This video series, highlights career opportunities in cyber security through the lens of the Canadian Cyber Security Skills Framework (CCSSF)link is external. Viewers will hear real stories from professionals at the Communications Security Establishment (CSE) and the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security (Cyber Centre) who work in each of the four categories below.
The series makes technical and strategic roles relatable, helping to explore pathways into Canada's cyber security workforce.
Learning Objectives
After watching the Cyber Career Awareness Week video series linked below, viewers should be able to:
- Describe the four Canadian Cyber Security Skills Framework link is external work categories.
- Identify and explain key skills required for different roles within the cyber security field.
- Reflect on their own strengths and interests, and how these may align with cyber security opportunities.
Videos
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Video 1: Introduction
Video 1: Introduction - Transcript
Welcome to Cyber Career Awareness Week, a celebration of the people, paths, and possibilities in the ever-evolving field of cyber security.
This video series is built around the Canadian Cyber Security Skills Framework, also known as the CCSSF, a comprehensive model developed by the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security.
Adapted from the U.S. NICE Framework, the Cyber Skills Framework provides a Canadian perspective on cyber security roles, competencies, and career pathways, helping address the workforce gap in this vital field.
This series is designed to help you discover where your skills and interests could fit within the field and explore the many paths to joining Canada's cyber security effort. You'll learn about both core cyber security roles and adjacent positions, all essential to protecting today's digital world.
The Cyber Skills Framework organizes careers into four key work categories.
- Oversee and Govern. The overarching responsibility for this occupational subgroup is leadership and management of the cyber security program. This includes technical and non-technical roles.
- Design and Develop. This occupational subgroup supports design and development of the digital infrastructure, systems, and software. This includes largely technical roles.
- Operate and Maintain. The primary responsibility of this occupational subgroup is ensuring secure operations of the digital systems and data management. All roles within this subgroup are technical roles.
- Protect and Defend. This occupational subgroup is focused on cyber security operations. All roles within this occupational subgroup are technical roles.
Through real stories of professionals across these work categories at the Communications Security Establishment, CSE, and the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, including technical experts, strategic thinkers, communicators, and problem solvers, you'll explore educational journeys, day-to-day responsibilities, and the challenges and rewards of the field.
Available in both of Canada's official languages, this series turns complex job descriptions into relatable stories, making cyber security careers easier to understand and imagine. It provides insight, inspiration, and practical guidance to help you take the first step toward your own career in cyber security.
Cyber Security is more than a job, it's a mission. No matter your strengths or background, there's a path for you to make a real impact.
Explore the roles, find your fit, and take your first step into this exciting, ever-evolving field.
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Video 2: Oversee and Govern
Video 2: Oversee and Govern - Transcript
Oversee and Govern
Now, get ready to dive into positions within the “Oversee and Govern” work category to learn more about the roles, what a typical day looks like, and advice for those starting out in this field.
The “Oversee and Govern” work category highlights the strategic leadership side of cyber security. These are the professionals who set the vision, define policies, manage risk, and ensure compliance across organizations. Their work ensures that cyber security efforts align with organizational objectives and that digital operations stay secure.
You'll encounter roles such as Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), Project Lead, Policy Analyst, Compliance Officer, Risk Manager, Privacy Officer, and Information System Security Officer (ISSO), and many more.
Across these positions, you may notice that several common themes across these roles. Let’s take a look:
Leading through policy, risk management, and compliance.
Continuously adapting to new technologies and evolving threats.
Translating complex cyber security concepts for diverse stakeholders.
Building strong collaborations and strong relationships as core enablers.
Problem-solving and strategic thinking as key competencies.
Career entry and growth without a strict technical path.
In short, the Oversee and Govern is all about connecting and directing cyber security efforts from a strategic perspective. Whether you're shaping policy, managing risk, or leading a team, these roles are essential to creating secure, resilient organizations!
Role 1:
Narrator: Let's meet Alex, our Senior Policy Analyst.
Alex: I typically work from 8 to 4 p.m. and begin my day by addressing the highest-priority tasks related to my files. As a Policy Analyst, there are four primary duties. Developing policies and providing clear guidelines to operational staff. Providing policy advice and guidance. Maintaining and ensuring internal policies remain evergreen. Reviewing and providing consultation on various government documents. The role is dual in nature, requiring both independent and collaborative work. Most days are fairly structured. However, analysts must be agile to ensure they can quickly pivot and prioritize files when urgent, ad hoc questions arise.
Education Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Alex: I have a master's degree in international affairs.
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear or is your background more unconventional?
Alex: I'd say mostly linear. Like many at CSE, I began my national defense career as a co-op student where I worked under both the cyber security and foreign intelligence aspects of CSE's mandate before accepting an opportunity in policy.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Alex: I'd always wanted to work in national security, and given the exponential growth of cyber threats emanating from adversarial national states, cyber criminals, state-sponsored advanced persistent threat groups, etc., a career in cyber security seemed like secure and rewarding opportunity.
Myths and Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Alex: That we are the policy police. In reality, we work very closely with operational areas to facilitate their activities and prevent possible contraventions of the CSE Act.
Narrator: What's the biggest challenge you're facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Alex: The biggest challenge is the proliferation of cyber tools and technology. It seems like every day, a new technology comes out that isn't covered in the existing policy framework. The best way we tackle this is through consistent dialogue with cyber operations and keeping policy principles broad enough to cover a wider breadth of activities.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Alex: The main one would be interpersonal skills. Sometimes an operator will come to you with a cool, fascinating idea, and you've got to shape that activity to fit within our mandate and legal constraints while also keeping them happy. It can be a delicate needle to thread.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Alex: For me, the best part is seeing an activity you've worked closely on effectively mitigating cyber threats to Canada and Canadians. Seeing it in real time is a unique experience.
Narrator: Could you elaborate on some of the most common or typical tasks you handle in your day-to-day work?
Alex: Everything from consulting operators on policy gaps, advising on cyber activities, creating educational projects and training sessions, and collaborating with adjacent teams on multi-dimensional questions.
Advice, Traits and Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Alex: Definitely problem-solving. Policy is all about someone coming to you with a complex problem and you figuring how it fits within the existing framework.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Alex: Read about international events, especially cyber-related, as much as possible. We're all news junkies at CSE, and learning more about the tools, techniques, and procedures of cyber activities, regardless of whether or not you have a technical background, will be an asset.
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Alex: Anything training that focuses on policy writing, or writing in general, is valuable.
Rewards and Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you've learned over your career?
Alex: You don't know what job you'll enjoy until you give it a try. There are many factors that contribute to job satisfaction, so it's paramount to try out a few roles, especially early on in your career.
