Episode 33 - The Importance of Cybersecurity to Protect Our Technology with Scott Howitt

State of the CIO

Scott Howitt has over 30 years of experience in aligning information technology (IT) with business strategies and initiatives. He is experienced and successful in both Fortune 100 and internet start-up environments.

Scott shares so much great information about cybersecurity and technology. We talk about ways to be more informed about cybersecurity threats and where to start with protecting your businesses. Scott shares about the importance of cybersecurity with many people still working from home because of COVID-19.

Show Notes:

• [01:07] Sometimes cybersecurity is for protecting against annoying threats and sometimes it is for protecting against catastrophic threats.
• [01:21] Scott shares how he got into the IT world. He started in physics and moved into the IT world.
• [03:42] Often we don’t realize the importance of security until we have our first security incident.
• [05:12] Security needs to be baked into good engineering because that way it is not something you are thinking about as you are developing and modifying it later on.
• [06:13] First, it is important to know your business.
• [07:57] As you’re looking at security within your organization, your job is to help keep revenue flowing and make sure they can meet their business objectives as much as it is protecting the data.
• [08:28] If the cash isn’t flowing, we all suffer.
• [10:02] Be informed about what is going on in your industry right now, but also be knowledgeable across different industries. What they are experiencing now may affect your company down the road.
• [11:10] With COVID-19 many 3 year plans were turned into 3-week plans.
• [13:49] Scott is seeing increased productivity with his team working from home. They are actually working on finding ways to help their employees disconnect more.
• [15:02] Conversation with peers is always needed. Many teams are having Zoom lunches and Happy Hour to facilitate these conversations.
• [17:54] Now when people come into the workplace and are handed technology the technology is not as good as they have at home. Employees are going to find what technology works best for them.
• [18:47] People are going to want to use the technology that is most convenient.
• [19:21] The cloud is where all security is moving to and we need to incorporate it.
• [21:15] Universities can’t teach you current technology and keep up so go take a Renaissance education.
• [21:46] If you want to be seen as a contributor to the game, you have to be able to talk technology but you also have to be able to understand the business.
• [22:01] If you don’t understand the business you can’t be a good CSO because how do you know you are protecting the right thing.
• [23:14] Scott shares his best worst boss story.
• [25:36] Scott reads 50-100 books a year. You always have to be educating yourself.
• [25:59] As Americans, we need to learn to get a heck of a lot scrappier than we are today. We need to be vivacious learners and not rest on our past accomplishments.

Links and Resources:

• State of the CIO Podcast Website
• State of the CIO Podcast on Apple Podcasts
• Dan on LinkedIn
• Scott on LinkedIn
• Scott on Twitter
• AI Super Powers Book