From Royal Marines to Tech Recruiting: How Josh Keeley Built A Successful Recruiting Firm

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:20

Hi, welcome back to another episode of the Tech Exec Wellness Podcast. Today, I'm excited to welcome Josh Keeley and we're just going to go into it. We're going to have a lot of fun this afternoon. So, listeners out there, this is my first guest from the UK, so I'm excited about that, josh.

Music Tastes and Concert Experiences

Speaker 1 0:35

With deep expertise in the cybersecurity sector, josh partners closely with the venture capital and private equity community, specializing in placing go-to-market and R&D executives into their portfolio companies. His work spans advising early and growth stage cyber vendors across the United States, conducting talent audits and crafting strategic talent plans with executive boards. With nearly a decade of experience and over 350 searches completed, josh takes pride in being the go-to career advisor for high-performing cyber security professionals in the usa, helping them navigate the market and excel in their careers. So, josh, if you've listened to the podcast, I ask this of all of my guests because it gets people outside to know a little bit about you. With that being said, we'd love to know your favorite music genre, and if you could share maybe one or two memorable concert experiences with our listeners, that would be great. So, so welcome.

Speaker 2 1:25

Hey, well, firstly, thank you. That's a hell of an introduction and I actually did not help you write that, so that wasn't me, but thank you for having me on. Okay, first question I always yeah, all right, I have two genres and you have to forgive me for this.

Speaker 2 1:45

The first has always been a love for house music and just like um, tropical, kind of like island vibes, right, um, and, and maybe that's because I'm half spanish and I love that kind of the genre, I love the sun and I love being out into the ibis of the world and stuff, so definitely house, um. And then more recently, probably in the last like eight years, like super, super love country music and I can't tell you like I'm hooked. I'm hooked to the point where like it's kind of all I listen to these days, unless I'm out for a run or I'm in the gym, it's house, everything is house me. Uh, sorry, sorry, country sorry, uh, yeah, I'm hooked on country music, the uh concerts. So the first one would most likely be just a house, uh, it was actually a like an arena concert. Do you remember swedish house mafia? Oh, yeah, right, yeah, that's it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I won't sing, but yeah, absolutely, but uh.

Speaker 2 2:34

So I went to their last ever tour. So when I was in the military, uh, me and a few guys, we actually flew to amsterdam from london and we went and saw him in um the ix arena and, uh, that was epic, and because you knew it was like the last time they're going to be performing together. Well, little did we know. They obviously got back together because they probably blew their money. They blew their money and they needed to go back on tour.

Speaker 2 2:54

But so that's definitely one, and I think it's because of the atmosphere. Everybody knew why they were doing the tour and had a bunch of Marines with me and we're in Amsterdam, right. So what's not to love? And then, most recently, sticking the country theme was I went and saw Luke Combs live last year at the O2 arena in London and he rocked like he. He was like after every song he would like he'd drink beer while he's singing and then he'd like drop, kick the can of beer into the crowd and everyone just go wild. And yeah, he's and really good performer. So, yeah, I'd say those two.

Speaker 1 3:29

Well, you know what, before we get into the seriousness of it, let's talk about music a little bit. I love house music. I grew up in Chicago, so that's where it all started. And then, you know, I got into EDM Paul Van Dyke, paul Oakenfogel, fatboy Slim love that. And, like you, I do like country Chris Stapleton, dolly Parton, slim love that.

Speaker 2 3:47

and, and, like you, I do like country chris stapleton, dolly parton I love that you're so versatile with your music and kind of like the things that you're doing, yeah, and there's a new genre coming out which is like rap with country and yeah, yeah, I'll send you some songs after this. But yeah, and like you got on my phone right, then you got acdc, then you have drake and you have two pack and then you have all the classics right that everyone listens to.

Speaker 2 4:05

But I'll listen to anything. But yeah, country music, yeah, I've got a very specific type of I'm not an old-school country guy and I like the yeah a bit basic. I like the Morgan Wellens, the Luke Combs, the Luke Bryans and stuff. So, yeah, I love it.

Speaker 1 4:18

Did Luke Combs? Is he the the one that did the uh tracy chapman fast car was? Was he? Was that yeah?

Speaker 2 4:24

yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, big dude, um, I'll give it away, right, big dude. Checkered shirt, beard wears a trucker hat, right he really, he really nailed it.

