The need for cybersecurity professionals has been rising, even faster than companies can hire—and that demand is expected to continue.
It’s no secret that there is a severe lack of cybersecurity talent in the modern business ecosystem. The word has been out for years that many well-paying positions needing cybersecurity expertise are vacant.
As a consequence, organizations, including enterprises, governments, schools, and other organizations, have less effective security measures in place than is necessary. Data breaches, privacy violations, financial fraud, and other adverse consequences are becoming more likely as a result, which will affect everyone.
Meanwhile, demand for cybersecurity talent is rising, making it challenging for businesses to hire cybersecurity specialists as they compete to get a share of the limited talent pool.
Identifying the roots of the cybersecurity skills shortage is essential to tackle this enormous gap. This whitepaper examines the talent shortage and offers data-backed strategies to deal with the cybersecurity talent shortage.
Analyzing the Widening Demand-Supply Gap
Despite the influx of over 700,000 professionals into the cybersecurity workforce in 2021, global demand for cybersecurity professionals continues to outpace supply. The rising demand for cybersecurity talent amidst the current talent shortage has created a massive global gap of ~2.7 Million cybersecurity professionals.
The consequences of a growing cybersecurity workforce gap may severely hurt organizational processes if not taken care of. Globally, cybersecurity professionals observe that a skills gap like this can result:
- 32% increase in misconfigured systems,
- 30% uptick in oversights in processes and procedures,
- and 27% rushed deployments.
Companies across industries are attempting to scale their cybersecurity teams, but they are running into several hiring challenges on the way.
Some of the major hiring challenges faced in scouting Cybersecurity talent include:
- Lack of cybersecurity academic programs
- Demand for cybersecurity talent exceeds the total supply
- Finding the right mix of technical, analytical, and soft skills
- Graduates from academic programs without job-ready skills
80% of companies are struggling to fill crucial, in-demand mid and senior-level job roles that cannot be outsourced.
Mid-level job roles such as ‘Cybersecurity Engineer’ are highly skilled and are witnessing a significant demand across Industries. We will discuss this specific role and the steps that must be taken to hire or develop this role in the sections that follow.
Hire Cybersecurity Engineers using Location Intelligence
Global businesses must experiment with targeted hiring tactics to meet the current spike in demand for Cybersecurity talent. One way to perform this is to identify key locations with the maximum talent availability.
A thorough analysis of global talent hotspots for Cybersecurity Engineers indicates that Washington D.C. and San Diego hold the highest talent percentage in the U.S. In Asia, this position is held by Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul, and Bengaluru.
Nearly 80% of Cybersecurity Engineer talent is based out of the top 12 locations globally, with Asian locations holding the highest talent with the lowest median talent cost. This makes Asia an effective place to hire cybersecurity talent.
Hiring from a relatively small talent pool restricts a company’s capability to rapidly expand its personnel. To avoid this, organizations must implement reskilling as a strategy to create a future-proof Cybersecurity workforce.
Case Study: Reskilling for “Cybersecurity Engineer” role
The rapidly widening demand-supply gap for cybersecurity professionals globally has made Reskilling an inevitable alternative for companies to develop a cybersecurity workforce. The global cybersecurity workforce has to grow by 65% in order to defend organizations’ critical assets.
Reskilling will also benefit organizations in other ways, including:
- Providing a viable career path for disrupted roles.
- Helping save up to 20-50% of recruitment cost per employee.
- Increasing employee satisfaction by allowing your employees to grow.
In this case study, we will examine how a sample role such as a Network Engineer can be turned into a Cybersecurity Engineer through a strategic Reskilling program.
In a timeframe of 6-8 months, a Network Engineer would be transformed into a Cybersecurity Engineer following the tailored reskilling program discussed above.
With rapid deployment and new solutions on the horizon, the modern working ecosystem is expected to significantly disrupt existing skills across all experience levels very soon.
Reskilling is essential, and businesses that opt for custom reskilling will be less likely to face a talent shortage in the future.
Draup is an AI-powered talent intelligence platform that delivers H.R. leaders with data-backed insights into the global talent pool, cost modeling, and reskilling pathways suitable to manage talent faster and drive company-wide reskilling initiatives or hire quality talent.
