To celebrate International Women’s Day 2022, Check Point Software Technologies reveals how it has made great strides in recognizing the importance of women in cybersecurity. Check Point works and carries out actions every day to increase female representation within its company and to support the proliferation of women in the cybersecurity industry.
In 2013, women held only 11% of jobs in the world of cybersecurity but by 2020, they represented 24% of the cybersecurity workforce according to the ISC2 Women in Cybersecurity report. Despite more women taking up positions, from R&D (research & development) to engineering, there is still a long way to go to close the gender gap.
To achieve this goal of a more gender-balanced organization, Check Point Software participates in different conferences and events that promote gender diversity in order to recruit female candidates. The company has also established mentoring drives such as Woman Mentoring Program, a leadership development campaign for future female leaders or the FIERCE Mentorship program in the US.
The Woman Mentoring Program is run in the EMEA region every six months. It works by appointing an experienced female manager or female team lead, from various divisions to guide a less experienced female mentee. It is a learning and development partnership with a two-way exchange of guidance and counseling, to support female colleagues who wish to be more proficient in the world of cybersecurity.
Another initiative carried out in collaboration with the company FIERCE, is a program called FIERCE Mentorship in the US, which aims to empower young women to get involved in cybersecurity. This community outreach forum works with local communities and programs to provide innovative activities that inspire girls to choose and pursue careers related to cybersecurity.
“At Check Point Software, we have always been very committed not only to equality, but breaking the bias in the workplace when hiring, training and evaluating our employees. To this end, we run special programs dedicated to developing the careers of all our female employees, for example in the area of training and appraisal. We have implemented a high-performance mentoring program to develop the careers of women in our teams and another one focused on leadership development for future managers, a four-month project to prepare the next leaders of our company,” said Maya Horowitz, Vice President, Research at Check Point Software.
“Women of excellence have been a crucial part of Check Point’s success since its establishment and I’m pleased that we continue with this important tradition. The best cyber security is based on the best women and men providing it, and our diversity is a blessing” said Gil Shwed, Founder and CEO of Check Point Software.
Check Point strives every day to increase female representation and continues to promote campaigns and partnerships with relevant organizations to increase the number of women in technology-related positions and train them to increase their skills in cybersecurity. More than half of Check Point´s top executive management today are held by women, such as the Chief Product Officer (CPO), Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Chief Commercial Officer (CCO).
