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Our guest, Charlie Moore, is a recently retired USAF Lieutenant General who sits down to share his story from flying high in the air to becoming a bigwig in the cyber community. He was most recently the Deputy Commander of the United States Cyber Command, and also spent part of his career as a human factors engineer working on human interfaces for fighter aircraft. When he first began his Air Force career, he was a member of the last class entering into the Academy that was not issued desktop computers. Charlie discusses how this changed as the year went on and how that impacted his career both in and out of the military. Charlie worked for different companies over the years to further his career and his goals, and discusses how his flying career has helped him and says, "I was extremely passionate about the flying aspect of my career for 25 years and I became even more passionate about operating in this space." We thank Charlie for sharing his story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Miriam Wugmeister, co-chair of Morrison & Foerster’s Privacy and Data Security practice, sits down to share her in-depth experience and understanding of privacy and data security laws, obligations, and practices across a wide range of industries. She talks about how she grew up not knowing exactly what she wanted to get into as a profession, starting off as a chemical engineering major in college before switching to philosophy. She then got asked to work on a project relating to a company’s privacy and fell in love with the subject matter, deciding then to pursue it as a career. Miriam mentions how technology is not as complicated as tech people might have you think. She hopes she can advertise a tech degree for young women and men looking to get into the field, as well as making sure she "encourages women and diverse lawyers to, uh, come into this area to thrive." We thank Miriam for sharing her story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gene Fay, CEO of ThreatX sits down to share his experience rising through the ranks to get to where he is today. He shares how even at a young age he wanted to work in an office and become a businessman, though at the time he did not understand what that entailed. After college he acquired a job that was revolutionizing video editing for post-production studios as well as TV stations, where he started to really learn about technology. Gene talks about leading from the front and how a good leader will always do so, even if he has to lead from two different fronts. He said "it's kind of the two fronts, sometimes you've gotta put on the leadership face, and believe it, that, that you can get, and we can get through any situation, cuz sometimes you're, your gut feelings are, might be wrong and, or it's a moment in time and if you can help the team grind through that situation, it does get better." We thank Gene for sharing his story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Teresa Rothaar, a governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) analyst at Keeper Security sits down to share her story, from performer to cyber. She fell in love with writing as a young girl, she experimented with writing fanfiction which made her want to grow up to be in the arts. After attending college she found that she was good at math, lighting the way for her to start her cyber career. Teresa moved to being a writer at Keeper, finding she wanted to spread out and try more, so she ended up becoming an analyst while still doing writing on the side. She quotes David Duchovny in an interview once, explaining how sometimes you need to keep your head down and outwork others. Teresa said this resonated with her, saying, "that's how I went from a foreclosure box on the porch to where I am now. I have a good job and, and I have a career and I have a really good career and I absolutely love it." We thank Teresa for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simone Petrella, CEO of cybersecurity training workforce firm CyberVista, spent her career in the Department of Defense as a threat intelligence analyst before founding CyberVista. She says that running a company has a new set of challenges each day thrown at you. She explains that the way she finds the most success is by letting her team contribute to each matter, and having a say in the decisions made as they pertain to each department. Simone says "I would say is I am a firm firm believer in the idea of empowering people to really own and kind of run with the things that they're passionate about." She notes that people will do amazing things when they are passionate and that faking it until you make it is true, because you will get where you're going by having that passion and that inspiration. We thank Simone for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chief intelligence officer at Intel 471, Michael shares his story where he started as an actor and quickly changed over to intelligence and what the transition was like for him. Michael grew up wanting to be an actor and even was able to land some acting jobs, after going into the Marine Corps he decided to leave acting behind and start a new path in his journey. He says looking for a purpose really helped to shape him, saying "looking back on it, I feel like my life purpose has really been all about kind of this relentless pursuit of justice" and how the risks in his life has helped to right the wrongs of the world. We thank Michael for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Don Pezet, CTO of ACI Learning, sits down to share his over 25 years of experience in the industry. Don previously spent time as a field engineer in the financial and insurance industries supporting networks around the world. He co-founded ITProTV in 2012 to help create the IT training that he wished he had when he got started in his IT career. He also shares insights for anyone else wishing to pursue IT, no matter their age or past experience. Don explains how important stepping stones are as you get into this field, stating "know that that first job you get is probably not going to be the job you want to have your whole life, but it's a stepping stone that leads to where you want to get." Don started teaching on the side as well as working in the IT