Narrator: Thank you, Alex, for sharing with us.
Alex: My pleasure.
Role 2:
Narrator: Now let's take a look at the role of a supervisor within a program for operational compliance. Across the industry, you may also hear Compliance Analyst/Officer, Risk Manager, or Governance Specialist. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this role most closely aligns with Privacy Compliance Manager. No matter the title, the role helps ensure cyber practices follow policies and regulations to keep operations secure. Now that we've introduced the role, let's hear directly from Benoît, a supervisor within a program for operational compliance. They'll share their educational background, what a typical day looks like, and insights from their own career journey.
Benoît: Hi, I'm Benoît. On a typical day in my role, I need to sort through emails for every operating team in CSE either Cyberside or SIGINT. I either meet face-to-face or via MS Team with the teams who have questions about how they can be compliant with their activities. Once we have met, I gather the questions slash concerns. We consult with other teams such as policy, risk assessment team, legal services, etc. I write down our recommendations and send it to the team. Once the advice and guidance have been provided, I usually try to provide an assessment two years after the activity has been put in place to make sure everything is still compliant if there were some changes to some policies.
Education Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Benoît: College education, and professional training.
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Benoît: For myself, my career path was long and twisted. I started by studying in leisure then worked at a ski mountain as the activity coordinator. then went to public service with Health Canada for 20 years, doing all kinds things such as monkey-walker-slash-feeder, Admin Officer, Occupational Health and Safety Coordinator for the building, Acquisition Card Credit Card Auditor, Access to Information and Privacy Coordinator, then got recruited from CSE.
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Benoît: Received an email for an invitation for an interview to see if it would be a good match. Got the interview in the building and found it really interesting. Jumped into the challenge.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Benoît: One of my big things in life is rules are made for everybody to be efficient. We may need to modify it, but without rules it's anarchy. When they asked me if I would like to be part of the compliance team, how can I say no to that?
Myths and Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Benoît: That we are policy. We are not policy. We do not write policy. We are enablers. We are the Google map or Waze that will help you navigate through the policies.
Narrator: What's the biggest challenge you're facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Benoît: We are trying to keep up with the changes such as artificial intelligence, different tools that can be used. We need to have policy for that, so we can guide the operators through the changes and the new tools.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Benoît: The need to translate analyst words for everybody to understand. Sometimes analysts are so much in their tools that nobody talks like that, then we need to translate so senior management or other groups within CSE can understand. We make some connection between groups as well, because they work sometimes too much in silo.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Benoît: When analysts come with an idea, ask us how they can do it so they are compliant with the law and policies and then they put it together and it works.
Narrator: What kind of career progression or growth opportunities exist within your role?
Benoît: All kinds of opportunities, because everybody wants to have somebody in their team that knows the policy and rules. Because we are meeting every team within CSE, we always receive an offer from a team. You can go from a Compliance Analyst, to Advisor, Team Lead, Subject Matter Expert, or to be part of any team within CSE.
Narrator: Could you elaborate on some of the most common or typical tasks you handle in your day-to-day work?
Benoît: We need to provide advice and guidance via emails, outreach meetings. Sometimes we help groups when an incident happened and we help out to fix it. We help maintaining the respect of Canadians towards our organization.
Advice, Traits and Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Benoît: You need to appreciate the challenges. If everything would go as planned, we would not exist.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Benoît: Need to be ready to learn something new every day and ask questions.
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Benoît: How to Read and Interpreted Policies and Authorities, Compliance, and Transparency.
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job role and or domain?
Benoît: Compliance group, don't talk to them otherwise they will find something bad. We are not COP, we are POC, Program of Operation Compliance.
Rewards and Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you've learned over your career?
Benoît: Nothing is perfect, because it's driven by human beings. Human beings are not perfect, which is a great thing. That's where we learn collectively. We just need to remember our collective learning experience.
Narrator: Do you have a favorite success story?
Benoît: Mainly is for the people who are learning the second official language. Don't be afraid to talk in your second language. People will help you out. If they start to laugh at you, you know not to trust them. I was playing golf with two assistant deputy minister and one director general. I was not that good with my English at the time. Every time that I was doing a good shot, I was turning around and wanted to tell them, it's up to you to beat that, but it came out up yours. The three men just smiled at me, but never said anything. The next day I explained it to my wife, and she explained to me what I just said. I called back to their offices and all three said, "We knew that you didn't want to say that, but we didn't know how to translate in French." Everybody got a good laugh.
Narrator: Have you encountered any significant obstacles or setbacks along the way? How did you overcome them, and were there any mentors, people, or experiences that helped you throughout?
Benoît: Yes, one man told me, you will always remember the people that you have worked with, but rarely you will remember the file you have worked on. Take care of the people around you first, then focus on the file.
Narrator: Thank you, Benoît, for sharing with us.
Benoît: Anytime.
Role 3:
Narrator: We are now going to look at a position that is internally referred to as a Program Oversight Senior Manager, but within the Cyber Skills Framework. It maps to the roles of Program Manager or Security Manager. Across the industry, you may also hear titles like Cyber Security Lead or Operations Manager. No matter the title, the role is about providing direction and oversight to ensure cyber programs are effective, aligned, and secure. For the final spotlight, let's hear from Terri-Lynn, a professional in this role, as they share their educational background, a day in their life, their career journey, and advice for those looking to enter the field.
Terri-Lynn: Hi there. My day kicks off with a strong coffee and a scan through overnight emails, a quick check-in for urgent requests, flagged risks, or any developments that may shift the day's priorities. No two days are identical, but that's part of the draw. By mid-morning, the calendar fills with cross-functional meetings, aligning deliverables with key stakeholders across the cyber center and ensuring that the risk lens is firmly embedded in all program areas. Whether it's refining governance frameworks or supporting the rollout of a new initiative, collaboration is constant. A good portion of time is also spent reviewing and approving risk products, performance measurement dashboards, assessments, or strategic briefs that will go on to inform high-level decision-making. Between briefings with executives and real-time problem-solving with the team, there's a satisfying rhythm to balancing the planned with the unexpected. Tools like Power BI, risk registers, and internal dashboards are always open in the background, but it's the conversations, the trust built with the team and with partners, that drive the work forward. Leadership here isn't about command and control, it's about empowering others, asking the right questions, and making space for new ideas. Of course, not everything goes as scheduled. There's usually a hiccup, sometimes it's a last-minute briefing request or risk assessment, there is always a role to play in keeping things moving, unblocking issues, pulling the right people together, and making sure leadership has what they need to make informed decisions. It's all part of the rhythm, and honestly, it keeps things interesting. And when the laptop finally closes the energy doesn't drop, it just shifts. Whether it's heading outdoors for some fresh air, planning the next winter getaway, or finding that next big challenge, the drive to explore never really shuts off. Because leading in cyber security isn't just a job, it's a daily adventure. And this role? It's just getting started.
