Embodiments of systems and methods are provided herein to establish a secure communication channel for communicating dock configuration actions from an administrator information handling system (IHS) to a docking station. One embodiment of such a system includes an administrator IHS configured to communicate dock configuration actions to a docking station, a host IHS configured to verify the validity of a dock certificate received from the docking station against a dock certificate authority server, and a docking station configured to verify the validity of an administrator certificate received from the admin IHS against a preconfigured list of valid administrator certificates stored within the docking station. If the validity of the dock certificate and the administrator certificate are respectively verified by the host IHS and the docking station, the host IHS and the docking station are further configured to establish the secure communication channel between the administrator IHS and the docking station.