The Great Conversation in Security™ agenda is influenced by the conversations we have with security executives who are attempting to keep pace with risk, budget optimization and technology in an evolving threat landscape.

This year a persistent theme emerged around the hidden costs of security. It is being influenced by the growing realization that the very technology that was supposed to address the threat and lower the cost is becoming an anchor that very few companies can carry. The hidden costs also contain the competitive landscape for hiring subject matter expertise in hardware, networks, integration, and application software that drives the use case for access control, video management and communications.

Add to this, the need for the security team to become more of a strategic advisor to the owner’s of risk such as the line of business executives, HR and Finance.

To begin to address this requires a strategic model for managing your people, process and tools as well as your business partnerships on the road to the digital transformation of your department and your organization.

As always we sought out the thought leaders and the security executives that were tackling these issues that led to the agenda for Seattle.

• Scott Klososky, who was a featured speaker at GSX 2018, will provide a compelling call to action around an integrated security model.

• Dr. Zafar Chaudry, the CIO for Seattle Children’s, one of the leading hospitals and research institutions in the country, will provide his insights into integrating security into the fabric of the organization’s digital transformation roadmap

• Ed Bacco, the former head of security at Amazon.com and currently the CSO of the Enterprise Risk Security Group of ADT|ASG, will outline the burden of the hidden costs of security and be joined by security executives who are facing this as well.

• Cheryl Michaels, the Senior Director of Security at Seattle Pacific University, will help describe how their efforts at creating an integrated security model helped them when the worst case scenario occurred at their campus: an active shooter.

• Shawn Galloway, a noted author and subject matter expert in creating cultures of excellence that can be applied to security and safety, will provide us a path to cultural excellence; the greatest leverage we have in our organizations.

• Claude Yusti, Partner of the Public Sector Watson AI and Data Platform Group at IBM Global Business Services, will attempt to demystify AI and show how it is being adopted and adapted in applications today and how we might prepare our organization for expanding AI uses tomorrow.

• Barbara Endicott-Popovsky Ph.D., Executive Director, Center for Information Assurance and Cybersecurity at the University of Washington, has direct experience in attempting to build a bridge in understanding for executives and risk owners on how to think about cyber security. She will be sharing a cutting edge learning model for our review.

• Michael Foynes, the Global Lead for the Center of Innovation at Microsoft, leverages his 15 years managing global operations for security to help us understand the imperative to digitally transform our profession, our industry and our organizations. And provides us a way to think about the way to achieve it.

• Interspersed throughout the two days are case studies delivered by security executives who had to face a problem, organize a team of internal and external stakeholders to address it, and then deploy a technology against a use case to ensure the problem could be addressed. These studies are always a lesson in leadership, management and measures of performance. But we will also invite technology leaders to share with us their insights on the future roadmap for access control, video surveillance, intelligent communications, identity management and data aggregation, storage and communication in a sensor driven world.

As always, The Great Conversation is an invitation into a community dedicated to the advancement of the industry, the profession and to our individual and collective pursuit of excellence within our organizations. A nation depends on us to keep our people safe, our economy stable, and our assets protected.

We thank you for your voice as it joins with your peers in a great conversation.