Changes in the Profile of Security Managers

Abstract

Twelve years ago a development program for security managers was started in Finland. The first program was designed to fulfil the needs of a security manager in an organization. However, the content was an educated guess. During the second program, in 1993, we made a study on how security managers themselves feel the requirements of their work and which part of their work they felt difficult or easy. We were interested in what kind of education security managers would need. These results were used when the following programs were planned and some extra courses were introduced. However, these results were never really published. Now, we try to improve the development program for security managers again. We took the results of the old study and found out the current situation. We noticed that the requirements for a security manager have changed. The security managers have become a manager of a department instead of a single specialist. They do not need as deep specialized knowledge as nine years ago. Instead they need understanding of business processes and managerial skills. Another finding is that security manager is a long term career. Few security managers have proceeded to higher vacancies. Instead many of those security managers who participated the old study as a security manager are now retiring from that very same position.

Can We Tune Information Security Management Into Meeting Corporate Governance Needs? (Invited Paper)

“…Teemupekka Virtanen (2003) makes an interesting remark in a similar survey of Finnish academic and vocational IS/IT security education 1990-94. After various educational programs in IS/IT security people stay on in the same or a higher position within IS/IT security.…”

“…In the same group previous experiences were from police and armed forces 16%, security 47%, IT industry 60% and various working experiences 11%. Amongst positions held by the same group (n=71 where 57 had distinct positions prior to the program) four years after the academic program were Corporate security and IT security manager and general management (14), IT security consultant and security coordinator (18), Project manager and programmer/system analyst (16), IT auditor (5), and teacher (4). (Yngström L 1996, table 4.1 A p 105 and table 4-7 p 111).…”