Overview
#037 — In this next episode, I was joined by Erin Grippo, Senior Manager of Product Operations at Brivo, who brings nearly a decade of experience in the security industry across marketing, business strategy, partnerships, and product operations.
Today’s conversation explored Erin’s career journey and how she navigated major transitions across roles, companies, and countries. We discussed her philosophy about career growth, overcoming early career challenges, and her advice for aspiring professionals. Erin also shared her perspective on leadership development, the value of networking, and why mentorship is important in our careers. I think you’ll find this to be an honest and inspiring discussion!
After graduating from DePauw University with a degree in Communication, Erin launched her career at Allegion in the U.S. and later relocated to Toronto to lead multifamily and PropTech initiatives for Allegion Canada. She continued to expand her expertise at Latch, managing partnerships and launching new products and programs before joining Brivo in 2023.
Erin is active in the security industry’s professional community, serving on the Security Industry Association’s RISE Steering Committee and previously on the Foundation for Advancing Security Talent (F.A.S.T) board from 2020 to 2024. She was recently named one of the 2024 Women in Security Forum Power 100. Erin is passionate about mentoring early-career professionals and building stronger pathways for the next generation of security leaders—and it was a pleasure having her on the podcast.
Get involved with SIA young professional programs here:
(1) acceleRISE
(2) TIME mentorship program
Highlights from This Episode
- Nonlinear career paths are valuable. Erin highlights the importance of exploring different roles and departments, even without a predetermined destination.
- Early career “Swiss Army knives” often struggle with transitioning into focused leadership. Being the go-to person for everything early on can create challenges in delegating and specializing later.
- Marketing roles offer underrated technical exposure. Working in marketing forces you to deeply understand your company’s technology, competitors, and strategic positioning.
- Strategic collaboration between marketing, product, and operations drives better outcomes. Cross-functional communication enhances product launches and business impact.
- Toastmasters is transformative. Erin attributes much of her executive presence and communication growth to Toastmasters.
- Storytelling is central to security and leadership. Whether pitching products, mentoring, or selling ideas, effective storytelling creates connection and impact.
- Reception theory (from communications) enhances audience-centered messaging. Tailoring your communication to the recipient’s context is a strategic advantage in leadership and sales.
- Networking across generations strengthens the industry. She emphasizes the importance of young professionals learning from both retiring leaders and mid-career experts.
- Thought leadership can open unexpected doors. Publishing online content, even niche blogs, can lead to career-defining opportunities.
- Community creates retention. Erin credits the relationships she’s built through SIA RISE and other networks as a key reason for staying in the security industry.
Memorable Quotes:
- “You can’t tell a good story unless you’re interacting with a lot of different perspectives…Some of the strongest storytellers in our industry are those who’ve built relationships across generations.”
- “Feeling like you’re part of a community of professionals is one of the strongest motivators for staying in the industry.”
- “If you have the chance to jump into a role where you wear many hats, go for it. It’s like living in an MBA program.”
- “Improv teaches empathy—and empathy is at the heart of effective communication.”
RESOURCES MENTIONED
- 📚 Books:
- Talk Like TED by Carmine Gallo
- If I Understood You, Would I Have This Look on My Face? by Alan Alda
- 🌐 Websites / Organizations:
- Security Industry Association (SIA)
- SIA RISE – SIA’s young professionals group
- Foundation for Advancing Security Talent (FAST)
- LinkedIn – Frequently referenced for networking and thought leadership
- 👩🏫 Training Programs / Courses:
- Toastmasters International – Cited for public speaking and business communication
- TIME Mentorship Program (Talent, Inclusion, Mentorship, and Education) – Run by SIA RISE
- Accelerize Conference – SIA’s young professional-focused industry conference (August 4–6, 2025 in Boston)
Use CONTROL + F to search the transcript below if you want to learn more!
Transcript from this episode
*Note: this transcript was generated using automated software, and may not be a perfect transcription. But I hope you find it useful.
Travis: ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Security Student Podcast...
And a little bit about Erin. After graduating from DePaul University with her degree in communications, Erin launched her career with Allegiant in the US, later relocating to Toronto to lead multifamily and prop tech initiatives for Allegiant Canada. She continued to expand her expertise at Latch, managing partnerships, and launching new products and programs before joining Brevo in 2023. Erin is active in the security industry's professional community, serving on the Security Industry Association's RISE steering committee, and previously on the Foundation for Advancing Security Talent, FAST, on their board from 2020 to 2024. She was recently named one of the 2024 Women in Security Forum's Power 100.
Erin is passionate about mentoring early career professionals and building stronger pathways for the next generation of security leaders. And I think you'll definitely see and hear that on the podcast today. And it was an absolute pleasure having her on the podcast. I hope you enjoyed the following conversation.
Cheers. Erin, welcome back. It was really nice chatting with you when we were preparing to do the podcast. We talked about so many interesting ideas, like challenges that young career professionals face, some of the advantages of seeking mentors about being involved in different aspects of security businesses.
And I feel like after we talked throughout the week, I was just kind of seeing those themes a little bit of everywhere I went, whether it was me interacting with people on LinkedIn or it was watching a movie and connecting it back to some idea that we might have talked about. So I've been really looking forward to this conversation, Erin. Welcome.
Erin: Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to chat with you today.
Travis: Of course. And I think a good place for us to start would be, could you start things off by sharing a little bit about your career path and what led you to where you are today? Sure.
