Executive protection encompasses such a wide variety of people and their unique perspectives, concerns, and capacities—all of which are important to understand. Each facet of this field will affect your own unique EP experience, and each person involved in your sphere will have to consider a variety of questions whose answers will invariably impact everyone else.

With this broad scope in mind, one of my objectives is to cover the essential elements of executive protection (EP) while also incorporating other topics worthy of consideration. To accomplish this, it is important I directly address all of the many individuals who are involved under the “EP umbrella” at various times throughout the book. For example, I may address principals directly on topics they need to consider, but I also want to be sure security professionals of all levels will find this information helpful as we explore the methodologies behind EP. While it may seem counterintuitive, sometimes the best programs aren’t necessarily built from the top down – skilled practitioners can and do bring many layers of experience to educate principals who have never been exposed to executive protection.

Below, I’ve outlined the various groups of people most affected by or involved with the world of executive protection:

• The Client: You are the first order of business – i.e., the “principal” or “protectee.” You hire executive protection because your exposure, profile, position, financial success or family legacy has brought you to a point where you or someone else has decided it’s prudent to have consistent security coverage to anticipate risks and threats. Or maybe you simply want to facilitate complicated foreign travel and receive the comfort of knowing someone is watching out for you and can prepare for the worst as you enjoy the best. At times (because of your association), your family members and other close individuals can also require a level of personal protection.

• The Practitioner: You have been called EP, bodyguard, close protection, security officer or agent, and many of you have been in protective operations most of your career. You have either chosen this profession or, in some cases, it chose you. You have gained years of real-world experience protecting others in unique environments and conditions.

• Chief Security Officer (CSO) / VP, Director or Manager of Security: You are either a generalist or subject-matter expert in a specific security discipline (e.g., IT, cyber, facility or supply chain security) and you may or may not possess previous close protection experience. You may not have been formally trained in EP but are now required to arrange a level of protection for someone. As a CSO or security manager, you might find yourself in the center of a hurricane of demands as your organization has grown rapidly, increasing the profile of your CEO and other executives. Either deliberately or circumstantially, the need for an EP program has grown almost overnight, and you are in the pilot’s seat.

• The “Concerned”: You are a family attorney, corporate general counsel, estate manager, head of a private family office, financial advisor, or just a family member or close friend. You may be placed in a position of responsibility and care for your client or loved one’s safety, security and privacy, but you may not understand the requirements and need help navigating the process to assist them in evaluating, hiring and building a level of EP that sensibly meets their security needs.

• New Protection Specialist: The future of our time-honored profession depends on you, as you are just beginning your career (or perhaps are in transition from another career). You’re looking to the senior practitioners for training, education and mentoring as you gain the exposure and experience necessary to one day become a true veteran of our profession.

With that introduction behind us, let me now give some insight as to where this book will take you.

Understandably, most EP-related works are written primarily for practitioners (rather than clients/principals or the general public) and include a lot about how to provide EP, often in a physical sense. Though I’ll talk about these topics, it’s not my intention to present a step-by-step guide to working in this field.

Instead, I’ll focus more on what might influence a principal to consider personal protection – i.e., the why – and how that by extension affects the design and implementation of an EP program. Properly defining the why question is crucial because the answer shapes this important work from the start. Your reasons could be mandated, threat-based, event-driven or derive from a personal comfort factor. Whatever they are, the reasons behind starting such a program permeate through its establishment, management and daily functioning.

We’ll begin this journey with an exploration of what executive protection looks like, who might need it, and the present and future threat environment. As we proceed, I will address establishing an EP program and who may fall under the protective umbrella, while keeping in mind the why behind each individual situation. What influences someone today might also be different next month or next year. You can be assured those reasons will continue to evolve – and it would be my hope they may even dissolve over time. The middle of the book is more about the details of designing and running an effective program. This information is very important for clients/principals and other concerned people with a “need to know” as a program is developed. Everyone involved at this level needs to understand this process in order for a program to truly work.

For many, the persona of an expressionless agent behind dark glasses is the only image that comes to mind when they think of security details or bodyguards. Having often been asked to describe what motivates and drives a person to commit his or her life to this type of career, I have compiled/blended various real accounts and reflections into this book. As you’ll see, many of these experiences are not mine alone, but involve the many men and women who have walked similar paths.

The stories will give you a better perspective of who we are, how we might think, and how our experiences shape our careers in executive protection—i.e., our “EP DNA.” You’ll also get a sense of the fact that we, the protectors, are not (yet) robots, machines or infallible – we are human.

Additionally, those serving as protectors often play many roles – e.g., confidantes, facilitators, messengers, gatekeepers, gate openers, listeners, procurers, investigators, analysts, witnesses, medics, sometimes babysitters, sometimes friends and, in rare cases, even more. The jobs we have been asked to do can range from the simple to the incredibly complex, and from the very dangerous to the humorous.

