In a recent interview with Richard Mogg, Executive Director at Cybermindz, he discussed the organisation’s mission to raise awareness about mental health and wellbeing in the cyber security sector.

Cybermindz is a not-for-profit organisation that has been around for about a year, working across the cyber security sector in the mental health space.

They are promoting awareness about the high rates of stress and burnout that are occurring in the sector and facilitating training in a resilience protocol called i-rest or integrated restoration.

I-rest is an evidence-based technique that is having profound effects in assisting people to manage their emotional responses, their reactions, and their stress levels.

Richard explained that they have conducted a survey to quantify the anecdotal discussion of stress and burnout in the sector.

Over 170 individuals from the cyber industry responded to the survey, and the metrics they responded to were a collection of three different metrics, including the Maslach Burnout index, sleep quality, and professional efficacy.”

They found that individuals in the cyber industry were at the high end of all these metrics, and some of the ratings were also predictive of potential high levels of burnout and potential leading indicators that members might be looking to change positions to avoid those high-stress levels.

Speaking to Gabby Fredkin, ADAPT’s Senior Research Analyst, Richard said that the data confirms the concerns that boards and managers have always had.

The changes in legislation around psychological injury have now increased the focus on mental health, and with the measurable data that confirms these concerns, it is now gaining greater traction.

Cybermindz exists to identify what the stresses are and measure them before and after the training they deliver.

Their main purpose is to confirm that they are making a difference in the resilience training they are then bringing to organisations.”

The stresses that cyber security professionals are facing are an inability to switch off the relentless threat environment, fear of the consequences of failure, fear of letting others down, feeling a lack of support, feeling a lack of isolation, and a lack of power and influence regarding changing this environment. These are different from the other sectors out there, such as the data scientists.

Richard raised an interesting point that some level of stress is important and necessary for us to perform at our peak level.

When it comes to the definitions of stress, that’s often called use stress to perform at the optimal level that needs to be that right level of challenge to get us working at the right level.

However, our biology is designed to only work at that level for certain intervals of time and not ongoing levels where it actually becomes detrimental to health.”

Richard Mogg will share more on Mental Resiliency for Security Leaders as ADAPT gathers 120 Australian leading CISOs at Security Edge.

Contributors
Gabby Fredkin Head of Analytics & Insights at ADAPT
Gabby’s primary role is managing analysis to produce ADAPT’s actionable insights. He has extensive experience in using data to identify technology trends... More

Gabby’s primary role is managing analysis to produce ADAPT’s actionable insights. He has extensive experience in using data to identify technology trends to support Australian organisations.​

Using modern data science techniques, he provides ADAPT and its customers with confidence in the accuracy and validity of the information used for ADAPT’s research, advisory and events.​

With a passion for creating stories with data, Gabby is consistently rated as one of the top speakers at ADAPT’s events. In roundtable discussions, he specialises in using statistics to initiate thought-provoking discussions. ​

Gabby is effective in translating information into insights, enabling ADAPT’s customers to become more data-driven.​

Gabby’s primary areas of expertise are:​

  • Advanced AI and ML practices, including AI ethics.​
  • Building models to benchmark and predict IT performance.​
  • End-user behaviour and human-centred design.​
  • Cross-functional team design and value, such as DevSecOps.​
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Richard Mogg Executive Director at Cybermindz
Richard Mogg is the Executive Director of Cybermindz.org, a not-for-profit supporting the mental health and optimal performance of cyber security professionals. Richard’s... More

Richard Mogg is the Executive Director of Cybermindz.org, a not-for-profit supporting the mental health and optimal performance of cyber security professionals.

Richard’s first career was 30 years as an Australian Army Officer. He led teams and transformation programs during peace-keeping operations, disaster response, counter-insurgency and conflict resolution operations – in East Timor, Iraq, Afghanistan, the United States, Australia and the South Pacific.

During his military career, he explored various resilience and well-being techniques to maintain balance, manage stress and optimise performance. Richard is passionate about sharing his experience to help others enhance self-awareness and emotional intelligence, recover from trauma, achieve optimal performance and well-being both individually and as a team.

He has post-graduate qualifications in: Business Management, Strategy and Logistics. He is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and the United States Army Command and General Staff College. Richard is an Integrative Restoration (iRest) teacher, registered meditation teacher, accredited conflict management coach and dispute mediator.

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