Education Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Terri-Lynn: I studied in business administration.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Terri-Lynn: What first drew me to cyber security was the pace, how quickly things evolve, how no two days ever look the same. It's a space where you're constantly learning, thinking ahead, and adapting in real time. I was especially drawn to the mix of strategic thinking and just enough technical depth to stay curious. There's something incredibly rewarding about helping teams navigate complex risks, knowing the work supports big-picture decisions that really matter.
Myths and Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Terri-Lynn: It's a common myth that you need a degree in computer science to work in cyber security, but that couldn't be further from the truth. While technical roles are essential, the field also relies heavily on people who bring strengths in strategy, risk, communication, and governance. Cyber Security is about understanding complex challenges, connecting the dots, and helping stakeholders make smart, informed decisions, and that takes a wide range of skill sets.
Advice, Traits and Certifications
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Terri-Lynn: Approach everything with curiosity, especially the things you don't fully understand right away. It's okay to sit with a challenge before jumping into action. Taking a moment to think it through often leads to better outcomes. And remember, you're not in it alone. Lean on your colleagues, ask questions, and learn from their experience. Collaboration is one of the most powerful tools you have.
Rewards and Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you've learned over your career?
Terri-Lynn: One of the most valuable lessons I've learned in my career is not to let ego get in the way of progress. Early on, it's easy to take feedback personally or feel like you have to prove yourself in every room, but growth comes when you learn to separate your sense of self from your work. Not every decision or comment is about you, and that's a good thing. Letting go of ego creates space to really listen, to learn and to build stronger relationships. The work gets better, and so do you.
Narrator: Thank you, Terri-Lynn, for sharing with us.
Terri-Lynn: You're most welcome.
Narrator: As you've heard from Alex, Benoît, and Terri-Lynn, careers in oversee and govern are as diverse as they are impactful. Each role brings its own challenges and rewards, but together they shape the direction, strength, and resilience of an organization's cyber security position. If you're interested in strategy, leadership, and making decisions that influence the bigger picture, this could be the path for you.
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Video 3: Design and Develop
Video 3: Design and Develop - Transcript
Narrator: Next, let’s explore the Design and Develop work category. This area supports the design and development of digital infrastructure, systems and software that keep systems secure and resilient. This is a highly technical branch of cyber security work. Professionals here develop and shape the infrastructure, software, and tools that enable organizations to operate safely in today’s connected world ensuring that security is integrated from the outset.
Narrator: Roles in this domain include Security Architects, Software Developers, Network Engineers, Security Engineer/Technologists, Security Testing & Evaluation Specialists, Operational Technology Systems Analyst, Supply Chain Security Analysts, Information Systems Security Developers, Secure Software Assessors, Security Automation Engineer/Analysts, Cryptographers/Cryptanalysts and more.
Narrator: Across these positions, you may notice that several common themes emerge. Let’s take a look:
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- Building secure systems and software from the ground up
- Balancing innovation with protection
- Anticipating vulnerabilities during the design process
- Working closely with diverse teams to bring technical visions to reality
Narrator: At its core, Design and Develop is about creativity and precision — developing digital systems that are not only functional, but resilient against the threats of tomorrow!
Role 1:
Narrator: Now, let’s step into the daily world of a Software Developer—exploring what their work looks like and what guidance they can offer to new entrants in this field. Across the industry, you may also hear similar titles like Software Programmer or Software Engineer.
Narrator: No matter the title, the role is about designing and developing secure systems and software, ensuring that architecture decisions align with both business needs and security requirements.
Narrator: Behind every role is a story—the journey of how someone got there, the challenges they faced, and the advice they have for those just starting out. Let’s hear from Alex, a Software Developer, as they share their perspective on building a career in cyber security.
Alex: Hi, I'm Alex. As a software dev in SIGINT, I work on a team with five other developers and a team lead. Together, we maintain an internal data processing platform to support other user-facing teams. Most of my day is spent working on tickets to improve our system, but I also need to respond to client requests and monitor our staging and production environments. Most of my work would be applicable at any large software organization. I use open source tooling, I write in languages like Java and Python, and I deploy my team's code on Kubernetes. However, the SIGINT context makes my work exciting. I'm often faced with unique challenges and impressive capabilities that I wouldn't see anywhere else. I learn a lot of transferable skills, but I'm applying those skills to things you wouldn't see anywhere else. My team has a daily stand-up meeting to catch up and check in. Otherwise, I have weekly one-on-one meetings with my team lead and weekly sprint planning meetings where we discuss future work. We'd also work closely with our Five Eyes partners, U.S., U.K., New Zealand, and Australia. And my team has annual opportunities to visit and collaborate in person with those partners.
Educational Background
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Alex: I have a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science.
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear or is your background more unconventional?
Alex: I always knew I wanted to be a developer, and I started at CSE as a co-op during university.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Alex: I didn't know about CSE until they visited my university and gave a presentation. At the end I asked the presenter, on a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you feel like James Bond at work? He said that on a normal day, it'd be about a 4, but some days he feels like it's a 9.
Myths and Challenges
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Alex: Being new to the industry, I was surprised at how valuable social skills are. There's so many opportunities for collaboration, and we all need to work as a team to keep moving forward. Every day, I'm communicating with clients, collaborating with other teams in the org, and helping my teammates with their tasks, or getting help myself. It's a very social environment, and there's plenty of opportunities to make friends like sports leagues, department movie nights, and lunchtime board games.
Advice, Traits and Certifications
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Alex: Don't be afraid to get involved with problems outside your immediate team. I've loved contributing to cross-team projects, and it's helped me expand my skills and challenge myself. People notice when you're regularly contributing to those initiatives, and it doesn't take much to be seen as an expert.
Rewards and Growth
Narrator: Do you have a favorite success story?
Alex: CSE has various annual innovation conferences where teams develop prototypes of new tools or new projects over two weeks. I recently was a co-captain for one of these events. I didn't feel experienced enough or qualified to do it, but I signed up and ended up co-leading a team of 23 people. It challenged me, but things went incredibly well, and I had a fantastic time. I learned so much, I got to try so many new things, and our final project impressed a lot of people.
Narrator: Thank you, Alex, for sharing with us.
Alex: My pleasure.
Role 2:
Narrator: Let’s take a closer look at a Technical Supervisor in Mission Integration. You may notice that some roles have different titles within organizations and roles such as this could also fall under Software Development and/or Management roles, among others. No matter the title, the role is about embedding security requirements throughout the design and development process—ensuring that systems are both functional and resilient. Now that we’ve introduced the role, let’s hear directly from Shay, a Technical Supervisor within a Mission Integration team. They’ll share their educational background, what a typical day looks like, and insights from their own career journey.