Erin: I love my career path. It is a very nonlinear career path. So talking about it is always pretty fun because I've jumped around a little bit. But I entered the security industry in 2016 after I graduated from DePau University in Green Castle, Indiana. And I was just a channel marketing specialist at Allegiant.
Joining the security industry was very unintentional. I was just looking for entry-level marketing positions in the Indianapolis area and happened to end up at a really great massive company that represents pretty well in the industry. So I started in a channel marketing position and then kind of moved from the mechanical portfolio to the electronic portfolio, got deeper into technology and different types of technological partnerships and integrations between access control companies and our locks.
And then they actually transferred me up to Toronto, Canada in 2019. So I really focused on the multifamily market up here from an access control perspective. In 2021, I left Allegiant and I joined Latch for about 18 months and threw a variety of different roles in about every department at that company. I got a lot of really unique experience in the 18 months that I was there. And it was cool because I went from a very established access control manufacturing company like Allegiant to a company that was thinking about access control differently that had more of kind of the tech influence that was a little bit of a disruptor in the industry.
And then I left Latch in 2023 and moved to Brevo. So another access control company, but really focused on cloud-based access control, the system, and then how ultimately it can all enable different experiences in the physical space. So I've done everything from marketing to partnerships to channel development to a little bit of sales to supporting sales teams. And now ultimately, I'm in product operations. So I have a very well-rounded set of skills, but I'm a generalist and definitely not a specialist.
Travis: Yeah. And as you're talking, one thing that stands out to me, I could definitely relate to the nonlinear career. I was just talking to someone the other day about how kind of like how I came into where I am now, where at first when I was in college, I thought, oh, I needed to work in law enforcement. And I thought, you know what, maybe being a Marine Corps officer is really the thing that I need to do.
And then I was like, no, that's not it. Maybe being a research analyst working for a think tank, because I studied political science, maybe that's what I need to do. And then and on and on and on, eventually, I finally wound up in the security industry only with the luck of having people in my peer group that could really guide me and say, hey, maybe you should go take this course and read these books and connect with these people. So I think really, I just happen to be very fortunate and have some of those people surrounding me. Otherwise, I feel like the security industry is such a niche industry. It's almost hard to find where you're going to get started. So I think those nonlinear paths, I have a feeling that's why these are so common when we talk to some of our peers.
Erin: Yeah, I think so. And I think this conversational lend itself well to a conversation around networking and mentorship and sponsorship, kind of going back to some of what you said. You've had opportunities posed to you because of those relationships. But I think that's one of the unique things about the industry is it's so relationship based. And so if you can find people that can help open doors for you or open new perspectives of the way you're thinking about your career, that can be really fantastic. But I do think, you know, one of the reasons, at least in my opinion, I've had such a fruitful and wonderful career is because I've had the opportunity to jump around to a bunch of different roles.
And I, you know, I think a lot about how in college you have to declare a major and you have to figure out what you want to do. And I'm nine years into my career. And while I haven't gone through a traditional rotational program at one of my companies, I have jumped around from role to role, giving me exposure to all of the different departments I could be part of, kind of the impact that I could make, where my skills are. And I think my career is a really good reflection of the power of jumping around and not just necessarily going on a single track, unless you absolutely know that's what you want to do. Because nine years in, I'm still not entirely sure what my end goal is. But I do know that I'm collecting really unique skills and experiences along the way that are going to continue helping build those building blocks for me. So it's nice to not have to have it figured out, but know that the opportunities are kind of endless.
Travis: And I can relate to that too. When you talk about jumping around or even working with smaller organizations where you have the chance to wear many hats to be involved in many parts of the business, thinking back to when I started working for a security technology software startup, I remember one of the founders had told me, hey Travis, working here for a few years, you're going to learn way more than any of your friends at their corporate gigs will in the next 10 years. And when I first heard that, I was very skeptical. But then as the years went on, and then eventually after I left, and I work more with my peers, or I see, I don't know, I just have like a different lens for maybe assessing how the business works or how people engage in their own leadership strategies. It just gave me a complete new way of looking at business. And that founder was completely right when he told me that I would learn more there in three years about business than anywhere else.
Erin: Yeah, I'm in a role like that right now where I think it was one of those roles that we knew it was going to be a culture fit. And we knew that the skill set that I wanted to gain, I would get through this role. I think the ramp up was a little long for me because I was learning so many new things about the business and just about how to do operations.
It was the area that I really hadn't touched in a tremendous amount before I jumped into this role. But consistently, I find myself saying I feel like I'm living in an MBA program because it but it's wonderful because it's experiential like it is my day to day work. And I'm passively learning skills that I almost don't recognize I've gained until I'm doing a presentation or thinking about something I'm like, wait a second, I'm thinking about this through a completely different lens than I was a year and a half ago because I understand all of these other contexts that impact the business. And it's been really rewarding to have that type of experience because you do see the industry and see your impact and kind of see your career through a completely different lens. Because you get exposure to so many different areas of the business, you get to see how strategic decisions are made, you get to understand where the impact comes from and how heavily you have to weigh that impact against potential consequences of a decision. So if you have the chance to jump into a role like that, anyone listening, go for it. Because as long as you've got the passion for learning, I think those roles can be really transformative.
