The Security Circle

EP 115 The 'Women In Security' Documentary Special for International Women's Day 2025

• Yoyo Hamblen • Season 1 • Episode 115

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For media inquiries and sponsorship opportunities, please contact:

Richard Ticho, Executive Producer of The WOMEN IN SECURITY Documentary

contact@womeninsecuritydocumentary.com 

(862) 686-1312


1. Introduction & Purpose of the Documentary

  • Overview of the Women in Security documentary by Yvette Freeman
  • Why this film was made—shedding light on challenges and triumphs of women in a male-dominated industry
  • The importance of storytelling in driving change and awareness

2. Women’s Role in the Security Industry

  • Historical underrepresentation of women in security and how this has evolved
  • Key challenges women face: bias, lack of mentorship, limited leadership opportunities
  • Success stories and achievements of women breaking barriers in security

3. Voices from the Documentary

  • Richard’s perspective on how security events have shaped the narrative on gender inclusion
  • Bonnie Michelman’s insights as a seasoned security professional—what’s changed and what still needs work
  • Sandy Davis’ role in leading the International Foundation for Protection Officers (IFPO) and why representation matters at leadership levels

4. Allyship & Industry Support

  • The importance of male allies in advocating for workplace equality
  • Policies and initiatives that can support women in security
  • How organizations can foster more inclusive hiring and promotion practices

5. The Impact & Future of Women in Security

  • How the documentary aims to inspire the next generation of women in security
  • What more needs to be done—training, mentorship, visibility
  • Encouraging more young women to consider security as a career path

6. Call to Action

  • Where listeners can watch the documentary
  • How they can support or get involved in mentorship and advocacy efforts
  • Encouraging open conversations and continuous learning in the industry

Security Circle ⭕️ is an IFPOD production for IFPO the International Foundation of Protection Officers

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Yoyo:

Hi, this is Yolanda. Welcome. Welcome to the Security Circle podcast. IFPO is the International Foundation for Protection Officers, to providing meaningful education and information and certification for all levels of security personnel and make a positive difference to our members mental health and well-being where we can. Our listeners are global, they are the decision makers of today and tomorrow, and I want to thank you personally, wherever you are, whatever you're doing, for being a part of this Security Circle journey. Don't forget to subscribe, or even better, just like, comment and share the LinkedIn post. Thank you for your company. Some of you might have heard about the Women in Security documentary. If you're a regular user of LinkedIn, you can't miss it. It's the very first visual deep dive into the triumphs of women in one of the world's most male dominated professions directed by Yvette Freeman, award winning actress and accomplished director. The women in security documentary documents talented and tenacious women's rise to influence and the impact they and other female pioneers still make. On both physical and cyber security today. What a great subject for our international women's day episode four The Security Circle. So let's find out who the contributors who are special guests are for this week's episode. I'll start with you, Richard.

Richard T:

Hi, Yo Yo. It's great to be on the Security Circle podcast. Thanks so much for having all of us. I spent, over 30 years producing and writing and directing security events all over the globe. From 1996 to 2016, I, wrote co produced and directed events for ASIS International, all over the world and their, general sessions here in the United States for their, seminar and exhibits, which is now known as GSX., I really established, quite a a group of connections over the years, uh, working within the security professional.

Yoyo:

Well, it's great to have you, Richard. I'm going to come to Yvette next. Yvette, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Yvette:

Well, my name's Yvette Freeman. I've been an actress for over years, over 50 years. I am most for, being on a show called ER that, was global. I played the nurse, Halle Adams. Almost got to direct one of those. This is what my next chapter is. Richard asked for me to direct it. I showed him all my little films and things like that. And first of all, It's about women and it is fantastic. All the interviews, all the wonderful women, and one thing is, I didn't know that this was happening. These women were doing all these wonderful things.

Yoyo:

Halle was one of my favorite characters in ER. I watched every single episode. I watched the season several times. Of course, George Clooney's in it. I can't believe you got to meet him. We'll talk about that afterwards, because that's got to be a story for the very end. Let's come to one of our biggest stars in security, certainly in the women's security field. And it's a real pleasure, Bonnie. I've wanted to get you onto the security circle for quite a while now. Thank you so much for joining us today.

