Wilf Knight Award joins The Security Excellence Awards

08 Sep 09

SMT Online and The Security Institute have announced that The Wilf Knight Award – designed to honour students of security management – will be presented at the 2009 Security Excellence Awards ceremony. Brian Sims reports.

By Brian Sims

The Wilf Knight Award is designed specifically to recognise and celebrate the achievements of security management students who are, after all, the budding professionals of tomorrow. It’s named in honour of Wilf (who as many of you know was a Fellow of the Institute, but sadly passed away in 2008).

In essence, this award reflects The Security Institute’s ongoing desire to encourage and recognise the achievements of new members entering the security profession.

The beloved husband of former Institute director and constant champion Patricia Knight, Wilf was himself the proud holder of an MA and MPhil from Cambridge University. He always regarded himself as very lucky to have been given the opportunity to attain these qualifications.

Indeed, later in life Wilf often commented that he really believed these qualifications helped him to achieve the undoubted success he enjoyed as a security consultant following his successful career in the police service.

Background to the Security Excellence Awards

In a joint statement issued this morning, Brian Sims – the Editor of SMT Online, as well as being an Honorary Fellow and life-long supporter of the Institute – and the Institute’s chairman Mike Bluestone revealed that the winner of the new Wilf Knight Award will be announced at the 2009 Security Excellence Awards.

Organised by United Business Media’s Protection and Management Portfolio (which includes the info4security web portal that encompasses SMT Online), this event is recognised as the major and most prestigious awards ceremony for security management professionals in the UK. That being the case, it offers the perfect platform for presenting The Wilf Knight Award.

This year, the Security Excellence Awards Ceremony takes place on the evening of Thursday 22 October at the London Hilton Hotel on Park Lane. With more categories than ever before and table sales rocketing despite the economic downturn, it’s entirely likely that last year’s record attendance of over 750 guests will be surpassed.

The Wilf Knight Award will be presented before dinner to the author of a management project and/or report or dissertation judged to have met the relevant criteria and adjudicated to be the best project or report published in the calendar year in which the accolade is bestowed.

Development of security management

The judging panel, which includes both Patricia and Brian Sims, will be looking for a project which shows evidence of particular distinction and/or innovation in methodology or theorising in the general field of security management and/or professional security practice. The winning project report must make a valuable contribution to the development of security management.

Encouragingly, the Institute reports that five entries have already been shortlisted for this inaugural award. Judging will take place shortly.

Commenting on the decision to add The Security Institute’s Wilf Knight Award to the Security Excellence Awards’ well-established portfolio, Brian Sims explained: “There’s an old saying that says you should never rest on your laurels. We live by that maxim in the Protection and Management Portfolio at United Business Media, and it’s one of the reasons we chose to take Security Management Today into the online space and pioneer the effective use of digital and social media.”

Sims continued: “We’ve had some fantastic Security Excellence Awards ceremonies over the years and, each time October comes around, we always strive to go that extra mile in enhancing our guests’ enjoyment. This year, we have several new sponsors on board, and I know that all of our Awards supporters will be delighted at the addition of The Wilf Knight Award.”

In conclusion, Sims said: “My raison d’etre for Security Management Today has always been to strive for the Holy Grail of seeing security management recognised as a profession. One that ranks alongside the legal profession, healthcare, engineering and architecture in terms of prestige. I have supported The Security Institute ever since I started working on SMT in 2000, because this is the organisation that will eventually realise Chartered status for security managers. That’s what Wilf would have wanted, and we’re all determined to see his own wish – and that of many of us – granted in the not-too-distant future.”

Highest standards of professionalism

Now with over 1,000 members, The Security Institute is actively involved in promoting the highest standards of professionalism within the security business sector and, indeed, to the wider business community.

Earlier this year, the Institute launched student and graduate membership strands with the aim of attracting professionals embarking on a career in the security sector. In support of students, the Institute has also introduced a free mentoring service.

The Institute currently has five student members on its books, but anticipates many more as the mentoring scheme and The Wilf Knight Award begin to gain significant momentum.