Travis: Yeah. And you mentioned jumping around too. And I think another advantage there too is just you get to see the different ways that people solve problems going from one organization to another, they're going to have a completely different approach, everything from the people and the culture, the way that they organize and conceptualize the projects that they're working on, the way that they do their planning. There's just so much to learn from the way that managers, the way that technical experts, the way that all of them do things differently. And it's just going to give you a toolbox for solving diverse problems rather than, I think the challenge with staying with one particular org for a long, long, long period is just you're going to be so like just indoctrinated in maybe only one way of solving problems or approaching things without really having any new blood in the mix.
Erin: I think that's also one of the really cool consequences of jumping around from different teams into different departments. It's because good leaders bring with them the lessons that they've learned from previous experiences. And it's really neat when you're joining a team or collectively a new team is being formed and you're part of it. And leaders and colleagues get to share, this is the best practice I learned at this job three years ago. Or my team used to do this and I actually found it was really detrimental to the culture of the team or the trust of the team.
And being able to have those candid conversations about how to run a team based on previous experience, I think also gives everyone on the team a little bit of agency and ownership over that collective team experience. How do you collaborate? How do you hold each other accountable? How do you build the trust between coworkers? And I think that's if you have the passion for creating really strong and dynamic teams, bringing in your past experience to help craft the future of what that team looks like can be a really cool team building exercise.
Travis: Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And you also mentioned working in marketing and operations. And I think those are really interesting aspects of the security industry where at least my knee jerk initial reaction might be, oh, like how much can I really learn being involved in the marketing side of the business or this side of the business. But in having to work with marketers in security vendor organizations over the years, there is so much that you learn in those roles, you have to learn deeply about your competitors, about what their strategies are, about where they're going, what audiences they're talking to, you have to understand the nuances of different product launches from different organizations about new trends, it's setting up partnerships. There's just so much, even if someone is like, even if a security person might not be inclined toward marketing, there is so much that you could learn being involved in those roles.
Erin: I agree. I think I was very fortunate to have marketing as my entrance into the industry because the role required me to have a really strong foundation of the products, the industry, the complexities, the technology, how it all works together, how do you differentiate from your competitors. I think that's one of the neater things about marketing in the industry today, because while we have emerging technologies like AI and biometrics and facial recognition and kind of emerging trends on security solutions are becoming operational efficiency tools, we're seeing less, I would say less differentiations in the core products. But what you see the differentiations in is the story around the core products. How was it built?
What was the intention? How can you use the analytics to manage your business a little bit better? It's really, I think, a fantastic case study into especially getting young talent into the industry. If you can either bring them into marketing roles or bring them into roles that have to heavily rely on marketing, I think you get a lot more context into the products, the solutions, and the technologies in the industry because you have to understand the competitive advantage between your company and your competitor, but you also have to understand where there could be synergies for a really unique partnership that ultimately benefit the industry. I think as the industry continues on and we're looking at retaining talent and we want people to grow in their careers, it's really hard to join the industry later in your career and get caught up, whereas if you start from the beginning and build that foundational understanding, you can take the skill sets from different company to different company, whether it's an access control company or a video management company or a prop tech company or anything on the auxiliary of what an access controller security system is, but that context helps you understand how complex the solutions are because we're deploying security solutions in a very complex world and so it ultimately helps make a better professional because you have all of that additional understanding.
Travis: And I think also too, there's a huge advantage in having that type of person working in your marketing and your operations team because they're going to have an understanding of the landscape of competitive or related companies. They'll understand how those companies have evolved over the years, different ones that have been acquired by this company or this company that's taken a different approach. And I think there's just so much to add there having a more technical person in those roles because otherwise really the alternative is going to be taking someone from a different industry, maybe working in marketing technology.
And then now you have to teach them the entire security industry in, I don't know, a few months and they just have to learn it on the job. And you can really tell when you go out and you talk to some of these organizations at ISC West when you read their literature and whatever they're authoring online and you read their websites, you can really tell if, like you said, if they really understand the story of how whatever the product is fits into their day to day operations. And there's just so much that a more technical person can add when they're involved in those types of marketing roles. Yeah.
Erin: And I think strategic collaboration between marketing teams and operations teams, I think at least in my opinion, are starting to be exceptionally more critical for businesses. Because on one hand, you have product organizations that are really focused on the core product line, augmenting the impact that it can have. How do you build it? How do you incorporate new technologies? How do you fill a gap in the marketplace? But ultimately, I think a strong product team relies on the marketing team for what is that market research? How is it competitive against similar products? Or do we know that a certain competitor is going after a vertical and maybe thinking about a solution differently?
How do we combat that? But ultimately, the role of the operations team in all of it is to make sure that those decisions are viable for the company and profitable for the company and align with the types of solutions or the strategy. And so when you have the product organization, the operations team and the marketing organization strategically collaborating, you get much more viable go to market processes because A, yes, we know from a product and technical standpoint, we've built a really strong new product. From the market standpoint, we've decided, yes, based on our research, it fits a need, it fills a gap, we have a compelling story, and we know how to go against our competitors. And from the operations standpoint, we've done a good job of intentionally pricing the item, understanding the market need, understanding what our margins can be, where we can be a little bit more competitive with pricing so we can deploy the systems. And then you create feedback loops between those organizations so that if something doesn't work, how do you not replicate that for the next time around? And I think when you have strong marketers, you can bring to life the business analytics and the technological details in a way that you can't if you don't have someone who understands the full context of the industry.
