Got your A-Level Results? Rewards Await If you choose to get into Cybersecurity By Matthew Olney, XQ Cyber

Want to be well paid in an industry crying out for talent? If yes, then the Cybersecurity sector is for you.

With just a week to go, teenagers up and down the country are nervously awaiting their A-level results. Now is the perfect time for them to get into the cybersecurity industry. With the government strongly pushing for more talent to join the sector it's a great time for people to join it.

Why Choose Cyber?

With teenagers being the most tech-savvy generation in history, it’s a no-brainer for businesses to tap into this pool of talent.

Plentiful Opportunities

With competition in other industries being fierce, the cybersecurity sector continues to struggle with a large skills gap, which for anyone considering entering the industry can result in excellent benefits as organisations compete to attract and keep the best talent.

Excellent Rewards

If you get into the cyber industry, you can expect to earn well above the national median average pre-tax income of around £22,400.

According to CW jobs, the average salary for cybersecurity jobs in the UK is currently around £72,500. With there being so much competition between organisations for skilled cyber professionals, and with the skills gap continuing to be a problem, this figure is likely to continue to rise.

Job Security

Hackers and cybercrime aren’t going anywhere, not with more and more businesses doing the bulk of their trade online. The need for security professionals isn’t going to go away anytime soon so you can be assured that demand for your skills will remain for many years to come.

It’s fun!

Being part of one the newest sectors in existence is exciting as you are at the forefront of change. Every day promises something new and with the cyber threat constantly evolving, you always need to be learning. Red teaming could see you (legally) infiltrating an organisation in order to test its security or, as an incident response team member, you could be sent to all sorts of places to help mitigate security breaches and potentially track down criminals. A penetration tester literally gets paid to break stuff!

“Cybersecurity is exciting because there are so many different areas of it you can fall into and you do not have to be a programming computer nerd to get into the field. However, it really helps progress your career if you have an understanding of the technical stuff and do the non-technical. These are rare skills in our industry and not everyone can do both. Technical people tend to think in 0 and 1s and struggle with high-level concepts whereas non-tech types struggle with the 0 and 1s. In short, it’s an area ideally suited for both types of people,” says Sachin Bhatt Head of Incident Management at XQ Cyber.

What qualifications do you need?

A good starting point is to do a 4-year bachelor’s degree in subjects such as computer science, computer programming or computer engineering. Maths and English are also important skills to have.

Check out this handy Cyber Skills roadmap - https://www.sans.org/cyber-security-skills-roadmap

Get CyberSavvy

Check out these useful links:

1. https://www.itgovernance.co.uk/cybersecurity-training
2. https://www.itgovernance.co.uk/blog/how-to-start-your-career-in-cyber-security/
3. https://www.cybersecuritychallenge.org.uk/careers

Work Experience

Getting work placements at established cybersecurity companies is also an excellent way of getting hands-on experience as well as learning from the pros already working in the field.

XQ Cyber will be doing its part by taking on apprentices that will work with and learn from our team of experts. Hopefully, they’ll have a blast and choose a future career in cyber.

About the Author:

Matthew has worked as a content creator in the cybersecurity sector for three years. He is the content manager for XQ Cyber the creators of CyberScore™.