Every year in June, global communities join together to celebrate Pride Month – a month dedicated to promoting equality and inclusion and raising awareness of political and social issues impacting society.
This year, Pride Month takes place at a time when societal pressures and challenges are typically significant, with global Black Lives Matter movements calling for an end to racism and racial injustice.
Improving inclusion and bettering equality has been a key mission of large parts of the information security industry – traditionally criticized for its lack of diversity – in recent years. One company in the sector that has taken notable steps in this regard is Cybereason with its UbU (you be you) initiative, created by CEO Lior Div.
Keen to learn more about UbU, Infosecurity recently spoke to Div about it’s mission and the wider importance of inclusivity and diversity in the information security industry.
Can you tell me about UbU, its mission and what it aims to achieve?
UbU is a value that sits front and center at Cybereason – and it has been since our early days as a company. I am incredibly passionate about it and remind our people about living our UbU value at the start of every company meeting. Acceptance of every person is at the heart of who we are as a company, and never has it been more important than it is today as we grieve the racism and violence taking place around us.
It is our mission to continue to build a global team of diverse ‘Cybereasoners’ where everyone feels welcomed to UbU every day. Our strength comes from all of us, exactly as we are.
How important is diversity and inclusion in the IT tech and information security industry?
Achieving equality and inclusiveness is a shared responsibility for all of us, and security companies can take the lead.
The world of cybersecurity is facing a growing talent shortage and we already feel it today. Technology is a huge contributor to the solution for this. However, there are several other actions that can be done. For instance, companies can address some of the gap by actively broadening their candidate pool and investing in training and development for additional groups with high potential. The most brilliant cyber-minds come in all shapes, and forms. Collectively, as an industry, we just want the best brains out there to join our mission. This is a great opportunity for our industry to lead the diversity initiative and make a stronger societal impact.
Where has the industry gone wrong in the past with regards to diversity and inclusion?
Investing in diversity and inclusion requires commitment and focus. It isn’t a one-time blitz, but an ongoing activity that needs to be integrated into a company’s culture and DNA. I think our industry, as a whole, can do more and be consistent with these actions.
At Cybereason, we have done a great job of making UbU a part of our DNA, but similar to the industry, we need to keep pushing relentlessly to be the leader on this important topic and consistently measure it. I’m a big believer that we can grow faster and better with more diversity across the board.
“Achieving equality and inclusiveness is a shared responsibility for all of us, and security companies can take the lead”
What steps can be taken to make the security/tech industry more diverse and inclusive going forward?
Having anti-discriminatory values and policies is not enough. We need to live our mission – we need action, and Cybereason is taking it by turning the UbU value into a company-wide initiative with these new actions:
- The formation of the UbU employee advisory board, for which the first task will be formulating a company action plan to support Black Lives Matter
- Giving all Cybereasoners a voice by opening online and live forums for employees to share their thoughts, feelings and ideas
- Offering educational services, starting with bias training workshops and access to self-guided materials
These are small steps and just a beginning of what I hope will grow as a community-led program. While these actions will not solve the problem, we hope that championing diversity, equity and inclusion at Cybereason will provide some healing for our community and make UbU a living value within and beyond the walls of Cybereason.