Bonnie:

Thank you so much, Bonnie Michaelman, but I'm still just infatuated with the fact that Yvette was on one of my favorite shows, and now I recognize her, and I really need to talk to you later. I'm Bonnie Michaelman, I've, been in this career field, trying to advance the professionalism of the whole security and enterprise risk industry for way too many years to mention. I've been blessed to have been, the president of three international security organizations and being a woman was interesting in all three. I'm currently the vice president, the chief security officer. For Mass General Brigham, which is a 90, 000 person health system located in the northeast part of the U. S. It's also got its challenges with an awful lot of violence and other things going on that we deal with. When Richard asked me to think about participating in this, I was not only so privileged and honored, but really compelled that a man Would be willing to do this work and to see it through for something that I think was a very innovative endeavor for all of us who have been there. I've always been a little bit of a person who pushes the boundaries and did going into this industry as a very young woman when nobody else was there that looked anything like me. So I'm delighted to be here. Thank you.

Yoyo:

Oh, Bonnie, it's our pleasure. And to make some contributions today, another, I can't say rising star, top at the top of her game, award winning, lifetime achiever. She's also recently been on the Security Circle podcast, Sandy Davis,

Sandi:

how are you doing? I'm doing great. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to be here today and get more involved with the documentary from what I've seen so far. It's A much anticipated, documentary with some real superstars, and, so far I'm thinking you're doing a magnificent job. I think that once some of those tidbits get out into the mainstream, you're going to have a best seller on your, on your books, that's for sure. Sandy Davies, CEO of the IFPO, we're a global international organization that develops educational opportunities for security officers and supervisors. In my 40 plus year career. We'd see females getting involved in further education, and now I would have to say that the scales are really turning around where many more women are looking into this industry as a career. They are no longer starting in the uniform either. They're coming in with major degrees. And highly educated, and. My involvement goes back into, 2015. I wrote one of the, well, I didn't write it, but I edited a woman in security book and Bonnie was part of that, publication and many others that are in your documentary. So I want to wish everybody the best of luck. If I can contribute in any way, please let me know.

Yoyo:

Yeah, I've got a copy of that book within, we're literally just out of arm's reach, Sandy. there's a lot of great names in there, including a lot of great names of amazing women we're going to talk about in this special podcast episode and just entering the, meeting. So the women in security documentary, let's find out how this all came about. Richard.

Richard T:

I'd have to go back to, when the, pandemic began. I was working as a, production manager. I was doing a lot of events and things, were very busy. then pandemic hit and things started slowing down. And I decided that I wanted to, work on a documentary. for a very long time, I had been associated, as I mentioned earlier. With working with A. S. I. S. International doing events for the security profession, and, I had made the decision that I really wanted to make a women in security documentary, a documentary would that would focus on the value of having more women within the security profession. And that really kind of dates back to the early 19, the late 1980s, early 1990s, when I was a stage manager doing security events. I remember walking out on the stage, looking out at the audience, at an A. S. I. S. Event and seeing an audience that was made up of mostly all men, you know, 98 percent men over the age of 50, mostly gray haired men or bald men. Not that there's anything wrong with that. there were very, very few women in the audience. At the time, being a young man myself, I looked at the audience. I looked at the client and I thought These are the people that we're addressing. This is the type of content we need to create. For a little while, frankly, I felt like I was part of the problem because I was part of a production company that was creating. Content specific to men and to the audience. But over time, it became clear that the women and security mission, the campaign to bring more and more women into the industry was of great value and getting to witness that was very, very important. And when I had this opportunity to move forward and create a documentary, I decided that this was the document, documentary that I wanted to make. So I formed Resilient Features and started the process.

Yoyo:

What was your next step, Richard? You started it. How did it all come about?

Richard T:

It happened actually very quick, quickly initially because I had so many contacts, within the industry. All I really had to do was put together a one sheet that's explained my plan. What I was hoping to achieve. I released that and put it out via LinkedIn. And within a month, we had over 150 advisors from all over the globe who wanted to be involved, offered their input and offered their advice. And that got us started.

Yoyo:

And so, what was your focus in terms of what you wanted this to achieve, what you wanted to achieve? What was your vision, like, what did you envisage the final product to be? Well,

Richard T:

my vision of what I thought the documentary should be initially, at the time I was in a frame of mind where I wanted it to be a documentary that, found the people who were causing the problems. I wanted it to expose people. I was kind of taking that approach. Then when we had our meetings and we talked with the advisory board, every single advisor, every woman in security that I spoke to. Felt that this was a bad idea, that the idea should be to uplift the women to focus on their achievements and to focus on allies, people who are men who are looking to uplift the women in security.

