Cyberattacks almost double each year, and last year was no different. These days, CEOs and business owners are the ones who answer for security breaches, and those who aren’t prepared to face an attack jeopardize everything. We sat down last week with one of the U.S.’s top digital security veterans, “white hat” hacker, and CEO, Tarah Wheeler, to discuss strategies for radical resiliency in 2024. The broad strokes of what we covered was Tarah’s outlook for 2024, along with tips to stay resilient and the importance of personal recovery. We also touched on concepts from Tarah’s book “Women in Tech”, including the importance of advancing roles in cybersecurity, the unique experience of women in tech, and the difference between sponsorship and mentorship from a leadership perspective.

If you missed our chat, don’t worry! We’ll cover the highlights here and hopefully you’ll be able to join us for our next live webinar.

Continuous Development Is Key

In order to develop your business and improve, you need to embrace failure. Tarah says that if you’re not experiencing failure, you’re not aiming high enough. When you fail or make mistakes, you gain essential information about what doesn’t work, which brings you closer to a better solution to any issues you may be facing.  This is a key part of bouncing forward after an attack; to go beyond just bouncing back to the status quo, you need to identify what went wrong and learn from your mistakes.

Being Proactive Is Crucial for Resilience

Resilience comes from having a backup plan, so it’s essential to consider all the possible ways things could go wrong and solve for those issues in advance. For an example of what this can look like from a leader’s perspective, Tarah discussed the importance of ruthlessly hunting down and closing single points of failure in your organization. This could look like production roles that aren’t working quite right, or maybe having just one person holding your backup encryption keys.

To remain radically resilient, CTOs must root out the cause of each failure and be ready to bounce forward, and the best place to start is with these single points of failure. As a leader, you are the one in charge of initiating change in these areas, and its critical that you address them proactively so that if something happens, your organization can keep running without a hitch.  When you see a point of failure, document it, expose it, and fix it.

Ask an Expert: 2024 Predictions

As one of the U.S.’s top cybersecurity veterans and as the head of her own tech company, Tarah shared some unique insights into what we should all be prepared for in 2024. These predictions include:

• Increased AI usage. We’ve seen this to some extent in 2023, but in 2024, AI usage is expected to become more widespread and widely adopted in workspaces.
• Embrace “cross-species” relationships. AI can be helpful, but it’s important to remember that AI is not magic. Using AI for more formulaic work can be a massive time saver, but it’s best to keep creativity to you and your human counterparts.
• Our human relationships are our wealth. Your workforce is your strength. Foster the relationships you have with your partners and coworkers and give them the power to organize their day and life in whatever way they need to perform their best.

Conclusion

Want to hear more? Listen to a full recording of our conversation as we uncover more insights from Tarah, including her own journey into tech, how to advance your role in cybersecurity, and a Q&A!

Whether you were able to attend this webinar or not, if you’re interested in future sessions like this one, be sure to sign up for our next live webinar. Don’t miss out on the chance to hear from experts from all over the cybersecurity field!

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