teissTalk: Cyber career paths – a way out of our skills shortage?

teissTalk Host Geoff White was joined by Danny Dresner, Professor of Cyber Security, University of Manchester; Jay Jay Davey, Cyber Security | Ethical Hacker & Blue Team expert, Nox Cyber and Amanda Finch, CEO, Chartered Institute of Information Security

 

The role of universities 

 

As, thanks to Covid, universities had no choice but to launch online courses, the number of IT students studying cybersecurity has increased. In all likelihood, online learning is here to stay for the next academic year in a blended learning format, which may give universities further opportunities to find ways of admitting more IT undergraduates than in previous years. The upside for students is that the necessity to find their feet in a mixed physical and online environment will prepare them for what they will encounter in their future jobs. 

 

The statistic indicating that about two-thirds of students on cybersecurity courses progress to an entry-level job in IT may sound underwhelming, but it, more or less, mirrors the make-up of a cohort on any university course, with top students giving it all right from the beginning of the course visiting conferences and keeping up with the latest trends of the industry, while the majority’s main focus is to meet course requirements.  

 

Universities need to ensure that apart from pure academic performance, they also recognise and nurture students with the right attitude and keenness for the subject.  

 

How standardisation can help the job mature 

 

The Chartered Institute of Information Security (CIISec) founded in 2006 to address “the problem of how to recognise a competent information security practitioner,” is also a witness to how the importance of cyber security increased in the past 15 years.  

 

CIISec has always gone out of its way to accredit people not just for their certified knowledge but their skills too, as well as to assist people with the right aptitude and approach to build a career in cyber security. It is agnostic in terms of members background, recognising training courses and university degrees alike and offering associate status to those joining straight away.  

 

You can access the full recording of this teissTalk episode here.