Editor’s note: ISACA Foundation recently formed with a mission of helping to build a healthy digital world. The following is a Q&A excerpt from a new podcast introducing ISACA Foundation with Ginger Spitzer, the foundation’s executive director, and Gail Coury, the foundation’s board chair. To find out more about how to become involved in ISACA Foundation.
ISACA Now: What is the ISACA Foundation, and why is now the right time for its formation?
GC: Just to give a little history, it was about four or five years ago that ISACA brought together a number of women leaders to talk about the underrepresentation of women in the tech space, and as we started those conversations and we developed a program – it started off as something different, but it eventually became what we know today as SheLeadsTech. That is a program that has been hugely successful under ISACA (addressing the underrepresentation of women in the tech workforce), and it gained so much interest, and there seems to be such a desire from the ISACA membership to be involved, that we began discussing what else could ISACA do to give back, and it was from there that the idea for the foundation first came into being.
GS: And to add a little bit of color around why now … one of our key assets is that we are global, and so while there are various non-profits in this space, none are global, which ISACA’s membership allows us to be. And I think also, the current state of technology and its entry into every aspect of our lives – young people, older people, whatever walks of life – people are integrated with technology, and so there’s a lot more consideration for things like safety and access, being able to really be part of the cyber space. And so, I think the foundation will resonate with quite a few people as those concerns really become a large part of the conversation.
ISACA Now: The ISACA Foundation mission is to build a healthy digital world that is safe, secure and accessible to all. Let’s focus on the accessible to all part for a moment – what are some of the challenges on that front, and how can the foundation help to make a difference?
GC: We had many discussions about this when we were formulating the foundation, and we settled on some very key founding principles, and that is that technology knows no gender, knows no color, knows no age, makes no assumptions, holds no biases and has no bounds. So when it’s used for good, it can actually level the most uneven playing fields in the world, and we think that there’s real opportunity with this as a founding principle … how can we, because we have all this expertise within the ISACA membership, assist those most vulnerable groups, and how can we help in those areas where technology may not be as readily accessible.
GS: We’re looking at this from a global perspective, so what those barriers are to technology may differ. It may be socioeconomics, it could be geography, it could be countries that are having various issues with broadband. So, depending on where we are going to be delivering services and to which particular populations, our programs are going to be very flexible and very targeted toward the area that we’re in. It’s not going to be off-the-shelf programming directed at everybody the same way, and I think that is also an asset of ISACA Foundation, is that we’re very nimble and will quickly be able to assess the barrier, and address it.
ISACA Now: Can you walk us through some of the new programming that is in the works, in addition to continuing to grow SheLeadsTech?
GS: We’ve been very thoughtful about this program development. The board of directors, when they first were discussing the foundation, identified areas in which we would have programming, and we really list those in three pillars. One is pre-K through 12th grade programming, or the equivalent, whatever that might be – maybe it’s more of an age bracket for populations outside the US, but the idea is you’re both helping educate students about technology and the security required and the responsibility when utilizing technology, as well as doing some career exploration.
… Another pillar of our programming is around increasing the diversity in the technology field, and diversity is a number of things. We could be talking about gender, we could be talking about race, or culture, we could be specifically talking about a region that is underserved, but the whole idea is there are various populations who do not have the accessibility or the resources that are really going to allow them to succeed in their careers. SheLeadsTech fits under this, but we’re also going to have a program called WeLeadTech, and that’s going to be specifically around minority groups who face multiple barriers in this space.
The third pillar that we’ll be focused on is bridging the digital divide. Now, in essence, all of our programs really try to bridge the digital divide, but this is a little more specific around particular groups that are left out of the conversation or are left out of resource acquisition because of something in their lives. … We really want to make an impact, so we’re going to be very particular about quality programs that have measurable outcomes.