Yoyo:

I think you would have probably learned in that discovery that most women's journeys haven't been smooth sailing. Therefore it just becomes very negative and no, and it's not productive. It's not productive for me to talk about something that happened 10 years ago. It is so productive, isn't it? To talk about where we are now and where we're going to be. So how did your journey to finding a fantastic director, a woman director, how did that come into play?

Richard T:

We conducted, the interviews and I was responsible for,, making sure that those were executed properly. I did not feel that it was, appropriate for me to be the director. I just didn't, I didn't want to direct it. I wanted someone to. Appropriate to direct the film, someone with, the, credentials and the, perspective that would fit the film well, David Allen Stein from, the North Coast Repertory Theater is, someone I've known for a while, along with his, wife, Denise Young, they made some, recommendations and the first person, from, David's lips was Yvette, Denise Young. who is, directing, Fences, I believe, coming up, and, he said she's a bit, might have some availability in your time slot, and I went to Yvette, and we started talking, and she was very receptive, so I was very excited to have her on board.

Yoyo:

To you Yvette, really, you've got this, very excited guy called Richard coming to you, saying he wants to do a women in security documentary. What's going through your mind? Thank you.

Yvette:

I'm going, is this for real? And it is, he's given me like,, a wonderful gift to be doing this. To see the different women that have gone through the, to illuminate them and be a part of this. It's just going to help because. Once you see what they are doing and you hear their stories. There's so many women, I want to be one of them. I'm too old, but anyway, I would like to be that because they have so much responsibility and they're doing it. They're handling it. They're creating more space for women in security. I love them.

Yoyo:

Yvette. How did Richard explain the vision to you? When he handed that to you? How did you start to piece things together? Okay. This is the plan. This is how it's going to look.

Yvette:

Richard from the beginning. He set up all the interviews. He knew the story that he wants to tell. And then he also got these questions that he asked that women throughout insecurity, that they wanted to hear answers to about each other. And so basically we're looking at following these questions and listening, picking out the women who are answering the questions. Great. But see, the problem is. We have too many women answering those questions. Great. I mean, we got, we have a movie at least five hours. It's great. It's now, our problem to cut it down. So I think we should do two, but anyway, who am I?

Yoyo:

It doesn't surprise me that Yvette, you would have had a whole lot of content to edit because knowing the women in this industry, as I do, I haven't ever met one that doesn't want to give something back. Support another woman, show, tell, explain, guide. So yeah, I feel always surrounded by great company and talking about great company. What a segue. Bonnie, give us an idea how you were introduced to this project. Then tell us how were you involved?

Bonnie:

Richard called me one day and said, I'm thinking about doing a documentary on women and security. I think my first question was why? I liked his answer and, he asked if I'd be involved and as someone who has, sacrificed a lot of my life for this industry and the fact I happen to be a woman too, I thought this is wonderful that he's doing it and I did want to be involved. I think I've always struggled. I've always had the conundrum of being in a field where I did not. Want it to be so front and center that I was different early in my career, I wore the greatest suits I could wear and my hair is in as tight a bun as I could wear it. As the years churned, and I was able to showcase some things and achieved some accomplishments. I realized. I could be me and the woman that I am and not make it about being a woman, but make it about my, my, my level of performance and skills and personality. And I wanted to make sure I gave back to other women. I was very pleased when ASIS, really started the women in security. group. I had been asked to do that when I was president of ASIS International. And to be perfectly honest, I said no, because I didn't want to keep factionalizing women as being separate. I thought that that would not help women to elevate or accelerate in this field. There were good reasons for that, but I think I was wrong. I had taught for about 25 years while I was working, at Northeastern University's College of Criminal Justice in the graduate school, and It was always mostly men in these classes. I taught one course at a time and the last class I taught a few years ago, this is a true story. I walked into the room and it was a room full of women and I said, Oh, I'm sorry. I must have the wrong room. This was the first night and one of them came running out after me and said advanced security management. I said, yeah. She said, you have the right room. And I walked in and there was one man and lots of women and I thought, my job is finished. This is great. so I've really evolved my own thinking about how to elevate not only women in security, but other minorities in security. And will do anything in my power to help, ensure that we have the right. complexion of an industry that we really need with all kinds of differences.

