One of the earliest mentions of the cybersecurity talent shortage was in January 2011, when ESG analyst Jon Oltsik asked, “Will there be a shortage of cybersecurity professionals in 2011?” 11 years later, leaders in the industry are still talking about the very same topic. Organizations have had a decade to address and overcome this growing problem, yet the talent shortage is far worse today than ever. In fact, data from CyberSeek shows that there are nearly 715,000 cybersecurity job openings in the U.S. right now.
Where is the cybersecurity industry going wrong? This is a loaded question, as there are a number of things that the industry needs to fix to overcome the cybersecurity talent shortage. Let’s focus on the broken employment process—because this is where all the problems start.