Book Image

Cybersecurity Leadership Demystified

By : Dr. Erdal Ozkaya
Book Image

Cybersecurity Leadership Demystified

By: Dr. Erdal Ozkaya

Overview of this book

The chief information security officer (CISO) is responsible for an organization's information and data security. The CISO's role is challenging as it demands a solid technical foundation as well as effective communication skills. This book is for busy cybersecurity leaders and executives looking to gain deep insights into the domains important for becoming a competent cybersecurity leader. The book begins by introducing you to the CISO's role, where you'll learn key definitions, explore the responsibilities involved, and understand how you can become an efficient CISO. You'll then be taken through end-to-end security operations and compliance standards to help you get to grips with the security landscape. In order to be a good leader, you'll need a good team. This book guides you in building your dream team by familiarizing you with HR management, documentation, and stakeholder onboarding. Despite taking all that care, you might still fall prey to cyber attacks; this book will show you how to quickly respond to an incident to help your organization minimize losses, decrease vulnerabilities, and rebuild services and processes. Finally, you'll explore other key CISO skills that'll help you communicate at both senior and operational levels. By the end of this book, you'll have gained a complete understanding of the CISO's role and be ready to advance your career.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)

How to become a CISO

There is no direct path to the CISO role. While this is true, it's really important to hire the right talent. Being a CISO used to be a hardcore cybersecurity role; however, the function of a CISO involves much more business leadership and risk management.

Today, a CISO must be able to help executives at a C-suite level to understand risk. CISOs in any enterprise organization must have skills to be able to explain security for non-techies, build and maintain critical relationships, and communicate at both senior and operational levels. Soft skills are critical to evangelizing security initiatives and celebrating wins, which need to be expressed as business outcomes.

CISOs who can develop those skills can sell security to their peers and other business-line executives. So, who can become a CISO? Let's find out who the contenders are here:

  • Experienced techies, such as cybersecurity architects, network security engineers, or IT security managers...