Yoyo:

Richard, what can you tell us about the story without giving away too many spoilers?

Richard T:

it's the story is about the women that are interviewed. It's about representation. we really did. We also kind of focused on, we didn't have to press on struggles, Those kind of came out. We didn't have to, push too hard on, stories that, were iconic or, that would connect with our audience because, in the case of Bonnie, she's been involved with so many different iconic moments in history that people can connect with, whether it's,, dealing with the pandemic. Or the Boston, marathon bombing. These sort of things, people have lived through. So the story is really about the involvement of women in the background, getting things done. If you're a successful security professional. Generally people don't hear about what you've accomplished and I think it's very important that this is one of the things that that this film sets out to do is to tell some of those stories to get some representation and to really encourage more women to be involved in the industry.

Yoyo:

It sounds just like what we need, doesn't it, Sandy, in terms of how this, it's itself, this documentary is a great platform of encouragement for other young women in our profession.

Sandi:

I think it's a great opportunity to see such, professionalism in the that are being featured in this production, this documentary, that, and Bonnie's comments about having to wear gray suits and wear your hair tight back. I think that we've evolved in this industry. I think that, the respect has been gained by, by our peers and that I think that, We don't pose a threat. Not that we really did or it wasn't even a threat. Like, why are they here? Like, I think that this is just gonna be very positive. I think that it's going to impact a lot of young women to come into the industry and, to achieve the same type of and level of success with the women that are being featured in the documentary.

Yoyo:

Bonnie, when I look back at my past career, I know that there were times my being a woman in security certainly seemed to serve a benefit. I was seen as a novelty. Oh, let's try that out. This is new. We haven't done this before. Certainly when it came down to, contracting roles, integrator type roles, and serving client sites. Do you feel in any way that that's been a reflection of you? your journey and how have you managed to evolve out of that kind of novelty status?

Bonnie:

That's an interesting question, Yo Yo. I think I didn't see that, for the most part, at the beginning when I was trying to penetrate the industry I think the minute people began to realize that many women like Sandy, like me, like so many others that are involved in the documentary and have been involved in this work with a, in a very serious way, the minute people see that by having a strong, tenacious, smart women increased the professionalism, the functionality, the performance of the industry, and has made a difference in that way, then there's far more acceptance. And realizing that, we do have sometimes very similar skills, but sometimes very complimentary skills to males in the industry, and that both are sorely needed. I did not feel like I got a lot of advantages because I was a novelty, to tell you the truth. So other people may have had that experience. I did not necessarily have it. I will tell you that I've seen women who are very Very good in this industry who were so obsessed with worrying that they would be ostracized because they were a woman that everything that happened that was negative or that they were criticized about they used their sexuality or the fact they were a woman to say that's why this person is criticizing me or that's why I didn't get a promotion and that was a real problem for them and I've seen that as well.

Yoyo:

Rich, I'm going to come to you first for this, you had the plan. You sketched it out. What were you listening for? And what did you find?

Richard T:

Well, we, you know, we worked very hard with the advisory board over a long period of time to create a questionnaire. it had 15 questions on it and, I'm very proud of that questionnaire and we, stuck to that. We utilized it. We also created, a questionnaire based on that for allies to use. and that really was, the focus, of our direction, for the film, for, what we were trying to achieve. So when we asked the questions through the questionnaire, you know, there's an expectation of what you might get from those questions. And when we were going through it, it was really quite surprising. We got a wide variety. And what I learned was not to have expectations to really listen. We got so many incredible stories, that it became just okay. Now where. Can we piece this together? How does it all fit together into one story where we can, focus on representation? We can make it interesting, not just to people who are in the security profession, but also, have it appeal to people all over the world. It is a global story. It is about the security profession. So it's really, I was hoping for us to get that global story. I really feel like we're, Not just focused on the United States. We're not just focused on cyber security. We're looking at the security profession as a whole, and we're looking at as a global security profession and the opportunities that exist all over the world.

Yoyo:

Being a director is about transforming, isn't it? Something that's conceptual into something that's beautifully visual and certainly in this case transformative and easy to understand and communicates a strong narrative. What were you listening for and what did you find in your journey?