Shay: My day always begins by greeting those around me before reviewing my daily calendar and emails. I focus on emails I can address quickly and immediately, and flag those which need to be addressed later. I next review my team’s client support and internal chat channels to orient myself on what is happening with our system and where immediate guidance is needed – such as addressing an outage or escalation of tickets. Afterwards, I join my team, and we go for a walk to refill our coffees before we gather in a common area and have a daily standup. At standup we identify what tasks everyone will focus on that day, I answer questions and provide guidance as needed, and I share what updates or kudos I have from management, as well as my meeting schedule. The rest of my day is split up between meetings with clients or management, backlog refinement and prioritization, team management tasks, issuing communications to clients and partners, escalating requirements to our enablers, providing mentorship to team members and colleagues, monitoring client support and internal chat channels, and generally addressing any roadblocks or challenges that are preventing my team from moving forward. I spend 50% of my time on routine work, 40% on problem-solving or strategy, and 10% on unexpected challenges.
Educational Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Shay: BA with Honours in Geography and Geomatics, and Post-graduate Certificate in Geospatial Intelligence
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Shay: My path was very non-linear or unconventional. I began my career in Foreign Intelligence as an intelligence analyst and worked my way up to becoming first a strategic advisor to and then supervisor within the area which originally hired me. Because I was viewed as highly specialized, I sought opportunities to diversify my experience beginning with applying and being accepted to an internal training program to develop operations managers. Through that program I was offered the opportunity to join the teams responsible for establishing the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, from strategy to employee and system movements, to building construction and fit-up projects. Once established, I joined the program management office of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security where I was a strategic advisor then supervisor to teams responsible for business planning, performance measurement and reporting, and recruitment. After a few years, I returned to Foreign Intelligence and stood up a team responsible for providing training and accreditation to cyber operators, before moving into software development as the supervisor in Mission Integration. My job roles have evolved from intelligence analyst to project management to business analysis to software development.
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Shay: It was an internal training program in operations management that I became a cyber incident manager, followed by joining the team which established the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, that I got started in cyber security. I have worked on cyber incident response, strategy and organizational development, and business and performance management.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Shay: I was interested in the opportunity to provide critical services to Canadians. The cyber security industry faces constant demands and threats and there are many touch points with day-to-day life in Canadians, from banking to healthcare and personal information security.
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Shay: The biggest myth about being in software development is that all you do is write code. Especially in government, many teams don’t have the benefit of business and project management support or client engagement teams. There are opportunities for software developers to remain hands-on or become experts in their products, but it is also necessary to have a role in client engagement and in communicating with our enablers such as system security and infrastructure managers.
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job role and or domain?
Shay: Additionally, a common myth is that the team supervisor needs to be an expert in what that team does. While that can bring benefits, it’s easy to fall into the trap of being too hands on, for example, hiding away from challenging tasks and just working on code. If you are the team leader or supervisor, you need to be willing to address the team’s needs such as managing conflict, providing mentorship, and being their voice in management and client circles, while also giving them the space to grow and develop their technical skills and expertise. Finding that balance is important.
Narrator: What’s the biggest challenge you’re facing in your role or project(s) right now and how are you tackling it?
Shay: Our main challenge is that our team has shrunk but provides an essential service to our clients that we must maintain. At the same time, demand has increased significantly which has pushed our software to it’s limits and takes time away from development while we support newly onboarded clients. Our strategy is to be clear about what workload we can manage, make necessary system improvements which will make it easier for us to maintain and easier for our clients to adopt while reducing the amount of time we spend onboarding them. We are also working with our infrastructure partners to improve our hardware and software so that we can meet demand which will reduce the risk of intermittent outages. I personally play a big role in the workload balance and job satisfaction of my team members and am careful to ensure they have clear priorities, communicate our capacity with clients and management, provide professional development opportunities, and listen to my team when they have concerns.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Shay: I am always happy to hear that the system my team has built, which is an automation platform for end-to-end and security testing, has helped our clients by saving them time or catching small things they had overlooked. I've heard directly from clients that tasks which would take hours have been reduced to minutes, or that they dedicated several years of work writing software which didn't work as expected, but that our system helped them to quickly understand why and how to fix it. Knowing that clients are finding measurable value as a result of our work is the best feeling a software development team can have.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Shay: Be communicative! Software development is a team sport and it’s important to contribute your knowledge and ideas to help shape interesting projects and products. Also remember that everyone has a different background and experience and it’s important to learn from each other. It's true that not everyone is an extrovert, and there are lots of introverts in our field, but it's important to still try to find ways to reach others.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Shay: Be humble about what you don’t know and be honest about what you do know. Recognize that you have lots to learn but that you also have lots to offer.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned over your career?
Shay: One of the most important lessons for me has been to realize that doors close throughout your career, sometimes for reasons outside of your control. But a closed door has two sides and if you take a moment to reflect on the room you are in, you might be surprised to find that it is a new room after all.
Narrator: Have you encountered any significant obstacles or setbacks along the way? How did you overcome them, and were there any mentors, people or experiences that helped you throughout?
Shay: I’ve had many setbacks where I was passed over for opportunities that interested me. At first I struggled with feeling bitter or that my work wasn’t good enough. I overcame them by self-reflection and finding new pathways which pushed me into unfamiliar territory, and along the way I have had numerous mentors and supporters. Going through periods of struggle forced me to reckon with my weaknesses but also to discover my strengths – some of which surprised me, who would have thought the kid who was terrified of classroom presentations could have fun as public speaker for career and personal growth topics? Ultimately, I am a more well-rounded and resilient employee today with a vast professional network and lots of stories of interesting work I've done. The winding path has turned out to be the most humbling and interesting path.
Narrator: Thank you Shay for sharing with us.
Shay: Anytime
Narrator: The design and develop domain is all about building, innovating, and creating.
Narrator: Professionals like Alex and Shay show that there's no single path into cyber security, just curiosity, teamwork, and a drive to make systems stronger.
Narrator: Every idea counts, and the next big breakthrough could start with you.
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Video 4: Operate and Maintain
Video 4: Operate and Maintain - Transcript
Narrator: Let’s move into the Operate and Maintain domain. This category is all about keeping systems running smoothly and securely day after day. Professionals here are the guardians of digital operations and data management, making sure that data, networks, and infrastructure remain reliable and protected.
