad-guys don’t have access to guns” can be saved for a dirty martini and good friends at another time. Right now, guns exist and bad guys have them. Let’s plan accordingly.

Moving on.

What we suggest to everyone is a plan of, “PREPARE, FIGHT, WIN”

To start down the path to truly try and protect a group of people at a business, school, place of worship, etc, there are two primary ways to start looking at a planned armed response to violence:

1. Create a “Security Force” (whether an actual security team or designated staff members who do other primary jobs)  that is responsible for the armed response on location that will protect all others.

2. Empower and Train individuals who are willing to be responsibly-armed and give them the legal permission to be armed on the property.

Are there issues and caveats to both of options? Sure there are. (And frankly far too many to list here) But these two options jive with the reality that if the good guys/guns aren’t already there, waiting for good guys/guns to arrive ten minutes (to an hour plus) after they are needed has proven time-and-time again a failure.

Once you make this decision, it is time to start training. No 8-hour class with guys/gals in polo-shirts and tactical pants are going to create competent and confident responsibly-armed folks.  It is going to take time and homework.

THE PLAN

The below roadmap is a very short introduction to the FIRST STEPS we would suggest to any organization looking to get serious about violence prevention and preparedness.

Use of Force Training

Arguably the most important training any armed citizen needs yet is the most overlooked. Use of Force portions of CPL courses as certified by the state do a horrible job articulating this to their students and frankly, they do not spend even close to enough time on it. We offer a 10-hour course called, “When A Gun Is Not An Option” that is a seminar-based indoor class that goes in depth about Reasonableness, Constitutional Use of Force, Situation Awareness, and defensive options for when a firearm is not 1. available or 2. a legal option. 

This class can be offered as a private class for up to 30 people and can be conducted at the client’s venue of choice. 

As highlighted daily across this country, there are a lot of people out there that carry guns for their protection that are as dumb as a stick of celery when it comes to use-of-force understanding. Without the knowledge of, “when to gun,” all someone is doing by carrying a gun is upping their likelihood of going to prison.

https://trainmdfi.com/courses/waginao/

Firearms Training

MDFI is all about building “competent and confident” responsibly armed citizens. While most firearms training is called, “Tactical,” we actually hate that term as it is often overused and many times lumped in with law enforcement and military operations. We train good people to go to work, go do errands, and get home again by being safe, responsible, and prepared for the actions of bad actors should it ever come to that. 

We have a three-tiered Firearms Training curriculum that is based on a Foundation-Building approach that builds on the previous tier of classes. At a minimum, I would suggest your Leaders take our nationally known “You Suck! It’s Not The Gun! class that is all about making sure shooters are as accurate as possible with a handgun, and then our Foundation Handgun class that covers the defensive use of a handgun. Once those classes are complete, our students have the option of taking our “Advanced” handgun classes that include Low Light, Cover and Movement, and Injured Shooter training. 

These are conducted at ranges around Michigan.

https://trainmdfi.com/courses/

Force On Force/Navigating A 360 Degree World While Armed

We offer a class at our training facility in Luther, MI that takes place in a simulated neighborhood that is all about safe movement while armed in buildings and also teaches students how to do so safely with other team members. The emphasis for this class is proper movement in a structure where there are other good folks and possibly bad actors in the same environment. Students will deal with communication, positive identification of targets, and problem solving. 

This class can be tailored to happen at a client venue.

https://trainmdfi.com/courses/beyondadoor/

Medical

As good folks, we are far more likely to need to help others with medical skills than with firearms (thank goodness.) Slips, trips, falls, cuts, bruises, broken bones, etc can all happen in a workplace and it is important to know what to do to help ourselves or others should we find ourselves in such a bad situation. For our medical classes, we offer at least two “public enrollment” classes each year that are 16-hour (2-day) classes through our training partners Dark Angel Medical of Colorado. They are the best in the business and they are the ones that train myself and my cadre of Instructors with our life-saving skills. 

MDFI can also quote and coordinate private classes at a client location

https://trainmdfi.com/dark-angel-medical/

Security Planning, Consulting, and Evaluation

We do offer evaluation and consulting on client’s security plans, security standard operating procedures and qualifications, and a client’s overall security posture.

Email us at Info@trainMDFI.com for more on this option

IN CONCLUSION

Once an organization has come to the realization that a change is needed, all it takes is small steps to change from “The appearance of security” to “actual security.”

MDFI works with lots of organizations from all over the Big Mitten and we’d be happy to help your organization out as well. All it takes is an email to get that ball rolling.

There is never a guarantee that any plan will save the day, but knowing off the bat that the plan was not based in reality and working to fix/replace it is a pretty good start.

Stay safe and as always, let us know if we can help.

v/r

Trek