Yvette:

First off, I was surprised. I was surprised how all our interviewers, they all had a story and they were all eager to tell it. Then they also have a beginning, middle, and end of their own stories. I'm listening to all these interviews and I'm hearing the story and I want the story to be in my ears, like audible. I do a lot of audible I want to hear the story of all these women together. I'm excited. One more thing, the allies, all the women had someone to help them, be it their father, be it their first contact with a police ride along, be it, all have had contact mentors that led them. They are now the mentors. These women are really major, major helping the world. That needs to be told. That's what I'm trying to tell.

Yoyo:

Bonnie, it's a good, lead in, isn't it, that because there are some that would say quite strongly that we never get anywhere by ourselves. Can you talk to the people who've maybe supported you at very critical stages of your journey?

Bonnie:

I think that you have to have a combination of people that support you in different ways. Some have to push you. Some have to be your Real honest mentors and tell you what you're not doing so well. Some have to be your cheerleaders. Some have to be the people that push you from behind when it feels so hard that you just want to keep going backward, but they won't let you. Others have to be people that you can let your hair down with. Sandy and I have had, you know, way too many conversations to mention over the years that we've known each other, which has been many, about different struggles and different Successes that we have had, professionally having that. makes all the difference in the world. And I have a lot of male friends that I can do that with as well.

Yoyo:

there are an awful lot of men in our industry who are very proud to support and advocate and be truly good allies. So many of them have been involved, certainly in the background, haven't they, Richard, in terms of pushing and promoting this upcoming documentary. How important is allyship, do you think

Richard T:

well, I think it was, especially very early on in within the industry, it required male allies just to get some women into the associations to be able to participate, put them in positions of leadership within associations. Male allyship was kind of necessary. But the one thing that's really interesting is interviewing, some of the younger women involved in this project. Allyship seems to be all over the place. It's not just the men who are allies. It's women who are supportive of each other. and in some case, the ally is the individual themselves. They uplift themselves. They push themselves and they support themselves. It's not always an outside person. Sometimes it's the voice in your head that's pushing you. I think allyship is really important from my perspective. I don't think this film would have been made without the help of some allies, male ones specifically. I'd like to mention, Mike Gipps, has been a big help along the way. Just like a lot of the men that I've met along the way through the work that I did through ASIS, people like Mike Hurst, who's in this podcast, just so many wonderful people. That just came out in the interviews, when we talked with people and asked about allies, we heard from all over that they're there and they're out there and you can find them.

Yoyo:

What a great way to introduce Mike Hurst. Mike, you've been described as a wonderful person, thereby Richard I don't hear that very often.

Mike Hurst:

Mike, you tell my wife,

Yoyo:

What doing, um, Mike, take us through why it's important, you know, to support this project. I take it you've all known each other a really long time as well. Well,

Mike Hurst:

I mean for me it's a bit of a truism really. You've got, you can't have any profession that it's where half the population feel excluded from it. That's just ridiculous. But also the thing I like about this project, and obviously I'm not seen the film, I'm hoping it's going to generate some really positive images, positive messages, positive role models. I've been in this industry for 30 odd years. Most of the time I've been in recruitment. I can remember early on people getting assignments for people to recruit someone. And they've said to me, no women. That was 30 years ago. I mean, I've not heard that for I don't know, 15 years, 20. It's just, it's just stopped. People have stopped. And the people are changing. And, you know, she mentioned his first conference he went to was predominantly men and I was probably the same. I mean, there's always been some really very good, very senior women in the industry, in the profession, just not enough of them. that's part of the problem. but so I just, I just feel it doesn't make sense. Cause See for me, what I always think, about the whole, you know, diversity thing is diversity is great, but there's also the diversity of thought. People do think if you've got an industry that's full of one type of person, whether it's all men or women, all ex law enforcement, all ex-military, then they are likely to think in a certain way, which isn't, doesn't I. We respect their service and thank them for it. You need people who come at things from a different angle, different perspectives, different backgrounds, different all sorts of things. It just makes the whole thing stronger. And I think it's better for security as a profession, but also I think it's better for business. People come up with different things. The whole thing, the allyship thing, there's very few things that have changed in the world, certainly, you know, that have happened without allyships. So whether it's the fall of the Soviet Union, whether it's the breakdown of apartheid, whether it's other things, you always had to have someone on the inside. You know, go against the grain. Um, you know, because I suppose for me, I mean, some of the views I had, 40 years ago, probably very different to what I've got now. You do learn, you do, you change, you meet people, you evolve. I have a daughter who's, you know, 27 and she's brilliant. I've always treated her the same way as I would treat a son, I think, you know, we go to the rugby on the weekend. I always encourage her career and her academic education in the same way I would have treated the son. It's treating people as people. And just as an example, because I used to be involved with ASIS on the European Advisory Council for about 10 years, and we always used to have a women in security track. But after all, we stopped it. We thought, this is silly, really. And what we try to do there is just make sure we had some really good senior women speaking. That has a much better effect than having that sort of the carrot, the stick thing. So you just have that people there who are magnets, you put with people. So I could do that. Think of it that way, rather than trying to, be too judgmental and try to encourage people, set good examples rather than just, You know, preach about it, get out and do it.

Yoyo:

New pair of glasses you've got there, Mike.

Mike Hurst:

Yes, probably, actually., I keep losing them. I will tell you, I have glasses all over the house and I've got another pair here.

Yoyo:

Well, that pair really suits you.

Mike Hurst:

Oh, very much. Geez. More flattery.

Yoyo:

Well, you should wear those for more audio podcasts., Rich, when you look back now to all of the stories that you've heard, is there, any particular story that does stand out for you?

Richard T:

I kind of like to mention the fact that the film is not, the documentary is not just. interviews. We also filmed reenactments. We have, actors involved. It's a documentary that has many levels to it. Some of the stories that really jumped out at Us, we turned into reenactments. one of those, is the story of Kate Warren, who, was the, first, female security professional in the United States and worked with Pinkerton. that's obviously not a story we got from interviews. but then, Bonnie shared some stories about her experience using the 24 hour rule that really kind of stuck with us that maybe she would like to talk about that if she wants, but that's in the film, and, we have a Marine Allison, involved in the film as well. She told some stories about her early career that we decided to turn into reenactments as well., so a bunch of the stories were very, very impactful. Um,, so we decided to highlight a few of those, um, Bonnie's, stories really are very. Motivational for me and inspired me to move forward with the documentary. The effort that she's put forward, as a mentor and as a representative within the industry, she's relentless and awesome and to me, she's one of the, truly one of the stars of the film. So she would, some of her stories have been turned into reenactments as well. I'm a big fan of Bonnie's and I'm just glad that she's on this call and she agreed to be part of the film.

Yoyo:

Bonnie, and I will come to you with it. Bonnie, could you give us a teaser about the 24 hour rule?

Bonnie:

You need to hear the whole story, and I think that would be a good teaser for people to watch the documentary.

Richard T:

That's right.

Yvette:

It's really good. And it's something that every woman needs to know if they don't know it already, to give it a minute before you judge and for it, before you speak your word.

Bonnie:

Yoyo. One point I want to make, and Richard sort of started with this. One reason I really wanted to do this, and I think others feel the same, is it has not been easy to recruit non white men who have retired from federal service or military service at times in this industry. I'm hoping this documentary is going to expose people to what this industry is all about. How exciting it is, how diverse it is, how many different arms of it, and how lucrative it is. Whether it's women or men that it does that for, I think that's going to be a huge success if we can achieve that.

Yoyo:

Yvette, Out of all of the stories that you heard, is there anything that particularly stuck with you?

Yvette:

There are so many stories that we have that make you go, wow, you did that. You were a part of that. And Bonnie, you're right. This, this documentary will bring up women and they will know that you've got an exciting profession and you also have a profession that you keep growing.

Yoyo:

I've also seen a kind of divergence as well, Richard, into different types of security roles. So one of the emerging security roles I'm seeing is nursing security,, there are now, nurses that are focusing on security in their professions because of the levels of violence that they're having to deal with, they're going real. Deep. They are looking now at the psychology of why patients become violent. All of a sudden we're seeing this emergence of great intelligence in a field more diverse than we could have ever imagined it to be 15 years ago. What did you notice in terms of just the variety of security divergence in our, women in security community?

Richard T:

it became very clear through the interviews, talking to a lot of people who are directors, and management folk, that it's clear that the opportunity is immense. There's all kinds of, of different directions you can enter into the field. It's no longer only for military folks and for people who are former police officers or former FBI. There's all kinds of ways to get involved in the industry.

Yoyo:

Yvette, firstly, I want to say thank you so much for directing this documentary. Can't wait to see it. I love the fact that you're a woman. We'll ask you about George Clooney in a few minutes. As a woman director, how important was it for you to get aligned with a women in security documentary?