Travis: Yeah, that's a really good way to put it. I like the way you describe that of having the full context of the industry because that person has a better understanding and is a little more technical and really understands the audience. And Erin, also, I remember in a previous conversation, we had talked a little bit about some of the challenges for young professionals. And specifically, one of them was around being kind of the Swiss Army knife in the organization, someone that could really solve any problem. And that idea really stood out to me because I could think back to working in a security technology startup and being one of those people joining the organization so early, where really everyone is doing everything. And then also, especially being someone that's more junior, that was definitely my experience trying to say yes to everything, whether it's helping with the WordPress, whether it's writing marketing content, it's going to the conferences and shaking hands with people and assisting with demos, trying to educate the marketing team, the sales team, and everything like that. And then really kind of one of the challenges eventually is after you've been the Swiss Army knife in an organization for so long and say yes to so many things, eventually it kind of becomes your persona in your career as you evolve. And it's really hard to kind of make that jump from being the person that does everything to being someone that's a little more specialized and is in their own niche area, leading whatever initiatives it is. So I wanted to get your thoughts on this kind of dynamic that young professionals might face in careers.
Erin: I think it's a pretty relatable dynamic. I think there's a lot of really strong go-getters that enter our industry, other industries in general. I think one of the best parts about young professionals is the energy that they bring to the job. They're excited, they're building their career.
Everything about the real world is new. So there's kind of that excitement around this new experience that you get to participate in finally after being in school and getting ready to enter the real world. So I think the energy around young professionals is fantastic. I do think that there's a bit of a double-edged sword to taking advantage of every opportunity when you're younger and then ultimately requiring yourself to build the skill set to delegate and to manage.
And I think that is a really challenging transition for a lot of people to make. When I was early in my career, I volunteered for every type of role for any type of meeting. So if my manager was going into a meeting with the executive team, I would offer to take notes because I wanted to be in that space. I wanted to at least have visibility to the types of conversations.
And if the biggest impact that I could make was there was a really strong record of what was discussed in that meeting and it was organized and I could send it out afterwards, in my opinion, that was a really fantastic opportunity to build trust, gain some visibility with leadership, and just kind of get exposure to how companies operate. Again, that gave me more context on the industry than just being siloed in my role. I will say, as I've progressed through my career, I have mostly been an individual contributor. While I've been part of teams, the work that I do is very siloed. I'm not necessarily collaborating on group projects all the time. Like I'm a component of a project, but we're not meeting weekly to talk about my work impacting your work.
It's, did I get my portion of the pie done, that kind of thing. And I've gotten very used to taking things on, executing and checking them off the list to a point where my transition to being a people manager was more challenging than I anticipated because the skill set of managing a person and being able to delegate tasks was not something I was inherently good at. And I think for people like me who are still considered early career professionals but are starting to transition into that more manager position, being a manager is a skill set because really you're not the person executing on all of the tasks, but you are the person that is responsible for the outcome of those executions. So how do you build trust with the people on your team? How do you give them the agency to do the job that they were hired to do?
How do you empower them to do the best work that they can? While also trusting yourself that it was okay that you delegated that task, you didn't have to do it yourself. And I think that's sometimes really hard for me because I am just really easy at executing and moving on.
And so it's, if you have a great manager who's very good at delegating, start those conversations early on. Like how did they give up control over their responsibilities? Because I think that's a really difficult thing to do when you're a yes person like I was. And I still want to say yes to a lot of opportunities, but I have to be much more intentional with where I put my time now. And that is also a trajectory of your career development, learning and development that you have to have.
Travis: As you're talking about this too, it makes me think we had talked about in one of our previous conversations about the benefits that we found from attending Toastmasters and engaging in some of those activities.
And I think I feel like that's so relatable. One to what you're talking about right now where you're essentially coaching and managing people. And then also just being a better business communicator. And I feel like for me, my experience in Toastmasters, it's also helped in this area of just interpersonal communication, because I feel like the more and more and more you're involved in presenting in front of small groups, and really just engage more in communications and using those muscles more often. I feel like it also helps sharpen our ability to lead and just be better interpersonal communicators in the workplace as well. Have you seen some of these benefits too in your experience with Toastmasters?
Erin: I have. It's been a couple of years since I've done Toastmasters, but I absolutely loved it. And when I was doing it, it was at a pretty critical point in my career where I saw my personal brand taking off. I was really advocating for the young professional experience.
And I was being invited into a lot of conversations and opportunities to discuss my point of view on a lot of different topics. And it was mainly, I did Toastmasters before the pandemic, but it also transitioned into the pandemic. So we did virtual Toastmasters for a while, which is also, I think, incredibly critical to do because so much of business is one-dimensional in Zoom calls now.
But I think one of the things that Toastmasters does really, really well besides gives you an opportunity to flex the public speaking muscle is it helps you feel competent being present. And I think that is one of the challenges of my generation. We grew up on screens.
We grew up on phones showing up and being able to, you know, articulate a point of view, feel the gravity of our presence in a space, stand up straight, posture, articulate, well speak eloquently. Those are skill sets that are not automatic. And I also think they're really hard for a lot of people. Public speaking is a difficult thing to do. But in business, some aspect of public speaking skills are required no matter what your job is, whether it's even if you're, you know, kind of back of office and you're just emailing every day, being able to articulate something clearly, being able to make sure that your message gets across, being able to make sure the project progresses.
