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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Cybersecurity Director

💰 $ - $

SecurityITLeadership

🎯 Role Definition

The Cybersecurity Director is a senior technical and strategic leader responsible for developing and executing a comprehensive information security program that protects the organization’s digital assets and enables secure business growth. This role leads security operations, threat detection and response, risk and compliance programs, identity and access management, cloud and application security, and security architecture workstreams. The Director partners with executive leadership, engineering, legal, and business units to prioritize risk, ensure regulatory compliance, and continuously improve security posture through people, process, and technology.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Senior Information Security Manager or Manager, Security Operations
  • Head of Security Architecture or Senior Security Architect
  • Principal Security Engineer or Lead Security Program Manager

Advancement To:

  • Chief Information Security Officer (CISO)
  • VP of Security / VP of Information Risk & Security
  • Head of Technology Risk or Global Security Lead

Lateral Moves:

  • Director, Cloud Security
  • Director, Privacy & Data Protection
  • Director, IT Risk & Compliance

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Lead the development, execution, and continuous improvement of an enterprise-wide cybersecurity strategy aligned to business objectives, regulatory requirements (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA, PCI-DSS), and industry frameworks such as NIST and ISO 27001, ensuring measurable reductions in organizational risk.
  • Own operational responsibility for security operations center (SOC) strategy and execution, including SIEM tuning, alert triage, threat hunting, SOAR playbooks, and 24x7 incident detection and response capabilities.
  • Design and run an enterprise vulnerability management program—scanning, prioritization, patch orchestration, risk-based remediation, and tracking—to reduce critical vulnerabilities and minimize exposure windows.
  • Build and lead a high-performing security engineering and operations team through hiring, mentoring, performance management, and career development, creating succession plans and capacity forecasts to meet growth objectives.
  • Drive identity and access management strategy, including privileged access management, least privilege enforcement, SSO/IAM platform design (Okta, Azure AD), lifecycle provisioning, and regular access reviews.
  • Define and maintain security architecture standards and reference designs for cloud (AWS/Azure/GCP), on-premise, hybrid networks, and microservices, working closely with cloud and infrastructure teams to embed security by design.
  • Lead incident response planning, playbook creation, tabletop exercises, forensic investigations, and post-incident root cause analysis; coordinate communication to executives, legal, communications, and regulators as required.
  • Establish, monitor, and report on security KPIs and metrics (MTTR, dwell time, patching cadence, risk scores) for the executive team and board of directors to demonstrate program effectiveness and investment ROI.
  • Manage third-party and supply chain security risk programs, performing vendor risk assessments, contractual security requirements, penetration testing mandates, and remediation tracking to reduce vendor-sourced incidents.
  • Oversee secure software development lifecycle (SDLC) integration—SAST/DAST adoption, developer security training, threat modeling, code review standards, and pipeline gates—to reduce application vulnerabilities and accelerate secure delivery.
  • Lead data protection and privacy engineering efforts including data classification, encryption strategies (at-rest, in-transit), tokenization, DLP deployments, and alignment with data privacy teams to meet regional privacy laws.
  • Establish and maintain compliance and audit programs for regulatory frameworks and certifications (ISO 27001, SOC 2, PCI, HIPAA), coordinate external audits, remediation plans, and control attestations.
  • Define and manage security architecture reviews, system design approvals, and security requirements for new projects and major changes, acting as an approval authority for high-risk implementations.
  • Create and run security awareness, phishing simulation, and training programs across the organization to build risk-aware culture and measurably reduce human-driven incidents.
  • Coordinate continuous threat intelligence, monitoring, and red-team/blue-team exercises to validate defenses, identify gaps, and prioritize investments based on attacker techniques and industry trends.
  • Oversee endpoint protection, EDR/XDR strategies, and desktop/mobile security posture to ensure consistent controls across remote and hybrid work environments.
  • Manage security tooling portfolio, vendor selection, contract negotiations, TCO analysis, and roadmap alignment for SIEM, SOAR, EDR, CASB, WAF, IAM, and cloud security posture management.
  • Create and manage security budgets, staffing plans, and capital requests; articulate business cases for security investments and track program financial performance.
  • Partner with legal, privacy, compliance, and business stakeholders to develop incident escalation criteria, regulatory notification processes, and post-breach legal/forensic coordination.
  • Champion risk quantification and risk acceptance processes, enabling business leaders to make informed decisions with documented residual risk and mitigation plans.
  • Lead cross-functional governance forums (risk committees, technology steering, change advisory board) to review high-risk projects, architecture exceptions, and to enforce security policies and controls.
  • Stay current with threat landscape, emerging technologies, and regulatory changes; recommend strategic initiatives like zero trust, micro-segmentation, or confidential computing based on business and technical feasibility.
  • Drive continuous improvement initiatives including automation of repetitive security tasks, reduction of alert fatigue through analytics, and integration of security telemetry into engineering workflows.
  • Represent security externally with partners, regulators, investors, and customers; prepare executive-level briefings, RFP security responses, and public-facing security documentation where required.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc security data analysis and reporting requests for internal stakeholders and executive leadership.
  • Contribute to the organization's security strategy roadmap and multi-year investment planning.
  • Collaborate with engineering, product, and IT teams to translate security requirements into technical implementation roadmaps.
  • Participate actively in agile ceremonies, sprint planning, and security backlog grooming to ensure security work is delivered with engineering teams.
  • Provide oversight and subject matter expertise for penetration tests, red team engagements, and remediation tracking.
  • Advise on mergers, acquisitions, and integrations to evaluate security posture, perform due diligence, and coordinate remediation efforts post-close.
  • Mentor mid-level security managers and individual contributors, developing internal training curricula and knowledge transfer sessions.
  • Create and maintain security runbooks, playbooks, and operational SOPs for reproducible incident response and operational consistency.
  • Assist in drafting and updating organizational security policies, standards, and procedures to reflect current threats and business needs.
  • Support customer security reviews and questionnaires (e.g., security trust centers, SOC reports, customer audits) to enable sales and customer success processes.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Information Security Leadership: strategic program design, policy development, and governance aligned to business goals and regulatory requirements.
  • Risk Management & Quantification: enterprise risk assessment, asset classification, risk scoring, and risk acceptance frameworks (CRISC experience desirable).
  • Incident Response & Forensics: IR playbooks, DFIR, malware analysis, chain-of-custody, and post-incident remediation.
  • Security Operations & Monitoring: SIEM (Splunk, QRadar, Sumo Logic), SOAR automation, SOC organization and threat hunting.
  • Cloud Security: cloud architecture review and controls for AWS, Azure, GCP, including CSPM, cloud-native logging, and shared responsibility models.
  • Identity & Access Management: SSO, MFA, IAM provisioning, PAM, and directory services (Okta, Azure AD, AWS IAM).
  • Application Security: secure SDLC, SAST/DAST, dependency scanning, threat modeling, DevSecOps integration, and CI/CD security tooling.
  • Vulnerability & Patch Management: Nessus, Qualys, Tenable, remediation workflows, and prioritization strategies.
  • Endpoint & Network Security: EDR/XDR (CrowdStrike, SentinelOne), firewalls, WAF, VPNs, micro-segmentation, and network telemetry.
  • Compliance & Audit: ISO 27001, SOC 2, PCI-DSS, HIPAA, GDPR program management and evidence generation for auditors.
  • Penetration Testing & Red Teaming: scoping, supervising third-party engagements, and translating findings into remediation plans.
  • Data Protection & Encryption: DLP, tokenization, key management (KMS/HSM), encryption standards, and secure data lifecycle management.
  • Security Architecture & Engineering: reference architectures, integration patterns, and technical risk assessments.
  • Secure Cloud & Container Practices: Kubernetes security, container scanning, runtime protection, IaC scanning (Terraform, CloudFormation).
  • Scripting & Automation: Python, PowerShell, or other languages to automate detection, response, reporting, and integration tasks.