field and explains how much his teaching skills come in handy to help him with his leadership skills, which in turn helps him to be a better CTO, helping his customers. We thank Don for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jameeka Aaron, Chief Information Security Officer at Auth0, a product unit of Okta, sits down to share her story following two different paths that led her to where she is today. Jameeka has 20 years of IT and cybersecurity experience and has mitigated security risks at Nike, the U.S. Navy, and now Auth0. She joined the Navy not knowing what she wanted to do after high school and ended up becoming a Radioman, which is now titled IT. She shares her experiences of challenges she faced being the youngest, and the only woman, and the only woman of color in her group. She followed two different paths, getting an education as well as being in the Navy, and started her career at Lockheed Martin Mission Systems in San Diego. She eventually found her way to Auth0 in 2018. She says "I realized cybersecurity folks can do anything, everywhere. We're everywhere, we're in every industry and so I started to kind of say, I wanna work on programs that are fun for me." We thank Jameeka for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rohit Dhamankar from Fortra’s Alert Logic sits down with Dave Bittner to share his experiences as he navigates the industry. Rohit has over 15 years of security industry experience across product strategy, threat research, product management and development, and customer solutions. Before Alert Logic he served in Product roles for Live Oak Venture Capital at Infocyte and Razberi Technologies. He has previously worked in senior roles in several start-up companies in security analytics, intrusion detection/prevention, end-point protection, and security risk and compliance, including VP, Click Labs Solutions at Click Security, acquired by AlertLogic, and he was a Co-Founder of Jumpshot, acquired by Avast. Rohit shares the advice of never closing a door too prematurely, because you never know what could be behind the door waiting for you. We thank Rohit for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Laura Whitt-Winyard, CISO from Malwarebytes, sits down to share her story, beginning with a desire to be a pediatric oncologist that she later discovered was not the path for her. Laura was bouncing around from job to job until she bought her first computer, and a light bulb went off in her head. She set out to make it her goal to learn about this new, interesting field and grow within it. Now as a successful CISO, she wants to make the world more secure and goes from company to company to complete her goal. She considers herself a servant leader whose goal is the greater good. She compares her role to football, explaining that she is not the quarterback, but the center for the team. She believes she is the center that paves the path for the quarterbacks on her team to reduce the noise, to give the quarterback all the tools that they need to do their jobs and do their jobs well. We thank Laura for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Omer Singer, Lead Cybersecurity Strategist from Snowflake, sits down to share his experience getting into the cybersecurity field. Growing up, he knew he wanted to work with computers, but he just didn't know what he wanted to do within the field. His college gave him great hands-on experience to then transition into the workforce. He's played both on the offense and defense of cybersecurity, and he says that experience showed him and he "kind of saw firsthand, uh, what a well funded and motivated, uh, team of cybersecurity experts can do and it's pretty scary." In addition, Omer is a big advocate for encouraging other security professionals to learn data skills, and strongly stands by the belief that the future of cybersecurity is in borrowing from modern data analytics tools and techniques that enable consistent risk reduction. He also makes it a priority to invest in his people, believing that this unlocks intrinsic motivation that enables a ton of personal growth and accomplishment, and is a big believer in the OKR system for enabling security operations and avoiding burnout. We thank Omer for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lauren Campanara, a SOC Analyst from ThreatX shares her story as she made the decision to break into cybersecurity after spending twelve years in the cosmetology field. She worked her way through college in a job she did not enjoy and felt trapped in while competing her online degree. She found ThreatX and fell in love with the work she is doing now. Lauren hopes to inspire others, especially women, to consider a challenging and rewarding career in cybersecurity. She shares what it's like to be in a field she was not happy in and how she was the only one standing in her way to achieve her goals. She says "Another huge obstacle worth mentioning is learning to get out of my own way. You are your own worst critic. I learned to be more forgiving of myself." She hopes her story will inspire others to follow their dreams and stop holding themselves back. We thank Lauren for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gary Brickhouse, CISO from GuidePoint Security, sits down to share his story, looking back over the last 25 years of his career working for Fortune 100 companies, including Disney. He shares that every role he has had, he’s had to grow into and how each one was a pivotal point in his technical career. Gary ended up transitioning to a different organization and says how it was really compliance that was the transitional sort of moment for him as he grew into different roles. He says, “What I found was sort of just, riding the wave of growth and opportunity and trying to take advantage of it along the way." He shares some advice for new people entering the industry, saying that he wants to help shatter the myth that you have to be technical to get into this field. We thank Gary for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jenny Brinkley, Director of AWS Security at Amazon Web Services (AWS), sits down to share her empowering story working through the ranks, and even co-founding her own company. While she did not have a typical upbringing in the industry, she credits her parents for