That has to do with a clarity of communication. And Toastmasters gives you the opportunity to try it out in wonky ways. Sometimes you get to pick what you get to present about and then other things like the table topics that you and I have talked about before. You know, it's a random topic and you have two minutes and you need to fill the two minutes. So how do you do that in the best way possible while trying to have a cohesive narrative?
And the topic is about a coffee cup. Like it's, it makes you be a little bit more creative in a space that feels very serious, which I think is the best part of practicing skill sets like that because you're surrounded by a community that's cheering you on. And I think one of the really neat aspects about Toastmasters that I wish we could replicate in the real world is when you have to give your big speech and someone is counting down the time for you, someone else is marking down how many times you use filler words. So that really helps you, you know, figure out where are you leaning on pauses in your speech?
Where are you more uncomfortable continuing the narrative that you started? And then ultimately, the whole room gives you feedback. And some people are like, this part of your speech was really great. And you went on a complete tangent that actually took away from the validity of your speech here. And I think that feedback is so nice to get in an environment where everyone is practicing on this skill set.
I also think it makes you a better listener, because you're being much more intentional with, okay, when someone else is speaking, what am I receiving about what they're saying? Do I understand what they're saying? What follow up questions do I have? And how can I help them articulate it better?
Because it left me asking, you know, X, Y, and Z, when I thought that they were going to prove that based on the beginning of of their their narrative. So I if you have the chance to do Toastmasters, do it. But it's, it's been an incredibly important aspect of my career.
And I would say any type of business acumen, communication, speaking, training that you can do, whether it's listening to podcasts to figure out how to articulate things better, or if it's doing something like Toastmasters, those are really strong development investments that you can make as a young professional, so that when you show up in spaces later on in your career, you have the executive presence that's expected. Because let's be honest, perception is 50% of the battle. If you walk into a space and you are perceived to belong there, people will treat you differently versus if you walk into a space and you are perceived not to have the skill set. To belong there, you're already knocked down three rungs before the conversation has even started.
Travis: And I was reading one really interesting book on this topic recently. Maybe you've heard of it. It's called Talk Like Ted by Carmine Gallo, essentially a public speaking and communications type book. And he talks about so many of these topics that kind of essentially boiled down to in terms of communication, everything doesn't come down to just the content alone and just your competency alone. Everything has to be thought about in a holistic way. For example, he's talking about one of the topics he's talking about is he's talking about VC firms giving funding to new startups. And he's talking about all these factors that they've looked at and how those are weighed and whether the VC is going to grant them any funding at all and the degree to which they're going to grant them funding. And so much of it had to do outside of just the content. It was their personality, its enthusiasm, its the use of humor. It's all of these different things that we usually think of it being on the periphery, but they're being weighed so heavily and how people perceive you, your business idea, the work that you're doing. I just thought that at least that insight and some of the other ones were just so like they seem so obvious, like they should be common sense.
But once you see them written in a book by someone who's been doing deep research about it, it just makes you think about it in a totally different way. And also just a little bit about my experience in Toastmasters too. I found it to be so useful. Like, of course, there are very challenging, stressful times, like you mentioned, doing table topics where you essentially get a prompt and you have to go talk about it in front of the room for two minutes or even just some of the speeches themselves. But I found the feedback so useful because many of these aspects that you're getting critiqued on, I don't normally think about. I don't think about my use of vocal variety or how I'm going to inject more emotion into the conversation or if my gestures are moving too fast and it's taking away from my message.
There's just so many nuances that I feel like we typically don't think about until we thrust ourselves into that environment, where we're thinking more deeply and being more thoughtful about the way that we communicate. So for me, that's been such an amazing learning experience.
Erin: It's really a transformative program. Whoever created Toastmasters has done a fantastic service to orators everywhere. But I think one of the things you said that was really interesting to me was when you were talking about the book that you were reading and how some of these things are, they feel like they should be common sense. And then you talked about your Toastmasters experience around you're not thinking about those aspects of your speech. So in one part of our brain, we know charisma, the ability to tell a good story, the ability to command presence on stage, to walk into a room and own the energy that you bring with you is so critical to people being engaged with you as a speaker, whether you're doing a brand presentation, you're doing a keynote speech, or you're a coach on the sidelines with your team. On the other hand, when we go through exercises like Toastmasters puts us through, we realize how intentional that has to be because it's not common sense because it's a learned skill set.
And I think we can all, you know, I think storytelling in general is one of the biggest opportunities in the industry. I also think because we're in physical security, moving in and out of spaces and the idea of safety is a universal concept with different contexts based on who you are, how you present in the world. I mean, you know, I think about people with physical disabilities, they navigate the world through physical spaces a lot differently than an able-bodied person. And we have to understand that context in order to deploy security solutions. So how do you tell the holistic story of a building and a security solution if you're not also taking into account all of the different people that have to interact with it? And that goes to the context and the ability to tell the story.
But, you know, you and I were talking about communication styles in general. And when I was at DePaul, my senior capstone thesis for my communication degree, which I love liberal arts degrees, I think they make you exceptionally well rounded. I've had to do a lot of work on my hard skills. But this is one of the areas that I've seen myself excel because of my liberal arts degree. My entire communication thesis was based on a communication theory called reception studies. And now there's a lot of marketing strategies that use this communication theory as kind of the foundation. But they're not applying reception studies is a little interesting. Like when I applied it, I was talking about Elvis Presley.
