Richard McCaslin
5.0
(19)
Expert coach: cybersecurity, leadership, general business and careers
Studied at University of Texas at San Antonio
Hiring Manager at Arctic Wolf
Successful clients at
Not currently taking new clients
Richard’s Cybersecurity Qualifications
Experience level: Director
100+ people coached for Cybersecurity
Richard has helped clients get into these companies:
Deep experience in cyber operations and incident response from hands-on-keyboard to strategic thinker. Experience spans start-ups to Fortune 100 and Big-4 consulting. Client industries include financial services, medical provider, specialty insurance, technology/media/telecommunications, power & utilities (including nuclear power generation) among others. Experienced at technical analysis, engineering and architecture. Adept at translating technical concepts to non-technical audiences. Separate from cyber experience, I have over 20 years' experience in career coaching spanning college graduate/new hire, to executive level. Specific areas of focus include leadership, resume review, military/veteran transitions, and pay/promotion negotiations among many others.
Richard can help with:
Behavioral Interview Prep
Cover Letters
Cyber Security Strategy
Freelancing
Incident Response
LinkedIn Review
Networking Strategy
Network Security
Promotion Strategy
Resume Review
Risk Assessment
Salary Negotiation
Security Auditing
Skill Building
Technical Interview Prep
Vulnerability Management
Work Experience
Director, Business Operations
Arctic Wolf
February 2024 - Present
Hiring Manager
Led a team of Business Analysts and Program Managers in a fast-paced, late-stage startup environment. Responsible for strategic planning, build vs buy analyses/decisions for business-critical platforms, data analytics, vendor relations, budgeting, capital expenditures, forecasting, automation, recruiting, and employee engagement. • Delivered multiple key company projects focused on maturing business processes, developing metrics, increasing accuracy and automating tasks on time and under budget resulting in 3 FTE savings annually within 6 months of starting. • Completely rebuilt critical security and business metrics package for S2 senior leadership and C-level. Enabled more effective decision making • Recognized as Partner of the Quarter for outstanding collaboration • Identified and resolved multiple gaps in headcount planning process resulting in alignment between growth model and hiring plan.
Director - Cybersecurity & Technology Risk
EY
May 2021 - March 2024
Richard led several global teams of over 100 cyber professionals to provide innovative solutions to multiple global clients. His responsibilities included Threat Detection and Response (SOC/SIEM/EDR/NDR/XDR), Threat Exposure Management (vulnerability management, scanning, patching) and Cyber Threat Intelligence (curated intel feeds, signal development, threat landscape assessment). He combined technical skill and business acumen to make quantifiable improvements in the overall security posture and increasing the ROI on overall security spend. Infrastructure, IT Security Assessments and +6 skills
Director
EY
January 2018 - February 2024
Hiring Manager
Infrastructure, IT Security Assessments and +6 skills Provided oversight and direction for end-to-end operations, including Fortune 100 clients’ 24x7 security programs, while ensuring alignment with organizational practices. Monitored and coordinated all cyber security activities, for 200K+ endpoints with unique cultures, challenges, project timelines, and deliverables. Direct responsibility for Threat Detection, Incident Response, Vulnerability Management, Threat Hunting and Cyber Threat Intelligence including staffing and budget. Orchestrated the development of effective strategies, and technical implementation plans. Managed security operations for highly complex global organizations, including the establishment of security infrastructure and policies for mixed (on-premises and multi-cloud) environments. Built and led a global delivery team to deliver exceptional outcomes and accomplish organizational objectives for security operations, engineering, and architecture teams. Excelled at effectively communicating and translating between technical and business constituencies. Responded to cyber security-related inquiries, concerns, and issues in a highly professional and courteous manner. • Saved $500k+ annually by identifying and implementing multiple technical and process improvements. • Conducted risk assessments and developed detailed recommendations to address security gaps and vulnerabilities. • Developed the next generation of cyber practitioners and leaders by providing technical and leadership training, guidance, and one-on-one mentorship to over 40 security professionals. • Directed and supported a team with the responsibility to manage a complex cyber security audit, while analyzing audit findings and interacting with cyber professionals to communicate all information. • Experience with clients in nuclear power, professional services, telecom, media, data analytics, healthcare/primary care provider, manufacturing, financial services and specialty insurance industries.