Soft Skills

  • Strategic leadership with the ability to translate high-level business goals into tactical security initiatives.
  • Excellent executive communication and board-level presentation skills; able to convey technical risk in business terms.
  • Strong stakeholder management and influencing skills across product, legal, finance, and operations teams.
  • Proven coach and people manager who can build trust, develop talent, and foster a culture of accountability.
  • Problem solving and critical thinking under pressure with a bias for measurable outcomes and continuous improvement.
  • Change management and program delivery experience to implement large-scale security transformations.
  • High ethical standards, confidentiality, and sound judgment when handling sensitive incidents and data.
  • Negotiation skills for vendor management, contracting, and cross-functional tradeoffs.
  • Customer- and business-oriented mindset that balances security controls with product usability and time-to-market.
  • Collaboration and facilitation skills for cross-functional governance and risk decision-making.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Security, Information Technology, Cybersecurity, or related field.

Preferred Education:

  • Master's degree in Cybersecurity, Information Assurance, Computer Science, MBA, or related advanced degree.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Computer Science
  • Information Security / Cybersecurity
  • Information Systems
  • Electrical/Computer Engineering
  • Risk Management / Business Administration

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 10–15+ years in information security, IT, or related functions with progressively increasing responsibility.

Preferred: 12+ years in security roles with at least 5 years of people leadership and proven experience running SOC, risk, or security architecture programs at scale. Demonstrated experience implementing enterprise security frameworks, leading incident response for major security events, and managing vendor portfolios.

Preferred certifications: CISSP, CISM, CRISC, CCSP, GIAC/SANS, ISO 27001 Lead Implementer/Auditor.

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