Speaker 1 4:33

And I did see the performance. I wasn't sure about the name, but I did see the performance where tracy got on stage with him and that was an epic. I mean, like his, his voice is so soulful. Tracy knocked it out of the park, but but his version, it just made me want to cry.

Speaker 2 4:46

Yeah, he's amazing, honestly, and then he goes into some more gnarly gravelly voice songs. Yeah, he's really good, really really good.

Speaker 1 4:55

Do you have any upcoming concerts on your schedule?

Speaker 2 4:58

Anything you're going to see, I don't, at Black Hat last year, I don't know if you remember, but at the convention centre, morgan Wallen played on the day we left and I remember this because he basically locked down traffic and it took us like an hour to get back to the airport, which takes like 15 minutes. To answer your question. No, I don't think I do. Oh, no, I do. I lied, I am going to watch, of all people, hans Zimmer, really. Yeah, talk about diverse, right? Um, yeah, it was a, it was a gift, but han zimmer I love. I think han zimmer is amazing and like all of the movies and stuff he does, like he's got so many classics, right, um, but yeah, the chance to go see him live at the royal albert hall in london would be amazing wow, I was gonna say, I'm over here listening to you and I didn't know that we have that in common.

Family Life and Personal Wellness

Speaker 1 5:44

We have so much in common. That is so cool. Josh, let's pivot here for a minute before, well, you know, before we go into the cyber questions dogs, kids, what about that? What can you share that with?

Speaker 2 5:55

us. Yeah, I've got, I got a dog. I'm sorry I have a. He's a bulldog, but he's a mix of American old time with English, like old English, so they call them like tribe, tribe bullies and so we call him Frank. He's Frank the tank and, um, that's because he's not very tall, but he's like 45 kilos, so he's probably about what, 95 pounds. He's a big boy, um, but super athletic. He runs doggy daycare. He's the chief in doggy daycare. So we get a lot of videos in like a WhatsApp group, um, and he, um and he, he runs the playground.

Speaker 2 6:23

And then I've got a little boy, uh, who turns three in a month. But we're, um, we're like fully immersed in potty training right now. Oh, my goodness, anyone that's had children will feel my pain and um, the spontaneity of having to run and pull your kids pants down to get them on the potty, um, but uh, yeah. So we had a few near misses and and like it's amazing actually how fast they learn and like just through repetition and and I actually think sometimes he jumps on the loo just purely, like he'll say daddy, we, we, and then we'll go on it and he goes finished, I'm like you haven't done anything, and then he jumps off and he runs straight to the sticker chart. He's got a baby shark sticker chart and he's's like sticker sticker. I'm like you're done, but you have to keep rewarding him because it's good, it's good process and reinforcement. So I think he's like gained the process and he just likes stickers. So yeah, dog and a kid.

Speaker 1 7:16

I love that. I mean you're teaching them young Like hey, I made an achievement my sticker. I love it. Fascinating career you were in the Marine Corps in the UK. What drew you into cybersecurity? And then why did you?

Speaker 2 7:29

decide to start trade. Yeah, so two parts of that question right. The first one, securities when I was leaving. So in the UK, when you leave the armed forces, regardless of a cap badge or rank, you have to give 12 months notice. Is it the?

Speaker 1 7:41

same in the US. No, we just have our end of enlistment. You go, drop off your stuff, get your card and you're done.

Speaker 2 7:48

But we can leave. So you have to give a minimum of four years service. After that you're just on a rolling 12 month notice period in the UK. You get your half, you get 12 years, you get your half pension and then 22 years, I think. If it's still the same, you get your full, full pension. So I left at kind of seven and a bit years, um, and you have to give a 12 month notice period during that period.

Speaker 2 8:08

Like the raw marines are really good to you. Um, I think there's a stat I don't know if it's still true, but like 48 percent of all raw marines have a university degree, right. So, and and that's that, could just be other ranks. It doesn't have to be officers, uh, or enlisted soldiers, I think you guys call it. But so so throughout that 12 month notice period, lots of talking, lots of networking, lots of like conferences and stuff, and I decided on um retraining in it. So I ended up being a network engineer working for cisco. So, um, I kind of just followed as a guy I, one of my best friends, he left. I was like, hey, you're making lots of money, what are you doing right? And he was doing that little.