So I have like a 50 page paper on Elvis. And it has to do with the responsibility of a good communicator is to privilege the context around the recipient of the message. So if you and I are talking about, I don't know, we'll just say what we're having this conversation. And I know that you are actually a computer scientist engineer. And I don't relate any of the topics or the context of what I'm talking about to the field in which you're most familiar. Not all of what I say is going to be received by you in the way that I mean it. And so how do we as really strong communicators as marketers take into, you know, a privileged state, what is the context around the person that's trying to receive this message so that I can make sure to frame the message in an appropriate way where it's received correctly. And I think that's a really big opportunity for everyone in the industry, but also going back to that skill of how do you speak, can you articulate a thought when you're giving a presentation? Are you taking into account, you know, what is this company value?
Does the pitch that I'm giving align with the values? How you frame a story, whether it's as a keynote speaker or you're pitching to a venture capital firm for funding really depends on intentional work of understanding the audience and meeting them where they're at. And that's what makes a charismatic, engaging speaker.
That's what makes a really great executive when you can drop them into a situation and they can just take off. And I'm, you know, I would love to be that one day. I'm not that one day, depending on the situation you can probably drop me in.
But when it starts getting to an elevated degree of discussion, I have to tap out, I don't have the skill set yet, but I'm constantly looking for experiences that help build that skill set.
Travis: Yeah, and you mentioned to adjust the ability to tell a good story. And that was one of the topics in the same book too. And one thing that really stood out to me in the book was the author was talking about how storytelling tends to be more persuasive, because we can get the listener, the audience to be more related to whatever the topic is, because they could kind of put their selves in the shoes of whoever might be the hero or the main, the main character in your story. So I think a lot of these communication ideas too, it just expands and improves all these different aspects of the work that we're doing. And for someone like me working in consulting, being able to be persuasive and to get people to see one perspective so that they could understand why we're making recommendations or why the organization might want to consider changing this thing. A lot of it does come back to being able to tell a good story from the perspective of whoever the end user might be or the population that they're serving. So being able to tell good stories and understand the audience, I feel like these also just they improve our ability to be useful to the organization and the clients that we're serving and just always.
Erin: I would, you know, going with that too, I think that plays a really kind of strong segue into, we've mentioned it before, but mentorship and networking, you can't tell a good story unless you are interacting with a lot of different perspectives. And when we think about, you know, some of the strongest storytellers in our industry or those executives that really have honed this craft, they have a really strong network of people that have helped them get to that understanding or, you know, exposure to different thought processes. And I think that's one of the really neat things about the industry.
The amount of thought leadership there is, is just astronomical. And you kind of have a really unique opportunity to both learn from, you know, the old guard, this traditional security professional that is starting to age out of the industry, starting to think about retirement, the tribal knowledge and just the, you know, historical understanding of the industry, the developments that we've had, the technological advances, the partnerships, how one company became another company became a third company, all because of, you know, some person that started this technology 45 years ago. Those stories are so fascinating to learn, but you can't get them unless you build relationships with that generation in the industry. Then you have the middle managers in the industry who are really strong thought leaders because they've been, in my opinion, through the most change of the industry, where they started is so far away from where the industry is now. And they've experienced and navigated through that industry change while building their competence as security professionals. And then you have the younger generation, these early career professionals who in most cases are entering the industry without intention. They're not, you know, actively pursuing being security professionals, but they recognize how incredible the industry could be from a career perspective and the energy that they bring to wanting to build relationships with intergenerational teams and seek out mentorship and go to networking events and build their relationships really helps facilitate the storytelling that can happen between professionals, which can also ultimately help people tell their own stories in the industry and what impact they want to make. And I think that's just really unique because so many industries I feel don't have the strength of such a historical workforce still present. And I want us to capitalize on that by facilitating networking and mentorship and sponsorship because we can just learn so much from the different generations. And that's the only way the industry is going to continue, I think, with the momentum that we've got right now. Yeah.
Travis: And I think one thing that might not be totally intuitive to other people, at least for young career Travis, that was not the case. But when you go out, when you're a younger professional and you go out and you talk to some of these more established people, they want to help you. They are, they're interested in hearing whatever crazy questions you have about challenges that you might be facing early in your career or questions that you have about professional development or things that have served them well in their careers. They really want to help you. And I've even seen, it seems like there's a dynamic too, where I think a lot of those established professionals too, when you go out and you talk with them and you reach out for help, I think in some ways they almost see you as, oh, this younger person here, this could be my son or daughter out there in the workforce. And how would I want the established professionals in their industry to treat my son or daughter when they were in the same position?
So I think there's kind of like a really interesting dynamic where I think they almost use that set of lens for viewing the situation too. So I just really encourage the younger professionals to engage more with the established professionals that you see at the industry organizations, the chapter meetings online, because really they want to help you. They want to talk about what worked for them in their careers and how you might be able to avoid some of those challenges or address them in a more effective way.
Erin: I mean, I can think of a couple of industry moms and dads that I have, that they're my people. They're people that I was introduced to or sought out in introduction early in my career. And it's been a really rewarding relationship to build because they helped me navigate through all of the changes that I've had in my career, both professional, but then also personal challenges as well.