Narrator: Across the domain, you’ll encounter roles such as System Administrators, Data Analysts, System Managers, Network Operations Specialist, Identity Management and Authentication Support Specialists, Encryption/Key Management Support Specialists, and Technical Support Specialists. These professionals ensure that the systems people rely on every day continue to function without interruption.
Narrator: Across these positions, you may notice that several common themes emerge. Let’s take a look:
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- Monitoring and maintaining the health of digital systems
- Responding quickly to technical issues or disruptions
- Ensuring compliance with security protocols
- Supporting users and enabling safe, efficient operations
Narrator: Simply put, Operate and Maintain is about ensuring that everything behind the scenes stays secure, functional, and dependable.
Role 1:
Narrator: Let’s begin with a Senior Principal Cyber Security Technical Advisor. Across the industry, you may also hear similar titles such as Senior Security Consultant or Cyber Security Advisor, and in the Cyber Skills Framework this position overlaps with multiple roles including Cyber Technical Support Specialists, Data Analyst and Software Developer.
Narrator: At its core, this position is about providing shaping strategy, mentoring teams, and bridging the gap between executives and analysts—ensuring security operations stay sharp, resilient, and future-ready.
Narrator: Behind every role is a journey. Let’s hear from Chuck, our Senior Principal Cyber Security Technical Advisor as they share their path, challenges, and advice for those starting out in this fast-moving field.
Chuck: As one of the Principals in Cyber Defence, my job is to help the different areas, SMEs (Subject Matter Experts), Tech advisors, Executives and analysts/developers to perform their job better. I engage with all of them using different mediums and capture their challenge and identify strategic decision the directorate can take to improve the efficiency of their solutions delivery. I act as the chain of our Architecture Board and Security Practitioners ensuring architecture synergy and efficiency, as well as security and compliance of our entire business pipeline. I also act as an analyst and developer for a small percentage of my working hours in order to keep my skills up-to-date and staying proficient and relevant in order to get a thorough understanding of the daily lives of our analysts and developers. So I use the same tools and perform the same duties as our cyber analysts but at a much smaller pace. I also act as a SME across the directorate to provide support, mentoring, coaching and teaching to all our staff. Principals are the hierarchically highest position one can reach within our organization on the technical side (rather than management side) so you need a good depth of knowledge and experience in order to make a meaningful impact across the directorate.
Educational Background & Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Chuck: I have a computer science bachelor degree
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Chuck: Unconventional since I started my career in the early days of Cyber Security. There wasn't any education available back then that focused on it so most of my knowledge today stemmed from experience. I started as a System Administrator then move into a cryptanalyst position to then jump into Cyber Security.
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Chuck: Within our organization. A new area dedicated to Cyber Security was being created and was fortunate enough to secure one of the 3 spots in it.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Chuck: I like the creative aspect of cyber security and the problem solving angle. It's challenging, ever changing thus ever learning. It is discouraging at times when you face complex challenges but you get the utmost satisfaction when you succeed. I like the fact that in order to be successful, you need to combine your creative/arty side with your scientific one.
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What’s the biggest challenge you’re facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Chuck: As a strategic advisor, encouraging the different teams to push the envelope, be more strategic and handle change more effectively.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Chuck: People and soft skills. Even if it is primarily a technical position, the engagement with everyone makes people/soft skills a MUST.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Chuck: I love the feeling of helping other and I draw a lot of pride and satisfaction seeing them succeed.
Narrator: What kind of career progression or growth opportunities exist within your role?
Chuck: From a Senior principal Tech Advisor, the next logical step would be to become a Chief Technology Officer but our government environment doesn't facilitate that. Most would leave the GoC and explore options in the private sector.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Chuck: Leadership. As an advisor, you do not have any decisional power; All you have is influence so your leadership skills have to shine in order to rally people behind your proposed solutions.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Chuck: Love of learning! It's a must if you want to succeed and progress in the field! But it never gets dull!
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Chuck: I didn't receive any but experience is key; primarily for the creative/art side of the tasks!
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned over your career?
Chuck: The cyber security field is VAST. You won't ever be able to master all its aspects. So working closely with a team to divide and conquer is key for broad success. The people you work with are KEY to your success and happiness! More than the tasks themselves.
Narrator: Do you have a favourite success story?
Chuck: One of my hires, someone I coached and help grow is now a Deputy Minister.
Narrator: Have you encountered any significant obstacles or setbacks along the way? How did you overcome them, and were there any mentors, people or experiences that helped you throughout?
Chuck: Being in a team that celebrates your success rather than wanting to steal your spotlight. Picking the people you work with has more impact on your success and happiness than the tasks assigned to your position, in my opinion, I can easily find satisfaction in learning anything/performing almost any tasks when surrounded by good coworkers.
Narrator: Thank you Chuck for sharing with us.
Chuck: My pleasure.
Role 2:
Narrator: Next, consider a Technical Training & Promotion Coordinator. Across the industry, this role may also be known as Help Desk Coordinator or Training & Awareness Lead. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this is also referred to as a Technical Support Specialist.
Narrator: No matter the title, the role is about supporting users, resolving technical issues, and promoting security best practices so that operations remain safe and efficient.
Narrator: Let’s hear from Nicole, a Technical Training & Promotion Coordinator as they share their perspective on building a career in cyber security.
Nicole: Hi, I'm Nicole. On a typical day in my role may include: answer any client's coordination or course requests or questions; verify our voicemails and get back to clients within a reasonable time; analyze new client accounts on our Learning Management System and approve them according to our course eligibility criteria; ensure the coordination of each course on our schedule (prerequisites, security clearance requirements, placing print requests, sending calendar invitations, classroom set-up, taking attendance, course billing and sending invoices); ensure in-class and virtual courses are running smoothly; adding course and participant information in our dashboard to keep track of tendencies and data we can analyze for service improvements; cancel or modify courses and notify participants; update instructors and contractors about their upcoming course schedule; review our public-facing website and ensure all information is accurate and up-to-date; draft and send quarterly newsletters to all clients; create our yearly public course calendar; review our annual strategic marketing plan; develop and maintain procedures and SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures).
Nicole: Notable things to note about my job: organization and timeliness is key! The only way our course schedule can run smoothly is if every detail is coordinated in a timely manner. Creativity can shine! If you love to design or develop visuals for marketing strategies, this job has a touch of this aspect. Learn to write and communicate. This position allows you to work on your writing skills and communicating with clients to provide excellent customer service.
Educational Background & Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Nicole: I have a B.A. in B.Ed., and I'm also currently working on a graphic design certification.
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Nicole: Very unconventional. I was previously an elementary school teacher, but I've always had a love for coordinating events from my childhood. So I made the leap to join the Cyber Center, and it's been one of the greatest decisions of my life.