Speaker 2 8:40

Did I research or know that I wasn't actually that good at the job. Secondly, it wasn't the type of environment I'd operate well in. I lived in data centers for like four months straight at like 3 am in the morning in a full suit and tie and it just didn't suit me. That's how I fell into headhunting, because I was a friend of a friend. So my point is to answer that question I always knew tech. I always knew firewalls, switches, routers and just kind of network security. I had quite a close affiliation with it. It just made sense to then. If I'm going to work in headhunting, I'm going to do tech, or at least some sort of tech.

Speaker 2 9:16

And it just happened to be cybersecurity because of that kind of relationship with my previous background and I think also when we were just doing research and particularly building Trident, which we can go into, me and my co--founder, charlie, who's uh, I think you know him, he's a submariner, right, and we did some research and I think it's like in the uk, 51 of hiring managers or cyber security executives are ex-military or law enforcement. So it just happened to be that it was just such a familiar stomping ground for us that um that we knew one. We have a good time doing it, because we're talking to people like yourself and like we all have to share a same background, um, and therefore I think the trust is there immediately because of the shared experiences. So, yeah, that's how I kind of got into cyber security headhunting, um, and then what led us to find, kind of found tram search. So me and charlie were working for a together in a big corporate recruitment agency, like if you can do some like vision, big white walls, no music on the atmosphere was because everybody had to be on the phone for four hours a day, obviously weren't allowed to leave your desk, everyone's wearing suit and ties. Yeah, it was. It was pretty boiler room style and we me and charlie come to an inflection point and we were like, dude, we're doing this for somebody else. I think we can do it better, but do it our way and also, like, give back to the community, give back to the military community and help guys and girls who are leaving move into cyber security. Because that was a big like kind of um, like area of operations for us when we first set up trident, um, and just do it differently on our own terms. So if we have an idea, me and charlie have ideas? Ask my team. I have a really good operational team now. We're super like, way more mature than we were like.

Speaker 2 10:47

I'll pick up the phone to my head of marketing this morning and I'll give you a real life example. I'm like our, our web domain is dot couk. It just always has been, and I work up. I went for a run this morning and I work up after that. I was like that's where I get all my best kind of thoughts or or bad thoughts, depending on if you ask my team but bad ideas, um, and I was like why are we not a dot com? Or why are we not a dot io? Like 95 of our revenue and all of our like market is in the us.

From Military to Cybersecurity Recruiting

Speaker 2 11:10

So immediately I went out, I brought tridentio um and I rolled it out across the business and then I get my head of marketing call me like what the hell have you done? You have no idea what you've now done to the website and the domain name and so. But that was like the freedom, or at least the autonomy that me and charlie wanted to do um building a company. And that's why we built trident search. The name trident comes from the nuclear submarine program up in scotland where charlie served on the submarines and um and yeah. So that's kind of how I got into cyber, that's kind of how we co-founded it and so far, so good and I think, yeah, we're the largest of what we do globally. Um, I suppose, if it's for what it's worth, maybe I'll tell you kind of like what we do as a business and how we do it why don't you go ahead and go with that business?

Speaker 1 11:53

and then I'm gonna bend your ear on that one cool.

Speaker 2 11:55

I'll give you 30 seconds. We're we started off doing very technical security, hiring lots of like sock ir consultancy stuff for like MSSPs or MDR firms. And then the enterprise environment. Today we build very early stage cyber vendors with the investors as you alluded to private equity and venture capital and we build go-to-market and R&D teams. I have 20 staff and they're all very experienced principals or directors and all got six to 10 years experience plus and based in the US and the UK. So that's our kind of search business and we love that. We love working with the investors and they bring us in to build the portfolio companies, et cetera. And then we have Trident Horizon, which is our investment arm.

Speaker 2 12:34

So we've got seven companies that we've invested in. We're self-funded. We have no LP. We are the LP. We put our own money into it. We're also an investor into a fund out in Israel. And then we have our events business, which is called Try to Connect. So we really tried to build like this platform where the sole goal is to put founders in front of CISOs executives, put executives in front of the founders to really learn about what's going on in the AI space right now and so they can answer questions to the board and keep their enterprise safe, whilst us kind of building teams and placing executives. So yeah, it's worth to kind of like maybe set the scene as to what we do.

