Every individual and organization in this digital age is exposed to cyber threats. Cyberattacks often catch you off guard. This is true, especially for new employees or those who have yet to be trained to counter these attacks.
For instance, a seemingly harmless email from the organization’s IT Department could be a phishing scam. To the untrained eye, this email might look like an urgent request to update a password or an urgent request for some confidential information.
A simple click on such a link exposes the entire company to a network of cyber threats. The entire organization is at risk if the employees are not trained to identify and avoid cyber threats. This is just one example, there are several other cyber threats that harm organizations.
Organizations need to have a robust cybersecurity training program to counter situations like the one above. These programs train new and current employees about identifying, avoiding, and dealing with security dynamic and evolving cyber threats.
Many organizations have started to understand the importance of cyber security readiness and have started implementing cyber security training programs. However, these programs fall short in many aspects, and the employees are still not completely ready to face cyber attacks.
In this edition, we aim to provide you with three expert tips to launch your cyber security training program in a manner that yields results and creates a behavioral change in your employees, empowering them to classify and identify cyber threats like phishing.
Let’s get started!
Redefining Cybersecurity: 3 Expert Insights to Transform Your Cyber Security Training Program
At CybeReady, we found that most cyber security training programs follow a one-size-fits-all approach. These programs remain ineffective as they try to focus on everything related to cybersecurity.
To counter this, we’ve come up with three expert tips that would help you build a meaningful cybersecurity training program:
Tip #1: Prioritize the Most Significant Threats
Organizations face various cyber threats, the most common being social engineering schemes like phishing and ransomware. In light of this, it becomes extremely important to identify which threat puts the organization at the highest risk.
Once you’ve identified the threat that puts your organization at the highest risk, you can focus on it and create a meaningful and effective program.
This would help you to create ready employees who can instantly identify these threats and protect themselves and the organization from their harmful impacts.
Tip #2: Tailor Your Training to Employee Needs
Most of the training programs use theoretical training methods to train their employees. Also, all the employees are trained in the same manner, with the same resources, without considering their experience, risk group, age, and more.
The days of theoretical training are long gone. These programs are not adequate for the simple reason that they are not relevant in the real-life context. They only give the employees a bunch of generic information that does not teach them how to identify and respond to specific threats.
Cybersecurity training should focus on empowering employees to face real-world challenges. Employees should be armed with the skills to immediately identify patterns and counter the various cyber threats they face in their daily lives. The content should be short, easy to process, and relevant to the employees.
Each employee is unique in the organization regarding experience, awareness, and so on. Hence, a One-Size-Fits-All training program remains ineffective in making them cyber-ready.
The program needs to be planned in a relevant and helpful manner for the employee.
For instance, a study by CybeReady found that new employees (less than six months with the company) are more than twice as likely to click on phishing emails, putting them at a higher risk of cyber threats.
This highlights the need to tailor your training according to the roles and responsibilities of the employees and the actual mistakes they make. The training material should be regularly updated as cyber threats evolve. Also, employees should be trained more frequently.
Tip #3: Make Cyber Security Training a Continuous Process
Many organizations have a cyber security training session occasionally, which is why they do not see significant results in creating cyber readiness.
Cyber threats are constantly evolving, and so should your cyber security training. A one-off training session or an annual event is insufficient to keep up with the growing cyber threats.
Cybersecurity training programs should be conducted continuously and across all the organization’s departments to make a difference.
Continuous and tailored cybersecurity training programs would have remarkable results.
The Focus Should Be on Changing Employee Behavior.
The goal of your cyber security readiness training should be changing and improving your employee’s behavior. Meaningful training makes the employees capable of spotting a cyber threat immediately and not falling victim to it.
While training employees, the focus should be on helping them improve the skill of identifying patterns of cyber threats and responding as expected, even if they are distracted or tired.
Elevate Your Cyber Security Training Program With CybeReady
A robust cyber security training program is a must-have for every organization. The threats are real, and the stakes are high. But with the right approach, we can create ready employees and protect our organizations from cyberattacks.
At CybeReady, we create training programs based on the three best practices discussed in this article. As phishing is the most significant cyber risk for organizations, we help employees recognize the patterns of phishing scams.
Moreover, we align our training with the needs of the employees and ensure that all the employees receive cybersecurity training continuously. While training employees, we consider their role, experience, location, risk group, and more.
We understand businesses’ unique challenges and offer tailored solutions for your cybersecurity training needs. With CybeReady, you can ensure your team is prepared, confident, and cyber-resilient.
If you’re ready to take your cyber security training program to new heights, level up your solution with CybeReady.