And on the flip side, I'm learning so much. And I think they're also learning with someone who's not a direct report that they don't have career responsibility for how to work with the younger generation if I'm a representation of that. So I think they're really mutually beneficial relationships to build. But kind of what you essentially alluded to was how strong the community aspect of the industry is. And I know I've said it a couple times that the industry is so relationship based. And we really need to get young people to these networking events, to these industry events to build those relationships. But feeling like you're part of a community of professionals in an industry is such a strong motivator for retaining talent in the industry. And that's, you know, I talk a lot about my kind of interactions with young professionals because I'm very involved in the young professional experience in the industry through things like the security industry associations, RISE group, I was on the board of directors for the foundation for advancing security talent. And so much of what RISE has given me is a peer group of true friends in the industry who I'm growing up with. It's kind of like when you go through, you know, grade school with the same 30 kids all the way to eighth grade, you have all of these shared experiences that aren't necessarily identical, but there's empathy, there's relations there that you can kind of bounce off of. RISE has given me just an absolute crew of peers who are like-minded, who are in the industry, who want a similar type of career advancement as I do. And they give me their time, they give me their friendship, they provide opportunities, they'll introduce me to people in their network, I'll introduce them to people in mine.
And I think, you know, that's one of the the rarer aspects of the industry. My friends in other industries, their work friends are people in their company. And I have friends in my company, but the broad majority of my friends from the industry are all across the world working for different organizations that happen to be part of the security industry. And that is such a unique career aspect that I've benefited from. And also, I can't like say enough good things about because part of the reason I want to stay in the industry, besides I have just a lot of niche knowledge about access control systems and door hardware, is these people mean something to me.
And I want to be at their retirement parties in 50 years saying, do you remember when we were 23, and we had our first meeting at ISUS in like 2019, that would be such a cool trajectory to build on top of. And it only happens because we're seeking out those relationships, we're trying to learn from our peers, from our mentors, from our sponsors. And those people love the engagement, just like we crave the engagement from them when we do that outreach.
Travis: I could kind of relate a little bit, at least going to a number of professional development courses over the years and kind of connecting with some of the people in those groups. But after hearing you, I could probably do a little bit better job connecting with some of them and reaching out to them more often. Because that does sound like a great setup that you have, where you've been able to really like stay with that same cohort and progress throughout your career, which is really cool. And Erin, I know you're involved in many young security professional initiatives. Can you tell us about some of them? And especially Accelerize, because that was one that stood out to me too. Absolutely.
Erin: So within the Security Industry Association, there is a group called Rise. And that's kind of the core group that I've been a part of the last eight-ish years. I actually joined Rise because in 2018, they had a scholarship, an annual scholarship fund, that I ended up being awarded one of the scholarships. And then I went to the very first Accelerize, which was in 2019 in Minneapolis. And then from there, I joined the Rise Steering Committee and just decided this was going to be my extracurricular for the industry. I was only about, I don't know, 18 months into my actual career at Allegiant.
And this just busted the doors wide open for me. It was kind of my first introduction to, oh, kind of like at college, when you have your clubs and you have your societies and your extracurricular things you can do. I was like, oh, there's ways I can do this in my professional career. So Rise gave me a place to put my energy around outside of my actual job.
How can I build a network for myself, get involved, do some fun program stuff? Within Rise, we've seen exceptional growth in the last couple of years, which is a lot of credit to the Steering Committee and the members who, in my opinion, are some of the most dedicated volunteers. And anyone who has been in any type of volunteer management position knows. Sometimes it's really hard to get initiatives off the ground when it's a group of volunteers because there's not really a strong way you can hold people accountable. Rise has been a really fantastic experience of people with a lot of passion who have dedicated their time and energy to getting programs off the ground. And the impact is so significant in the industry.
So I give a lot of credit to my fellow Steering Committee members. But we have an annual scholarship. Well, we have an annual scholarship. So last year, I think we gave out $25,000, $3,000 scholarship, something like that, that can be used for anything. So professional development courses, certification courses within the industry, attending conferences, repaying student loans, going after advanced degrees.
We want to eliminate some of the barriers for young professionals to participate in the activities that help advance their career. So we've got our scholarship. We have a content subcommittee. So they're really focused on providing a platform for thought leadership for young professionals. So we've got a newsletter, we post on LinkedIn, but it's kind of the early opportunity for people who are part of Rise to start thinking about how they want to show up in thought leadership in the industry, which is really neat. And it can be anything from like a very technical content piece to this is why this soft skill really made a difference in my career.
So kind of runs the gamut from a topic's perspective. We have our DE &I committee. So that committee is really focused on how do we advance diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in the industry, bring more visibility to them. And that committee also is responsible for our mentorship program called TIME, which stands for Talent, Inclusion, Mentorship, and Education. And every year we have a cohort of mentors that apply to be mentors in the program and then a cohort of mentees, including student mentees, who get one-on-one paired up by our steering committee to match people up for a year-long mentorship program. And our applications for mentees are open right now.
So I'll send you the link after this so you can include it in the show notes because the mentorship program has been one of our most well-received and kind of biggest accoladed programs that we've been able to launch. So we're very proud of that. And then we also have our Accelerize planning committee.
And Accelerize is the security industry's only conference tailored to the young professional experience. So this year it's in Boston, Massachusetts, from August 4th through 6th. It's about 150 early career professionals from around North America come together for two and a half days of a mix of hard and soft skills. So networking etiquette, build the relationships, really have a chance to participate in the community of young people in the industry.
And then you also have really on topic, harder topic sessions, things like AI and security systems and the global impact of the political climate on the security industry's supply chain and things like that. So it's a fantastic conference for young people to participate in. And we're accepting registrants now. So if you're free in early August and want to participate in our conference, Accelerize is consistently a transformative experience for young people. And it's my final year as chair of the conference. So I'm really excited for what we're planning in Boston this year.
