M+E Connections

Women Tech Execs: New Opportunities Being Created for Diverse Security Workforces

As content protection becomes a more digital challenge and cybersecurity drives digital transformation in the security sector, new opportunities are being created for diverse security workforces — especially amid the shift to more remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to female technology executives who spoke during the Dec. 8 virtual Content Protection Summit.

Technology companies are also focusing on creating gender-diversity in the workplace with the added benefit of having the security industry itself be more representative of the community it serves. And as always, a diversified team means more creative ideas, more innovation, and better adaptability to the rapidly changing, the executives said during a Special Session: Women in Technology Hollywood (WiTH) @CPS – “The Changing Role Of Women In Security.”

Noting that she had been working in enterprise software sales for many years, Rachel Roberts, VP of Enterprise Sales, West at Palo Alto Networks, recalled that when she was offered a role at the company, she had to consider whether the move to a cybersecurity firm made sense for her, noting it wasn’t an area she had been thinking about.

But “the journey of security companies and what we’re doing in the space is really transitioning across so many different workflows that it’s been interesting to see over the last few years the number of folks that are coming from industries that were adjacent to security,” she pointed out. Security “spans across all of our businesses” today, she said, conceding: “It wasn’t my choice. I ended up here but it’s been an interesting conversation and … most of our customers are still going through that journey.”

Echoing what another speaker said earlier during the event, she said it’s important not to fight human nature. “I think there’s really an interesting conversation… that we’re having now around security not being a set of tools that we put in place, but it’s also a mindset, it’s a development thought process,” she said, adding: “Security is everyone’s responsibility … . So having more voices in that conversation, more awareness” is a good thing.

“My path was a little bit different,” recalled Jade McQueen, senior managing director, Media & Entertainment, Retail & CPG at Box. Noting that she came from the entertainment industry, in production and talent acquisition, she said: “I was always very sensitive to the fact that our artists had to protect their content and multiple times, unfortunately, try to educate our artists and try to educate our talent about how [to] protect yourself because ultimately what it comes down to, specifically in entertainment, is what you create is basically your moneymaker.”

When McQueen moved to the security area, she recalled: “I felt like I was going to be able to help my beloved industry and talent in a different way, where I could not just educate but also provide a solution.” With Box, she explained: “It was kind of like a natural evolution of being able to protect what I felt mattered the most and really bring in the centralized idea of security is for everyone, not just one person. So while I have a security team that really focuses on this, every single person that touches sensitive industries such as financial services and media and entertainment has to have security in mind.”

The security sector has been “one of those worlds which really felt like a boys club for a really long time,” McQueen said. But that has changed in recent years. “Because of just the involvement of women at every front – whether it’s in IT or whether it’s in content management… having solutions that are out there for your help, in the cloud, is really widening what’s happening in security,” she said, adding: “Ultimately with folks working from home and the desire for content from a consumer perspective, it’s really created more and more opportunities for people to work from anywhere in security, but ultimately bring it back to what truly matters, which is, in this industry, protecting how we’re going to monetize and how we keep our companies alive.”

McQueen went on to point to one major challenge for those handling security for entertainment companies: “All of that information needs to be secure but ultimately,” at the same time, you have to also “make it so easy that you’re not killing the creative side of the house…. With security comes a strong sense of traditionally having anchor-down type of solutions. And so I feel like” a major challenge “that we’re seeing across every single industry is … making sure that you’re not killing folks’ creativity so that they don’t think of security first – they think of creating, knowing it’s secure.”

Noting that she started her career in the IT sector, Shira Harrison, VP of information technology at Amblin Partners, said that, for her: “It actually all started in second grade, when my dad bought me a Mac computer – Apple IIc.” She’s worked in the security sector in multiple positions, from help desk to network engineer, she noted. “Security organically came along with it because if you have a network, you have network issues, security issues – so you have to know the enemy.” And, to do that, “you definitely have to roll and grow with whatever is around you,” she said.

“Ten years ago, I was always ‘the girl’… I was always surrounded by men and now I see” that is changing and there are many more women in the sector, she said, adding: “It’s really beautiful to see how it’s going. It’s amazing.

Noting the importance of balance in the industry, Roberts said: “You need both voices…. You need that balance of voices” – whether it’s men or women — “which is why having diverse teams really matters,” she said. But “diversity of thought is increasing” across all industries, she was quick to add. In addition, with leadership, she said: “You need carrot and stick. All reward leads us to a society where everybody gets a trophy. All stick leads to all sorts of other challenges.”

For McQueen, “it’s all about empathy” — being in a collaborative environment and bringing empathy to it, she said. The pandemic created a challenge for companies to keep work communities strong, but it’s become clear that, with the shift to more remote work, women can have a better life-balance now, she said.

Noting that more content is needed than ever as a result of the surge in streamed content, McQueen said firms realize that to be more competitive in the market, “you have to have an extremely agile culture of change — but also have the backbone of the cloud so that you’re not essentially having your employees have to be in one location.” Diversity and inclusion are also getting better in the sector because you can now live anywhere, not just tech-heavy areas, and work for a tech firm, she added.

People didn’t even know what the cloud was before the pandemic in many cases, Harrison said. “It’s shifting the world and I don’t think it’s ever going to change back to where it was,” she said. Women who need to have a flexible schedule have proven they can do their jobs from home and she predicted many people will continue to work remotely after the pandemic.

Flexible work schedules are important now, agreed Roberts, who predicted there will be a “massive expansion of opportunities” including for women in different fields. She is able to recruit from cloud startups today and this opens the door for women who previously were not heavily in the IT sector, she said, adding: “We’re also going to see a rapid acceleration of gender diversity in the workforce, I believe, coming in the next couple of years.”

Presented by Microsoft Azure, the Content Protection Summit was sponsored by SHIFT, Genpact, Akamai, Convergent Risks, Friend MTS, GeoGuard, PacketFabric, Palo Alto Networks, Richey May Technology Solutions, Splunk, Zixi, EIDR, Cyberhaven and Xcapism Learning.

The event was produced by MESA, CDSA, the Hollywood IT Society (HITS) and Women in Technology Hollywood (WiTH), under the direction of the CDSA Board of Directors and content advisors representing Amazon Studios, Adobe, Paramount, BBC Studios, NBCUniversal, Lionsgate, WarnerMedia, Amblin Entertainment, Legendary Pictures, and Lego Group.