Ahmed Pasha
CISO
Nomura
Ahmed Pasha is the US Head of IT Security (CISO) for Nomura, a global financial services group (27,000+ strong) with an integrated network spanning over 30 countries and regions, and he is a Governing Body Member of the New York CISO Community.
Learn more about the New York CISO community here.
Give us a brief overview of the path that led to your current role.
I started out as a developer and a project manager and then got into cyber where I had senior roles in threat intel and incident response at multiple organizations (Citibank and Fiserv). I joined my current firm (Nomura) in 2018 and built the threat intelligence and offensive security functions. Prior to taking on the CISO role, I was managing a large global team, running threat management and advising many other key functions.
What are your guiding leadership principles?
To walk a mile in another person’s shoes. This helps level-set each conversation so to understand where they are coming from. It’s important as leaders to position each conversation in advance. In my experience, it is imperative to understand perspectives when you are getting a request or asking someone for a favor. It makes both ends of that transaction better.
With disruption being a key theme of the past few years, where do you see your role as a CISO going in the next 1-2 years?
I see it staying as a critical role, but additionally a jump-off path to many other roles such as CIO, COO, etc. This is because, at its core, it’s a risk management discipline and as technology and operational estates grow, that core skill of managing risk comes in handy.
What advice would you give to someone just starting out in the role as a CISO?
I would recommend speaking to as many people as possible and building connections, both internally and externally. Secondly, with the increasing legislation around cybersecurity, understand liability and risk as it pertains to your role.
Tell us 3 fun facts about yourself.
- I don’t like roller coasters
- But, I did go skydiving
- I worked up and close to a number of notorious hacks – ask me.
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