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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for WFP 524 Application Security Leader

💰 $ - $

SecurityApplication SecurityDevSecOpsInformation Technology

🎯 Role Definition

The WFP 524 Application Security Leader is a senior technical and strategic role responsible for defining and executing the organization's application security strategy across cloud-native and legacy applications. This leader owns the secure software development lifecycle (SSDLC), drives AppSec tool integrations (SAST/DAST/IAST/SCA), partners with engineering and DevOps teams to embed security in CI/CD pipelines, and runs vulnerability and threat management programs to reduce risk and ensure compliance with enterprise frameworks (PCI, SOC 2, ISO 27001, etc.). The role requires a strong blend of hands-on technical expertise (secure architecture, code review, pentest oversight) and people leadership (mentoring, stakeholder influence, program management).

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Senior Application Security Engineer
  • Lead DevSecOps Engineer
  • Security Architect (Application-focused)

Advancement To:

  • Director of Application Security
  • Head of Security Engineering / Chief AppSec Officer
  • VP of Engineering (with security portfolio)

Lateral Moves:

  • Cloud Security Lead
  • Secure Architecture Lead
  • Product Security Manager

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Lead the definition and execution of the enterprise application security strategy (AppSec program roadmap) to secure web, mobile, API, and microservice architectures across multi-cloud environments (AWS, Azure, GCP).
  • Design, implement and continuously improve a secure software development lifecycle (SSDLC) program that mandates security gates, automated testing, and security sign-off for production releases.
  • Build, own and operate AppSec toolchains including SAST (e.g., Checkmarx, Veracode, SonarQube), DAST (e.g., Burp, ZAP), IAST, RASP, and SCA (e.g., Snyk, Black Duck) and integrate them into CI/CD platforms (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins).
  • Lead enterprise-wide threat modeling initiatives (STRIDE, PASTA) for new and high-risk features, producing mitigations, acceptance criteria and design changes with engineering teams.
  • Define, implement and monitor vulnerability management processes for application and third-party components, including automated discovery, prioritization (CVSS and contextual risk), remediation SLAs, and exception governance.
  • Manage and oversee penetration testing, red-team engagements and application security assessments, validate remediation effectiveness, and convert findings into actionable backlog items with engineering owners.
  • Create and enforce secure coding standards and code review guidance, perform advanced secure code reviews for critical systems, and provide practical remediation recommendations to developers.
  • Lead supply chain and third-party risk assessment for application dependencies: enforce SCA, SBOM generation, license compliance checks, and vendor security questionnaires.
  • Collaborate with product, engineering, and DevOps leadership to embed security controls into CI/CD pipelines and IaC (Terraform, CloudFormation), enabling security-as-code and shift-left testing.
  • Define and measure AppSec KPIs and metrics (vulnerability trend, mean time to remediate, scan coverage, false positive rate) and present program health to executive stakeholders and risk committees.
  • Architect and implement runtime protection and monitoring (WAF, RASP, runtime threat detection) and integrate findings into incident response and security operations (SIEM/SOAR).
  • Lead threat-hunting, logging and observability alignment for application-level telemetry to accelerate detection and response to application attacks and vulnerabilities.
  • Drive authentication and authorization security best practices across teams, including OWASP Top 10 mitigation, OAuth2/OIDC/SAML implementations, secure session management and least-privilege access controls.
  • Develop and enforce encryption and key management standards for data in transit and at rest, working with cryptography experts and platform teams to standardize TLS, PKI and secret management (Vault, cloud KMS).
  • Own AppSec policy, governance and compliance deliverables, ensuring application portfolios meet regulatory and audit requirements (PCI DSS, SOC 2, GDPR, HIPAA where applicable).
  • Establish and operate a Security Champions program, coaching and mentoring engineers to take ownership of security tasks and to scale security knowledge across agile teams.
  • Coordinate cross-functional remediation efforts during security incidents affecting applications, lead post-incident reviews, and translate lessons learned into process and tooling improvements.
  • Define and manage AppSec budgets, tool vendor relationships, procurement, and licensing; evaluate emerging security technologies and negotiate commercial agreements.
  • Drive automation and orchestration activities to reduce manual triage and improve vulnerability validation and remediation workflows, leveraging APIs and custom tooling.
  • Create and deliver targeted application security training and awareness programs tailored to developers, product owners and SREs to improve secure development practices and reduce risky patterns.
  • Act as the primary liaison to enterprise risk, legal, and compliance teams on application security posture, risk acceptance, SLA definitions and reporting for internal and external audits.
  • Mentor and grow a distributed AppSec team, hiring senior engineers and technical leads, setting performance objectives, and building a high-performing culture focused on measurable risk reduction.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
  • Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
  • Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
  • Maintain clear documentation of AppSec policies, architecture decisions, runbooks, and integration guides for developer self-service.
  • Provide subject matter expertise to procurement and vendor evaluation for application security products and professional services.
  • Facilitate cross-team workshops and tabletop exercises to validate secure design and incident readiness.
  • Assist with preparation of executive-level reports and board materials focused on application security posture and program ROI.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Deep expertise in application security tooling and processes: SAST (Checkmarx, Veracode, SonarQube), DAST (Burp Suite, ZAP), IAST, SCA (Snyk, Black Duck), SBOM generation and analysis.
  • Strong experience integrating AppSec scans and gates into CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins, Azure DevOps) and automating remediation workflows.
  • Proven knowledge of cloud-native application security across AWS, Azure, and GCP, including cloud IAM, KMS, and managed security services.
  • Container and orchestration security experience (Docker, Kubernetes, Pod Security Policies, admission controllers, runtime security tools like Aqua, Prisma Cloud).
  • Secure architecture and design skills: threat modeling (STRIDE/PASTA), secure patterns, anti-patterns, and mitigation design for microservices and APIs.
  • Hands-on secure coding lifecycle skills and secure code review experience for languages such as Java, .NET, Python, Node.js, Go, and modern frontend frameworks.
  • Practical cryptography and key management knowledge: TLS, PKI, symmetric/asymmetric encryption, HSMs and cloud KMS solutions.
  • Proficiency with identity and access standards and systems: OAuth2, OpenID Connect, SAML, SSO, role-based and attribute-based access control.
  • Vulnerability management and orchestration tools experience (Tenable, Qualys, Kenna) and ability to map vulnerabilities to business risk.
  • Familiarity with web security standards and attack vectors (OWASP Top 10, API Top 10, XML/JSON attacks, SSRF, XSS, CSRF) and recommended mitigations.
  • Experience with security monitoring and detection for applications: SIEM (Splunk, Elastic), logging, tracing (OpenTelemetry), and alerting best practices.
  • Knowledge of infrastructure-as-code security and scanning for Terraform, CloudFormation, and policy-as-code (OPA, Sentinel).
  • Experience managing third-party/vendor risk assessments, security questionnaires, and contractual security obligations.
  • Ability to design, run and evaluate penetration tests, red-team exercises, and to operationalize findings into engineering backlogs.
  • Familiarity with compliance frameworks and audit requirements relevant to applications: PCI-DSS, SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA.

