Security Leader Insights for Success (eBook)

Lessons and Strategies from Leading Security Professionals

Dave Komendat (Herausgeber)

eBook Download: PDF | EPUB

2014 | 1. Auflage
140 Seiten
Elsevier Science (Verlag)
978-0-12-800908-6 (ISBN)

Infos

How do you, as a busy security executive or manager, stay current with evolving issues, familiarize yourself with the successful practices of your peers, and transfer this information to build a knowledgeable, skilled workforce the times now demand? With Security Leader Insights for Success, a collection of timeless leadership best practices featuring insights from some of the nation's most successful security practitioners, you can. This book can be used as a quick and effective resource to bring your security staff up to speed on leadership issues. Instead of re-inventing the wheel when faced with a new challenge, these proven practices and principles will allow you to execute with confidence knowing that your peers have done so with success. Security Leader Insights for Success is a part of Elsevier's Security Executive Council Risk Management Portfolio, a collection of real world solutions and 'how-to' guidelines that equip executives, practitioners, and educators with proven information for successful security and risk management programs. - Each chapter can be read in five minutes or less, and is written by or contains insights from experienced security leaders. - Can be used to find illustrations and examples you can use to deal with a relevant issue. - Brings together the diverse experiences of proven security leaders in one easy-to-read resource.

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How do you, as a busy security executive or manager, stay current with evolving issues, familiarize yourself with the successful practices of your peers, and transfer this information to build a knowledgeable, skilled workforce the times now demand? With Security Leader Insights for Success, a collection of timeless leadership best practices featuring insights from some of the nation's most successful security practitioners, you can. This book can be used as a quick and effective resource to bring your security staff up to speed on leadership issues. Instead of re-inventing the wheel when faced with a new challenge, these proven practices and principles will allow you to execute with confidence knowing that your peers have done so with success. Security Leader Insights for Success is a part of Elsevier's Security Executive Council Risk Management Portfolio, a collection of real world solutions and "e;how-to"e; guidelines that equip executives, practitioners, and educators with proven information for successful security and risk management programs. - Each chapter can be read in five minutes or less, and is written by or contains insights from experienced security leaders. - Can be used to find illustrations and examples you can use to deal with a relevant issue. - Brings together the diverse experiences of proven security leaders in one easy-to-read resource.

Textauszug

Chapter 1

The Art of Leadership

In The Art of Leadership, experienced corporate security executives share some of the secrets to their success and the resources they relied on to get there. The insights in this chapter will help the aspiring security executive answer the question “What is good security leadership?” The executives interviewed touch on the knowledge, skills, and characteristics the security leader needs, and list the available resources for acquiring these skills.

Keywords

Security leaders; leadership skills; training; knowledge; training programs; communication; security team

With insight from Dwight Williams, vice president of security for DynCorp International LLC; Lorna Koppel, director of IT security with Kohler Company; Jim Hutton, director of the global security department of Procter & Gamble; Leslie Lambert, CISO and vice president of IT for Sun Microsystems; Bob Pappagianopoulos, CISO of Partners Healthcare System Inc.; Miki Calero, CSO for the City of Columbus, Ohio; Jerry Brennan, founder of Security Management Resources; and David Burrill, former head of security for BAT Industries

In the headlines we read much more about leadership failures than leadership successes. The security professional aspiring to that coveted corporate executive position may find it daunting to watch the parade of fiascos and consequences the past several years have brought: Enron, HP, BAE, HealthSouth, Vivendi, Parmalat, and political disasters like the mishandling of Hurricane Katrina, Halliburton contracts, and Walter Reed. While there’s much to be learned from these leadership breakdowns, do their lessons really apply to security leadership? If so, what can the aspiring security executive do to develop the skills that will help him or her avoid similar catastrophes once in the top position?

Getting the best answers to these questions means asking them of the right people—corporate security executives who’ve already faced the lions and become recognized, both in their organizations and the industry at large, as successful leaders. Several members and faculty of the Security Executive Council agreed to share some of the secrets to their success and the resources they relied on to get there.

1.1 What is Good Security Leadership?

Jerry Brennan, founder of Security Management Resources, a global executive search firm dedicated to corporate security, emphasizes the importance of first recognizing the difference between management and executive leadership. “A leader is a visionary, someone who can drive strategy and who understands the levers of power in the corporation, and someone who can clearly articulate his or her vision. There’s a lot of marketing involved in that. A manager has to think strategically as well, but there you’re dealing with people leadership, results and personal leadership, effective delegation, rewarding performance, developing employees.” Many executive positions today ask for a combination of leadership and management skills, says Brennan, but it’s important for the security professional to clearly understand the differences between them.

