What happens when the experience you already have starts to make sense in a completely different career?
In this episode of Root to CISO, Kris Rides sits down with AJ Debole, Field CISO at Oracle Cloud, to talk through a career journey shaped by curiosity, unexpected decisions, persistence and experience gained far beyond cybersecurity.
AJ started out studying political science before going to law school, joining the Army Reserve and later working in telecom, procurement and logistics. Cybersecurity was not part of the original plan and her interest began much later, through cryptocurrency, Ethereum and cryptography, before an opportunity within the military introduced her to cyber more directly.
From there, the transition was anything but immediate.
Her story raises an interesting question for anyone thinking about where their own career could go next: how much of the experience you already have might become valuable in ways you cannot see yet?
In this conversation, we explore:
• What moving across different industries can teach you about building a career in cybersecurity
• How experience gained in one field can become relevant when you move into another
• The ways curiosity can pull your career in directions you never originally planned for
• Why the path people are advised to follow is not always the path that actually shapes successful careers
• What preparation looks like when the right opportunity finally appears
• How the experience you are building now could become more valuable later than you realize
If you’re trying to enter cybersecurity, considering a career change or simply unsure how the experience you already have fits into where you want to go next, this episode offers a useful reminder: careers often make more sense looking backwards than they do while you are building them.
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