Soft Skills

  • Strong leadership and people management: hiring, mentoring, performance management and building high-performing AppSec teams.
  • Excellent communication skills for translating technical risk into business impact for executive stakeholders.
  • Influencing and stakeholder management: ability to advocate security priorities across product, engineering and business teams.
  • Strategic thinking and program management: roadmap creation, prioritization, budgeting and vendor negotiation.
  • Collaboration and facilitation: run workshops, threat modeling sessions, and cross-functional remediation planning.
  • Problem solving and analytical mindset: triage complex vulnerabilities, root cause analysis and preventive measures.
  • Teaching and coaching: build training materials and scale security knowledge through developer enablement.
  • Resilience and adaptability: operate effectively in fast-paced Agile environments and during security incidents.
  • Attention to detail and documentation discipline for policies, runbooks, and compliance evidence.
  • Customer and product-focused orientation: balance security controls with product delivery timelines and developer experience.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Security, or a related technical field; or equivalent practical experience.

Preferred Education:

  • Master’s degree in Cybersecurity, Information Systems, Computer Science or relevant technical discipline.
  • Professional certifications (CISSP, CSSLP, OSCP, GWEB, GAWM, GIAC AppSec certifications, CISM) considered a strong plus.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Computer Science
  • Software Engineering
  • Cybersecurity / Information Security
  • Information Systems
  • Electrical or Computer Engineering

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

  • 8–15+ years of progressive security experience with at least 4–7 years focused on application security and 2+ years in a leadership or people-management role.

Preferred:

  • 10+ years total security experience with demonstrable success building and scaling AppSec programs in cloud-native enterprises, launching SSDLC initiatives, integrating AppSec tooling into CI/CD at scale, and reporting to senior leadership. Prior experience leading global or distributed security teams and successful cross-functional influence across engineering and product organizations is strongly preferred.
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