Women in CyberSecurity Calling for Participants for New Measuring Inclusion Workshops

Program will help understand barriers to hiring and retaining women in cybersecurity

CHICAGO, Feb. 1, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Women in CyberSecurity (WiCyS), the nonprofit organization dedicated to the recruitment, retention and advancement of women in cybersecurity, today announced that it is seeking participants for its Measuring Inclusion Workshops, a new program designed to pinpoint and remove the barriers in the cybersecurity industry that keep women from being recruited, hired, retained and promoted at the same rate as men.

In collaboration with the DEI firm Aleria, WiCyS is launching this pioneering study to understand why the representation of women in cybersecurity is not where it should be and how that can be changed. WiCyS is calling on any member of the workforce (men, women and allies) to sign up for one of the one-hour workshops being held on Feb. 7 and 9. WiCyS and Aleria will take the findings from the workshops to create a benchmark study, "State of Inclusion of Women in Cybersecurity."

"WiCyS is proud to invest the time and energy to explore further the state of inclusion for women in cybersecurity," said Lynn Dohm, executive director of WiCyS. "Our focus, as a nonprofit, is to listen to our community and build programs that bridge gaps currently hindering women from either being recruited, retained, or advancing in their careers. Our attention to this inclusion assessment is critical for the future of the cybersecurity workforce as we continue to work on identifying gender disparities and overcoming the associated challenges. Participation from women, men, allies, and advocates is necessary to develop this important baseline."

During each workshop, participants have the opportunity to share workplace experiences using Aleria's online platform, which has been built with a focus on privacy, confidentiality and anonymity. The ability to build a sense of safety and trust is key to Aleria's approach to measuring inclusion. It is not possible for Aleria or anyone else to trace or identify workshop attendees who choose to participate in the activity, and no experiences are ever shared with anyone unless a participant specifically allows Aleria to do so.

"Measuring inclusion provides insights that go far beyond what is possible by measuring diversity alone, so we are delighted to work with WiCyS to measure the state of inclusion of women in cybersecurity," said Paolo Gaudiano, Chief Scientist, Aleria. "In addition to providing invaluable data and insights into the experiences that impact individuals who work in cybersecurity roles, this collaboration will help to raise awareness about this novel, revolutionary approach to quantifying the impact of workplace diversity and inclusion."  

Interested participants can sign up for one of four free workshops: Feb. 7 at 8:00 a.m. CT; Feb. 7 at 11:00 a.m. CT; Feb. 9 at 10:00 a.m. CT; or Feb. 9 at 4:00 p.m. CT. The "State of Inclusion of Women in CyberSecurity" report will be released on March 15. For more information, and to register for one of the workshops, please visit https://www.wicys.org/initiatives/wicys-state-of-inclusion/.

About WiCyS:
Women in CyberSecurity (WiCyS) is a nonprofit organization with international reach dedicated to the recruitment, retention and advancement of women in cybersecurity. WiCyS was founded by Dr. Ambareen Siraj in 2013 through a National Science Foundation grant awarded to Tennessee Tech University. In less than 10 years, it has grown into an organization (est. in 2017) representing a leading alliance between trailblazers from academia, government, and industry. WiCyS offers opportunities, trainings, events, and resources for its members. Strategic partners include Tier 1: Amazon Web Services, Battelle, Bloomberg, Carnegie Mellon University ? Software Engineering Institute, Cisco, Fortinet, Google, Intel, Lockheed Martin, Meta, Microsoft, Optum, Sandia National Laboratories, SentinelOne. Tier 2: AbbVie, Aristocrat, Dell Technologies, JPMorgan Chase & Co., LinkedIn, McKesson, Nike, NCC Group, Workday, Navy Federal Credit Union, Yubico Inc., DeVry University. To partner, visit http://www.wicys.org/support/strategic-partnerships/.

About Aleria:
Aleria is an HR tech company that measures inclusion in the workplace. Leveraging their patent-pending framework and proprietary technology, Aleria pinpoints exactly where business leaders should focus to drive greater employee satisfaction, diversity, inclusion and ultimately, greater business performance. Learn more about Aleria.

SOURCE WiCyS