New Year Career Advice for Cyber Professionals

Author - Anshu Gupta

If there is one advice I had to give someone as the new year dawns is “𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐏 𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐅𝐑𝐄𝐄”. Learn to pay for value and invest in yourself.

1. 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐞 𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐫 - Hire that resume writer and pay top dollar to the get best resume possible

2. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐖𝐞𝐛𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐞 - Hire that web developer and get your professional website done, if you don’t have time yourself

3. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐍𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠- Buy the ticket for that exclusive networking event, conference, join that professional community where you meet other like minded people (Plug - I run one called 𝐓𝐞𝐣𝐚𝐬 𝐂𝐲𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐍𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 - https://lnkd.in/gHCvxHtJ)

4. 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐮𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐄𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 - Pay for that in-person/online training yourself, which could help distinguish your profile among other peers (if your company is not willing to pay for it)

5. 𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐚𝐜𝐡 - Pay for that executive/career coach who will get you started on path towards success

6. 𝐅𝐢𝐭𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐂𝐨𝐚𝐜𝐡 - Get that personal fitness coach and invest in your health so that you can run the marathon of life with a fit mind and body.

7. 𝐍𝐞𝐰𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫 - Sign up for that paid newsletter and engage with the author and try to recruit them into your brain trust.

𝐖𝐇𝐘 - When you do that you will start getting associated with people who are passionate about their craft and trying to make a honest living through their talent and passion for their chosen domain. The analogy I like to give is that talented people are driving a bus, where their passion and domain expertise is the fuel for that bus. Either you get on the bus which will take you to a better destination or you watch other people ride this passion fueled bus and succeed. You have to be smart about it though. Ask for recommendations from other people, do some research, make sure the value is clear to you.

𝐅𝐨𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐥𝐤𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐨 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐚 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐬𝐞𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐟𝐫𝐞𝐞, 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞

1. Why are you looking for free?

2. Do you want people to work free for you? How do you think these folks would sustain themselves?

3. Are you not willing to pay for value?

4. Are you willing to offer your own time, product and services for free?

5. How would you scale anything, if everything was free (even Google needs paid Ads to give you GMail for free)

The other paradox I see is that people will not think twice on spending on their kids be it classes, extra curricular activities but they continue to under invest or not invest at all in themselves.