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Nicole: A common myth about a training and promotion coordinator is that our role is limited to just scheduling training sessions and booking rooms. Our role is strategic, not just administrative. We're key players in shaping the logistics and services behind the scenes.
Narrator: What's the biggest challenge you're facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Nicole: The biggest challenge we face in our day-to-day, I would say, is ensuring timeliness on all ongoing demands from group training requests, as well as our regular course training schedule.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Nicole: I would say the most unexpected skill I use is collaboration with other government departments and subject matter experts, but it's a great challenge.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Nicole: The most rewarding part about my job is when I receive remarks from clients for our great services.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Nicole: I think the most important personality traits or strengths are to be curious and always willing to learn, having great communication skills, written and oral, having problem-solving abilities, empathy for certain circumstances, adaptability, and innovation.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Nicole: My piece of advice is, don't worry too much about knowing everything at the start. You will learn as you go. Focus on understanding our process and getting to know your teammates and the rest you will learn along the way.
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Nicole: I think Excel training is important and any skills that I've previously mentioned that aren't the person's strengths and could be improved.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you've learned over your career?
Nicole: I think the most important lesson I've learned over my careers is collaboration is the shortcut. You don't have to know everything, you just need to know how to ask, share, and learn together. Working across disciplines and learning from others accelerates growth and innovation.
Narrator: Have you encountered any significant obstacles or setbacks along the way? How did you overcome them, and were there any mentors, people, or experiences that helped you throughout?
Nicole: There are multiple small obstacles when it comes to coordinating the logistics behind course delivery. The best way to overcome them is by communicating with teammates and analyzing different solutions.
Narrator: Thank you, Nicole, for sharing with us.
Nicole: Anytime.
Role 3:
Narrator: Finally, let’s take a look at a Senior Cyber Engagement Analyst. Across the industry, you may also see similar titles like Cyber Engagement Analyst or Operations Analyst. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this position touches on a few different roles such as Data Analyst, Information Manager, and Information systems security manager- cyber security operations.
Narrator: No matter the title, the role is about managing and maintaining systems—ensuring that servers, applications, and infrastructure remain secure, reliable, and up to date.
Narrator: Now for the final spotlight, let’s hear from Greg, a professional in this role as they share their educational background, a day in their life, their career journey, and advice for those looking to enter the field.
Greg: Hi, I'm Greg. My day-to-day duties involve the coordination of multi-agency responses to significant cyber security incidents and vulnerabilities affecting the Government of Canada and Canadian Critical Infrastructure entities.
Greg: If we're responding to an active incident, we'll establish Operations in line with the applicable frameworks: the Cyber Incident Response Plan and the Cyber Security Event Management Plan.
Greg: In support of the frameworks in place, during Operations I am typically supporting analytical exchange meetings between internal Cyber Centre and CSE teams and facilitating operational coordination between Government of Canada Security and Intelligence stakeholders to identify, in accordance with our various mandates, where we can assist in the resolution of identified issues.
Greg: I make full use of collaboration and information management tools such as Microsoft Teams, Outlook, to track updates and produce high quality situational briefing products informed by my technical knowledge and experience. Depending on the severity of the event, we may produce multiple reports a day to ensure technical resources and decision makers alike are kept up to date regarding situations that can be very dynamic, such as responding to active ransomware threats.
Greg: Outside of active incidents, which can be at varying levels of intensity, my duties also include the production of after-action reports for completed Operations, which serve to identify opportunities to improve and inform the Cyber Centre and the Government of Canada's ability to mitigate the impacts of cyber security incidents and vulnerabilities.
Educational Background & Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Greg: I have my master's in Infrastructure Protection and International Security, GIAC Certified Intrusion Analyst
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Greg: I'd say it's a bit unconventional given that my undergraduate degree was in Political Science and World Languages and that it was only during my Masters degree that I got the chance to take my first formal cyber security course. That being said, I've always been interested in learning about technology, and growing up I was the typical "Family Tech Support" when it came to computers and gadgets.
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Greg: I had applied to a different job in the organization, and in the course of the application process a team from the Cyber Centre reached out to inquire if I'd be interested in a role providing frontline support to Canadian citizens and organizations by way of the Cyber Centre's public phone lines and email intake. What I thought would be a foot in the door to the role I'd initially sought turned into 2 years on that intake team, during which time I became very familiar with the cyber security advice and guidance materials that I'd been providing to the public.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Greg: What piqued my interest was the ability to bridge my understanding of technical materials with my aptitude for the more conventional analyst work such as report writing and briefing senior officials. Finding out how dynamic the field of cyber security operations would end up being was an added bonus!
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Greg: I think a common myth about cyber security incident response is that better tools will automatically lead to better security. I would say that it's much more important to have better processes, in the sense that it doesn't matter as much what specific firewall or Intrusion Detection System (IDS) a client is using to prevent and detect malicious activity, when they don't have robust log retention policies, aren't regularly validating their backups, and providing easier ways for their employees to recognize and report phishing attempts.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Greg: Curiosity
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Greg: If someone was starting out in an operational coordination role, I would recommend that you get a sense of the information flows that exist in your domain. What information do your stakeholders need to execute their tasks? How does that information get to them? Do they source it themselves, or do they rely on specific inputs from other teams? Does the way in which they receive that information line up with their requirements? What policies affect what information they have access to and how they are meant to access it? Where do you fit in in the midst of all this? I think by asking those questions, you can get a good sense of how you can approach the work. Some coordinators are very good at translating technical material produced by analysts into key points for policymakers, some are great at organizing the information in such a way that they can readily identify chokepoints in the information flow and propose ways to fix them, and others are very good at facilitating the conversations that need to happen between teams. I think this is distinct from how technically proficient someone is when starting out, but I think increasing your understanding of technical matters will only help you with these sorts of tasks.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned over your career?
Greg: No problem at work is so big that it needs to come home with you.
Narrator: Do you have a favourite success story?
Greg: My favourite success story was supporting the secure delivery of the 2025 General Election. It took a lot of effort from folks across the federal government - especially from Elections Canada - but ultimately our preparedness, collaboration, and established processes enabled us to effectively deliver on our collective mission.
Narrator: Thank you, Greg for sharing with us.
Greg: You're welcome.
Narrator: The Operate and Maintain domain keeps the digital world running securely, smoothly, and without interruption. Professionals like Chuck, Nicole, and Greg show us that behind every secure system are people who lead, adapt, and collaborate. Whether you're solving problems, supporting users, or managing incidents, every action counts in keeping Canada's cyber ecosystem strong.
