Noting the warning lights to assess your levels of stress and mental health now, and in the future, can save a lot of anguish in your working life.
Excerpt from: Mental Health Toolbox
Speaking at 44CON in London on the issue of dealing with mental health, Duo Security CISO advisory group member J Wolfgang Goerlich recommended a strategy of a “career owners manual” and knowing what to do to “make sure you have got a career and what you’re doing well.”
“You need to be sure the inputs line up, as different companies have different values” he said, as if we are unhappy, it is too easy to ignore warning lights around our mental health, and it is too easy to take a “teenager’s action” as they ignore warning lights on a car. These warning lights should be around:
- Physiological effects
- Non-competitive compensation
- Lack of training
- Lack of career path
- Poor teamwork
- Poor leadership
- No appreciation or recognition
- Misaligned values and culture
Read the full article: https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/44con-mental-health-toolbox/
Wolf’s Additional Thoughts
I burned out hard in 2014. I ended up taking a quarter off to refresh and renew. Since then, I’ve been very vocal about the need for managing the stresses of IT and cyber security.
I ran an apprenticeship from 2015-2019. This allowed me to hone my career advice with 67 junior-level security analysts. Quite sure they taught me more than they learned from me. It became readily apparent that no one advises on how to cope with stress, and how to separate bad stress from good stress, in cyber security degree programs.
I was therefore excited and pleased to have the opportunity to present on this topic at 44con, in collaboration with Mental Health Hackers.
If you’d like to talk, hit me up on my coaching page. We absolutely must do more to support each other, mentally and physically.
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