Linkedin live broadcast: Rethinking Talent and Diversity

Almost five years ago, I started a career pivot into cybersecurity - looking back, it is dizzying to witness the pace at which technology has advanced and changed, while some things stay stubbornly unchanged - such as the question that continues to plague ever more organisations then and now… how can we fill the critical talent shortage in security?

This is one of the main reasons why we started work on creating the CyberWayFinder program - to bring in much needed diverse profiles into teams to tackle the increasing complexity of cybersecurity challenges.

Reaching into my designer’s toolset (usually when I find myself stuck) - a great way to get unstuck is to change your perspective and reframe your problem statement. What we found out in the years that we have been helping people with unconventional “non-tech” profiles kick-start their cyber career is that the bottle-neck is not in the lack of talented and skilled professionals. The difficulty lies in finding the right opportunities that will help these potentials prove themselves - finding teams that know how to capitalise on their range of skills and competencies, and understand that talent is multidimensional and the challenges too complex for homogenous skill sets.

So, to reframe the problem, I suggest this: How might we tackle the lack of opportunity in cybersecurity for “untapped”, unconventional high-performing talent?

Listen to a conversation on the topic I had with IBM Security’s Anne Leslie here on a LinkedIn Live broadcast