Leadership is not about telling people where to go and what to do; it’s about showing them the path you would like them to take and inspiring them to follow it. “The basis of leadership is having the characteristics that cause people to want to follow your lead—to listen, adapt and follow your example,” says David Burrill, former head of security for BAT Industries (British American Tobacco), a major global insurance and tobacco conglomerate, and founder of Burrill Green, a management consulting firm for corporate security.

Security leadership at the executive level is in essence no different than executive leadership of any other business unit. “In the corporate world you need to be a business leader, period,” said Dwight Williams, vice president of security for DynCorp International LLC, a multi-billion-dollar provider of specialized technical services to government agencies. “It’s about the business at the end of the day.”

While knowledge of the security field is an important factor of success, the ability to talk business at a level on par with other corporate executives is critical. Burrill explains, “The rest of the C-suite needs to look at the individual and say, ‘That guy is like us. He has different technical competencies but we’re comfortable with him, he’d fit in well, and he’s bound to bring value to us which extends beyond the pure efficiency of his function, which happens to be security.’ If the senior executive doesn’t have that sort of profile he will always be looked upon as a corporate cop. He’ll be there because he has to be, but nobody will discuss anything but security with him because they don’t reckon he’ll understand, and if he does, they don’t reckon that he’ll bring any thought leadership or value to any conversation in which he is involved. That’s pretty damning.”

If business skills are vital, what specific business knowledge, skills, and characteristics must the security professional develop to avoid being seen as the corporate cop?

1.2 What Knowledge, Skills, and Characteristics do you Need?

1.2.1 Know the Culture

Success begins with knowing business culture in general and the culture of your business in particular. According to David Burrill, one of the most difficult challenges for security professionals coming out of the public sector is learning to understand how the private sector works. The gap between public- and private-sector processes is wide, but can be overcome by the attentive and open-minded professional.

Lorna Koppel, director of IT security with Kohler Company, says that learning the culture of the organization and where you fit into it is first priority for leading successfully in the context of the company. “Be highly observant and watch others around you at your level and higher. Pick up things they’re successful at and avoid things that they’re less successful at.” Your leadership style should depend upon the culture and needs of the company, says Koppel.

Jim Hutton, director of the global security department of Procter & Gamble (P&G), agrees, adding that you also need to recognize and remedy any disconnects between your style and the organization’s. “Understand that what you think you need to deliver may not in fact be what they need. What you’re good at or best prepared for may not be the best fit for the new mission. Being willing to address the gap between your background and the mission is really important; you have to be confident enough to go out and learn new things.”

1.2.2 Enable the Business

Leading security is your job, but you can’t succeed at it unless you put the needs of the business first and then tailor security to those needs. “I tell my people that we start from yes, we don’t start from no,” says Hutton. “We may have to heavily caveat our yes sometimes, but it’s a general rule. We make them mindful of the constraints, but we enable them. And then the 5 percent of the time I have to say no, absolutely no, they’ll listen.”

“You have to know the risk appetite of the company and how you can match your security program to that,” said Leslie Lambert, CISO and vice president of IT for Sun Microsystems. Security is traditionally viewed as a naysayer, always telling the company what it can’t do. “But we should be learning to talk to business folks about what is possible instead of listing out all the limitations,” Lambert says.

If your security stance doesn’t resonate with the business, adds Kohler’s Koppel, you can’t expect business to change. You have to change your message. Corporate security may have legitimate and even critical concerns, but if they deal with them in a way that’s counter to business goals, they’ll fail.

1.2.3 Know Security

While business knowledge is the number-one priority for successful security leadership, an in-depth knowledge of security—specifically corporate security—is obviously also important. But that doesn’t mean you have to be an experienced installer, says David Burrill. “You wouldn’t expect a leader to be able to site CCTV or directly run a guard force or know how to break into a combination safe. But you would expect him or her to know that there is a range of activities for which there must be technical competencies, and to know that the people he’s employing or outsourcing to have the adequate competencies,” he explains.

Security acumen is critical because, according to P&G’s Hutton, “your solutions are going to have to be well grounded and well crafted. Executives are getting more sophisticated in this space.” If you’re proposing a solution that’s outdated or has proven ineffective at a similar organization, decision-making executives will recognize that and shoot you down.

1.2.4 Communicate Effectively

Communication is key to successful security leadership, both with other executives and with the security team below you.

“As security professionals in the corporate or IT side, we have to be strong in business language. If we can’t present our issues in a business framework or in business lingo, (C-suite executives) are not going to...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 6.3.2014
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Unternehmensführung / Management
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Wirtschaftsinformatik
• ISBN-10: 0-12-800908-X / 012800908X
• ISBN-13: 978-0-12-800908-6 / 9780128009086