Yvette:

Very important. At this time in my life, I want to do something like the women in security are doing. I want to do something that helps the world. This is my project and I feel very honored to be a part of it.

Bonnie:

I appreciate certainly Richard, but all the other people like Yvette and the others who have advised Richard and who have been part of this and who have joined sort of the parade to get this out. I do think it's not only something that might be useful. to people in the whole enterprise security risk world, which it certainly will, but maybe even to people who are minorities in other fields, they may learn something from this. So I think that it has a lot of reach and breadth and a possible benefit for many.

Yoyo:

Mike, the whole collaboration across our membership bodies will all get behind this and support it. won't we?

Mike Hurst:

Absolutely. Absolutely. I think people don't realize how important security is to businesses, society, to all sorts of things. I think it's so important that we're here to protect everyone. I think the people doing that should. Broadly reflect the people we're protecting. And I think that's makes sense really. The associations would definitely back it. So many of them have senior women in role. As president in the UK chapter, we've got, a female chair. Sandy's been leading IFPO for, well, longer than she cares to remember. So there's plenty of people out there. I think anything we can do, even in a small way to make a difference and support them. Yeah, we're very happy to do. I'm just delighted to, to be able to offer any support I can.

Yoyo:

Sandy, the number of women that are involved in this documentary is a, it's a beautiful list. So it's a powerhouse of a list of, you know, goal boss, goal security boss, basically. We'll include them all when we put the podcast out with the link to listen. Sandy, how important is it for you to align yourself with, with such an impactful? Project.

Sandi:

I think it's a, a paramount, of interest to me having this documentary, being rolled out. I think that women in security have arrived, the successes, the level of accomplishment that women have achieved. There's no longer the stereotypical cloud that hangs over people's heads. I think we talked about, the allies, the mentors and the volunteer leaders that have been involved in our careers and how they've helped us. Another really great source for developing. Even greater, and more successful women than perhaps ourselves is through our Y P. You go to a Y P event now, and the majority are women, which I'm very excited about, I think that we as women who've been in the industry for too long that we don't want to share that figure with. We can emanate the confidence and success that will also encourage young women to see this as a career and not just a intermediate career.

Richard T:

I would like to just say how important volunteer leadership is, this film wouldn't happen with all the incredible volunteer leaders from, organizations like IFPO and ASIS, associations, um, been a really great way to elevate these sort of concerns. The women in security groups, a lot of them formed through these associations and built through these associations. So I just like to really thank associations that focus on the security profession. I'd also really like to mention, obviously ASIS and Amazon and Pinkerton who supported this event. There are a lot of different companies that have got involved in organizations that are supporting this cast and crew. They're all just fantastic. And I couldn't have done it. This couldn't have happened without them. Yvette also, she's very much underselling herself. The work that we did in front of the LED screens with all the actors and doing the reenactments, that's all her doing. That's all her writing and her work doing that. Just having her involved with the project also has been just wonderful. I'm very, very excited about the documentary. I'm looking forward to the trailer coming out on International Women's Day on March 8th. We're going to have a screening here, out here in California at the end of the March, for, a small group of people, to get some input. Once that happens, we're going to finish our edit, and the film will be set for full release after the end of March. So we're looking forward to that.

Yoyo:

Yvette, dear, Anthony Edwards was one of my favorite actors in, in ER. There were so, so, so, so many

Bonnie:

Mara Tierney too.

Yoyo:

Yes. Love Maura.

Bonnie:

Love her. Yeah. She's done some great stuff.

Yoyo:

Yvette! So, seriously, was George Clooney nice? Was he lovely?

Yvette:

He was the sweetest man in the world. He was funny, kind, I still love him, I haven't seen him in years, but a good

Yoyo:

person. Hasn't he grown into a handsome man as well? Talk about it! And you know what? I've got the privilege of asking somebody who's in secret service. He was in Obama's registration. The first thing I asked him was, is that man the real deal? And he went, Oh yeah, he's the real deal. I was like, Oh, all my dreams come true when I hear that. Thank you for making it happen. For Bonnie Michaelman, who, well, you'll have to hear her story when you watch the documentary, a major contributor and big support artists here, Mike Hurst and Sandy Davis. Thank you all so much for joining us on the Security Circle Podcast.