Compliance Is Important. Performance Is the Goal.

This is Part 3 of Building a SCIF That Performs, a six-part series by Danny Heck, Technical Director, Secure Solutions at SPG, Inc., on the difference between completing a SCIF and delivering one that performs as intended.

Compliance is important. Performance is the goal.

A shielding material may have excellent published performance. A shielded door may have impressive attenuation data. An acoustic assembly may have a specified STC rating. An individual component may meet every requirement written into the specification.

Those numbers and requirements absolutely matter. But there is an important distinction:

The completed facility ultimately performs as an installed system, not as a collection of product data sheets.

That's where secure construction gets interesting.

Interfaces matter. Transitions matter. Penetrations matter. Workmanship matters. Coordination matters.

A facility can look complete. The finishes can be excellent. Individual components can appear to be installed correctly.

Then testing begins.

And testing doesn't care what the specification says a component was supposed to do. It measures what the completed system actually does.

This is particularly important when we're dealing with RF shielding and acoustic performance.

RF energy and sound don't care how good the finished wall looks. They find weaknesses.

That's why I believe performance needs to be part of the conversation long before the end of construction. If testing is the first time we're asking whether the complete system works, we've waited too long to ask the question.

The good news is that many problems discovered late in secure construction projects never needed to become problems in the first place. They could have been addressed much earlier.

Previous in the series: Part 2 — A SCIF Is a System, Not a Collection of Scopes

Next in the series: Part 4 — The Best Time to Solve a SCIF Problem Is Before It Exists

About the author: Danny Heck is the Technical Director for Secure Solutions at SPG, Inc., a veteran-owned firm that works across the full life of secure facilities—design, preconstruction, construction, testing, and accreditation and teaches the standards behind that work.

Planning a secure facility? The best time to bring experienced secure-facility professionals into the conversation is early while the problems are still lines on a drawing. Contact SPG, Inc.

Building the expertise in-house? SPG, Inc. teaches courses on TEMPEST shielding and ICD 705. See available courses.

More lessons from the field: follow Danny Heck on LinkedIn.