Organised by Eskenzi PR in media partnership with the IT Security Guru, the Most Inspiring Women in Cyber Awards aim to shed light on the remarkable women in our industry. The following is a feature on one of 2024’s Top 20 women selected by an esteemed panel of judges. Presented in a Q&A format, the nominee’s answers are written in their own words with minor edits made by the editor for readability and where relevant, supplemented with additional commentary by their nominator.
In 2024, the awards were sponsored by BT, Think Cybersecurity Ltd. and Plexal, with Eskenzi PR, Assured and Women in Cybersecurity UK & Ireland Affiliate as partners.
What does your job role entail?
I am a knowledge management subject matter expert, with a primary focus on the ingestion, standardisation, verification, documentation and publication of critical indicators and threat intelligence. My goal is to ensure such critical information is searchable and accessible to the varying teams, tools and community members who need it. I am a proud member of Secureworks Counter Threat Unit and an advocate for DE&I activities in my workplace.
How did you get into the cybersecurity industry?
I got my first job in Cyber Security after being headhunted for a Personal Assistant role at Secureworks. But I *really* got into the field when I took up my subsequent roles in Secureworks as a Change Manager and Coordinator. This was the role where I really begun to understand the needs and concerns of organisations from a cybersecurity perspective, ranging from compliancy checks, to red-teaming, to threat hunting, to compromised networks and beyond. It was my first role directly communicating with customers during their time of need, and inspired me to think ‘What could I do more to help’.
What is one of the biggest challenges you have faced as a woman in the tech/cyber industry and how did you overcome it?
Still to this day, I struggle regularly with self-doubt. I have always been someone who wants to jump in and support, but always questioned ‘Am I the right person?’ and ‘Can I do this?’. I’m not sure where it comes from but I do know I am someone who needs reassurance and affirmation to know I am pleasing my leaders and organisation. As I said, this is still something I feel to this day, but I am embracing it and have spun the self-doubt to actually be that I care deeply for what I am doing, that the concerns and nervousness is just because I simply care that much. That helps me feel more at ease with it all.
What are you doing to support other women, and/or to increase diversity, in the tech/cyber industry?
I am an active mentor and have push myself both in and out of work, to reach as many people as possible. In 2023 alone I undertook more than 30 initiatives to drive diversity and inclusion with an outreach of 2000+ people. This included presenting on many occasions on threat intelligence and industry specific knowledge, offering coaching, supporting STEM and female-focused events, working alongside SENCO and neurodiversity programs, as well as creating various blogs and podcasts.
What is one piece of advice you would give to girls/women looking to enter the cybersecurity industry?
You can do it! There is a space for you. It can be hard when you look at a cyber security organisation but cannot see anyone like you and so therefore aren’t sure to apply. But the fact is in industry we are there and we see you and we want you! My second piece of advice is to not be hung up on the need to be technical. Yes there are roles which require technical skillsets, but cybersecurity isn’t all coding and hacking. As long as you are keen to learn and ultimately want to help keep people safe, then there can be a place for you in Cyber Security.