Ben is CTO and cofounder of Obsidian Security. He previously cofounded Carbon Black and most recently served as the company's chief security strategist. He has also has been a lecturer at University of Chicago’s Masters Program in Computer Science and a cybersecurity specialist at the National Security Agency (NSA) as well as serving on the board of a variety of security companies.

Key Minutes

1:30 The first time Ben heard of Cyber Security

4:00 What does cyber security mean to you?

6:40 Starting Carbon Black

9:15 Carbon Black reaching a global audience

10:58 Staying in front of your competitors

13:00 Why did you leave Carbon Black?

14:47 Starting Obsidian Security

19:45 What’s unique about Obsidian?

24:17 Being a CTO

27:40 Learning from previous lessons

31:42 Hiring strategy

35:27 Retaining high level talent

38:48 Standing out from the crowd

42:27 Democratising cyber security

54:30 Biggest tips for founders or entrepreneurs

56:30 Ten Quick Fire Questions

Key Points

- Take the approach of people first

- If you have 100 employees, that 100 people increases the risk because they are human

- When hiring we emphasis culture fit. You have to focus on character.

- If we don't retain our staff, its because we haven't created the right environment

You can find:

Conor on LinkedIn at: www.linkedin.com/in/conordsherman

Obsidian on Twitter at: @obsidiansec

Ben on Twitter at: @chicagoben

Follow us:

Twitter: @zero_hourpod

Instagram: @zerohourexperience

Website: www.karlsharman.com

This podcast is sponsored by:

BeecherMadden - www.beechermadden.com

Cyber Security Professionals - www.cybersecurity-professionals.com