I enjoy reading the blog postings from Seth Godin. I also enjoy reading his books and watching him speak. Flattery aside, I read a post today that made some serious sense in how I think we need to be addressing information security.
The Posting is called ‘This might just be the one‘ in which he writes:
“I’m not asking your advice because I need help coming up with a tried and true, predictable, safe or proven idea. No, I’ve already tried all of those and they didn’t work. I’m asking your help in finding something creative, untested, unproven, off the wall, risky, fashionable and challenging. Don’t let me down. Don’t hesitate to share your crazy idea… it might just be the one.”
Seth used this as an example of how words and approach can make a difference. I’ve been thinking about security, security 2.0 and our future as professionals in the last few weeks. As I’m about to launch Effective Assurance (the course) publicly, I’ve been challenging everything to see what does and doesn’t make sense. And I have decided that we need to be more courageous in the way we approach and practice security.
So why this quote and link back to Seth Godin?
Simple, really. Imagine if when posed with a security challenge (which is nearly every day), instead of trying to solve it by yourself, you asked for help. And instead of simply saying, “help” (which we commonly do), you said something along the lines of above?
Seriously.
What if in asking for some advice, we actually invite people to be crazy? What if we toss off the shackles from our mind, bring our passions and experience into play and then see where it leads?
I know this much: you’ll have more fun. I also would bet dollars to donuts (then again, that’s probably a wash these days anyway) that you’ll come up with a clever and inventive solution that makes a difference.
Try it. I know you’ll like it. Practice now. Stop reading, try it. Then tell us how it worked.
Comments are open. Catalyst Community is coming this month.
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