Turning information security pros into cybersecurity change agents
What gets cybersecurity pros out of bed in the morning?
If you’re on the front lines against digital attackers, you got there because your creative juices are flowing when you’re fixing things, solving problems, and know you are working to make the world a safer place to be online.
The draw of the industry (besides the zero percent unemployment) has been solving, what many perceive to be, unsolvable problems. The technology and threats are changing so quickly that there is truly no status quo.
Over the last few years, however, we’ve heard from our members (the Certified Information Systems Security Professionals, or CISSPs, that make up the backbone of the information security field) and they have never been more bogged down and harried.
The thrill of creative problem solving, of going to work on a massive mission that is critical to everyone, is being hollowed out by the slow pace of change in the overall cybersecurity industry, whether in government or the private sector. We’re stuck having the same conversations about the same problems, whether at major industry gatherings or within our agencies and companies.
Our industry’s current moroseness (stick around a gathering of information security pros for long and you’ll be quick to hear the lamentations of “systemic failure” to protect against attacks), attests both to the scale of the challenge we face and the pressure on today’s cybersecurity workforce.
Who can fix this?
Policymakers, corporate leaders and academics all have a role to play. But there’s an untapped layer of change agents that our industry often overlooks: the cybersecurity pros down in the trenches.
It is their mix of technical talent and creative energy that can help re-start the information security conversation — if they’re given a chance to speak.
At (ISC)²’s CyberSecureGov 2016 conference May 19th and 20th in Washington, D.C. all layers of technical experts will come together as a cyber community to solve problems. We’ll be focused on change agents within federal agencies and within the firms that serve those agencies and how to drive change from the bottom up.
Why do I believe our cybersecurity pros can be transformative to our industry?
While the industry has a critical talent gap going forward, we already employ scores of creative, dedicated individuals today. Our technical talent is finely attuned to the digital threats we face. These are the people that must be harnessed to explain the risks and possible impacts of changes to the cybersecurity field.
We need to give these people the training they need to translate their already-sharp technical skills into insights for public good and the bottom line.
What you’ll see at CyberSecureGov (and everyday in the Security Operations Centers where information security experts protect our networks) is that today’s cybersecurity pros didn’t just sign up for the nice salary. They are going to the extra mile to give back — and to drive change from within some of our most important institutions.
Dan Waddell is the managing director for the North America region of (ISC)². You can follow him on Twitter @DanWaddellCISSP.
