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Sunday, May 06, 2018

Conversation starter for cybersecurity and workforce networking events

Elevator icon, created and released to public domain by Stephen Cobb
Suppose you work in cybersecurity and/or workforce development and you find yourself talking to other people in those fields, maybe during a networking break between conference sessions, or at one of those randomly seated lunches. Everyone has been introduced, said where they're from and for whom they work, but now there's a lull in the conversation. Try starting the conversation with this question:

A man and a woman get into an elevator; which one is doing risk assessment?

I have been asking strangers this question for a while now and the responses are very interesting. I don't want to tell you what they are at this point - that is a separate blog post. (I'm trying to devise a more formal study of responses from a range of audiences.)

But if you know me, or know of my research into gender and risk perception, you might be able to imagine where I'd like to see the conversation go after this icebreaker (places like a deeper understanding of how our sense of risk varies based on who we are and how our experiences in life have led us to differing levels of concern about potential threats to our wellbeing).

You might also want to ask this question outside of cybersecurity circles. Maybe in class? And you could change it up a little. For example, I have used "which one is more likely to be doing risk assessment?"

You could also ask this question on Twitter or Facebook (feel free to use the image above - frankly I think it's a daft sign, but I made it based on a real one that I saw recently in a very new office building in San Francisco).