Most of the time, principals and even other practitioners are never aware of these backstories, but they can be interesting, informative and sometimes just entertaining. My intent is not to sensationalize the content or the experience, but to bring relativity and conceptual clarity to the subject and topics by including these behind-the-scenes stories.

On a brisk late autumn morning just outside Frankfurt, West Germany, bank executive Alfred Herrhausen started his day off just as he always did. After being picked up from home by his protective detail, his three-car security motorcade proceeded along its standard route through a beautifully manicured and wealthy suburban neighborhood, with Herrhausen himself in the rear right seat of a heavily armored Mercedes sedan. It was November 30, 1989. Herrhausen was 59 years old and had risen to become both the head of Deutsche Bank and a close friend and advisor to Chancellor Helmut Kohl. In addition to his work in banking, he was a member of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group, a small and secretive association consisting of European and American leaders that has been of great interest to many conspiracy theorists for over 50 years.

As Herrhausen’s motorcade approached the intersection less than 1,000 yards from his home – like it had done hundreds of times before – a blue and silver bicycle sat inconspicuously next to the parallel sidewalk railing. This bicycle had been seen periodically at this same spot – so much that it had become part of the landscape and had not drawn attention or concern.

However, on this day, a small satchel had been attached to a rack behind the seat of the bike. Unbeknownst to Herrhausen or his protective detail, a small group of determined individuals had put a plan into action months before what would be his last departure from his home. As the lead vehicle in his motorcade passed the bicycle, someone watching from a safe distance on a nearby hill initiated a remote infrared beam across the road.

Seconds later, Herrhausen’s armored vehicle broke the beam, detonating a bomb made of approximately 19 pounds of explosives. A copper cone-shaped plate approximately eight inches in diameter had been placed inside the satchel beside the bomb. As the explosives ignited, this plate was launched with the accuracy of a sniper’s bullet, tearing through the right rear door of the armored Mercedes at a speed of two kilometers per second. The copper plate penetrated the armored vehicle and nearly severed Herrhausen’s legs. Within minutes, he bled to death from his injuries.

At the very moment of this attack, I was just 21 miles away (near Darmstadt, Germany) along with Air Force OSI Special Agent Jack Smalley. As a young sergeant and security specialist in the U.S. Air Force, I was temporarily assigned to the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) Detachment 7024 at Ramstein Air Base. A trained security driver at the time, I was a member of a protective service operation (PSO) and the primary driver of a Level B7 armored Mercedes.

You will not find definitions in Webster’s Dictionary for executive protection or close personal protection. However, these terms can be defined as measures taken to ensure the safety and security of a person or persons who may be exposed to elevated personal threats, risks and/or vulnerabilities as a result of their title, position, employment, public profile, wealth, associations and geographical location.

In other words, executive protection (EP) involves a person with specialized skills – as well as a particular mindset and sense of dedication – keeping another person safe, even at their own peril. Of course, people in the profession understand it frequently goes even further. Often, experienced and polished EP professionals will also provide their principals with a limited level of executive and personal assistance while on travel and serve as coordinators and facilitators to ensure itineraries, travel and events are kept on schedule.

If we take the definition another step further, it could also be described as providing principals with a certain peace of mind regarding their personal safety, security and privacy that allows them to focus on their executive roles and leadership responsibilities.

Principals requiring protection today are a more diverse and dynamic group than ever before. While wealth isn’t the only motive for someone to request or require personal protection, it is often the reason for it. The number of ultra-high-net-wealth (UHNW) individuals and families has been on the rise for many years now. In March 2018, Forbes identified 2,208 billionaires from 72 countries and territories. In the U.S. alone, there are over 500 of these ultra-wealthy people. CNBC reported there is a new billionaire somewhere in the world every two days, with Asia leading this growth.

But you don’t have to be a billionaire to need or consider a level of executive protection. People using EP can often require various levels of assistance to facilitate their very active lifestyles, travel and exposure. They may represent governments, organizations, corporations and/or influential family dynasties, but can also be key decision-makers and social influencers. Some live to push the limits of exploration and invention, taking dangerous but calculated risks as a part of their norm.

The EP programs that protect such people usually evolve over time, beginning with the individual and then extending to the family; in most cases, coverage includes an office and one or more residences. Normally, the protection at some point involves travel support and begins to slowly cover other aspects of a principal’s life. As it does, the need for additional security facilitation by trained professionals grows with it. Eventually, if a program is developed for a corporate executive, a separate program for the family outside of the corporate program may be necessary to meet the security requirements.

Policies and procedures help establish an operational foundation and maintain consistency, but it is still important to recognize that EP encompasses more elements of an art than a science. Every principal, every family, every threat and every individual’s risk appetite is different. If the only standard of achieving effective close protection was keeping someone alive, the evaluation process would be simple – but flawed. Executive protection goes well beyond just protecting another life, and it’s in this area that there can be major variances in the capabilities of those providing these services. Therefore, principals should have the right expectations of the EP provider(s) they have hired. When capabilities and expectations don’t match, just like with most services, the result will be eventual disappointment on both sides.