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Video 5: Protect and Defend
Video 5: Protect and Defend - Transcript
Narrator: Finally, let’s explore the Protect and Defend work category. This is the frontline of cyber security, where professionals actively safeguard systems, detect threats, and respond to incidents. It’s the fast-paced, high-stakes world of defending digital environments in real time.
Roles here include Information Systems Security Managers, Cyber Security Operations Managers, Vulnerability Analysts, Cyber Security Technicians, Cyber Security Operations Analysts, Incident Responders/Handlers, Penetration Testers, and Digital Forensics Analysts. These professionals are constantly scanning for vulnerabilities, investigating suspicious activity, and neutralizing risks before they can cause harm.
Common Themes Across Domains:
Narrator: Across these positions, you may notice that several common themes emerge. Let’s take a look:
- Vigilance in monitoring and detecting threats
- Rapid response to incidents and breaches
- Hands-on testing and evaluation of systems
- Collaboration with other teams to strengthen defenses
At its heart, Protect and Defend is about action — keeping systems, data, and people safe from those who would exploit them.
Role 1:
Narrator: Now let’s take a look at the role of a Subject Matter Expert in Incident Handling. Across the industry, you may also hear similar titles like Incident Response Lead or Cyber Security Operations Supervisor. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this aligns with the role of an Incident Responder.
Narrator: At its core, the position is about leading teams that detect, investigate, and contain security incidents. These professionals coordinate response efforts, guide analysts through complex investigations, and ensure that threats are neutralized quickly to protect systems and data. It’s a role that demands both technical expertise and strong leadership under pressure.
Narrator: Now that we’ve introduced the role, let’s hear directly from Rene, a Subject Matter Expert in Incident Handling, as they share their perspective on building a career in cyber security.
Rene: A typical day in my role starts with lots of reading. Catching up on news, events, and more for situational awareness. Lots of meetings as the Subject Matter Expert. Lots of answering complicated questions. Special projects, collaboration, conferences, speaking engagements, exercises and more. I rarely do much technical work anymore. Mostly it's leadership, informal mentoring, guidance and so on.
Educational Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Rene: I studied Electrical Engineering
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Rene: Linear. Marine Engineer then moved to IT. I level up to infrastructure, then security.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Rene: I loved computers at an early age and had a knack for it!
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What’s the biggest challenge you’re facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Rene: Staffing. 100% Very hard to find the right fit and skills.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Rene: Communication. Never thought I'd have to talk this much.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Rene: Helping Canadians, stopping the bad guys, and my team.
Narrator: What kind of career progression or growth opportunities exist within your role?
Rene: Unlimited if you have the right skills and energy.
Narrator: Could you elaborate on some of the most common or typical tasks you handle in your day-to-day work?
Rene: Many questions we have to answer have nothing to do with incident handling but the organization structure: who does what, where do the questions go, who has the answers and more.
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job role and or domain?
Rene: That you need to be some kind of technical superhero to work with us. On our team, attitude, confidence, ability to learn and being a team player is more important than the tech skills.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Rene: Problem solving skills. Never give up. You need to be clever and adaptive. You need to be easy to work and non-confrontational even though you may not agree with everything.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Rene: Keep learning, keep playing with tech, tools and more.
Rene: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Rene: NONE! I feel this is another misleading assumption. Unless you're focusing intensely at one thing, on the job training, shadowing smart colleagues, listening and absorbing will be the best way to learn.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: Do you have a favourite success story?
Rene: Because I do lots of presenting and public speaking hearing people use my personal "buzz terms" is the best! Imitation is the best form of flattery.
Narrator: Have you encountered any significant obstacles or setbacks along the way? How did you overcome them, and were there any mentors, people or experiences that helped you throughout?
Rene: Sometimes people don't work well with others. Finding work-arounds, escalation when needed and figuring it out. I was very lucky to have very senior government execs as mentors and friends.
Narrator: Thank you, Rene for sharing with us.
Rene: Of course.
Role 2:
Narrator: Next, let’s explore the role of a Supervisor of a Detection Engineering Team. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this aligns with the Vulnerability Assessment Analyst and Cyber Security Operations Analyst roles.
Narrator: No matter the title, the role is about designing and improving tools and techniques that detect threats, guiding teams to identify vulnerabilities and malicious activity before they cause harm. It’s a mix of leadership, technical expertise, and innovation.
Narrator: Now that we’ve introduced the role, let’s hear directly from Joey, our Detection Engineering Team Supervisor as they share insights on building strong defenses and leading teams in this dynamic field.
Joey: Hi! I'm Joey. My job is highly operational and my routine will differ depending on the crisis of the day. I will start my day by reviewing the cyber security news to be up to date with the recent exploited vulnerabilities, potential cyber attack trends and latest breakthroughs in detection engineering research. This helps prioritize the work that will be accomplished by the entire team where the ultimate goal is to prevent, detect and mitigate cyber attacks against the clients and partners of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security.
Educational Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Joey: I have a Bachelor in I.T. Engineering, DEC (Cégep) in Techniques de l'informatique
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Joey: Participated in Capture The Flag (CTF) competitions.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Joey: One of my personality traits is to always question status quo. I applied this concept to I.T. by questioning if systems were truly doing what they were expected to. This was my gateway into cyber security.
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Joey: There are 2 types of organizations: those that have had a cyber security incident and those that will have a cyber security incident. You can't prevent 100% of those and it is naive to believe that you are not a target.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Joey: Public speaking. Cyber Security is not a solo job and knowledge sharing is key to progress in the industry.
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Joey: Our physical life is greatly impacted by connected systems and knowing that I participate in safeguarding the wellbeing of Canadians and people in Canada by protecting these critical systems is truly rewarding.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Joey: Be curious and accept that you don't know everything.
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Joey: Nothing beats applying your knowledge by participating in your computer science club or in Capture The Flag / Hack-a-thon. Artificial Intelligence will not have the answer to everything so you need to work on developing your own critical mind.
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Joey: A college or university degree in a field related to computer science. Certifications are for your personal growth but don't make the mistake of locking yourself into a single vendor's technology.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned over your career?
Joey: Having an employer that respects my work-life balance is critical. While my job happens to also be my passion, I find it important to live a fulfilling life outside of the office.
Narrator: Thank you, Joey for sharing with us.
Joey: My pleasure.
Role 3:
Narrator: To end off, let’s look at the role of a Cyber Analyst. Across industry, this position might also be called a SOC Analyst, Threat Hunter, or Detection Analyst. In the Cyber Skills Framework, this can be referred to as the Cyber Security operations analyst role.
Narrator: Cyber Analysts are the frontline. No matter the title, the role is about monitoring and analyzing cyber threats, triaging incidents, and ensuring that security events are detected, investigated, and resolved quickly. Analysts also track emerging threats and work with their teams to continuously improve defenses.
