For SNA Authors
Your SNA, carried through to completion.
If your client is pursuing the exemplary security credit through Proctor, your Security Needs Assessment (SNA) becomes the foundation of a rated, independently validated process, and your involvement continues through design and construction after the report is issued. This page sets out what Proctor asks of you and what it means for how you work.
Where you fit
The two engagements.
There are two separate engagements on a Proctor project. The client appoints you, as the Suitably Qualified Security Specialist (SQSS), for the SNA and the continuing security role. Separately, the client commissions the Proctor assessment from a licensed Proctor Assessor Organisation. Toren Consulting Ltd is currently the sole licence holder, and the scheme provides for licensing further assessor organisations as it develops. Proctor sits alongside your appointment and rates the quality of the security risk management process your work delivers, and your SNA remains your deliverable, produced to your professional judgement.
Proctor is in its pilot phase. While the first assessments are completed, Toren Consulting Ltd writes the SNAs it assesses, so that the process and the evidence standard are proven on live projects. Proctor asks more of an SNA, and of the security input that follows it, than the standard BREEAM credit does, so SNA Authors from other practices will be trained before their SNAs are assessed. Timing will be set once the pilot has produced enough evidence.
Before you start
Know the target rating before the SNA begins.
Proctor scores the security risk management process against defined criteria, and some scores depend on how the assessment is produced as well as what it concludes. An SNA that satisfies the BREEAM standard security credit will not necessarily support the rating the project is targeting, and the design stage scores are fixed once assessed. Agree the target rating with the client at appointment. When the Proctor assessment is commissioned, the assessment criteria relevant to the SNA are shared with its author so the work can be planned against them from the start; during the pilot, that author is Toren Consulting Ltd.
The activities
What Proctor asks of you.
The Security Needs Assessment. The SNA you would produce for the BREEAM standard security credit: site context, threat assessment, risk assessment and security strategy. BREEAM requires the SNA during or before Concept Design (RIBA Stage 2), and a later appointment can still earn the credit where you confirm that nothing which could have been recommended has been ruled out by the delay. Proctor's cut-off is the end of RIBA Stage 3, and the SNA must be issued to the design team by then.
Design coordination. Documented engagement with the design team as the design develops through RIBA Stages 3 and 4, tracking the status of your recommendations. Only documented coordination can be scored.
Implementation review. As the works complete, a structured comparison of the security measures specified at design stage against what has been delivered, with deviations recorded and resolved.
Sign-off and handover. A final sign-off at completion, and the handover of your SNA, coordination records and implementation evidence to the Proctor Assessor.
The ratings
The rating reflects how the work was done.
A Proctor assessment results in one of three ratings: Certified, Commended or Distinguished. The rating is set by the weakest mandatory criterion, so each tier describes a way of working across the whole engagement, and the higher the target rating, the more the process asks of how the work is planned, evidenced and carried through. The full criteria are in the scheme documentation shared when an assessment is commissioned.
Who does the work
The SQSS role after the SNA.
The continuing activities sit with a Suitably Qualified Security Specialist, ordinarily the SNA Author. Where a project is resourced differently, another SQSS can carry the work forward, for example a delivery specialist taking over design coordination and the implementation review from the colleague who wrote the SNA. Every individual in the role must meet the same SQSS competency standard, none of them may act as the Proctor Assessor on the same project, and where the individual changes a documented handover is required.
Independence
How the assessment is scored and checked.
The Proctor Assessor is always a different individual from the SNA Author. They score the process on documented evidence, with a written rationale for every score, and the completed assessment is validated by a separate organisation before any certificate is issued. Your SQSS competency is confirmed as part of that validation, and the BREEAM Assessor relies on that confirmation on every project.
Already written the SNA?
An existing SNA can still be revised.
During the pilot, this applies to SNAs written by Toren Consulting Ltd: where one already exists when the Proctor assessment is commissioned, we review it against the assessment criteria at the outset. It can be revised and reissued up to the end of RIBA Stage 3, so gaps found early are fixable.
Briefings
Sessions for your team.
We run two sessions for BREEAM Assessors and the consultants who work with them, in person or online: an hour on the BREEAM security credits (a compliant SNA from the assessor's side, the pitfalls that lose or delay the credit, then Proctor and the exemplary credit), or a half-hour introduction to Proctor on its own.
Common questions
Questions SNA Authors ask.
Proctor rates the security risk management process, of which your SNA is the foundation. The assessment considers whether the work is documented, traceable and proportionate, and the professional conclusions remain yours.
No. The competency standard is the same one BREEAM already applies to SNA authors, and Proctor adopts it unchanged.
During the pilot, yes. Toren Consulting Ltd writes the SNAs it assesses. SNA Authors from other practices will be able to take part once they have been trained on what Proctor expects of an SNA and of the continuing SQSS role. If you would like to be told when that opens, register your interest.
Not at present. Toren Consulting Ltd is currently the sole licence holder, reflecting the scheme's current stage of development, and the scheme provides for licensing further assessor organisations as it develops. If your organisation would be interested in a licence, register your interest and we will contact you when licensing opens.
Yes, provided they also meet the SQSS competency standard and the handover is documented. The rating rewards continuity of specialist oversight, so the transition needs a clear record.
Design changes affecting security are part of what the coordination record should capture. Reviewing the change, updating the strategy where needed and documenting the outcome is the behaviour the assessment recognises.
Writing an SNA for a project targeting the exemplary credit?
Talk to us before you start. During the pilot we can tell you what the project needs and how Proctor could be delivered on it.