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to reduce recruiting costs and improve efficiency, and job seekers the opportunity to clearly
and objectively demonstrate their skill level.

NCCF also gave participating employers a leg up in the race for talent. It helped them be
seen as “employers of choice,” in cyber security. Employers from the NCCF have access to
the pool of current and future jobseekers that visited their booth and now have the ability to
compare the technical skill levels of these individuals. NCCF follow-up programs give the
employers the opportunity to connect with additional candidates among the 4,000
participants through “matching” programs that will operate during the 6 months until the
December NCCF.

The National Cyber security Career Fair is a pilot program. Intense evaluation of both the
candidate and employer experience will be undertaken over the summer and fall. With
appropriate improvements, and increasing numbers of employers and candidates, the NCCF
may become a trusted tool for employers who are seeking talent and for talented people
seeking jobs in cyber security, helping to close the skills gap that is threatening the security
of the nation.

About the author

Alan Paller founded SANS, a college and professional cyber security
training school that has trained more than 145,000 cyber security
technologists in 72 countries. He oversees the Internet Storm Center, the
annual identification of the "Seven Most Dangerous New Attack Vectors"
and a global program that identifies and celebrates people responsible for
remarkable improvement in cyber risk reduction. He has testified before the
US Senate and House and was an initial member of the President's National Infrastructure
Assurance Council. He was chosen by OMB and the Federal CIO Council as the 2005
Azimuth Award winner, a lifetime achievement award recognizing outstanding service of a
non-government person to improving federal information technology. In 2010, the
Washington Post named him one of seven people "worth knowing, or knowing about" in
cyber security. He co-chairs the Secretary of Homeland Security's Task Force on
CyberSkills, and serves on the FCC Communications Security, Reliability and
Interoperability Council and on the NASA Advisory Council. Earlier in his career Alan helped
build one of the first major software companies, took it public, and merged it into a larger
company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. His degrees are from Cornell University
and the Massachusetts institute of Technology.

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