At Trend Micro we’re proud to be walking the talk on gender diversity — from our co-founder and CEO, Eva Chen, all the way down. It’s always been a keen part of our corporate culture, from the very beginning 30 years ago. But we also realize that there’s still a major diversity challenge facing the industry as a whole. That’s why we’re showing our support for the cause as platinum sponsor at the fantastic Women of the Channel Leadership Summit 2018 in December.
Time for change
Women currently make up just under a quarter (24%) of the global cybersecurity workforce. That’s crazy, in a world in which there is a current shortfall of nearly three million professionals worldwide — 500,000 of them in North America. This couldn’t come at a worse time. Trend Micro blocked more than 20.4 billion threats for the first half of 2018 alone and by some estimates cybercrime costs the global economy more than $600 billion. Organizations desperately need access to the best talent in the escalating battle against cyber threats.
Of course, the gender diversity problem is manifest not just in cybersecurity but across the whole IT industry. This has to change. The bottom line is that diverse teams produce better results, create a richer corporate culture and a workplace capable of attracting the brightest and best new recruits. That’s something all employers should be on board with.
As part of Trend Micro’s efforts to lead the front on this, we launched our Close the Gap initiative, which is sponsoring 30 women to follow their dreams. Going forward, this initiative will help create new networking and mentoring opportunities, thought leadership, education programs, and an online community of knowledge and resources to help advance the careers of gender diverse applicants.
Reaching the summit
We want to keep the momentum going any way we can. That’s why events like Women of the Channel Leadership Summit are so important, offering attendees fantastic opportunities to meet like-minded women and hear from some inspiring individuals in workshops, peer panels, and motivation speaker and networking sessions.
One of those speakers will be Trend Micro’s own Louise McEvoy, who has been heading up our US channel strategy for cloud. Louise has spent the past 14 years climbing some of the world’s highest mountains, and in May 2018 notched a remarkable achievement by reaching the summit of Everest. She’ll be sharing her experiences and hopefully inspiring some attendees to overcome career challenges and reach their own personal “summits.”
Also at the event we’ll be giving away cards handmade by rescued victims of human trafficking in El Salvador. We’re encouraging attendees to use them to write a personal message to someone that has inspired them. Trenders will also be delighted to share their insight and personal career experiences to any attendees who want to drop by to our stand during the show.
You can find out more about the women that work at Trend Micro here. And to register for the Women of the Channel Leadership Summit, click here.
