Weekly Walk with Casey Renner: Sharon Mandell, CIO at Juniper Networks
Are you a future CIO? You’ll want to watch this.
In this episode of her Weekly Walk show, host Casey Renner takes a stroll with Juniper CIO Sharon Mandell and chats about why Juniper doesn’t purchase a company based on product alone, what an ideal CIO and CSO relationship should look like, and what Sharon would be doing if she weren’t a CIO.
You’ll learn
Sharon’s advice to someone who might sell to a CIO like her right now
What makes for a perfect relationship between a Chief Security Officer (CSO) and a Chief
Information Officer, according to Sharon
Who is this for?
Host
Guest speakers
Transcript
0:00 Hey Weekly Walk viewers!
0:01 Greetings from... where are we?
0:02 San Jose?
0:03 We're in San Jose.
0:04 Houge Park.
0:05 Lovely Houge Park.
0:06 It's beautiful.
0:06 And I am here with Sharon Mandell,
0:08 CIO at Juniper Networks.
0:14 You were one of my first virtual Weekly Walks
0:16 in the pandemic.
0:17 So we are making our show,
0:19 Sharon was like, how do we do this?
0:20 I was like, you just have to walk,
0:21 I'm gonna ask you questions,
0:22 and here we are.
0:23 So are you ready?
0:23 I'm ready.
0:24 Live question number one, let's do this!
0:26 All right.
0:26 So we get asked a lot...
0:29 As VC's, we always want to talk to CIO's
0:32 about what you're seeing in the vendor market.
0:34 You know, your insights.
0:36 When you're looking at early stage companies to potentially bring them in,
0:40 What are you looking for?
0:41 Like, what advice do you have to share with
0:42 somebody who might sell to a CIO right now?
0:45 So obviously, we'd be buying it
0:48 because we thought that there was
0:49 something innovative in the product.
0:52 But for me, it's not enough to have a product.
0:55 Juniper's a large company.
0:56 If we're going to place a bet on you,
0:57 I have to know you're starting to think
1:00 about the things beyond the product
1:01 that make you enterprise scale.
1:03 So have you thought about security
1:05 in your certifications?
1:06 You don't necessarily have to have them all done,
1:08 but you know,
1:09 are you taking all the right steps there?
1:13 Are you going to have the right support infrastructure,
1:15 things like that.
1:16 So it's the parts of the experience
1:20 that are part of the product
1:21 that you don't think of as part of the product
1:23 but are really important.
1:24 But should be thinking about.
1:25 So now they know to think about them.
1:27 So on the security note,
1:28 and this question,
1:29 Sharon and I had had a chance
1:30 to drink wine and eat cheese together last week,
1:33 and we had a CSO there,
1:34 they were saying hi to Edna Conway.
1:36 And this got me thinking...
1:37 The CIO versus the CSO relationship,
1:40 what should that look like?
1:41 Because, I mean,
1:42 there are so many security vendors out there,
1:44 so it's sort of up to you to implement
1:46 the security vendors,
1:47 But the CSO to set the sort of precedent,
1:49 so yeah,
1:50 what is a perfect CSO and CIO relationship?
1:52 So obviously collaborative and respectful.
1:57 So each of us are going to come from
1:59 different perspectives.
2:01 The CSO's job is to secure the enterprise,
2:03 and sometimes also make sure the products are secure.
2:07 And the CIO's job is to increase the productivity
2:11 of the employees through the tools
2:15 that they bring to bear,
2:17 as well as make great customer experiences.
2:19 And so sometimes those things,
2:21 you know,
2:22 don't necessarily line up.
2:24 But for me,
2:26 in my case,
2:28 the CSO reports to me.
2:30 And I'm not successful
2:31 if we don't secure the enterprise.
2:32 So at some level I work for him,
2:35 but at the same time,
2:37 hopefully I bring that perspective that balances
2:41 what we're trying to do with security,
2:43 with helping make the employee experience
2:46 still a good and frictionless one.
2:49 And that's a very hard thing to achieve.
2:51 But with the right partnership,
2:53 you can get there.
2:53 Yeah, collaboration.
2:55 I feel like that's like the key.
2:57 Collaboration and respect!
2:58 That should be like a 2022 theme
2:59 for every role, I feel like.
3:01 Well, I, you know,
3:02 I have a set of expertise and I might know
3:04 a lot about security,
3:05 but it's not my core...
3:07 It's not my core set of expertise.
3:09 And I need his skills and his knowledge,
3:13 or hers if it happened to a her,
3:15 in order to do that well.
3:17 So if I don't respect them,
3:20 it's going to be a pretty ugly situation.
3:23 Some good live advice right there too, in general.
3:25 And then my last question,
3:26 if technology did not exist as a thing,
3:29 there was no such thing as a CIO role,
3:31 what would you be doing instead?
3:34 Probably trying to run a ballet company.
3:36 OK, yes.
3:36 Sharon is a former ballerina,
3:38 which is why we're such height differentials here.
3:39 I'm like trying to...
3:40 I'm on a big angle here! Yes!
3:42 Next time I'm going to make her do some moves,
3:44 and as I told her, you can still do that.
3:46 That can be your post CIO role down the line.
3:49 Sharon's going to run a ballet studio,
3:50 she's going to teach all of you how to do ballet.
3:51 So awesome.
3:52 Sharon, thank you for Weekly Walking with me!
3:54 And Weekly Walk viewers will see you all soon!
3:56 Bye Guys!
