Guppy in the Sea

Reflecting on Chef Kristi’s incredible success yesterday really made me think about my own trajectory and my tendency to mentally downplay the significance of my own accomplishments. While I can’t say I’ve had my face on the giant screens at the sportsball stadium (seriously, how cool was that?!), I realise I have made some huge leaps and I need to embrace that, too.

Most of you know that it was a difficult decision to move into my current role. In my last position, I was a big fish in a little pond. I felt valued and respected, and every day, I had an opportunity to share what felt like a wealth of knowledge to peers and customers. When I went looking for a new challenge, my choice ultimately came down to two options. The first option was head of security for an e-commerce startup, and the second was as a technical leader in product security architecture for an extremely well known and established network security product vendor. They were completely different roles, but in one, I would continue to be the big fish in a small pond, while the other would make me a guppy in the ocean. For some insane reason, I picked the latter.

Y’all, I can’t even lie. It is HARD. Every day, I go to meetings and I feel like the dumbest person in the room. Every single person I work with makes brilliant contributions to innovating our field every single day. Every time I interview someone for my team, my imposter syndrome gets worse and worse, as I can’t understand how I managed to get hired into this role with so many more intelligent applicants to chose from. Much like when I was brand new to infosec and moved to the place where all these brilliant people I respected were, I feel completely out of place in every discussion.

I think back to those times, though, and as dumb as I felt, there were people helping and encouraging me instead of reaffirming my own beliefs. When I got my first consulting gig and called Dan Kaminsky in tears because I couldn’t do it and someone was going to figure out I wasn’t qualified for my job, he told me, “Octal, we’re ALL faking it. The trick is figuring it out before your customer does.”

I thought I was committed to learning. I thought I was keeping up. In reality, I had become complacent. I learned a few new tricks here and there, but I have spent several years resting on my laurels, and it’s time to get back to work. I think back to that choice 15 years ago that led me to Seattle, though, and I remember what I learned from that experience: When you surround yourself with the smartest people you know, people who set the bar high and still manage to leap over it, you can’t help but get carried along with that tide and meet that bar yourself. So, I find myself trusting that once again, I should embrace this opportunity to grow again, rather than be intimidated by the talents of those around me. By growing others we grow ourselves, and I’m just on the other end of that equation again. Soon, I’ll have no trouble keeping pace with this new pack, and I’ll get to be the one cheering on those who are challenged to keep up, rather than feeling like I’m slowing everyone down, but today, it’s my turn to let them grow me, to let them challenge me, and for me to recognise the success in that even from the back of this pack, we’re still way ahead of the pack behind us.