Kerry Marker
Kerry Marker

Alongside growing cyber threats, organizations face an ongoing skilled worker shortage and wage inflation amid the “Great Resignation.” And in the race to hire, train, and retain top-tier tech talent, the competition is fierce.

The good news is that cybersecurity has expanded beyond just a technical field. It now covers operational resilience, fraud, risk management, governance, and other critical areas. New and diverse career paths are emerging. This creates new moves organizations can make to plug their cyber talent gaps. That’s where HR comes in.

Here are three actions your Talent team can take that will improve your cybersecurity team’s posture:

 

1. Cyber skills are very specific; consider asking for help

Recruiting top-tier cybersecurity talent is a highly specialized task. To find and attract the best candidates, you must have a clear understanding of the space and role requirements. Many HR teams often make the mistake of hiring purely off a job description and checking off some tech stack terminology. The results? They find it very challenging to match the right candidates to the actual role at hand, creating critical gaps in the cybersecurity team.

Your organization should adopt a tailored approach to cybersecurity recruitment. Be sure to debrief the hiring manager fully on the subtleties of the workload. You might also consider hiring specialists to handle this task. IT hiring can require specific knowledge of the terminology and structure of the departmental organization that the in-house HR team may not have.

 
 

At Wavestone, our specialized IT recruiters tap into a wide and extensive network to fill technical roles. We address cultural fit and go deeper beyond job descriptions to align opportunities with a candidate’s skills and experience. Our candidates are put through rigorous technical vetting to evaluate skills and aptitudes, so we can identify the best fit for the positions available.

 

2. Prioritize employee growth and satisfaction

Market standards and expectations have shifted drastically. Although remuneration is still important and a key consideration, organizations must consider many other factors like health and safety, location and timing flexibility, and career growth opportunities.

Many tech talents have stated an outright preference for either a hybrid or remote setup, and more are leaning toward wanting fully remote jobs. These are important considerations that the organization and HR must consider when dealing with cybersecurity talent too.

Upskilling and reskilling are some of the value-adds a company can offer to retain talent. This has an additional benefit when it comes to filling crucial cybersecurity vacancies. If your company can’t recruit enough cyber talent with the right tech skills, it may be worth thinking about training internal employees and equipping them with the necessary skills. It’s a win-win situation: your employees get wider and more varied career paths before them, and you fill tech talent needs. Internal hires also come with prior knowledge of the company’s operations and culture, making them prime candidates for future leadership roles.

 

3. Increase flexibility by considering interim leadership or contract hires

Digital transformation has become a crucial part of business strategy with the current age of technological advancement, and your cyber defenses must evolve to match. Whether you’re looking to implement a critical transformation program that requires additional support, recruit an executive position to handle digital affairs, or accelerate new IT projects, your organization will likely find itself regularly needing more trusted, skilled cyber talent.

 
 

To increase your workforce flexibility and keep up with rapid changes in the cybersecurity sphere, you can consider interim leadership and contracted staff to plug talent gaps, at least temporarily. It may also be worthwhile to consult IT staffing experts like Wavestone to take the analysis beyond HR to optimize workforce value, at the level of business strategy, with a thorough re-examining of your IT talent strategy.

 

Navigating the new demands of today’s workforce

The modern-day workforce has changed dramatically, and organizations need a proactive approach to address the new demands when filling key roles.

The effectiveness of your cybersecurity defenses depends on the quality of the team taking care of it. Talent recruitment and retention are not the same as what they were even before the pandemic. Priorities and expectations have shifted, for both your organization and the people you want to hire.

Wavestone can help fill critical vacancies within your organization by sourcing, selecting, and placing skilled IT professionals to meet your niche, technical needs.

LEARN MORE ABOUT WAVESTONE’S IT TALENT SOLUTIONS
 
 
 
 

Kerry Marker
Vice President, Talent

Kerry is responsible for talent acquisition and management at Wavestone US, where she blends her skills in recruiting, marketing, selling, and operational leadership to fulfill client demands. Prior to Wavestone, she served in marketing-management positions at leading technology companies such as Apptio, Qlik, Siemens Enterprise Communications (now Unify), and SAP.

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