We’re experiencing a national security crisis. Poor staffing and resource management in the cybersecurity industry has become a threat to the entire country, its citizens, and our organizations.
Not only are we short half a million cybersecurity professionals in the US, but employed cyber professionals are unhappy, and this is reflected in employee turnover. The average tenure of a CISO is 18-24 months, and with 41% of workers globally looking to change jobs, much of this time is spent looking at other roles. If this is the case among security leaders, then it’s no surprise that these feelings of discontent and distraction are permeating entire teams.
Security professionals are often underutilized, underheard, and overworked. 70% feel that their personal lives are affected by their work managing threats, with alerts coming in 24/7 and constantly growing in frequency. Heightened stress levels and the inability to switch off have led to 38% of cyber professionals experiencing burnout at their organizations.
But despite this job dissatisfaction and almost half of professionals looking for new opportunities, cybersecurity jobs are often staying open for 9 months or more before they’re filled. It’s clear that the cybersecurity job searching and hiring system is broken.
Cybersecurity job descriptions rarely reflect real tasks and projects, with the constant copying and pasting of role information leaving us with vague, impersonal job descriptions that are difficult to relate to. On the flip side of this, cybersecurity resumes do not represent the true value of what the professional has to offer. Job boards and online resources like social networks focus on job descriptions and personal profiles, lacking the career and succession planning that cybersecurity professionals need.
As a result, everybody is settling. Cybersecurity job seekers are tired of interviewing behind their employers’ backs, and employers have no choice but to move forward and fill their roles with candidates who are not the best fit. As well as causing widespread discontentment and settling, this is affecting diversity, equity, and inclusion within the industry. Diversity requires succession planning and a long-term commitment to education and business development, all impossible in this culture of restlessness.
And although this is a bleak outlook for any industry, in cybersecurity the cost is potentially enormous. Unfinished or neglected work and open roles leave the entire organization at ongoing and growing risk of IP, privacy, compliance, and brand-related business losses.
The brand new CyberSN Marketplace offers a solution to the current cybersecurity career and hiring crisis. We have developed the industry’s first “Deep Job Platform” for Cybersecurity professionals, delivering access to 53,000+ cybersecurity jobs posted in the United States, categorizing these jobs into our easily-searchable common language taxonomy, and classifying and matching confidential public profiles to suitable jobs, allowing job seekers to connect at their choice with jobs that match.