Speaker 2 13:07

It sounds to me, and we've known each other for a bit, but it sounds like you've just had explosive growth since I've met you yeah, yeah, um, we kind of slowed down on headcount and I'll be very honest here, once you get to like 25 heads, personally I just think it wasn't enjoyable. And I think I think it can be if you have like layers of team leaders and like lots of like teams, of teams which you have in the military, right, right, but we weren't there and we kind of had, like me, charlie sean, our director, who's like the og employee, um, and that was it in leadership, and then we had like 21 staff and that's a lot of people to constantly like I had more HR questions than I ever did, hiring or the fun stuff, right, and I'm like I remember me and Charlie were like what do we want to look like and what's the vision? And then, like, come back to the wellness piece, like if you're not enjoying it, what's the point? Work, go, work back in london and and wear a suit. So it wasn't like it's kind of like is it worth the stress? So we kind of doubled down in being like almost like an llp, like an operate like a law firm. Everyone's on a shared kind of share of the dividends, everyone's in an owner of the company. So we put 30 of the businesses aside for everybody and like, we're really big in belief of like, if everyone's pulling in the same direction, it could be really powerful. So, yeah, we kind of like wound back down to like 18 to 20 people and that's kind of our sweet spot that we really love and enjoy. Yeah, it's been explosive growth relative. Yeah, it's a grind, don't get me wrong, but we love it. And like, revenue growth is great and that doubles year on year, which has been epic. But we just kind of want to make it clear that, like, initially, I've, I've, I've.

Speaker 2 14:38

Initially I think it was ego that we're like, oh, melissa, like, hey, we doubled headcount again. And it's like, and it was like, do you know, when you go to like a family wedding? And they're like, oh, I hear you to like 18 people, now Great. And you're like is that the success metric or is it actually profitability, is it enjoyment? Is it? Are you high performing? Do you have a good reputation? And I think it's the ego thing that a lot of new founders go right, how fast can we get big? Because that means we're taking over the market. And you're like yeah, I got punched in the face with that a few times.

Speaker 1 15:11

I've seen that a lot in my experience as well as like hey, don't try to boil the ocean, do something great, and then expand. You mentioned something running. Tell me about your own wellness, and then I want to see how you evangelize that to your organization.

Speaker 2 15:21

Sure.

Speaker 2 15:22

So yeah, look, being ex-Marine, I'm pretty big into my fitness. It's one of my like baked in non-negotiables at home and, like many people, I'm sure if I don't work out, it can put me in the mood, make me I'm pretty miserable, I'm not a good person to be around. So, get the workout in. And a lot of my fitness at the moment is uh, lots of like it's kind of like uh, functional fitness. So I got really big into crossfit and then I got and then, as everybody does it, learn, you learn the hard way. You get injured a lot because of the crazy movements. So I kind of toned it down to more like weighted circuit training and just I have to go for long runs. So I do a lot of like half marathons, marathon. I've done've done the London marathon last year, which is really cool. So I'm big, I'm big into that, but I don't think I'll do many more marathons, if I'm honest. It's um, it takes over your life as well. I'll never do an Ironman Like I'd love to do one, but it's just my head of finance is an Iron, is a tri's your weekend and he's like yeah, I spent four hours on the bike, two hours running and then another hour swimming, and that was just a sunday morning, goodness. And I'm like dude, I'm like where's your weekend? But if you love it, fantastic.

Speaker 2 16:26

So a lot of my my sport is golf. I love golf, I'm really into golf. I'm a member of a fitness club called david lloyds which is here in the uk. It's a bit like an equinox. So I play a lot of tennis, a lot of tennis. Actually, I play a match at least once a week. Uh, so, yeah, golf and tennis and then just as much kind of fitness. And I, oh I actually, um, I went for a swim yesterday for the first time, I'd say, like a proper swim since I left the marines nearly 10 years ago. It's 40 like I've had 40 lengths and I just honestly nearly died. Uh, I was getting overtaken by like old ladies and I was like this isn't what the hell. I used to be a Marine. I've got a tattoo. I'll prove it, I'll prove it, I'll prove it to you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, yeah, that was a punch in the face. So that's my kind of my fitness world.

Speaker 1 17:06

You've got tank. You've got your family. How are you balancing it? You know, to me you're the picture perfect executive that has a successful business, family life and wellness. How are you balancing this?

