Career Help

[MoeTE87]

Good afternoon All,

On May 7th of this year I was relived of my duties at my previous employer, due to them moving my job to a different city (2hrs away) for a more pressing need by the market leadership of that city. I did not take the relocation as I have my family here in Cincinnati and couldn't make the move. I worked for a top 5 bank for over 7 years.

My previous role I was a Sr. Regional Physical Security manager. I was the project manager for over 25 projects at any given time for the bank, across the Midwest / eastern USA foot print. (multi million dollar projects). I made sure our corporate sites and branches were within govt and bank security standards along with completing other Risk Assessments to keep the govt happy. Among other duties as well..

This is my last resort (to post on here for help) as I feel like I have exhausted a lot of my resources. I went online and took 5 cybersecurity classes and received "certificate of completions" for them to better help myself in the field to land a new job.

I have had a decent amount of interviews and received a few offers but nothing that has fully checked my boxes.

I am looking for a 100% remote role or even a hybrid role. I have been applying to: cyber security, project manager, product manager and digital analytics but open to other fields as well.

I have been on job posting sites religiously and have been using LinkedIn every day to get my name out there to make valuable contacts.

I have been ghosted by hiring managers and HR reps after conducting the first few interviews. From what I have been told by some close friends, it's not uncommon as they are looking for the so called ..."Purple Unicorn"...which doesn't exist. I feel that my interviews have gone very well and felt like I did a great job answering all of their questions.

Not looking for a pity party but I do believe that I can bring a lot to the table, if given the chance.

If there are any suggestions on what I should do, my ears are open.

Thank you!

[TheWatchGuy]

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[MoeTE87]

Originally Posted by TheWatchGuy

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[TheWatchGuy]

Originally Posted by MoeTE87

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[spazzyfry123]

Check into healthcare. Larger corporate systems or even privately owned. Security is paramount for those guys.

[2000cs]

Try Risk Manager. It is a broader field than Cyber or Physical as it encompasses both. Has its own certifications which you can get over time, as well. It was the hot corporate job until Diversity Inclusion Equity (DIE) started, but still a lot of opportunity. Always comes to the fore when there is a cyber breach or major physical loss (storms, etc).

The more regulated the business, the more likely they have or need full risk management departments with board-level reporting often. Utilities, Banks and other financial institutions, health care. Major retail (because of credit card and data breaches as well as physical - what is Target’s plan when there is a local riot aka peaceful protest, and its TVs go “on sale”?).

[Fritzer]

Originally Posted by TheWatchGuy

o man youre missing out on a whole lot of fun.

google it

You guys know porn and pictures of pretty girls are readily available across the internet, for free, right?

[ipso_facto]

Perhaps obtain an associate level certification in the cyber security area. The courses you completed are useful for attaining knowledge and helping to converse in a meaningful manner at interview, but a “certificate of completion” for a course, carries very little credence, unfortunately. You need to prove your understanding, against a formal, industry recognised benchmark. Then you can drop all of the courses from your resume.

Naturally, I don’t know what your resume looks like, but I would broadly recommend to tone down the “physical” security aspect and focus on the project management skills, as these are generic skills. That is not to belittle the skills you have gained, but rather to acknowledge that you are looking to change your target role, to cyber security (if I have not misinterpreted you).

Hope that helps and best of luck.

[Tommy-G]

Crazy times, I hired a guy who is young for our field which already has a major shortage across the country as people aren't going into trades.

He worked for me for 3 weeks and told me he couldn't do the commute and it was making him miserable. Only 25 miles but would take him an hour due to lights and traffic.

I put in for a transfer within our company to 3 other managers who are begging for help. They didn't feel he was a purple unicorn MoeTE87 on paper and wouldn't even meet with him so we lost him to a competitor.
Yet they will all complain on social media and in person "no one wants to work, there's no one out there, blah blah blah"

Best of luck....keep your head up

[MoeTE87]

Originally Posted by ipso_facto

Perhaps obtain an associate level certification in the cyber security area. The courses you completed are useful for attaining knowledge and helping to converse in a meaningful manner at interview, but a “certificate of completion” for a course, carries very little credence, unfortunately. You need to prove your understanding, against a formal, industry recognised benchmark. Then you can drop all of the courses from your resume.

Naturally, I don’t know what your resume looks like, but I would broadly recommend to tone down the “physical” security aspect and focus on the project management skills, as these are generic skills. That is not to belittle the skills you have gained, but rather to acknowledge that you are looking to change your target role, to cyber security (if I have not misinterpreted you).

Hope that helps and best of luck.

Thank you sir for the input. I feel like cyber security is the job to have because if we have internet, there will always be someone out there trying to do bad shit that needs to be protected against.

I have looked into the CompTIA + cert and a few others. I know it's a lengthy process to study and pass. I do feel like it's been a full time job looking for a full time job to be honest.

What is your email? Can I send my resume over to you for a quick once over and provide any changes?

[zx10guy]

I'm going to be blunt here. When you're breaking into a new field, you can't be picky. It's all about getting experience. Physical security is not even remotely the same as cyber security. So very little of the knowledge and experience you have gained will translate. The key when trying to make a wholesale career change is to get what you can get to get your foot in the door.

