While ASIS helps security professionals at every stage of their career, ASIS recognizes that our young professionals represent the future of the profession. Each month, the ASIS blog features a Q&A with a young professional within our membership and share their unique perspective on a range of topics ranging from industry trends, and the value of ASIS membership to professional development.
This month’s blog features Erwin van de Weerd, APP, Vice Chair of the ASIS Young Professionals Community, the Young Professionals Representative for the Benelux region, and Area Physical Security Manager BeNeLux at SAP.
Q: What is an interesting story about your early career growth in the industry?
A: I joined ASIS International as student-member back in 2017 as I was interested in the security industry. During this time I applied for the ASIS Benelux Student-Mentorship, until this day my (old) mentor still guides me and helps me in achieving my goals.
Over the years I had an opportunity to establish valuable connections on a local and global level. These connections have helped me with my goals and what steps I should take to reach them. ASIS International helped me improve myself as a professional and I would like to help my fellow and future professionals as well. This year in my new role as Vice Chair of the ASIS Young Professionals Community I look forward to helping (future) Young Professionals from all around the world!
Q: As a young professional, what do you think the future of security holds?
A: Currently, if you look at security job positions (in Europe) you can apply for a lot of information security / cybersecurity positions. This will continue on as technology will evolve and so will risks. However, in the future cyber and physical departments will converge. These subjects are not two stand-alone domains anymore. This will result in a change in the experience, knowledge and competencies of a security professional. Especially, as a starting professional you will need to have knowledge on both subjects to understand the connections within organizations and to mitigate risks from a more integral perspective.
Q: What opportunities exist for young professionals in the security industry?
A: There are unlimited opportunities for young professionals in the security industry, the sky is the limit. Looking at the European region a lot of leadership positions will be filled by current middle-management professionals as many senior professionals will retire in five to seven years. This will leave a gap in the entry/operational positions in an organization. Now, young professionals study for at least four years to get a degree focused on security management. This will provide a head start regarding the more experienced professionals who didn´t have these. The young professionals already know the basic elements of security management and understand the industry jargon. I would recommend young professionals, especially starting professionals, to fill a few jobs in different security domains. It will provide them with additional specialistic knowledge and make them a more well-rounded security professional which will help them in the long term in a leadership position.
