Coaching Results
The Corporate Security Profession Is Changing...Are You Prepared For This Change?
An unexpected call came to me today from a Chief Security Officer I provided Latin American Corporate Security talent for several years ago. The call covered significant ground and many different topics and obviously prompted me to write this blog.
A large part of our call focused on this Chief Security Officer (CSO) sharing his perspective on where the corporate security profession is headed. This CSO’s career started out in a federal agency nearly 30 years ago. He didn’t stay in the federal arena long. An opportunity surfaced nearly 30 years ago for this CSO to step into private industry. He wasted no time in pouncing on the opportunity and has never looked back.
This CSO’s career has covered what I would call traditional corporate security topics such as:
- Executive Protection
- Supply Chain Security
- Protecting Intellectual Property
- Risk Management
- Investigations
- Security Assessments
- Business Continuity
- Travel Security
- Personnel Security
- Crisis Management
- And More
This CSO does not have an Information Security background. He does work closely with his organization’s Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) but his career did not grow up in technology.
Many times, the CSO told me that he wishes he had picked up more technology experience 10-15 years ago because everything in his business environment is now driven by technology of some kind. He is conversant when he sits at the table with his CISO counterpart but he sees a time in the not-too-distant-future when a position like his will report to the CISO in many companies.
I asked this CSO what advice he would give to a younger corporate security professional or to someone who is leaving a first career in law enforcement or some kind of federal agency. The CSO was quick to respond by telling me he would advise an up-and-coming corporate security professional to learn everything they could possibly learn about Cybersecurity and where it intersects with topics that used to be considered physical security such as the topics mentioned above.
Jeff Snyder Coaching found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com
What Is Measured In An Emotional Intelligence Assessment?
I was recently asked to explain what is actually measured in the EQi-2.0 Emotional Intelligence assessment I use in my coaching practice. The image shown below demonstrates the emotional intelligence skills that are measured by the EQi-2.0 assessment.
This is not an assessment that just anybody can purchase. In order to purchase this assessment, I had to go through certification and training to learn how to interpret the results of this assessment and to understand how to coach my clients around their unique results.
Jeff Snyder's Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
How to Become a Successful CISO or CSO
CISOs and CSOs need to possess a mix of appropriate education, certifications, experience and technical subject matter expertise. The needs of each individual company will dictate what experience, credentials and technical skills a CISO / CSO candidate needs to bring to the table.
Often Overlooked
A set of skills that companies often overlook when hiring a CISO / CSO candidate include relationship building skills. These are the skills that will empower a CISO or CSO to attract talent and to retain talent. As a strengths coach andan emotional intelligence coach, I’m privileged to see exactly and precisely how my coaching clients are wired from the inside as opposed to only seeing what a security professional chooses to show on their resume; the outside.
How a person is wired on the inside determines how they perform on the outside.
Somewhat Rare
Finding CISO or CSO professionals who possess relationship building strength themes in their top 5 strength themes or even their top 10 strength themes is somewhat rare. These particular strength themes are the themes that equip a person to build relationships, to grow relationships and to know how to work effectively with others.
I’m far more likely to see strategic thinking strength themes in CISO and CSO coaching clients. While strategic thinking strengths are necessary for security professionals, CISOs and CSOs need a greater balance of strengths than just strategic thinking themes.
The Full Package
In order to influence, persuade, negotiate and to collaborate with peers and customers, CISOs and CSOs need to be equipped with a balance of relationship building, influencing, executing and strategic thinking strength themes. These leadership professionals need to understand what they have to work with and they need to know how to leverage what they have and how to manage the strength themes that show up as weaknesses.
The Right Mix
CISOs and CSOs who build the most effective security programs, the best security teams and who generate the best results for the businesses that employ them are those who also have well-balanced emotional intelligence. These people know themselves well and they have an advanced understanding of how they are perceived by and how they come across to others across the business they’re there to serve.
A person’s unique mix of strength themes are like their DNA. We all have unique DNA but we can’t change what we have. Emotional Intelligence skills on the other hand are flexible and can be adjusted and improved upon over time.
What to Do
If you don’t know already, find out what your unique strength themes are so you know for sure what you have to work with and what you have within you to leverage.
If you’re ready to take your career to the next level, learn about your unique emotional intelligence. Your emotional intelligence (EI) or emotional quotient (EQ) as it is sometimes called can be measured and improved through coaching if in fact it needs work.
Jeff Snyder’s Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
How Many Words Are In Your Resume?
On my screen, as a result of my research team’s work, I am looking at a resume that contains 11,883 words. In case you’re not an expert on how many words fit on a clean, clear, logically written single resume page (I’m not either), the sample resumes in my resume coaching portfolio that have opened interview doors for my past resume coaching clients have an average of 1,250 words total. These 1,250 words cover 2-3 total pages with plenty of white space.
In case you were wondering, 11,883 words equates to 39 Word document pages. This resume I'm referring to was sent to me for one reason and that reason serves as the basis for this blog article. I wish I could tell you that I’ve never seen a 39 page resume before but this is the second time in the past few months that I’ve seen a 30-40 page resume.