From a Cyber standpoint, there are a bunch of different focus areas as Cyber itself is pretty broad. I don't know what certificates you got and from where. But if you're serious about getting into security, I'd not waste your time with the quick certificates and go after getting a CISSP certification. This cert carries weight in the Cyber world as a baseline. From there if you want to get into something that will carry you into the future as a long term career, you need to get into classes that will teach you cloud security. The 800lb gorilla in the room is AWS (Amazon Web Services). There are a few online sites which will provide quality training and help you get ready for the various AWS certification exams. If you're looking to be able to be 100% remote, get yourself cloud expertise. Two places that have quality classes are:

acloudguru.com
udemy.com

If you want to stick with your current experience and technical capabilities with physical security, I would look into getting in with some sort of Defense contractor. The problem is you'll likely will have to travel and most probably there will be overseas deployments.

[MoeTE87]

Originally Posted by Tommy-G

Crazy times, I hired a guy who is young for our field which already has a major shortage across the country as people aren't going into trades.

He worked for me for 3 weeks and told me he couldn't do the commute and it was making him miserable. Only 25 miles but would take him an hour due to lights and traffic.

I put in for a transfer within our company to 3 other managers who are begging for help. They didn't feel he was a purple unicorn MoeTE87 on paper and wouldn't even meet with him so we lost him to a competitor.
Yet they will all complain on social media and in person "no one wants to work, there's no one out there, blah blah blah"

Best of luck....keep your head up

Thank you for the reply Tommy-G!

That is the same feeling I have been getting this whole time. HR reps and the hiring managers are complaining about not being able to find anyone who wants to work and I am just over here like, give me a m'fn chance! I just shake my head in disbelief the mentality of some of these hiring managers.

I had an interview with the cyber security dept hiring manager for insider threat at my previous employer, and he was drilling me with all of these questions not even relating to the specifics of the job. It was like talking to a robot. Worst experience I have ever been through.

I am just looking for a company to take a chance on me, that is all. I got promoted within 4 months from a regular role to a Senior role and held that position for over 5 years until getting the axe in May. The hiring manager (no longer at the company) took a chance on me and I excelled. I had no clue about security / physical security and GLBA / Risk Assessments but I busted my ass and got promoted.

Gotta stay positive...being negative I feel like brings bad juju.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by MoeTE87

Thank you for the reply Tommy-G!

That is the same feeling I have been getting this whole time. HR reps and the hiring managers are complaining about not being able to find anyone who wants to work and I am just over here like, give me a m'fn chance! I just shake my head in disbelief the mentality of some of these hiring managers.

I had an interview with the cyber security dept hiring manager for insider threat at my previous employer, and he was drilling me with all of these questions not even relating to the specifics of the job. It was like talking to a robot. Worst experience I have ever been through.

I am just looking for a company to take a chance on me, that is all. I got promoted within 4 months from a regular role to a Senior role and held that position for over 5 years until getting the axe in May. The hiring manager (no longer at the company) took a chance on me and I excelled. I had no clue about security / physical security and GLBA / Risk Assessments but I busted my ass and got promoted.

Gotta stay positive...being negative I feel like brings bad juju.

I won't pretend to know anything about physical security or what it takes to learn it. But again, you can't equate physical security to Cyber. There is starting to be a lot of investment going into Cyber in light of all the recent ransomware and hacks making it to the press. My company has been searching for a Cyber SME (subject matter expert) for months. In the world of IT and Cyber, many companies need someone that can hit the ground running as there is no luxury to ramp someone up. This is why I provided those resources in my previous post. You need to have the credentials before going into a job interview. Or drop your standards as I stated and get anything that will get your foot in the door.

[Tommy-G]

Originally Posted by MoeTE87

Gotta stay positive...being negative I feel like brings bad juju.

I hear you, there are other dealerships asking about rumors of our company selling. My General Manager and the owners swear its not true but you never know....scares the sh!t out of me b/c my plans are to spend the next 20 years here.
Chin up, chest out and eyes open!!

[MoeTE87]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

I won't pretend to know anything about physical security or what it takes to learn it. But again, you can't equate physical security to Cyber. There is starting to be a lot of investment going into Cyber in light of all the recent ransomware and hacks making it to the press. My company has been searching for a Cyber SME (subject matter expert) for months. In the world of IT and Cyber, many companies need someone that can hit the ground running as there is no luxury to ramp someone up. This is why I provided those resources in my previous post. You need to have the credentials before going into a job interview. Or drop your standards as I stated and get anything that will get your foot in the door.

Hey zx10guy thanks for both responses.

When I was with my previous employer, I worked on some projects with the Cyber Security team on projects with AWS and Azure along with Google Analytics. I am familiar with the cloud and have taken over 30hrs of certification classes on udemy.

I have some great contacts within the Cyber Security team at my previous employer but it's all just a waiting game right now and I do plan on getting the CISSP cert here real soon.

Thank you.

[zx10guy]

Since you've done classes on Udemy, I'd focus on that and knock out the AWS certs if those are the classes you took. The CISSP is going to take some time to get.

