My experience as a mentor in a career comeback program for Malaysian women who want to return to the cybersecurity workforce has been very meaningful to me.
The cybersecurity industry is traditionally male-dominated. This industry needs to accept that more women are badly needed to help fill the large skills gap. However, I have observed that within the local region, many women either lack the right access to resources or the insights and guidance needed to kick-start their cybersecurity careers.
A secondary factor for my interest in mentoring women is the need to promote diversity and inclusion in the workplace. The D&I theme might be commonly viewed as the male-to-female ratio, but to me, it also includes the diversity of having a workforce of women from different life stages, ranging from seasoned professionals balancing family life to young professionals. To me, the inputs from a diverse workforce would lead to better solutions, growth enablement and value creation.
The program enabled me to share my passion for lifelong learning by mentoring the female mentees on the skillsets and mindset they will need in preparing for a return to the workforce. Through the program, participants have been able to secure internships and, ultimately, full-time employment. The mentees selected into this program are mostly women who had been working before they were married and then left the workforce to concentrate on bringing up their young ones, which is still quite common in Asian countries.
This program is part of an initiative from a local Malaysia government agency that is tasked to promote and grow the IT sector, including cybersecurity, by strengthening the workforce through education and training. I have been lucky to be selected as one of the leaders to provide mentorship as part of this program. Throughout the three-month program (which will continue but has been delayed by COVID-19), we meet and have frequent mentoring sessions whereby the mentees can raise questions related to the industry that they are interested in as well as technical questions from the training that they received during the week. The mentees also will seek my advice on how to tackle the tasks assigned to them by their companies, and we will be able to have a healthy debate on the approaches that might best suit their careers. One person was interested in becoming a penetration tester, while another wanted to find out what the day-to-day is like in IT audit, risk, and as a security compliance officer. Some of the mentees do not have IT backgrounds but have the passion and interest to succeed in the program. These non-IT mentees will be able to bring different viewpoints and skillsets into the cybersecurity industry.
Women who are able to build a successful career while in many cases also helping to manage their family lives serve as a great inspiration to many, including to the next generation. I am proud to be part of this important effort.