Career Management

1 Career Management Western Governors University 2 Table of Contents A. Three Competencies Gained from MBA Program.........................................................3 A1. Future Business Career.......................................................................................................5 B. SMART Goal................................................................................................................................6 C. Resume........................................................................................................................................7 D. LinkedIn Profile........................................................................................................................7 E. Three Academic and Professional Artifacts...................................................................7 3 A. Three Competencies Gained from MBA Program When deciding what degree to pursue my master’s degree, it was a choice between an M.S. in Cybersecurity and Information Assurance versus an M.B.A. in IT Management. Having been within the IT industry since 2008 with four years of experience in the Information Assurance section, earning my B.S. in Cybersecurity and Information Assurance this past March from WGU, and having several professional IT certifications, I ultimately decided on the M.B.A. in IT Management program. Through this program, I have learned important information that will assist me in my career. The first competency I learned from was my Clifton Strengths assessment for my Managing Organization and Leadership course. A great leader must understand their strengths and weaknesses to become effective. By identifying my Achiever, Analytical, and Focus strengths, I validated the skills necessary for these areas. My Achiever strength is my demanding and constructive work ethic, and I take great satisfaction from this work style. My Analytical strength validates how I brainstorm plans when working on my tasks to achieve success. This comes in hand with my Focus trait of providing direction and prioritization for projects my team works on. Understanding my strengths allows me to build upon these values to increase my leadership performance. The course allowed me to identify my leadership weaknesses and determine three actionable items to fix these deficiencies. As a result of understanding both strengths and weaknesses, I can improve my leadership style to ensure job satisfaction from my team employees. I used these skills in the capstone simulation to plan our pricing and expansion strategy for Olympic Bikes. As I worked through each quarter to decide on what actions the company 4 would take, the Analytical and Focus trait were the two traits I used the most. For our expansion, we expanded to cities where we had low competitors in the market. In the simulation, I strived to provide direction for our sales employees when setting the priority markets for our bicycles. My Analytical skill was vital when determining what prices our bikes should be when comparing them to our competitors. Ultimately, these three strengths played a critical role in my success with the capstone simulation. The following competency I gained was from my IT Strategic Solutions course. In my fourth task, I had to perform a GAP analysis and identify what changes I would make to support a company's growth. I had to determine the current hardware and software limitations, justify why they were ineffective, and create a three-year plan to correct the deficiencies. Counterproductive decisions could be made without this skill, and the organization could suffer from a cybersecurity attack. These skills came in handy when submitting proposals for the organization and taught me critical abilities to succeed as a leader. As in the case study for this task, I had to identify each bike's features. Since customers for each market differed, it was critical to determine what our customers wanted and provide it to them. Although the simulation wasn’t for three years, the six quarters did allow me to develop a tactical plan for our company. Our first goal was to make our market presence and set the bike prices. The second goal was to provide our employees with competitive salaries to give them a high job satisfaction rate. As previously discussed, we had our expansion plan for entering new markets. Without the knowledge of performing GAP analysis or developing what changes to improve a company, I wouldn’t have succeeded in the simulation. The third competency that came in critical was the pricing strategy from my Marketing course. In the task, I had to identify two new services for Tenable and then decide on pricing the 5 new services. In the marketing task, I decided to offer each product individually, including discounts if customers bought both products and purchased multi-year deals. The prices I used depended on the products' development expenses to ensure profits. Additionally, I had to evaluate our competitors' prices to develop the strategy I used. I used this skill for the bike pricing strategy during the first three quarters. I decided to establish high prices on the bikes but offer rebates. This was to develop customer interest in seeing a high-priced bicycle they could afford through the rebate. The company did have sales and, at times, couldn’t meet customer demands. In the fourth quarter, we dropped this strategy and offered the bikes at reduced prices without rebates. As in the task, I utilized promotion strategies, social media channels, and advertising to establish our company’s name in the market. A1. Future Business Career These three competencies will help me in my career in several ways. My first competency of understanding my strengths and weaknesses as a leader will allow me to avoid becoming an unpleasant boss. Through my analytical and Focus strengths, I can develop strategies to ensure the successful completion of my projects. I can provide a sense of direction and growth for my employees to nurture them to become the best they can become. By learning how to perform GAP analysis, identifying the weaknesses of current operations, and developing solutions, I will be able to use this in my current role. In my role, I must perform Risk Assessments (RA) and Authorized to Operate (ATO). When performing these tasks, we must start at the baseline of our accreditation boundary. Identifying what vulnerabilities exist and how to mitigate these risks. If a risk can’t be reduced, then a Plan of Action and Milestones (POA&M) must be submitted. In the POA&M, I must identify what fixes or technical 6 controls must be set up by specific dates. The skills I learned in my IT Strategic Solutions will be necessary for my job duties. The strategies I learned in the Marketing course, including the pricing strategy, will allow me to identify what products my organization might acquire to secure our accreditation