Speaker 2 17:18

I think, firstly, I have a performance coach and she's amazing. She's kind of like half I moan at her for an hour slash, half trying to work out how do I stay high performing. And it's not always mental health, it could be work, it could be a particular issue, it could be a long-term plan I've got. It could be anything right. It could be a personal relationship issue. So I use her a lot and we've actually rolled it out across the company. So our executive team have access to her and they do, which is amazing.

Speaker 2 17:48

She does like off-site retreats and things like that right. So we're going to roll one out for the whole company shortly, at the end of the year. But you'll fly to Ireland and you'll be part of like it's not a spa hotel, but it's like a big airbnb farm and you have, like your, your cold plunges and stuff. But it's more like how to stay high performing and recognizing that you're just on this hamster wheel all day. Um, and I think so to answer your like, the particular question is I see, what is work-life balance? As I love work and it's pretty. Not everyone likes that kind of or agrees, and it's bit of a I think it's like a taboo People go.

Creating a Healthy Company Culture

Speaker 2 18:20

Oh no, you need a work-life balance, otherwise what's the point of owning your own business? And I'm like no, I own my own business because I love working all day, all night, but I get to work around my important things, like the kids, like my baby, or go and play golf this morning, and then I'll just work nine o'clock tonight because that's the flexibility I have. So I don't think there's a perfect balance. My, my balance is making sure I can I do put time in the diary to go. I'm swimming tomorrow morning, no matter what, and um, because like, otherwise I'll be miserable day or I'll regret not going, or I'm going to play golf this morning, but that's fine, so I'll make it up and I'll work till nine, um, even though I don't have to.

Speaker 2 18:56

And and I think the other thing is, if I love work or if anyone loves their job as much as they do, it's like I hate the cliche, it's like then it's not work, but it doesn't feel like that. Right, I work with really cool people, we're all friends, so it's like I don't see that as a nine to five. Sat behind my desk all day. I'm like, after this, I just friends of mine and we'll just shoot the shit and just catch up. That's technically work and I have to log on our CRM because that's the process that we've built in, but I don't see that as work. I just see that going out in the sun and just having a chat with a friend. So I don't think there's that perfect balance. I think it helps when you I don't know if it's to answer your question, but that's just my view on it all.

Speaker 1 19:34

No, you did so. How do you filter that into the direct reports? How do you get them to stay resilient Because I think that's one of the best things is having a work environment where people are doing stuff like that. They're doing marathons or 5Ks or whatever. What are you? I mean, you're obviously the example, but what are you filtering down to your direct reports to make sure they're healthy and well?

Speaker 2 19:55

I think first things first is we hire adults. So the average age of our sales floor is like 33, 34 years old and typical recruitment firm or headhunting company is like early 20s. They hire lots of graduates and it's like an academy by churn and burn. So what that means is that I can just fully trust my team and I don't need to speak to you today because I know you're just doing your job and like if you need me, I'm here, if I need you, I'll give you a call. So you're just doing your job and like if you need me, I'm here, if I need you, I'll give you a call. So first things first is having that business model of hiring kind of people that have got six to 10 years experience means that everyone has a kid, everyone has a mortgage, everyone has life outside of work, and what that means also is that I can then trust them to say hey, if you need to drop your daughter off this morning and go pick her up, I actually encourage you, go do it, don't miss that valuable time. If you want to put your daughter to bed, go read her a book, have dinner with your family, do it. But then it means if you then log on at half eight at night till 10 o'clock instead of watch TV like half the nation do, then that's how you, that's how you make it up. That's how you make it up, but like all I care about is the result at the end of the month. Encourage the team just to like work around your life.

Speaker 2 20:57

But when we're in the office we work really hard. So we're in the office monday, wednesday, friday in the in our like london headquarters, but at the same time some people don't come in on fridays because they live so far out it's actually not worth their time and it means that they don't don't put their son to bed. I'm like, well, don't miss that time. And that's why you'll see, we have a very, very engaged slack channel. So that's kind of like how we encourage the team just to like work is work, but like, don't miss the family time and like, uh, enjoy life. The other thing also is that we have a great environment where people actually like enjoy being around each other. So that means when we do go away and we do do off sites and skos, we have such a great time. Like, in two weeks time I'm taking everybody to ibiza and we're just going to go for two nights and it's our kind of summer incentive and like I've created a whatsapp group today because it's all been planned here's the itinerary and the team are just like they're so excited to go and it's not like a forced fun, which I used to have a lot with people that you don't like. So that's helpful, things like that, yeah, and like we do. We do like days out paddle boarding and we try and do it in the mornings because all of us work us hours. So, from london and yeah, we go to dubai and ibiza and we do like we did a haunted house at halloween once where we just rented a big airbnb and we just dressed up the house and it was really cool and like. So we do a lot of that and also like.

