10 Lessons Learned While Looking for a Security Job
We’ve all been at that point in our career - when we feel we haven’t progressed much lately, especially if we invest quite a bit of personal time for our career development. That was my case, too, just a few months back this year. And although I enjoyed working there, I decided it’s time to move on. As such, I started interviewing and I learned a few lessons along the way, which I am sharing with you. Hopefully you’ll find them useful!
1. Before interviewing, discuss with external recruiters about your goals and the market.
You know your skills, you know your goals. What you don’t know is the market and the market an important part of the equation. Even if in theory a specific set of skills should get you to your goals, in practice it depends on the market needs and how skilled those you’re competing with are. External recruiters hire continuously for the roles you’re interested in, so they know the market requirements and what it takes for a candidate to succeed. So once you thought well about your goals, initiate discussions with external recruiters. You may be surprised how open they really are to give you insights and to assess whether your goals are realistic even.
2. Ask to discuss with the hiring manager for the first interview round.
Many companies ask you to go through all the interviews, before you actually have a discussion with the hiring manager. But generally speaking, the hiring manager is the only person who really knows what they hire for and the day to day responsibilities you’d have. Interviewing takes time, so it only makes sense to discuss first whether that job is what you’re looking for. Job specs may seem a good fit, but they are often generic and even outdated.
3. Ask enough details about the hiring process before starting it.
Some companies have a cumbersome hiring process or not well-defined. Before starting interviewing, ask as many details they can give you on the interviewing process, such as: topics you should brush on, how many interviewing stages there are, the stage of the other candidates or the difficulties other candidates find in securing that job. As long as you ask politely, it won’t hurt your chances. Most companies have 3-4 interviewing rounds for security roles here in UK. However, there was this company where I didn’t ask and I ended up having 8 interviews before they sent me an offer.
4. Negociations can be hard. If you feel it’s not worth it, then it’s not.
There was another company where all the interviews felt as they were discusssions with smart and professional people - that’s how much I enjoyed those interviews! The decision on whether to accept the offer was particularly difficult and here is why: my interaction with the Talent Acquisition was miserable. He let me know that I passed the interviews, then he left for holidays for a few weeks, without passing my application on to another colleague. After he got back, he sent me the offer where a good portion of the initially discussed base salary was subsituted with shares and other allowances. Then, negociations started and his arguments were either borderline offensive, either based on the gains I would get due to the company’s reputation rather than tangible benefits. Back then, that’s what I considered my dream job at my dream company and still I’m glad I turned the offer down. Respect is important, in all its shapes.
5. Interview the company while they interview you.
Always interview the company while they interview you. You can never know exactly how it’s going to be before you start working there, but those hours you spend on interviewing still give you some good indications. Remember the company where I had those 8 interview stages: they gave me enough time to see some red flags and decide not to accept the offer, even if definitely a good one.
6. Try to interview for two steps further in your career plan before interviewing for the immediate one.
Although time consuming, interviewing first for two steps further in my career plan gave me a reasonable idea of what I really need to get there. This was also the best opportunity I found to discuss with other people, who already are in their career where I am planning to be. Many of them shared with me career advices and their story that got them there - for that, I am really grateful to them.
7. Titles may matter. Specifications don’t.
Despite many people thinking that titles don’t matter, there are jobs for which the probability of getting hired is very low (at best), if you don’t already work in that role or your title doesn’t show it. I got that confirmed multiple times while interviewing for two steps further in my career. For this kind of jobs, you have to get promoted to that role and get the title internally, where you work, as it is unlikely to get hired by other companies if you don’t hold the role and the title already. Unfortunately, not all companies offer these growth opportunities and the recognition of your attributions given by the job title. That’s why asking for growth opportunities should be on your list next time you’re looking for a job. At the other end, job specifications don’t matter. As mentioned before, they are often generic or outdated and the only way to know for sure if the job is what you’re looking for is to discuss with the hiring manager.
8. Before searching for a job or after you got an external offer, ask your manager for the changes you’re looking for.
A manager told me once that it’s very difficult to hire people, hence whenever I wanted to leave, to let him know first and he’d do his best to accomodate my needs. He was one of the best managers I had. He was assigned to lead a different team after some time, so technically I never left him. I followed his advice further in my career path and I found that generally managers are open for discussions, but most of them fail to follow through with their promises (yes, you usually negociate promises at this point). More importantly, for some reason, even if you choose to stay, the relationships with most of those managers deteriorate effective immediately. There are exceptions, so be wise.
9. Contact internal HR directly if you found a perfect match.
Corporations and some other companies have internal HR teams, rather than recruitment consultants. Sometimes you can find a perfect match between what you’re looking for and what they’re looking for, but still be unable to get in touch with them or get contacted back. It may be that they use a referal system and you don’t know anybody there to refer you. In situations like this, it seems effective to just contact internal recruiters and start from there. Don’t abuse it though. Put yourself in their shoes first. And if you just contact everyone directly disregarding if you are a good fit for their job opening, don’t expect a response, or not a good one - you’re spamming them afterall. It has to be a win-win situation for this strategy to work.
10. Finding a job may be easy. Finding the right job takes time.
Unless you’re conditioned to find a job immediately, there is no need to rush looking for a new job. Breaks in-between interviewing are acceptable, too. Don’t be put off by the fact that it takes a longer time to find the right job compared with the time when you were at the beginning of your career and you were willing to accept anything. The more you progress in your career, the better you define a job on your terms, to take you closer to your goals. In this process, you cut out many of the jobs you could get but don’t align anymore with your goals or expectations. Chances are you get contacted a lot for new jobs you could get. However, finding the right job takes time.
Summing up
I was in doubt whether to post an article on this topic, but as my blogging “mantra” is to post anything security-related that I wish I would have found online, here they are. The 10 lessons I learned while looking for my next security role in UK. Hopefully you found something to help you in your next career search!