CyberWire Daily - Nadir Izrael: Play to your strengths. [CTO] [Career Notes]

Episode Date: June 11, 2023

Nadir Izrael, co-founder and CTO from Armis, sits down to share his story. Nadir started his love of cyber when he became a software developer at the age of 12. He always had a passion for making things work better and asking questions. Once he joined the 8200 unit in Israel, he was able to focus his interests on physics, which led him to making the discovery of wanting to start his own business. After he started building his company is when he learned to take smart and innovative risks at work and making it a way of life. Nadir shares advice, saying "Playing to your strengths, maximizes the odds of success and every other consideration lowers them inevitably, or at least, uh, um, kind of shrinks, I guess the, the probability space for success." He thinks playing to ones strengths is the best a leader can do to create the most success for their team. We thank Nadir for sharing his story with us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to the Cyber Wire Network, powered by N2K. and VPNs, yet breaches continue to rise by an 18% year-over-year increase in ransomware attacks and a $75 million record payout in 2024. These traditional security tools expand your attack surface with public-facing IPs that are exploited by bad actors more easily than ever with AI tools. It's time to rethink your security. Thank you. Hello, my name is Nadir Israel, and I'm the co-founder and CTO of Armus. I have always wanted to, I don't know, build something. Even as a kid in school, I remember I was fascinated with this idea of cars that can potentially not run on gas. And I dragged after school a few friends to try and build something.

And naturally, it didn't amount to anything at the time, but it did inspire me to study physics later on in life. And that's still like a dream of one day we'll get to that point as well. I grew up in a really kind of small town in Israel, not like the best place, not the best schools or anything like that. But I grew up in a home with my sister as well as my two parents. My mom, who to this day is kind of an inspiration for me, she was for all the time I knew her in my life almost entirely blind. for all the time I knew her in my life, almost entirely blind. And I think that's combined with just a general mentality at home of just pushing yourself to your limits,

not ever accepting things for what they are and just sort of trying to exceed any comfort zone that you have and achieve things was definitely kind of one part of that. The other part of it was definitely when I joined the military. I think that in Israel, it's a mandatory service, but you can definitely affect where you go.

You can try out to different voluntary units. And for me, I ended up joining 8200, which is a pretty well-known unit. First of all, I got to meet amazing people. I got to meet the person who would eventually be my co-founder, who is also, I mean, our relationship is hard to describe, I think, in words these days. It's beyond marriage. It's something that's very, very close.

beyond marriage. It's something that's very, very close. I knew I wanted to study physics, and that's what I went to do. And I also started working at Google at the time. It gave me a good, interesting idea of how larger tech companies look like. But I always knew that it was temporary and that I wanted to do something. And when the time came, after a few years, I ended up joining forces again with my co-founder. I think one of the lessons I learned there was play to your strengths.

The general background that I have has always lent itself well to cybersecurity. And with the growing ecosystem and everything around that in Israel, it was a natural choice. And when Evgeny and I started working together, it was really clear that that would be the area we'd focus on. And here we are today. I think one of the things that's important for me to foster in general as a leader are two things. One is communication, open, honest, transparent communication within an organization. Trust people to be there for the organization. Trust them to be aligned with what you need

and really openly and honestly project what's going on, even when it's not the best things or not the most ideal outcomes or scenarios. The other thing is empathy. This ability to also not just see the company, but also see the people in the company for what they are. not just see the company, but also see the people in the company for what they are. I think if you want to grow a truly scalable and good organization, those two things are important. I think that the open, honest communication fosters an organization that really cares and is not just

there to kind of collect the paycheck and do the work, but really cares about the organization as a whole, knowing that the organization truly cares about them. We all go through a lot of things in life, both professional and personal. And I think that having a true partner in this is important because it gets very lonely. I think there are things that you can't really share from a challenge perspective with anyone else. And you're bound to have your back against the wall on multiple different occasions. And knowing that someone is there to share that load is an important piece. I think

that ultimately adversity is kind of like, I don't know, going to the gym. If it's not hard, then you're not actually growing and not actually pushing yourself to the limits and pushing forward. And I think the flip side of that is that looking at what we've done and looking at all the amazing people, and in fact, the fact that nearly 700 families out there make their living, have a significant impact on their lives lives is a truly humbling experience that remembering that every now and then really helps even when the going gets very tough. Entrepreneurship is not a shortcut to anything in life. It's grit, it's ambition, it's the desire and really in some ways the getting pleasure from the difficult journey that is entrepreneurship. While there are people who can go this route alone, I think most people really benefit

from having the right partner. And I can't stress this enough to different entrepreneurs. I think that the natural tendency of people is to jump right into the idea that they have or the business opportunity they see or things like that. But really, that will change 50 times throughout the lifetime of a company. But the partners that you gain along the way and the people you work with are really what gets you through it.

The other thing is play to your strengths. Playing to your strengths maxim the probability space for success. I hope that people would remember the impact I've had not just in a company's direction or the product or things like that, but mostly the impact on individual lives of people. I hope that I'm remembered as a person who helped empower other people in the organization to be the best that they can be. be. I hope that my impact is measured not just in terms of the company growth, but also the people within it and the culture that got generated there. And now, a message from Black Cloak. Did you know the easiest way for cybercriminals to bypass your company's defenses is by targeting your executives and their families at home?

Black Cloak's award-winning digital executive protection platform secures their personal devices, home networks, and connected lives. Because when executives are compromised at home, your company is at risk. In fact, over one-third of new members discover they've already been breached. Protect your executives and their families 24-7, 365, with Black Cloak. Learn more at blackcloak.io.