Thursday, January 19, 2012

Help Build the Cybersecurity Workforce the Electric Sector Needs Now


So reports of successful attacks in every geography and sector just keep coming and you wonder whether our increasingly connected industry is going to survive the cyber deluge, what with aging infrastructure, aging people, and fraying nerves.

Well, some highly motivated people, unhappy with the status quo, are organizing a response and now you and your org can be play an important part. The National Bureau of Information Security Examiners (NBISE) in conjunction with DOE's Pacific Northwest National Lab are building .. (their words now):
.... a detailed Job Performance Model (JPM) for Smart Grid cybersecurity personnel in the functional areas of security operations, intrusion analysis, and incident response. We are currently in the process of identifying organizations to assist in the distribution of a Job Analysis Questionnaire (JAQ) devised in collaboration with a team of 30 senior cybersecurity professionals from stakeholder organizations involved in the development, deployment, and maintenance of the Smart Grid. This is an important effort to gather the experience of existing cybersecurity professionals from the industry.
I've played a small part in some of the early work and can attest these folks really have their act together.

So don't just sit there. The JAQ is coming Jan 25th and that's a little less than a week away. Click HERE for an excellent 10 slide overview, and please consider adding your expertise, as well as the heavy duty cybersecurity SMEs you're lucky enough to work with, to the team.