Five Ways to Make Sure You Hire the Right Cybersecurity Team Member

If you’re running an IT company, you already know that there is a huge gap between existing cybersecurity professionals and the current demand. This disparity is affecting almost all types of organizations, ranging from undetected breaches, prolonged response times and malware that severely affects operations, that employees cannot seamlessly do their jobs. It is estimated that the demand for cybersecurity jobs is likely to inch close to 3.5 million by 2021. As of 2020, organizations are increasingly becoming concerned with cybersecurity risks and how the security failures may jeopardize industry operations and cause a financial fallout. In a poll carried out by ISACA in 2019 that involved more than 1550 security professionals, 58% of them disclosed that their organizations have unoccupied cybersecurity roles and 32% said it takes almost half a year to fill those vacant positions. All these metrics point to a common question: what should companies do to hire and retain the best talent? To illustrate this hiring and retention disparity, over 80% of cybersecurity professionals cited better salaries and incentives as reasons for leaving their previous employer. With this urgency to meet corporate goals and the shortage of certified information systems security professionals, poor decision making at the hiring level can make things go wrong very quickly.

Here are the five primary considerations to help you hire and manage your cybersecurity team effectively.

Post a thorough job description

Vague job descriptions attract equally ambiguous candidates. Inarguably, you can reasonably conclude that the finest of cybersecurity experts are already employed. This means that a vague publication is likely to attract inexperienced cybersecurity professionals looking for entry-level jobs. While such a click of candidates can perform some portion of the job in the description, they won’t be suitable to entirely secure security frameworks. In your job description, define the specific skills you need, and remember that “people skills” are equally important as technical skills. Whether you post the job on LinkedIn, mainstream media or high-authority websites, highlight the need for someone with communication skills, extensive collaboration with members and customers alike.

Watch your salary range

Hiring managers are working round the clock to establish a viable salary range for top cybersecurity professions with a CISSP certification. As it stands, however, there is no adequate data on salaries for people with skills like ethical hacking. Consequently, hiring managers end up clustering closely-related job roles together, which severely jeopardizes their ability to recruit top talent. Keeping in mind that cybersecurity is an ever-growing industry, getting the right metrics on the average market salary will give you an edge on hiring and retaining the best talent.

Look beyond words

Cybersecurity is a pragmatic field which needs actions more than words. There is good general advice that you need to look for someone who will suit your organization perfectly, but you also need someone who can solve the problem and is flexible in most situations. While work experience is an essential metric in considering the competence of candidates, it does not mean you fail to consider the applications of other inexperienced candidates. In other words, a professional with CISSP training who puts the effort to acquire practical experience through pragmatic DIY approaches would be better than a “rigid” professional with over a decade of experience. Good IT professionals should be curious, ethical and willing to expand their skillset by solving new challenges.

Embrace diversity

Being selective is essential, but you also need to strike a balance between being picky and diverse. If your team isn’t adequately diverse, they will be unable to come up with new and innovative ideas. Without a doubt, cybersecurity professionals will bring a mammoth of solutions on risk mitigation to the table. In this evolving landscape, how professionals respond is critical in ascertaining their preparedness for an attack. That said, failing to embrace diversity will make your team run out of ideas, and this will only raise the susceptibility of the organization to attack.

Focus on retention

Competition in the cybersecurity space is so stiff that organizations with top talent are beginning to worry about retaining their existing staff. Employed professionals with CISSP training receive offers from other organizations with 10-30% salary increments. At the same time, over 80% of cybersecurity professionals cite issues with salaries and bonuses as the top motivation to shift to another company. Beyond offering attractive salaries and benefits, create a culture of routine tasks to minimize burnout and reduce the number of energy-sapping administrative and compliance work. Besides, invest in training and look for engaging opportunities to keep your staff doing interesting and relevant things.

Conclusion

Organizations are happy to pay top dollar for talent rather than wait for a security breach that will cost them millions of dollars in the long term. As technology continues to advance rapidly, more organizations are beginning to appreciate the need to hire the best professionals. Overall, being able to select the right talent will place an organization in a better position to secure its framework.