Speaker 2 22:11

The final point on that, I think, is the team go to a lot of events and like when we're all together in an airbnb and there's like seven of you in the Bay Area for RSA, like we have a lot of fun.

Speaker 2 22:21

Right, we sit on an Airbnb by the beach. We all go for a beach run in the morning or go for a swim and or others go to the gym or just go for a walk and then we plan what we're doing that day on the table and then we will go out to the conference or host events and it's like that for us is like kind of downtime right. That for us is like kind of downtime right, you're in a, you're in a Bay area, it's pretty nice. And it'd be the same when we go to black hat for Vegas. Or we went to DC last week for Gartner. Like a lot of the teams see that as kind of this is pretty cool, like we get paid to go and fly to places and go meet our friends who are our clients. So, yeah, yeah, I think that covers all of the points that my HR team wanted me to tell you.

Speaker 1 22:55

Anyway, I think you get the blueprint there If you know the leaders out there. We have a lot of executive leaders globally that listen to the show. If you're listening out there. Josh just gave you a blueprint on a healthy, happy, well culture, because I think I mean it's true, though. Think about it. I did my last paper because I was getting my bachelor's while I was working at Apple full time, which I don't advise that to anybody, but that's one of the things I did is I did a cost analysis of how wellness plays into cost and reduction of revenue. Sure enough, you don't keep your people well. You don't have a culture like the one that you cultivated, josh. It's going to cost you billions. It's going to cost you billions in healthcare costs, lost revenue, and maybe you get one person that comes in. They're sick. The whole damn organization's sick. I think there's you got something going that's really good that I think could be replicable. So kudos to you on that, thank you.

Speaker 2 23:46

And I think also like look, firstly, we're not perfect. Right, we're far from perfect. I think like, so when we were at RSA last week sorry, march, march, when was it? April? May, uh me, uh me and charlie sat down I can't remember where we were having a coffee and we said, like what do you want this business to be in three years time? And all we said was we probably will never sell trident.

Speaker 2 24:04

Right, it's very hard to sell a headhunting firm because it's like professional services. Right, it's little ar ar repeat income if you do executive stuff. Right, because there's not a lot of contract work. So we were like like, well, everyone owns the business. So we haven't promised anyone this big exit, we're not an Israeli cyber vendor, we're not going to exit to Paolo. But the reality is we were like well, why can't we work here for 20 years? And so, therefore, if that's the case, if you make it such a cool environment, most people won't leave if they're performing well, because we'll never ask them to leave, and why would go somewhere else?

AI Agents in Cybersecurity

Speaker 2 24:34

But like, and not have naivety, I know people leave and people come and go, but so what we actually come to the conclusion of is why not build a company where we would want to work as employees, like where we'd never leave? And I've got so many examples where people's kids have gone to hospital and they call up and they're I'm like, don't even bother, just go like, don't even worry about it, we'll cover you, just go and like people like there's so many examples I won't go into too much like private stuff, but like people like and there's so many examples I won't go into too much like private stuff, but like bad, like diagnoses and things like that, where it's like take whatever time you need, what do you need from us? And then like and then cause that's what I would want. How I'd want to be like responded to if I called my manager to say, hey, my wife's had this diagnosis.

Speaker 2 25:10

I'm like take work from wherever you want, as long as you need, because I want to be working with you for the next 10 years. Right, and this is a blip. So yeah, I don't know if I think that's a normal mindset and I hope it is, but I also appreciate that's not easy to do in a big corporate no-transcript, your dime and you're going to lose revenue because of that and it's going to deflate the whole culture.

Speaker 1 25:52

I like what you have and I was going to say. Do you think that attributes to your success having that mindset?

Speaker 2 25:57

Yeah, yeah, a hundred percent.

Speaker 2 25:59

And yeah, because then you, like you said, I visualize it of everybody's in a boat.

