You Can't Block Every Shot

Security operations is a lot like being a goalie.

I spent the first 20 years of my life on the ice — mask on, skates tight, eyes locked in — reading plays before they happened, reacting in milliseconds, and carrying the weight of every goal that slipped past. You're the last line of defense. It doesn't matter who missed the play — you're the one fishing the puck out of the net while the crowd blames you for it.

That mindset never left me. It followed me into my professional life, starting in 1999, and especially shaped how I led in high-pressure roles within SecOps. Over time, I became what I call a Shield Manager:

The one who absorbs internal chaos so the SOC can keep their eyes on the glass.

As a Shield Manager, you're the buffer.

You absorb the chaos:

• Poorly timed pivots.
• Half-baked product decisions.
• Fire drills that start with "We need this yesterday."
• Urgent dashboard requests that add noise but no value.

You push back. You translate ambiguity. You buy your team the clarity and stability they need to focus on what matters.

And for a while it works.

Until the chaos outpaces your ability to absorb it. Or a real incident hits and there's no bandwidth left to control your inner Roy Kent.

The Cracks Start Showing

The dysfunction doesn't come from adversaries. It comes from inside the org.

Here's what that looked like:

• Surprise tooling purchased without SOC input. No integration plan. No direction.
• Unilateral decisions made in silos announced as if alignment had magically happened.
• SOC analysts constantly pulled into reactive client tasks, far outside their role or scope.

You aren't running an SOC. You are running a high-stakes improv exercise. Every day. It starts to affect your sanity.

You shield your team for as long as you can. But shielding only works when leadership has your back. When misalignment becomes the norm, and chaos flows from the top, even the strongest shield cracks.

Reflection: What Actually Went Wrong?

After I left, I spent weeks replaying every decision. Every escalation. Every ignored warning.

• Was I too direct? Did I let my inner Roy Kent drop too many F-bombs?
• Did I over-index on crisis at the expense of diplomacy?
• Did I protect my team when I should've forced tougher conversations earlier?

Eventually, I landed on a deeper truth:

We never applied the same principles we demand of our systems… to our people.

In security, we live and breathe the CIA triad: Confidentiality. Integrity. Availability.

But we never asked:

• Do your people feel safe to speak up? Truly safe?
• Do your leaders act with consistency and honesty? It's okay to fail — just fail fast and learn.
• Are you protecting your team's ability to focus and think? Are you hearing their cries for help?

That's when it clicked. The very framework we use to secure networks should also be used to secure culture.