Managing Consultant
EY
May 2016 - January 2021
Hiring Manager
Successfully managed a $30B client, including 400k+ endpoints, while serving as a SOC senior technical escalation point and operations manager. Conducted a Red vs Blue engagement simulating inside threat for $16B client/165k+ endpoints as the senior technical lead. Developed customized detections for various tactics, including credential theft or abuse, lateral movement, and malicious code execution. Provided technical leadership to the Threat Hunting team for the identification and elimination of potential threats, while conducting scenario-based hunt missions for all managed security operations center (MSOC) clients. Built trust and increased engagements by fostering and sustaining strong relations. Supported a global firm with validation of security suite by analyzing an environment where coverage had been significantly over-estimated and providing expert advice. Developed targeted training packages for non-technical users through security professionals. • Improved performance and expertise of junior analysts by providing training and guidance in alert triage and analysis methodology. • Saved a $50M contract by successfully identifying a previously unknown misconfiguration which resulted in unexpected behavior that mimicked malicious activity.
Global Security Professional
Confidential
2015 - May 2016
Experienced technology professional with extensive experience improving business metrics and managing critical infrastructure and systems. Proven track record as a mentor – develops leaders and technical talent in business and volunteer settings. Understands interrelationships of complex systems – identifies and mitigates issues before they become problems. Positive change agent – experienced in iterative process improvement. • Solely responsible for securing the donation of a new 42 Terabyte SAN array to UTSA’s Cyber Security lab. Spearheading a project to create a platform for experiential learning. • Identified common root cause for series of vulnerabilities impacting 5 facilities – situation had remained unresolved for over 24 months. Outlined specific steps that led to remediation and presented recommendations to prevent similar situations. • Predicted a specific vulnerability based on independent industry research. Confirmed the vulnerability existed through correlation of feedback from multiple tools. Raised awareness and developed remediation plan. • Analyzed current security posture and made specific, actionable recommendations to dramatically reduce complexity and attack surface including PCI segments. • Reached out to several business units to forge partnerships, raise awareness and prioritize Global Security Team goals. Demonstrated business benefit – win/win. Infrastructure, IT Security Assessments and +6 skills
Information Security Analyst
Client Confidential
2014 - 2015
• Identified common root cause for series of critical vulnerabilities impacting 5 facilities – situation had remained unresolved for over 24 months. Outlined specific steps that led to remediation and presented recommendations to prevent similar situations. • Predicted a specific vulnerability based on independent research. Confirmed vulnerability existed on corporate network via multiple tools. Raised awareness and developed remediation plan. • Analyzed current security posture and made specific, actionable recommendations to dramatically reduce complexity and attack surface including PCI segments. • Reached out to several business units to forge partnerships, raise awareness and prioritize Global Security Team goals. Demonstrated business benefit – win/win. Infrastructure, IT Security Assessments and +6 skills
Senior Manager
Rackspace
August 2007 - November 2013
Hiring Manager
• Led Virtualization Operations – 23 Engineers/4 Architects/2 Managers, 24x7 responsible for supporting $250M annual revenue. • Coordinated distributed workforce across 5 sites on 3 different continents – exceeded 99.9% infrastructure/services availability. • Improved level of service through period of explosive 200% growth: “Every objective metric we measure has improved significantly”. • Led continuous improvement efforts to improve inputs into the Virt. on-boarding process. First pass yield (FPY) increased from single digits to >80%, saving hundreds of labor hours per year. • Developed queue management tool and methodology – data driven approach to improve customer experience through increased responsiveness and prioritization – dramatic success led to Business Intelligence support/roll-out of the tool company-wide – delivered training on methodology. • Responsible for several efforts both internal/external to place control/functionality directly in the hands of the customer, while maintaining resiliency of the underlying platform. • Conducted 4th iteration of Catalyst Project (see below) – approximately 20 weeks of mentorship in leadership fundamentals. Established framework for coaching using current challenges facing the participants for development opportunities. Infrastructure, Organization Skills and +2 skills
Education
University of Texas at San Antonio
Master's of Science, Information Technology - Concentration in Cyber Security
2014 - 2016
Organization Skills and Vulnerability Management
Ashland University
MBA, Executive Management
1998 - 2002
Activities and societies: Delta Mu Delta - International Honor Society in Business Organization Skills
The Ohio State University
Bachelor's Degree, Logistics
1992 - 1995
19 Reviews
Overall Rating
5.0
Richard has helped Leland clients get into McCombs School of Business (UT Austin)
Richard has helped clients get into these companies: