Last year we released the first-ever ConsultantReady^TM Report. The report was a huge success and showed it was definitely worth the effort (lots of pizza and caffeinated beverages went into that effort).

After taking in all the feedback, we decided a committee was needed to centralize and openly discuss the structure and evaluation criteria for the 2010 report. Therefore, we are happy to announce the formation of our first CRO open committee, the 2010 ConsultantReady^TM Report Committee.

Just like last year, we intend to qualify our framework, evaluation criteria, and grading methodology with our consultant members. However this year, we will allow one representative from each manufacturer evaluated to participate with feedback to the manufacturer member(s) of the committee. Consultant members don’t worry…. you are still the ultimate authority in the committee!

An email invitation will go out to consultants and manufacturers who expressed an interest early on.
All other interested parties should contact Susanne Ruse, our Director of Committee Strategic Planning and Development at [email protected].

ConsultantRegistry.org
President, Greg Bernardo

ConsultantRegistry.Org  is please to announce that Susanne Ruse has agreed to fill the position of Director, Committee Strategic Planning and Development.  “The addition of Susanne to our team is a significant milestone.  We have grown to the point where we are adding members to our board and building committees to manage the organization.” states CRO president, Greg Bernardo.

The Director, Committee Strategic Planning and Development is responsible for communications, organization and structural progress of each committee.  As a developing organization, Susanne’s immediate challenge is to establish the rules and agenda for each committee.

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As a follow up to our manufacturers’ survey, ConsultantRegistry.org has begun a new survey for Security Systems Integrators.

www.consultantregistry.org/survey Read more…

ConsultantRegistry.Org recently released a survey to Security Industry Manufacturers.  More than 10% of the security industry’s manufacturers have already responded.

www.consultantregistry.org/survey Read more…

ConsultantRegistry.Org is back from a busy week at the ASIS Conference and Tradeshow held in Anaheim, CA this year.  At this year’s show, our main emphasis was to promote the value of the organization to manufacturers, and to meet some of our members.  It was great to meet some of you face to face and hear your input and ideas.  We have plans in the works for our next organizational meeting at ISC West, so stay tuned.

The goal of the trip was to further awareness of the organization and start promoting some of the new initiatives of CRO.  Many manufacturers have agreed to use the new CRO Open ID platform that will roll-out sometime during the month of October.  We received great response to the organization as a long needed resource and a great value for the industry.  It is our design to generate more value for our members and thereby for our advertising sponsors.  By producing greater sponsorship, the organization has more revenue for future CRO projects like Open ID, and the upcoming iPhone application give away of Security Surveyor (stay tuned for this one as well).

Time was tight while we were in Anaheim, so we made good use of our time there. Our meetings literally started in the airport on Sunday and ran non-stop through Wednesday.  A special thanks to the folks at Salient Systems for allowing us to use their meeting space free of charge during the show as a place to meet with our members.

What we observed at the show….

I have to say, the attendance was the lightest we have seen in any of previous years (15 for me and 25 for my business partner).  However, I think most vendors would agree when I say, with this depressed economy, the people who attended had a purpose in being there.

ASIS is one of the two times a year (ISC West being the other) when most of the Security Industries’ vendors demonstrate their new products.  While we did not see anything to shift our design paradigms, there were a couple of notable pieces parts.  Axis had a notable modular camera mounting system that caught our eye.  Pelco’s new Sarix line demonstrated much improved contrasting light sensor technology.  TimeSight Systems was exhibiting a new way of recording video that optimizes the recording and minimizes the storage hardware.

Thinking forward to next year’s ASIS, we noticed that they are changing their dates and venues a bit. Perhaps they are noticing a change in the industry and are beginning to mix things up to promote more interest and attendance.  Next year’s conference is now almost 13 months away, scheduled for mid October.  We are excited that ASIS will be in Dallas next year since it gives CRO an opportunity for greater presence and visibility.  (For those that don’t know, Dallas is home to CRO’s offices.)  Read more…

ConsultantRegistry.Org released a free report today for security product manufacturers.  The report “Market Opportunities for Security Product Manufacturers” is available to all security manufacturers with free membership on the ConsultantRegistry.Org site.

CRO President Greg Bernardo states, “CRO released a manufacturer list derived from our ConsultantReady™ Report to streamline information sources for our Consultant Members.  We made this free report to available to manufacturers to encourage their sign up and updating their consultant support contacts. ”

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ConsultantRegistry.Org announces today that it has reached an informal agreement with the Security Industry Association (SIA) to cooperatively support each other’s organization through information and direct website links.

In an effort to promote the Consultant’s role in the security industry, ConsultantRegistry.Org is offering free and discounted memberships to all consultant members of SIA.  This agreement will provide another channel of positive communication between industry manufacturers, industry standards, and the consultants that specify the equipment implemented in today’s most critical projects.

CRO President Greg Bernardo states “ConsultantRegistry.Org values our association with SIA and we hope that the agreement that will allow more communication and greater understanding of the roles of each organization”.

ConsultantRegistry.Org is a professional organization for independent consultants in the converging space of the Security, IT and Communications industries. CRO is run as a not for profit by a council of its members and operates independently of all product vendors. CRO can be found at http://www.consultantregistry.org.

Security Industry Association (SIA) advances industry professionalism through education and training. To provide a means for predictable levels of performance, SIA creates recognized open industry standards as an ANSI-accredited standards developer. The Security Industry Association can be found at: http://www.siaonline.org/

The ConsultantReady Report is a tool to educate vendors on the needs of consultants.

Yesterday, we let everyone know about ConsultantRegistry.Org’s trip to ISC West. I mentioned how the preliminary release of our new Consultant Ready report caught the vendors and the industry’s attention.

At the show, we met with several consultants, and the overwhelming opinion is that the report is a necessary and welcome tool. The vendors we met seemed to recognise the need, too. Not surprising… the ones doing a good job welcomed the recognition. We had a few wary looks from time to time though.

The report we released last week was just a preliminary look at the security industry. About 55 of the 250+ security vendors. As a preliminary report, it represented a baseline of questions and rating scheme.

Some vendors questioned the scores since we didn’t have a chance to release individual results yet. As promised…. the vendors we met at the show will receive their scores tomorrow. (Funny thing about Las Vegas…. it sometimes takes a weekend and several days to recover.)

Some vendors were concerned about proprietary information they want to share with consultants, but not the world. Several vendors identified support materials and services they would like recognized on the report. We put our heads together and came up with several ideas to help vendors manage access to proprietary information. CRO is all about solving problems and we have a problem with waiting.

To finish the ConsultantReady Security Industry report, we will poll our consultants and tweek our scoring practices to make sure they are on target. During ISC West, we also heard questions and recomendations about our grading scheme. We are working on that now and should have it out later this week with the consultants’ poll. After the poll, we will restart the evaluations for the whole group and deliver the report around the end of the month.

If you are a consultant, please visit www.consultantregistry.org and sign up for free until May 1st.

ConsultantRegistry.Org has officially launched its affiliate program. The affiliate program is designed to find organizational sponsors with a collaborative effort in mind. The affiliates that we seek offer a unique service or benefit to the CRO membership. Some of the affiliate types that the organization is looking for would provide education, substantial discounts, or special access to their products and services.

CRO President and spokesman Greg Bernardo states: We are looking for companies that provide a true value-add to our members in areas of educational services, webinars, discounts, or unique services. We believe that our members have alot to offer, and conversely there are sponsors out there that can do the same for our members. It brings home the true focus and intent of our organization as a collaborative environment that benefits all of the participants.

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One of the first affiliates to advertize on the site and see the enormous benefit of the affiliate program is SecurePro Software, Inc. which offers a supporting software product to Consulting experts conducting Site Vulnerability Assessments and Regulatory Compliance Reports. Consultant Registry is looking for additional value-add companies to collaborate with their members site and support the efforts of the organization through advertizing, education and other medium. For more information contact [email protected]

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Twitter members can now get instant updates on postings, members, & CRO News through RSS feeds posted on our Twitter.com profile.

Twitter Members can find CRO by selecting Find People.. Find on Twitter… Enter “Consultant Regsitry” in Who are you looking for. Members can then select the “Follow Them” option to keep up to date.

About:

ConsultantRegistry.Org LLC is an online organization supporting independent consultants and subject matter experts in the Security, IT and Communications industries. The site enables members to collaborate with each other and market to commercial and government project holders. More information regarding ConsultantRegistry.Org can be found at www.consultantregistry.org.