Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Your Number One, Gotta-Have-It, Top Priority, Most Important, Critical Control

Security Awareness. 
Right. You know this. Or you've heard it enough that you accept it. Or perhaps you've heard this and think it's a bunch of hungry capitalists creating a new market opportunity to feed in perpetuity like the leeches clinging to the flesh of their unassuming victims...

Intelligent Agents.
One of the more interesting subjects I've studied that has given me a perspective on the complexity of organizations was Organizational Behavior/Managing Complexity at the McCombs School of Business with Dr. Reuben McDaniel. With the basis of my military experience on submarines as a backdrop, I listened as Dr. McDaniel wove stories together of chaos theory, change agents, and the unbelievable complexity of launching an aircraft off of an aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean. There are hundreds of people involved at different points in the process to launch a single aircraft. There are thousands of actions. Yet there are so few accidents. The structure and organization shape the direction of each individual's affect on the system to execute the singular complex action of launching a plane off the ship. Each individual is a change agent. These people are among the best trained in the world at what they do.

How does it work? 
No expense is spared to ensure these men and women are equipped with the skills to execute the expected routine actions... and... These men and women are equipped with the skills to execute on the unexpected, respond to the deviations from the norm - to analyze and correct with situational awareness.

It's with similar experiences during complex submerged operations that I related to his stories. It's with that understanding that I have always stood by security awareness as the number one control for any organization. If I can't break your perimeter, then I will shift tactics and social engineer my way into the organization. Your last line of defense? Well trained, expectant, alert, aware, intelligent agents.