boundary better. Although I will not be pricing products to sell to customers, I will understand how companies perform this. As a federal civilian working for the Defense Health Agency under the Department of Defense, I can negotiate better prices with an understanding of the pricing strategy. This will allow the organization to save money on software and hardware acquisitions we perform. The most prominent example of this is our hardware lifecycle refreshes. Most computers in our inventory have a lifecycle of five years, not including defects or accidents that break the computers. We must have a readily available supply of computers. Since we perform large orders to support our hundreds of employees, I can utilize my new knowledge of pricing strategy to negotiate better pricing. B. SMART Goal As a cybersecurity professional, staying updated with the latest IT technologies, emerging technologies, and vulnerabilities is critical. These areas will ensure I can protect my organization’s network from cybersecurity attacks using the latest technology and processes. The holy grail of certifications in the industry is the (ISC)2 Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP). I failed this exam twice shortly after entering the cybersecurity field. Although I have failed, I have not stopped wanting to obtain this certification. Within the next year, I will get this certification by studying vigorously. Using my WGU Udemy and LinkedIn Learning resources, I will take several courses that cover this certification. 7 Additionally, I have already purchased the course on Ucertify, which includes practice exams. Obtaining this certification is my top priority because I’m setting another SMART goal of getting my Ph.D. Since I need to submit a resume with my application, I want to have the CISSP to prove to the application committee that I’m 100% committed to completing my Ph.D. in IT from UTSA. Ideally, I’d like to have this certification within three months. To ensure I’m making progress on this goal, I will study and then take practice exams every two weeks. This will allow me to track my progress and adjust my studying topics. Additionally, if it appears I won’t be ready by the third month, I can delay my exam until I am ready. C. Resume Please refer to the attached resume. D. LinkedIn Profile Please refer to the attached LinkedIn Profile. E. Three Academic and Professional Artifacts The first artifact I’ve chosen is my B.S. in Cybersecurity and Information Assurance. I enrolled at WGU in July 2019 and began my educational journey. I completed my courses for my terms but sustained a terrible fall that resulted in several surface brain hemorrhages. As a result, I didn’t finish three courses in my fourth term. I took a three-month term break and wanted to give up on my degree. After recovering, I decided to continue because I promised I would complete my degree. It’s ironic because I don’t remember what happened the day or weeks following my fall, but I’ll never forget that day. That day lit something inside me, and I tell myself every day that if the fall didn’t kill me, nothing would stop me from obtaining my degree. Through the degree, I was able to learn the fundamentals of being a cybersecurity professional. I learned core 8 networking fundamentals, vulnerability analysis, ethical hacking, and business continuity. The competencies I learned in the B.S. in Cybersecurity and Information Assurance allowed me to improve my work performance. The following month after I graduated, I obtained a two-step promotion. I was immediately promoted to a GS-11, and in April 2023, I will be promoted to a GS-12 automatically. My B.S. in Cybersecurity and Information Assurance taught me additional IT skills that I can use to improve the security of my organization’s network. The numerous certifications I had to acquire in the degree were CompTIA’s A+, Network+, CySA+, PenTest+, and Project+, along with (ISC)2 SSCP and ITILv3. These certifications improved my understanding of IT basics, networking concepts, vulnerability analysis, service management, and project management. The second artifact I chose is my CompTIA PenTest+ certification. Although I work in cybersecurity, I’ve never attempted to learn ethical hacking. It had been an interest of mine when I started my career, but I never decided to pursue it. To complete my degree, the Penetration Testing and Vulnerability Analysis course required that I pass the PenTest+ exam. By obtaining this certification, I proved my knowledge of the five domains of the exam. I’ve applied the skills I learned in the five domains of this exam in my career. I will continue to use the proficiencies I’ve learned from this exam to improve my vulnerability management, reporting, and resolution of any weaknesses to improve our network's security.  Domain 1 – Planning and Scoping – This domain covers the requirements an ethical hacker must take when performing a test. If an ethical hacker were not to have authorization or exceed the testing requirements, that person may end up violating the law and can be held to criminal charges. 9  Domain 2 – Information Gathering and Vulnerability Identification – This domain covers the tools to gather intelligence on an organization. Additionally, the ethical hacker must be able to identify a company's vulnerabilities.  Domain 3 - Attacks and Exploits – The domain covers the various attacks an ethical hacker can use when performing their tests. Exploits are essential because a tester might overlook a vulnerability without that knowledge.  Domain 4 - Penetration Testing Tools – Understanding the difference in available tools is essential because each will play a role in what type of attack you perform for the paying customer. This domain discusses the various tools available to an ethical hacker.  Domain 5 - Reporting and Communication – The report must be provided to the customers after a completed ethical hacking test. Hence, they know the vulnerabilities and recommendations for fixing the problem. This domain covers the reporting and communication methods to accomplish this. The final artifact I’ve chosen is my Civilian Career Brief. This artifact is important because it reflects my performance rating, certifications, education, awards, and career history. As I learned material from my bachelor’s and master’s degrees, I was able to apply new skills to improve my work performance. CompTIA Project taught me how to manage IT better projects. CompTIA CySA+ certification enhanced my vulnerability management skills to protect our network better. CompTIA PenTest+ placed me as an ethical hacker and taught me how to think and act as a hacker. By employing my new skills, I have maintained an Outstanding rating of 5.0 out of a 5.0 scale. As a result, I have earned several awards in my career that resulted in time off or compensation. I graduated from WGU with my B.S. in Cybersecurity and Information