How Technologists See Each Other

In the world of technology development and operations, there are a cast of characters, each with their own perspectives in how they see themselves and each other. This is a humorous depiction, as there is some underlaying truth in it.     

I saw this come across my LinkedIn feed and it gave me a good laugh, especially the fact that everyone, including security, seem themselves as Darth Vader. In a perfect world, all these roles should be part of a well oiled team that communicates, appreciates each other, and works together for a common goal. The reality is sometimes very far from that Utopian view.    

Roles: 

Each of the different roles plays an important part in making technology a reality:    

• Developers mature concepts to ideas. They usually create the base engines or foundations of new technology to showcase the plausible value and function.  
• Designers focus on making what the developers come up with, more functional, usable, efficient, and desirable by end-users.  
• Project Managers provide oversight to resources, both human and financial, to coordinate all the different teams to work together and are driven by timelines and budget constraints.  
• Quality Assurance (QA) are in charge of testing, validating, and in some cases recommending fixes to vulnerabilities, inefficiencies, and broken parts before release. 
• System Administrators (SysAdmins) implement, configure, and maintain technology in their environments. They are part of the customers who integrate and tune solutions and keep them up-and-running while actively avoiding unintentional impacts to other systems. 
• Security is there to proactively and reactively manage the risks to confidentiality, integrity, and availability of systems. They also must ensure regulatory compliance, and respond to a wide range of attackers, from apathetic employees to intelligent expert hackers.    

The Real Hero’s Are… 

Every groups sees themselves as the hero and a crucial piece of the puzzle. They tend to perceive other areas as lesser components and have very specific viewpoints on their value and practices. This is mostly due to a lack of understanding of the other partner's roles, challenges, and impacts.    

This community must work together or things begin to fall apart. Ideas, designs, quality, security, usage, etc. must all work in synchronicity. Like the fabled Camelot, a round table is needed to get all parties working together in a way that benefits are seen across the group and participants are valued as equals in the challenge.   

From My Security Viewpoint 

From the security perspective, we should be enabling business to move faster with greater capabilities, and delivering more trustworthy products to market. Far too often we see ourselves as the ‘police’ for technology and must both limit usage and investigate incidents. Common sentiment is that security must weed out poorly trained employees, force adherence to security policy, and crush rebels who go rogue with caustic actions. This can easily cause unnecessary friction.    

Instead, security must be supportive of the end goals and work with developers and designers to weave protections into products in a proactive way. Security should help the organization build and operate technology in a more trustworthy way, to benefit all for a glorious republic.   

...and for the record, I don't wear my Vader mask in the office.     

Image source: https://www.linkedin.com/hp/update/6275139257103458304     

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