Speaker 2 26:03

We're rowing in the same direction and there's a lot to be said around like transparency and communicate like communicating very well to the team about changes or putting people at ease if someone leaves, and just being really open. And we do a thing called Director's Questions, where once a quarter the whole team get together, we all have a beer and me and Charlie will stand at the front, anonymous questions are put into a box and the team will just ask us questions, either anonymously or just put their hand up, and it can be anything like anything at all. Any worries, any concerns, because if one person's concerned about something, you sure as hell know someone else is thinking the same thing. Right, so they know we're not perfect by any means, but and we've made loads of mistakes. But I also think just last point on this you can go the extreme the other way. I've seen it, where hr teams go out there looking for problems and it's like hey look, the team are good, leave them alone.

Speaker 2 26:50

And it's like, well, no, no, they can't be perfect. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, but they're just getting on with work, you don't have to try and dig. So I'll say like, well, let's just do lots of reviews and one-to-ones with a team and just make sure everyone's happy. And I'm like, yes, of course, look after them, and that should be done by the management and stuff. Don't go looking for problems and trying to be busy, because problems will then come up. So I think you can go extremely the other way the other way.

Speaker 1 27:19

But so yeah, we're learning what's a recent trend or technology, because you mentioned AI there and we talked about that what's, what's something that's new in cyberspace that excites you, and how is it shaping the kind of talent that you're seeking today?

Speaker 2 27:28

Yeah, so I will talk about AI, particularly about the agentic side of it. So we're working with a ton of companies right now who are solving use cases with agents and the technology works like. I've actually seen it happen in real life, uh seen demos and applied inside an enterprise environment. So a good example would be I uh interviewed a founder yesterday, um, and just just had a conversation about the business and what they do is they build agents that can, essentially, they can do in the future, but right now, right now, they're more complementing, but they can replace the red teamer. So they'll go into an environment with the agent and they'll find your vulnerabilities on average within nine seconds. I can go into detail on this. That's 5,000 times faster than a human being can do it. That might take five days and what they've done is they've tested, so they create a ton of capture the flags and they've tested so they create a ton of capture the flags and they've tested about six or seven mostly front frontier models and they'll go hey, here's 80 capture the flag, different tests. How fast can you solve these? And on average, each test is solved in nine seconds, or sorry, they find, they find root or they hack. They have the box right within nine seconds where it would take like a human being like four days and then another like a day to write the report right. So that's like in my head I'm like mind blown. Like the big problem they're facing is the trust to deploy an agent in like a big enterprise environment, because we can kind of trust when we can see and feel a human being and watch what they're doing to a certain degree when they're pen testing your environment and it's a tried and tested model. But anything that's a gen tick blows my mind, particularly when it can solve a basic use case. I can go down so many rabbit holes on this.

Speaker 2 29:00

One thing I am concerned about in that space, though, and not many people are talking about, is if I'm a graduate at university and I'm doing a bachelor of science and I want to be a software developer, erc analyst or consultant level one, or I want to go into a SOC. Those roles are kind of getting replaced A lot of like inside a vendor right. 80% of code is written for internal use, for like automation tools, and about 20% on average is for like production of the actual product that they sell, so that 80% of internal coding. That doesn't have to be perfect, by the way, it's just a tool or an automation script can be done by, let's say, an LLM or an agent itself. Then if I want to get into a software role, surely those roles I don't know the figures or there must be someone out there with data Same with like an agentic level one SOC vendor.

Speaker 2 29:43

There's plenty out there that are replacing the triaging, the alerting and then prioritizing vulnerabilities, that level of work. So if I want to get into the SecOps world, I can't jump to like a level two or three role. So how do I get into that world? That's something I don't think many people are talking about because they don't believe it's real yet. But there are companies getting hundreds of millions in funding to replace the level one analyst in a SOC. So again, not to not do more gloom but like or too much doing gloom, but it's something that people aren't talking about, I think.

Speaker 1 30:13

No, it's a reality. If you good about I think. No, it's a reality. If you had advice to those people that are in the university, what would you tell them, knowing that this is what's?