When you send out a resume, you have to know who might be sitting in your resume's audience. Chances are very high that the people in your audience are busy, data-overwhelmed professionals who don’t read unless they have to. I don’t mean that they can’t read. What I mean is that they scan before they commit to reading and that resume scanning process might last for 10, 15 or maybe 20 seconds.
A 39 page resume doesn’t even qualify as a resume in my own data-overwhelmed world. A 39 page resume is more like a dissertation to a data-overwhelmed person. I can’t think of anyone I know who is busy and data-overwhelmed who would invest even 5 seconds to tackle a 39 page resume.
Jeff Snyder’s Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
ASIS Webinar Feedback for Jeff Snyder
After working with a group in Denver last week that was assembled to assist the Colorado Board of Education with future curriculum decisions and speaking to a large group of Colorado Springs ISSA members last week, my phone rang when I returned to my desk on Friday.
On the other end was the Communications Manager from ASIS International. She was in a bind. A webinar speaker she had scheduled for today had to back out last Friday. My name was brought to the Communication Manager's attention as a possible webinar speaker.
Today the webinar event happened and I had a blast. My part of the event involved covering topics that I work with every day as I fill information security jobs, corporate security jobs and cybersecurity jobs.
If you missed the webinar that focused on career development and resume coaching, I'm always available through Jeff Snyder Coaching to assist you. I teach my clients how to get from where they are to where they want to go and they have personal success.
Over-Delivery, Value, Refreshing, Motivating
Jeff Snyder's Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
A Successful Week of Public Speaking, Resume Coaching and LinkedIn Coaching
On Wednesday and Thursday of this week, I was busy fulfilling commitments to ClearedJobs.net, the Colorado Springs ISSA and to MBA Research, a company that contacted me to have me sit on a panel related to the future of education here in Colorado.
On Wednesday, on behalf of ClearedJobs.net, I gave resume reviews to groups of primarily Cybersecurity professionals in Colorado Springs. I did my best in a very short time to teach each group how to create a clean, clear, logical resume that would speak effectively to the resume's audience. This was fun!
Yesterday morning, I was privileged to work with a group of entrepreneurs and business leaders in Denver. We were assembled in order to provide information that will ultimately end up in the hands of the Colorado Board of Education with regards to curriculum adjustments that should be made in Middle School, High School and Colleges and Universities in Colorado. This was fun!
Yesterday afternoon, I was privileged to have been invited back to the Colorado Springs ISSA for second year in a row. I was asked to speak on the topic of LinkedIn. It was a relatively full room and I know I had fun delivering what I could deliver in less than an hour to get a highly diverse group of technology and cybersecurity professionals up to speed on the topic of building a personal LinkedIn strategy.
"JEFF, WE MET TODAY AT THE ISSA CONFERENCE. THANK YOU FOR A FANTASTIC TALK ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF LINKEDIN, YOUR TALK WAS VERY INFORMATIVE AND I APPRECIATE THE WORK YOU DO TO HELP OTHERS IN MARKETING, MYSELF INCLUDED."
Now I'm back at my desk where I'm providing Coaching Services, Recruiting Services for Security, Risk Compliance and Privacy skills and I'm about to write up several new brand new IT Risks Management and Security Strategist positions.
Jeff Snyder's Jeff Snyder Coaching Blog, 719.686.8810
No Personal Clarity + No Personal Confidence = No Job Offer
If you’re great at interviewing, you either have a natural gift or maybe you’ve interviewed too often and you have too much experience. You’re not supposed to be an expert when it comes to interviewing. In fact, I know many people who never face an actual interview until they are in their 40s or 50s.
Some people are just flat out lucky. They move from one job to another based on someone pulling them from one job to another. In this case, they are already know to the person who is inviting them to the next company and they never really have to interview to get their next job.
Not everybody is this lucky. Whenever possible, I write about real live factual situations rather than theory or my own opinions. This morning, an email came to me from one of my resume coaching clients. The resume I taught this client how to build performed precisely the way it was built to perform. The result of this client’s investment in my 1 Hour Resume Coaching was an interview within a week after building her new resume.
She just figured out that while a clean, clear, logical resume will open interview doors, the resume itself will not land anyone a job. She was lucky to get this feedback from the employer that just rejected her as a candidate.
"You need to relax and trust in yourself more. They sensed your tension at the front of the interview, and that will always be interpreted as a lack of confidence. So my advice is to trust in the value that you bring, relax and enjoy the experience of an interview. Think of it as a chat, and all will be well."
The good news here is that my client’s resume performed in the marketplace. The resume opened interview doors. The bad news is that my client is no as ready as she thought she was for the actual interview experience. More good news is that she received very clear and direct feedback from her interviewer and she can now decide whether or not to take action on the advice she received.
If my client decides to take the next career coaching step to learn about her natural strengths and she embraces the natural strengths that are part of her DNA, she’ll behave differently in her next interview. The clarity she’ll gain from understanding her talents and strengths will translate into confidence.
When she finds clarity and her clarity turns into confidence, the perceived or real tension she brought to her last interview will disappear. She’ll be able to enjoy the interview experience just like the interviewer told her to do in the feedback paragraph above.