Another resource to poke around is sans.org. They're a cyber think tank group that provides continuing Ed/training classes and newsletters on what is going on in the Cyber world.

[2000cs]

The similarity between physical and cyber is in the psychology of both the criminal/bad actor and the protected. Physical is a lot more than fences around plants these days. It now includes drones, hidden cameras (often used by enviro-terrorists to get “evidence”), critical infrastructure protection (Homeland Security stuff), as well as active shooter and office/workplace intrusion.

Cyber of course includes all manner of potential attacks on electronic/communications networks but that can include architecture changes, analogous to physical security, like air-gaps and other measures that limit damage when there is a breach.

In both worlds well-designed testing is also an important field, with companies specializing in this (example of physical is sending in some guys dressed as exterminators to see if they can gain easy access into a warehouse or office, then they wander freely and grab laptops etc or hack in. In this case, physical and cyber definitely overlap).

[NorCalAthlete]

Try Palo Alto Networks or Cisco. Both are giants in cyber security (with a fair amount of physical security people as well), both have 100% remote opportunities, both are large enough to take a chance on someone who might not be a purple unicorn but has the potential to become one.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by NorCalAthlete

Try Palo Alto Networks or Cisco. Both are giants in cyber security (with a fair amount of physical security people as well), both have 100% remote opportunities, both are large enough to take a chance on someone who might not be a purple unicorn but has the potential to become one.

I've never interviewed with Palo Alto. I have with Cisco twice. It's no cake walk. Both times was for a sales engineer position. First round I was in a room with 3 CCIEs that were throwing technical questions at me for 1.5 hours. I had to know all the various Cisco protocols forwards and backwards. And they made me walk through a network diagram discussing how spanning tree would select the best path through switches connected together with multiple physical connections.

The second job opportunity with Cisco was even worse. I had interviewed with I think 7 or so CCIEs all individually. With one of them being a Cisco fellow who is someone that is so key in the company that as long as Cisco is a company this guy will have a job. The technical interviews were all intense which went over everything from route, switch, some firewall, SDN, wireless, and architectural designing. The worst was with the Cisco fellow where he threw up a rectangle on the board which represented a building and he would rapid fire questions at me on how I would design a network and then make adjustments on the fly to see how fast I think on my feet. After an 1.5 hours of that, I was ready to crawl in a hole and take a nap.

If you're going to go after Cisco, you'll be best served by obtaining a CCNA first to be a substitute for experience. Also, Cisco is going through some massive restructuring right now. I know this because I interface with them on a regular basis with my current job.

[King Rudi]

Originally Posted by Fritzer

You guys know porn and pictures of pretty girls are readily available across the internet, for free, right?

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Hang on....I'll be back.....maybe....

[NorCalAthlete]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

I've never interviewed with Palo Alto. I have with Cisco twice. It's no cake walk. Both times was for a sales engineer position. First round I was in a room with 3 CCIEs that were throwing technical questions at me for 1.5 hours. I had to know all the various Cisco protocols forwards and backwards. And they made me walk through a network diagram discussing how spanning tree would select the best path through switches connected together with multiple physical connections.

The second job opportunity with Cisco was even worse. I had interviewed with I think 7 or so CCIEs all individually. With one of them being a Cisco fellow who is someone that is so key in the company that as long as Cisco is a company this guy will have a job. The technical interviews were all intense which went over everything from route, switch, some firewall, SDN, wireless, and architectural designing. The worst was with the Cisco fellow where he threw up a rectangle on the board which represented a building and he would rapid fire questions at me on how I would design a network and then make adjustments on the fly to see how fast I think on my feet. After an 1.5 hours of that, I was ready to crawl in a hole and take a nap.

If you're going to go after Cisco, you'll be best served by obtaining a CCNA first to be a substitute for experience. Also, Cisco is going through some massive restructuring right now. I know this because I interface with them on a regular basis with my current job.

1. I never said it would be easy, just that they're big enough and flexible enough to take chances on people - startups may not due to urgent deadlines and a need to produce to stay afloat.

2. CCNA and other Cisco certs would definitely help not just at Cisco but any company - Cisco certs are sort of the gold standard for cybersecurity and networks. I think something like 80% of the industry goes off of Cisco certs, I could be wrong on that but yeah.

[Kooch]

I feel your pain. My role (SVP at a bank) was eliminated in February. I just landed a new gig last Monday, but spent the time since Feb looking. Same thing on my end, lots of great conversations followed by ghosting was standard operating in my experience. Best results I found were in my network. Who you know and how well you know them, and close you stay in contact make all the difference. Some processes take awhile but agree that the recruiting process itself stinks right now.

My recommendations include some of the other mentioned approaches, but I would add looking into consulting. While it may mean travel, there are fully remote opportunities. You would get to see a number of companies, industries, etc and would build a strong resume for the future. You can look into big four firms or also some of the smaller boutique firms that specialize in security. Going that direction given you have knowledge, experience and certifications would just require that you have enough social maturity to be able to speak to clients, understand their needs and provide advice / or help them fix.