ending up where she is now, as they told her that she could do anything and she decided as she was growing up that she could. She had the opportunity to co-found a small startup before selling it to AWS. She says that working in her position is like a rollercoaster, as no one thing is like the other, saying her highs are high and her lows are low. Being a woman in cybersecurity, she is working to empower more women in the field, Jenny says, "I think that we're living in such an interesting time where empathy, kindness, compassion, honesty, partnership in the security space, I mean, heck for any industry, but really for security and cyber security roles today, it's, it's the life blood and to be underestimated, especially as a female or because, you know, my background doesn't follow a cookie cutter pattern of what individuals think of when they think of individuals in security roles." We thank Jenny for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Megan Doherty, a Technical Specialist from Microsoft Canada sits down to share her story of overcoming barriers in the workforce to get to where she is today in her career. Megan started out being a mechanical engineer before making the switch to do something with more creativity and problem solving. She shares about her passion of working with a group Microsoft created called "DigiGirlz." As well as just being able to work with her team who she says helps her face the world of adversity in her career. Megan said "There's so many barriers, just even mentally that we put on ourselves when it comes to looking for a career change or even thinking of cybersecurity as your next career path." She hopes that she leaves a legacy of kindness and compassion behind especially in the industry she is works in. We thank Megan for sharing her story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amanda Adams, VP, Americas Alliances at CrowdStrike, sits down to share her story as she pivoted into the tech field. She started her career wanting to be involved with sports, and after getting her master's degree Amanda was faced with a difficult choice, between working for The Golden State Warriors and Cisco. She ultimately chose Cisco as her path to move forward and has been working in technology ever since. Now she works for a team where she gets to prove her social skills and is focused on partnerships. She says that working in technology doesn't just have to be working with technology, there are many other ways you can get involved with the field. Amanda says "you can always pivot into the technology industry and support the broader mission by doing that job function." We thank Amanda for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Payal Chakravarty, Head of Product for Security and Risk from Coalition, sits down to share her story of working at several different organizations, including interning for IBM and Microsoft. After obtaining her master's degree, she worked with IBM a bit more closely and fell in love with one of the projects she was working on. Payal had a very interesting career path going from physical to virtual, virtual to cloud now, cloud to containers. She says that there is still some bias she has dealt with as a woman in her field, she says, "I think the way you handle it is you negotiate or you kind of calmly handle the situation, there's no ego involved." Payal shares that in working in this field you need to be in love with it, giving the advice that don't just choose a job because of the money or because it's cool, but because you feel connected to it as a profession. We thank Payal for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kayla Williams, CISO of Devo, sits down to share her story, from graduating with a finance degree to rising to where she is now. She quickly learned that finance was not for her and changed paths, working towards gaining an information security certificate. From there she was able to excel and was offered the opportunity to move to England which changed her life. Working in her new role, she really enjoys thriving with her team. She says "We really try to be the department of no problem versus the department of no." She mentions how her and her team work on a day to day basis together solving issues and yet she says not everything related to cybersecurity needs to be a fire drill. She would rather her and her team build bridges in the face of adversity and in the face of people who may be naysayers. We thank Kayla for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Marrè, CISO from Arctic Wolf, sits down to share his story of rising through the ranks. After 9/11 he decided he wanted to make a difference in the world, and so he chose to go into the FBI. There he learned the skills that got him to where he is today. In his time at the FBI, he was able to do what he loved, which was working with computers while gaining more knowledge on cybersecurity, and he became computer forensic certified. Ultimately, he needed a change in the end and decided to leave the FBI. He was able to learn the leadership skills he needed to move past that career path and follow a new dream. He is now able to share his passion with the world and help people understand security to help protect themselves as well as helping people finding success in their careers and in their lives. We thank Adam for sharing his story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jaya Baloo, a Chief Information Security Officer from Avast sits down to share her story, sharing how she got into the technology field at a younger age with being introduced to computers and games on her PS 24. She started off going to college for political science and after not knowing what to do after that, she got her first start in cybersecurity. After falling in love with cybersecurity she kept moving up the ranks in different organizations before finding herself at Avast. She shares that at Avast she leans on her team quite a bit and you should never be afraid to bounce ideas off of your teammates. She says "The best ideas come from like bouncing ideas off of each other, sharing within the group and then if I can't figure it out myself, that's why I hire these amazing individuals it's to help me figure it out." We thank Jaya for sharing her story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices