The OGs of Prevention: Why You Want Rob and Beth Andress in the Room
Rob and Beth Andress provide behaviour-based violence prevention, situational awareness and reality-based self-defence training for municipalities, security teams, healthcare workers, high schools and women across Canada. Their training teaches people to recognize developing risk, understand manipulation, respond to escalation and make safer decisions before an incident becomes violent.
When people see this photo, they may smile and think, “Rob and Beth, the Original Gangsters.”
We’re good with that.
Being an OG is not about sunglasses, black clothing or trying to look tough. It means you have been doing the work since before the work became popular. Before workplace violence became a corporate talking point. Before situational awareness became a social media phrase. Before everyone with a slideshow started calling themselves a self-defence or de-escalation expert.
Beth and I have spent years working with people whose safety cannot depend on theory.
Municipal employees dealing with an angry member of the public. Security officers working alone and making decisions without immediate backup. Young women preparing to leave home for university. High school students trying to understand consent, manipulation and unhealthy relationships. Women who need self-defence that respects the realities of violence—not techniques designed inside a martial arts school.
That is why you want the OGs in the room.
We Teach the Person Before We Teach the Response
Violence prevention does not begin with a punch, a restraint or a physical confrontation.
It begins much earlier.
It begins with behaviour. Distance. Language. Positioning. Environmental awareness. Changes in tone. Attempts to isolate, distract, intimidate or control.
If your training begins when someone becomes physically violent, it has started too late.
Beth and I teach people to recognize what is developing before it becomes an emergency. We help them understand what they are seeing, trust what they are feeling and make an earlier, safer decision.
Our purpose has always been simple:
Stop the Before, so the After Never Happens.
Why Municipalities Need This Training
Municipal employees are placed in difficult situations every day.
By-Law Officers, property standards staff, building inspectors, transit employees, recreation workers and frontline customer-service teams regularly deal with frustration, mental-health concerns, intoxication, noncompliance and escalating behaviour.
These employees do not need to be turned into police officers or martial artists.
They need behaviour-based workplace violence prevention.
They need to understand the difference between a person who can be calmed and a person who is preparing to become violent. They need to recognize when de-escalation is working, when it is failing and when continuing the conversation is creating more risk.
They also need permission to disengage.
Our training gives municipal employees a practical decision-making process they can carry into the real world. It helps them recognize risk earlier, communicate more effectively and respond within the responsibilities of their employment.
That protects the employee, the municipality and the public.
Why Healthcare Workers Need This Training
Healthcare workers meet people during some of the most emotional, unpredictable and vulnerable moments of their lives. They regularly face fear, pain, confusion, intoxication, mental-health crises and frustrated family members—all of which can quickly change behaviour. Rob and Beth teach healthcare teams how to recognize escalation earlier, communicate without surrendering personal safety and understand when de-escalation is working—or when it is time to create distance and call for help. Healthcare workers are trained to care for others, but that responsibility should never require them to ignore their own safety.
Why Security Teams Need More Than Use-of-Force Training
Security officers often work in the distance between policy and reality.
They may be the first person called when someone becomes aggressive, but they are not always given the behavioural training necessary to understand what is happening before the confrontation.
Use-of-force training has a purpose, but it should not be the entire safety system.
Security professionals need to understand pre-attack indicators, positioning, approach, environmental risk, emotional escalation and the limitations of verbal de-escalation. They must know how to make decisions under pressure without allowing ego, frustration or tunnel vision to take control.
We teach security teams how to see more, recognize risk sooner and make better decisions before physical force becomes the only remaining option.
Better decision-making improves officer safety, public confidence, incident reporting and client retention.
Why High School Students Listen to Us
Young people know when they are being lectured.
They also know when adults are avoiding the truth.
We do not walk into a high school and pretend the students have never heard about sexual assault, sextortion, toxic relationships, coercion, online manipulation or dating violence.
Many of them are already living with these concerns.
We speak honestly, without shaming them and without trying to frighten them into making better choices.
Students learn how manipulation develops, why boundaries are tested gradually and how attention can be used to create trust, obligation or control.
They learn that consent cannot be pressured, negotiated or assumed.
Most importantly, they learn that discomfort is information.
They do not owe anyone access to their body, their phone, their photographs, their location or their private life.
That is not fear-based education.
It is preparation for the world they are already entering.
Why Women’s Self-Defence Must Be Taught Differently
Women do not need another instructor promising that a few rehearsed techniques will defeat any attacker.
