Teaching IT to Teach

In my rants of late regarding User Awareness and the general attitude that IT has towards users I've commented on how I feel that often IT gets negative because it's easier than teaching. Many of us in IT are not great people people. We are comfortable around others who think as we do, but we feel out of place when taken out of our element. That is when it's easier to get irritated at users than it is to help them.

In talking with many in IT who are like this I've discovered that often they do really want to help the users learn. It's in their best interest to do so. It makes their job easier and frees them up to do the work that they really want to do and the job that they really need to do. I think that many in IT really want to teach they just don't know how and haven't been given the tools to do an effective job of it. This is also something that I hope to get more involved with. I want to train users and IT to be more secure. IT often understands security but they don't understand users. Users often don't understand either. I want to help both IT and users understand each other and as a result understand security.

If companies really want to take security seriously they will actively encourage and equip IT and Security Professionals to work with the users and help them learn how to be more secure as they do their job. As we rethink how we practice IT and start to be intentional about helping users learn we will all be better off.