Narrator: In the final spotlight, let’s hear from Charlie, a Cyber Analyst, about their journey and advice for starting in cyber security.
Charlie: Hi, I'm Charlie. I typically begin my day by checking alert feeds generated by in-house analytics and triaging alerts that came in over the course of the previous night, or evening. Triaging, in this case, constitutes quickly examining new alerts to identifying obvious or especially concerning incidents, prioritizing those incidents, investigating the host activity related to the alerts, and producing reports for affected partners. This process is dynamic, and can vary greatly depending on our initial findings, additional client requests, reporting from partners, ongoing operations, and recently discovered vulnerabilities. In some cases, I will spend the majority of my day investigating a single, especially complex or novel, incident. Beyond that, my day will consist of some time spent reading cyber security news feeds and reports to learn about current threats and trends. I will then spend a few hours exploring our host data based on what I've learned from these feeds to discover new possible compromises and share my findings with team members to help develop new detections for alerting. I enjoy working as a cyber analyst because there are always new challenges and problem-solving is our routine work.
Educational Background and Career Journey
Narrator: What is your educational background?
Charlie: High school, 3 years University History/Philosophy, a multitude of professional short courses for cyber security.
Narrator: Was your career path to get here linear, or is your background more unconventional?
Charlie: Perhaps a mix of the two. While I had done some minimal programming courses in highschool, I studied philosophy and history in university before quite suddenly deciding that it wasn't for me. From there I sailed as a member of the Canadian Forces for a few years, it was there that I first started to really work with computers. After that I gravitated towards cyber security, learning wherever I could, and then finally joined the Cyber Centre.
Narrator: How did you get started in cyber security?
Charlie: While serving in the Canadian Forces, I remustered to Cyber Operator when they stood up the trade.
Narrator: What initially piqued your interest in this profession or industry?
Charlie: Just about everyone and every industry depends on computers and the internet; they are vital to how most of us interact with the world. I think that Cyber Security is inherently fascinating for that reason. It is an industry that touches basically everything else and I enjoy working to defend that and working to make it safer. And as a cyber analyst in particular, I deeply enjoy the way that there is always something new to learn, and as the threat landscape changes so do my investigations and the incidents I work on.
Myths & Challenges
Narrator: What is a common myth about your job or field of expertise?
Charlie: That there is a single, specific path or certification for becoming a cyber security analyst or that you need to have a mastery of computer/network knowledge to get started. It is a job that rewards curiosity and I think that it is appealing to anyone that enjoys problem-solving and discovery.
Narrator: What’s the biggest challenge you’re facing in your role or projects right now and how are you tackling it?
Charlie: Sometimes it feels as though there is just too much to learn and it can be difficult to decide where to begin or what to pursue. Where I'm finding success is through collaborating with my peers. While none of us can know everything there is to know about cyber security, we all specialize in different areas and can all contribute.
Narrator: What unexpected skills do you use most frequently in your daily work?
Charlie: When I first started in cyber security, I had an idea in my head of a collection of lone computer nerds plugging away at their respective workstations in isolation and my experience has been the perfect opposite. Communication and collaboration are central to how we work. As an analyst, we are constantly relying on one another to share our insights on specific technologies, vulnerabilities, threat vectors, and lessons learned from previous experience. And being able to synthesize and articulate our findings for affected partners, but also more technical discussions with our analytics engineers and developers is put to use daily.
Advice, Traits & Certifications
Narrator: What is one piece of advice you would give to someone starting out in a similar domain?
Charlie: It is a cliche, but 'There are no dumb questions.' Ask questions when you have them. You'll either get the answer or get at least one more person asking that same question with you. The field of cyber security is constantly changing and it has been my experience that the industry is full of passionate people eager to share their knowledge.
Narrator: What certifications or training do you find most valuable for your role?
Charlie: Courses and training for specific operating systems such as Windows Internals courses can be very valuable.
Narrator: In your opinion, what is the most important personality trait or strength someone would need to work in your domain and be successful in this job role?
Charlie: Curiosity. Following leads, learning new things, and having a desire to discover why something is happening or has happened is vital to the job.
Rewards & Growth
Narrator: What do you find most rewarding about your job?
Charlie: I think the most rewarding part of the job is when we get to see our mitigations and findings prevent additional incidents or compromises. Some aspects of being an analyst is inherently reactive, we perform our investigation after an incident has occurred and report our findings and make recommendations to the affected partners with the intention of stopping it from happening again. Seeing later instances of a malicious payload stopped from executing or blocking a connection to a C2 from ever taking place is pretty satisfying.
Narrator: What kind of career progression or growth opportunities exist within your role?
Charlie: I think that there is a lot of room for a cyber analyst to choose their own progression and shape their career. You can specialize in certain areas depending on your interests and become a technical advisor or subject matter expert in a domain. On the other hand, it is a job that puts us in regular contact with a variety of other teams from incident handlers to data scientists to developers and so on. In this manner, there are a lot of opportunities for those who really enjoy those collaborative spaces and managing projects or teams.
Narrator: Could you elaborate on some of the most common or typical tasks you handle in your day-to-day work?
Charlie: Exploring network, host, and cloud telemetry is the bread and butter of my work. My most common task is to investigate alerts from a singular command line, network connection, or event and discovering all of the related activities to understand the context of what happened and whether the activity is malicious or benign. This often means pivoting between two different perspectives, referencing available materials found in internal and external sources and defining what is normal and abnormal activity.
Narrator: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned over your career?
Charlie: Take every opportunity you can to work with other teams. Learning from other teams about their tasks, workflows, and tools can give you a new perspective on an old problem and is a chance to share your insights in return.
Narrator: Thank you, Charlie for sharing with us.
Charlie: My pleasure.
Narrator: The Protect and Defend domain is where cyber security meets action — detecting, responding, and neutralizing threats in real time. Professionals like Rene, Joey, and Charlie show us what it means to stay sharp under pressure, adapt quickly, and work together to keep Canadians safe.
Narrator: In this field, every alert matters, every response counts — and every defender makes a difference.
Post-video Activity Sheet
There's no formal assessment for this activity. Instead, students can use the activity sheet to reflect on what they learned from the video series and how it connects to their own interests and experiences.
Additional Canadian Centre for Cyber Security Resources
- Cyber Security Career Guide for Students link is external
- Keep Canada Safe! Discover Careers in Cyber Security course (ChatterHigh) link is external
- Post-secondary cyber security related programs guide link is external
- Certifications in the field of cyber security link is external
- Get Cyber Safe link is external
If you have any feedback on the series, please send us an email at cyberskills-cybercompetences@cyber.gc.ca.