They deserve the truth.
Violence against women is often committed by someone known to them. It may involve emotional manipulation, coercive control, isolation and boundary testing long before the first physical assault.
This is where Beth’s voice becomes so important.
Beth is not my assistant.
She is a violence prevention specialist, digital self-defence educator and fraud awareness professional with a background in law enforcement.
She understands how manipulation crosses from the physical world into relationships, social media, fraud and digital communication.
Together, we teach women how violence develops and what options may still exist at each stage.
When physical self-defence becomes necessary, the response must be simple, immediate and based on escape—not competition.
We account for differences in strength, size and physical power instead of pretending they do not exist.
Real women’s self-defence must be honest enough to discuss fear, freezing, trauma and the emotional reality of being attacked by someone you trusted.
Anything less is performance.
Two Different Perspectives. One Purpose.
Beth and I do not teach exactly the same way, and that is one of our greatest strengths.
I bring decades of experience in violence prevention, situational awareness, threat assessment, close-quarter combatives and reality-based self-defence.
My work focuses on human behaviour, early recognition, decision-making and what happens when avoidance and de-escalation are no longer enough.
Beth brings her background in law enforcement, violence prevention, trauma-informed education, digital self-defence, fraud awareness and the psychology of manipulation.
I may recognize how an encounter is moving toward physical violence.
Beth may recognize how trust, urgency, emotion or authority are being used to control the person before the physical danger is visible.
Those perspectives belong together because modern safety is no longer divided neatly between the street, the workplace and the internet.
Human behaviour connects all three.
Experience Changes the Conversation
We have worked with municipalities, security teams, high schools, women’s groups, healthcare organizations, real estate professionals and communities across Canada.
Every audience is different, but the responsibility remains the same.
Do not exaggerate the threat.
Do not minimize the threat.
Do not promise that one technique or conversation will work every time.
Give people truthful information.
Give them a process they can remember.
Give them permission to recognize danger earlier and act before the situation takes away their choices.
That is what experience brings into the room.
Why Would You Want Rob and Beth Teaching Your People?
Because we are not trying to make your employees, students or participants feel tough for a few hours.
We want them to become more observant, more confident and more difficult to manipulate.
We want your municipal employees going home safely.
We want your security officers making better decisions under pressure.
We want your high school students recognizing coercion before it becomes abuse.
We want women understanding that self-defence begins with permission—the permission to question, refuse, leave and protect themselves.
Call us the Original Gangsters if you want.
We have been called worse.
What matters is that when Rob and Beth Andress enter the room, the conversation about safety becomes honest.
And honest training can change what happens next.
Stop the Before, so the After Never Happens.
Rob Andress
Violence Prevention Consultant, SAS-AP
Close Quarter Combative Instructor
Pure & Applied Debilitation Instructor
Active Threat Survival Trainer (A.L.I.V.E.)
Street Safe Self Defence Training Company
FAQ Section
Who are Rob and Beth Andress?
Rob and Beth Andress are the co-founders of Street Safe Self Defence Training Company. They provide behaviour-based violence prevention, situational awareness, workplace safety, digital self-defence and reality-based personal protection training.
Who does Street Safe Self Defence train?
Street Safe provides training for municipalities, security teams, healthcare workers, high schools, women’s organizations, real estate professionals and other workplaces across Canada.
What makes Rob and Beth’s training different?
Their training begins with human behaviour, manipulation and early risk recognition. Participants learn how to identify escalation, make safer decisions and respond before a situation becomes physically violent.
Do Rob and Beth provide healthcare safety training?
Yes. Their healthcare training helps workers recognize behavioural escalation, communicate safely, create distance and understand when de-escalation is working or when additional assistance is required.
Is the training suitable for women and high school students?
Yes. Programs are adapted to the audience and address consent, coercion, unhealthy relationships, situational awareness, digital manipulation and realistic personal safety.
Is Street Safe training available across Canada?
Yes. Street Safe Self Defence delivers in-person and virtual violence prevention and safety training to organizations and communities across Canada.
- T.R.A.A.C.S. workplace violence prevention
- Municipal and By-Law Officer training
- High school violence prevention
- Women’s self-defence
- Digital self-defence and fraud awareness
- About Rob and Beth Andress
- REALTOR Safety and Self Defence
- Ontario Employer Responsibilities
- Workplace Violence Training
- Healthcare Worker Safety
- Violence Against Women