Hold the door! Hodor!

We seem to have a lot of great work going on to increase diversity in our talent pool, through mentorship and outreach, for STEM generally and specifically in infosec. We’ve even started to recognise the need for sponsorship in tandem with mentorship, helping open doors for the talent we’ve identified and getting them through their first steps.

But then what? We support each other as peers for a while, some staying on a technical track and some veering over to a leadership track. How are we continuing to support, sponsor, and mentor those we have had this relationship with as they grow? We see diversity in our teams increasing, but it makes the glass ceiling seem even more real when I look at the CISOs around me and am hard pressed to even find one who looks like me. In the absence of representation, what are we doing to make sure that we’re not only opening these doors, but holding them open for those who have followed us?

It seems the more I move into leadership functions, the more my peers seem to be cautious about showing their hands. The same people who were eager to give a tip or make an introduction 10 years ago are suddenly close-lipped when it comes to personal growth. We’re suddenly terrible about just supporting each other as peers, talking about some of the hard challenges, allowing others to learn from our past experiences and share knowledge the way we always have about more technical topics. For those on leadership tracks, it seems like we’re almost embarrassed to talk about things that aren’t cool hacks or crazy things we’ve built and discuss instead how we handle a difficult conversation with one of our directs or how to speak to a board on some emerging new risk. 

How do we rekindle the spirit of collaboration that got us all here now that we’re the ones running the industry we built? How do we get back to the innovation which came from sharing the cool stuff we were doing, and apply it to the challenges that seem a little more mundane? Is there someone out there willing to please hold the door?