Cybersecurity is a heavily technology-oriented industry, where the brightest minds compete between breaking and securing systems. Or that’s what’s promised when young people are planning on their future and looking for education and job options.

The reality is often somewhat different. There’s standards, there’s legislation, there’s risk management. But worst of all, there’s a lot of people. And people require interaction. Technical understanding alone can get you pretty far, but the positions that allow for that are limited and extremely contested, and most companies can’t even afford to hire someone like that.

What I’d like to present is the need to understand and be able to interact with people of all backgrounds. Be it management (who are always wrong and understand nothing), or just the guys from marketing, you need to be able to explain your case if you want to be taken seriously. You need the soft skills to complement your technical prowess. Trust me.

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Ville Rantamäki

A former officer with a background in air defence and cyber, currently working as a cyber security consultant. Whenever it’s about people, processes and documentation, you can see his eyes light up and mouth frothing, ready to organize a 2-hour workshop on the topics.

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