My client does have a problem. The good news is that this problem can be solved if my clients takes action.
Jeff Snyder’s Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
Gratitude Suggestion
Jeff Snyder's Coaching Blog at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
Sometimes an Attitude Adjustment is in Order
Photo by Jeff Snyder
Jeff Snyder's Coaching Blog found at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
Do Your Homework before Saying “Yes” to a New Employer
One question a job seeker should always do homework on is the question or group of questions that uncover the reason a position is open. In the realm of Information Security or Cyber Security, many Cyber Security jobs are new positions that have never existed before. If you’re interviewing for one of these positions, find out what business drivers are sitting behind the new position in order to determine what kind of business support is being given to Cyber Security in that particular company. This might turn out to be a great career move.
If you find yourself interviewing for a position where someone has moved on, this can be a more complicated situation. Sometimes this is a good situation and sometimes it can lead to a career train wreck for the next employee.
Some people move on because they have truly found a growth opportunity that surpasses the growth possible in their current role. Other people move on and leave positions open because they desire to end a relationship with a questionable boss.
If you find out that someone left a position for anything other than better opportunity, do your homework and proceed cautiously. If a position is open because the hiring authority trying to fill the position is not a particularly good boss, be cautious.
Unless the previously questionable boss saw the light when he or she lost staff and took action to improve the personal behavior that caused the previous employee or employees to leave, odds are very high that nothing will change with the questionable boss when you take the job. The questionable boss will continue to be a questionable boss.
Behavioral change is one of the most difficult efforts for a human being to undertake. It takes courage and commitment to address behavioral change. If you determine that someone left a position recently because they faced challenges with a questionable boss, the questionable boss will not be any different in the weeks to come when a new employee takes on the open position.
On the outside, the questionable boss might appear to be less stressed for a time when their open positions have been filled but they're the same person on the inside. It will only be a matter of time before the questionable boss begins to behave from their default mode that was briefly masked upon the arrival of the new employees.
Human beings can always improve but it takes significant effort, commitment and courage to improve one’s behavior. If you find a prospective boss who is investing in their future to become a better boss, this is the kind of person whose team you might want to join.
Do your homework and don’t become a victim of a questionable boss.
Jeff Snyder’s Coaching Blog, JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810
Set Achievable and Measurable Goals…Put Blinders On…Do It
In mid-April of 2014, I was informed by the heart surgeon that a genetic problem in my heart that he’d been monitoring for the previous 4 years had gotten worse. It was time for me to have open heart surgery. I was physically ready for this event. While the surgeon was monitoring my heart for 4 years, I had skated over 200 hockey games, I’d ridden more miles than I can remember on my bikes and I had skied hundreds of thousands of vertical feet over 4 ski seasons. I was ready or so I thought.
I asked the surgeon when he thought I should go through the surgery. His response offered a time “next week” or “two weeks from now”. The idea of open heart surgery didn’t scare me as much as the reality of “next week” or “two weeks from now”. It was at that moment that I realized that recovering from open heart surgery would require more than just physical fitness. This would be a mental and emotional battle that I did not yet understand.
I reluctantly agreed on a date “two weeks from now”. I proceeded to ask the surgeon questions to give me an idea of how long it would be before I could live my life again. For me, living life means doing a lot of physically demanding things. I didn’t care much for the surgeon’s answers. I call these types of answers good to know and bad to hear. You need to know but you sure won’t like the way you feel once you know the truth.
What I did learn however was that the surgeon was all for me getting back on my feet as quickly as possible. Like me, the surgeon was a mountain biker. He was even more enthusiastic than I anticipated he would be about seeing me back on my bike and back on my skates to play hockey.
When I got home, I wrote everything the surgeon just said on my white board. On my white board I established specific dates throughout the summer of 2014 when I would return to skates, when I would hike, when I would play hockey, when I would get back on the mountain bike and more.
The hockey stick pictured above played a part in my goal setting. I bought the stick a week before my surgery date. Hockey sticks are not inexpensive. Conventional thinking would have suggested that I wait to buy the stick until I could actually use the stick. I bought this stick just before my surgery as a way of forcing myself to stay focused on the written goal of getting back on the ice. I knew how my wife would react if I spent money on the stick but never used it! I had no choice but to get back on the ice.
Because my goals for heart surgery recovery were written and known to a few people whom I knew would help me to stay accountable, I reached and crushed every goal I set related to my heart surgery recovery. Nothing about this recovery was easy. Nobody could have told me about all the unforeseen circumstances I would face during my recovery. I put blinders on and stayed focused on the goals that were written on my white board.
Goals can be wrapped around just about anything. They need to be realistically achievable and measurable. You can keep your goals to yourself but you’ll be far more likely to achieve your goals if you share them with a few people who can keep you accountable and maybe even help you when you run into unforeseen obstacles.
Create achievable and measurable goals. Surround yourself with people who want to see you succeed. Put blinders on and DO IT!
Jeff Snyder’s Coaching Blog, at JeffSnyderCoaching.com, 719.686.8810