Speaker 2 30:21

happening in the um. Yeah, I, um and this can go to the professors as well, I think, and I don't even. I don't have a bachelor's degree, so I'm definitely not in the position to tell people what to do or advise. But um is is get good at working with ai. Right, because we're always going to need human in the loop. So if that's the case, then there will obviously always be roles for people and we always need a human to trust and verify what an agent is doing. But really start learning how the models are working, how people are verifying the models. So, for example, there's really cool companies at the moment who are offensivelyly attacking the llms agents, assistants to test that they are fit for purpose in the enterprise environment before the bank deploys them. So, like, if I'm at university now, I'm all over the llms, I'm all over ai. I'm really learning how to work with it, um and uh, and try and figure out what it looks like in two years time. What does the career space look like then? Because we'll be hand in hand, side by side, with an agent or just general AI technology.

Advice for Future Cybersecurity Professionals

Speaker 2 31:25

I actually had a just a last point on that. I had a very interesting conversation over breakfast at RSA this year we were founder of a very big company who's just sold in cyber to PE and he's he's just got funding for a new company, which is? It kind of blew my mind and I was a little bit hazy because we had karaoke night before and it was like 8 am and he started talking about his new businesses. Yes, it's guardrails and it's putting secure prompts and protecting users from using like a chat GPT in enterprise. But it's also as we start using more agents. He's building technology that he believes in two to five years that agents will.

Speaker 2 32:00

Because you know, you can give an agent a task and at the moment it can run for half an hour and then they say, on average, every four months the agents will be able to double how long they can operate on a task. So it'd be an hour, then it'd be two hours, then four hours. So they're thinking about a year and a half they'll be able to operate an eight-hour day, so. So they're thinking like about a year and a half they'll be able to operate an eight-hour day, so quite literally, replace a human.

Speaker 2 32:23

However, when they get to like a five-year time period where the agent can, you could say to an agent hey, go and solve the geopolitical issue in X country, and can you do this before 2028? And then it goes away and does its thing right. You don't hear from it for that. But the problem is, then the agents start communicating with each other and then he believes it's gonna be like neurological pathways within the agents who can then bypass the prompts and the guardrails that you've put in place and the parameters and the harnesses to say don't do this, do this, don't do that, do this. But then they reckon they're gonna be able to like circumnavigate around them because they're learning off each other and they're getting smart and clever. And he was like so I'm building a company to protect agents that are off in the ether, like doing a long-term project, and that just blew my mind and I'm like that's some real matrix shit.

Speaker 1 33:03

Yeah, right, are you taking the red or the blue pill?

Speaker 2 33:05

How much of that is accurate. But, like I'm like if that's become a reality one it's scary but it's also really cool.

Speaker 1 33:10

I think it's cool and I think, if we can, and my next week's episode, another person from the UK we're going to talk more into, like the surveillance minority report, some of the incoming things, matrix-like if you will. So I think it's interesting and I think we have to have these conversations. They're not going to go away.

Speaker 2 33:25

Yeah, and I think a lot of people are afraid to have the conversations because they don't know enough, so they don't look stupid or they don't scare people or they want to bury their heads like ostriches, because they're like this can't be real. And I went to the Forge Point executive dinner at RSA and they had I can't remember his surname, but it's Dr Hay something and he's the founder of a deep fake tech company called GitReal. So Forge Point are just investing in them. But what he actually said, he showed the tech and it was amazing. But what he actually like he showed the tech and it was amazing.

Speaker 2 33:58

Um, but we actually said it was like, um, everyone keeps talking about how we're like, uh, future proofing. And he's like, no, no, you need to stop present proofing. That's the reality, like it's now, like we need to do it now. So I was like that kind of struck a chord. I'm like, holy shit, like he's not wrong, everyone's yeah, so you're right. I think the more conversations we have, the the better it is out there. And I don, yeah, I think it's. I think we're in a really cool time, like really cool time.

Speaker 1 34:18

Yeah, and listeners out there. I know we have a lot of people that, from executives to people that are just coming into the field, but the best advice I can give is just dive in. There's a lot of courses out there. They're free if you're military Coursera, I mean. There's so much so I think people have to take it upon themselves to learn. I don't know what corporations are doing as far as skilling up, but there's no reason that you can't do this on your own.

Speaker 2 34:41

Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 1 34:42

I am so happy that you stopped by. This was great and I really appreciate it, josh. Hopefully you'll come back again and we can dive into some other things in the cyber front, because we have a lot of people that are wanting to learn and hear and, again, people aren't talking about this. I'm so glad that you came in.

Speaker 2 34:59

No, thank you so much for having me on. It's been a pleasure.

Speaker 1 35:01

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