Travis: That sounds really awesome. One, the conference sounds cool that it's more directed towards young professionals. So I think that is so fascinating. And you mentioned some other really cool initiatives, such as the mentorship about having people in the group more engaged in thought leadership. And I feel like something as, I don't know, as simple as thought leadership, there's just so many benefits where you never know who it might connect you to. And then, of course, also, you're just learning in the process, you're becoming a better writer, you're having to research deep topics. And I don't know about others, but so much of my job is writing or presenting information.
And that's really everything. And if I could give maybe a short anecdote, I remember forever ago when I was in one of my old jobs, I had started writing a blog about just a bunch of niche security topics. And I'm sure I wrote, I don't know, 2030, 40, like a ridiculous amount of these blogs. And I had no idea who they would connect me to. I remember the role that I mentioned working in the security technology startup, that connection would have never happened if I hadn't written one of those articles, I think, maybe it was like critiquing some security technology platform. And the founder of that company had reached out and was like, Hey, I read this article that you wrote. And I was kind of interested in getting your perspective. I have this one business idea.
And then years later, I spent five years working for the company. So there's just, it's just so hard to predict how some of these networking interactions and something as simple as thought leadership publishing an article on LinkedIn, we really just don't know where it might lead us to. So I would also encourage others out there to participate in initiatives like this.
Erin: Yeah, I completely agree. I also think, you know, one of the, I love your story because I think it really strongly exemplifies the ability to feel empowered to put your perspective out there and what can happen from that. And I think it also goes back to the conversation around community. So much of the industry is based on these relationships and kind of giving people space to show up as the professionals that they are. So when you feel empowered to put your thoughts out there, whether it's thought leadership or coming on a podcast and having a conversation or meeting someone and knowing, Oh, you know what, you would really love my friend.
Let me introduce you because I think you would really get along. I think that's such a unique and really beneficial part of the industry, because so much of security, whether you're a team player or an individual contributor, your understanding of the industry, your role, the impact it can make can really help with the way other people are thinking about business or strategic partnerships and feeling empowered enough to put your thoughts out there in a space where people will engage with you is a really, I think, critical aspect of wanting to keep people in the industry when they feel like their thoughts are important enough for other people to pay attention to. What a great gift we're giving professionals in the industry.
Travis: Can agree more. And another thing I wanted to ask Aaron, your bookshelf behind you, you have a lot of books there. Are there any that you might recommend in particular for young professionals or for other security practitioners?
Erin: Oh, yes. This one is a bit of a rogue suggestion, but I suggested on every opportunity that I have. There's an actor called Alan Alda, who was the doctor on MASH, if anyone has watched MASH. And he, his entire acting career was based in improv. And improv is a really cool social experiment, truly, that teaches empathy at the core of it. Because improv is all about reacting immediately to the person in front of you without thinking.
You just have to automatically react, which requires a level of human connection that can only be achieved if you're really channeling empathy. And his entire book, it's titled, If I Understood You, What I Have This Look on My Face. And he talks about how he's created a communication school based on improv, I think at a university in California. And he works specifically with science research students who traditionally were having trouble getting funding for their projects because they couldn't articulate the value of their research to the people who had the funds to fund their projects.
And he created an entire communication school where he puts these very scientific, rigorous, STEM focused research students through an incredible collection of bizarre improv practices. And it's basically like playtime for them. But it got them to relate much more to the people on the other side of the conversation. And now there's been so much research done with his communication school of how astronomically more impactful their pitches for funding have been since they've been taking improv lessons. And so the entire book kind of outlines the science behind it. But it is really a communication strategy book. And I just think it's written in such a fun way that it's very consumable for everyone. It's full of anecdotes that are very relatable. Alan Alda is a fantastic storyteller in general. So it's just an enjoyable book to read. And it's short.
But it's kind of a he lays out the problem right at the title. Like if I understood you, would I be looking like this? Like I have a blank look on my face. I didn't catch what you were saying.
I didn't pick up what you were putting down. And so how do we combat that? Which kind of comes full circle to our conversations about, you know, how do you tell the story of what you're trying to present? How do you get the buy in that you need to make business decisions? So I would recommend it to anyone who's looking for a fun read.
Travis: Yeah, I will definitely highlight that in some of the show notes. And that idea is so important in security to being able to explain a technical topic to a non-technical audience. And some of my prepared Toastmasters presentations, that's actually what it's been about. Because I know these are situations that I'm going to be exposed to every day where I can't be talking in technical jargon that the next security person is going to pick up on immediately when so often we're presenting to executives or people that are not necessarily in the security niche, but they're in some part of operation.
So being able to put those technical topics and being able to relate it, like you said, using maybe an analogy or a story to someone else's to their background and to see where they're coming from. That's just so important. I agree.
I agree completely. And Erin, before we wrap things up, were there any other topics that you wanted to touch on or anything else that you had a burning desire to mention?
Erin: I think this was a fantastic conversation. I hope maybe there's an opportunity to have a follow-up conversation in the future. But until then, anytime anyone wants to talk about professional development or career development or kind of the young professional experience, connect with me on LinkedIn, let's chat. I love having conversations with people. So I'm just grateful for the opportunity for our discussion today. Thanks, Travis.
Travis: Of course. Thank you. And this has been such a fun conversation...
