Keeping Your Eyes Open For Opportunity with Sandi Larsen, Vice President of Global Security Solutions at Dynatrace

Carolyn Ford:

Welcome to Tech Transforms, sponsored by Dynatrace. I'm Carolyn Ford. Each week, Mark Senell and I talk with top influencers to explore how the US government is harnessing the power of technology to solve complex challenges and improve our lives.

Hi, thanks for joining us on Tech Transforms. I'm Carolyn Ford, and today I get to welcome Sandi Larsen, Vice President of Global Security Solutions at Dynatrace. And first of all, I'm a big fan of Sandi's. She's a little bit of a hero of mine and we'll get into why later, but well, you'll be able to easily see why. Today I've asked Sandi to talk to us about zero trust, layered defense and what it means to be a woman in leadership in the federal technology space. Welcome to Tech Transforms, Sandi.

Sandi Larsen:

Thank you. I'm very happy to be here and having the conversation today, Carolyn.

Carolyn Ford:

Well, the pleasure is all mine. I want to kick off with your current role at Dynatrace and talk to me a little bit about what some of your primary objectives are.

Sandi Larsen:

Sure. So the last two and a half years since joining Dynatrace have been a very thrilling ride for me from a career and personal perspective. I was brought on to Dynatrace to help launch our entrance into the security market. We are a observability heavyweight and have done amazing things in that segment, and the company just had the foresight to see that security and observability would be converging, and they made the move early to start working on this from a product perspective. And so as I said, I was hired to come in and help launch the product and build a security specialty team around that. Since joining my job has really been almost more of a GM as opposed to a sales leader. I am in sales and have that as my title and my function, but because we're such a small, nimble team, as we started, it really encompassed playing a bigger role where I was involved in every aspect of the business and the go-to-market.

Everything from sales operations to creating the right messaging, getting customer input, validating the market requirements, figuring out the types of reports we needed, more of the mundane things, just operational type things, and then as well as education, enabling the broader sales team and getting this whole thing off the ground. So from that perspective, it's been just really rewarding. And then on top of that, I am biased for sure, but we have amazing technology that I think is unlike anything else in the industry. So it's just from that perspective as well, it's a real treat to get up and do my job every day. That sounds hokey, but that's the honest answer right there.

Carolyn Ford:

No, I love that. And you and I have spoken in the past about zero trust, layered defense. There are two big buzzwords in industry, but especially in government. I mean, they've both been around I feel like a decade plus, right?

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah.

Carolyn Ford:

And for a minute, I started to question my use of layered defense because back in the day when I was more cybersecurity and working in the cybersecurity division for Raytheon, that was like our mantra. We're part of the layer defense, layer defense, layer defense. And now we've seen in the federal government another big surge, I feel like towards zero trust, even to the point where there's government funding that specifically calls out, you must do zero trust. And so I kind of questioned, okay, so should that term layered defense go away and we're just saying zero trust? So when you and I talked, I really, really like your philosophy and I would like you to talk more about that.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah, absolutely. My personal opinion is that not only can zero trust in defense in depth coexist, I think they should coexist. So just like you said, defense in depth has been around for decades and it really involves this concept of a layered security approach using multiple tools, hopefully working in unison, maybe sometimes not, but hopefully they are. And the thought that if one tool fails or gets bypassed by an attacker, that there is another layer of defense. Right? That's the name. So it also is strong when protecting against human error, misconfiguration of tools. So the benefit in defense in depth over zero trust is that is if one layer fails, there's something else there. But really with zero trust, that's a whole different concept of just providing, being able to adhere to specific principles, I guess is the better way to put it. And the goal is never trust anyone or anything.

So used with a lot of times identity management, authentication and access. So that's the primary sort of domain where that principle is used. But my thinking is that zero trust can be part of your defense in depth as one element of your defense in depth. And then the reverse, which I find even more interesting of that is also true in that defense in depth philosophy can be included in zero trust deployments. And what I mean by that is you can have limited access to only certain specific applications, and in addition to that, your network can be zoned off into different zones. So you have layered defense when it comes to zero trust. Those are two different principles about zero trust, but you're using both of those. And another example which hits closer to home of the way that Dynatrace applies zero trust is it's more on the vulnerability and application management side of the house.

And so while you're having all of these zero trust principles that you apply to access management, you could also apply that to scanning for vulnerabilities. So being able to have this continuously on software that is evaluating, not scanning, because that's the way Dynatrace application security works. It's not like a traditional SaaS or DaaS or IaaS or SCA tool in that I'm going to do a scan at 8:00 AM. I'm going to do a scan at 2:00 PM. It's as the software is operating running, there's that constant continuous evaluation of whether or not there are vulnerabilities present. So in my book, that is an element of that zero trust because it's the continuous assessment and verification of whether or not you are at risk from a security perspective. So those are just some of the ways that I think the two sort of intersect and complement one another. And I view them more as a complement than two distinct either or types of approaches.

Carolyn Ford:

I really like that and it feels better to me. I think the reason I started questioning the whole layered defense thing, term defense in depth, layer defense is because the old philosophy of you've got your castle in the moat and it was kind of this moat kind of thing. And anymore we say, well, there is no perimeter. And you still need a perimeter. You still want to have firewalls. That's part of your defense. And so I really like the way you just went into applying defense in depth into zero trust too. And for our listeners, I mean listeners, you know we're not a vendor or a product podcast. We like to keep it at the thought leadership level, but everything you talked about, I agree with you. I mean, Dynatrace is the bomb. And we're talking about observability technologies that provide these capabilities that you're talking about.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah, absolutely. We're not the only solution that has applicability in this, it's just the one that hits closest to home that I know so well. But there's plenty of other solutions that are complements to one another that certainly feed into this layered approach to zero trust.

Carolyn Ford:

Well, and to your point, sorry, we're going to go product again here. But I mean, Dynatrace does more than play nicely with hundreds of other technologies because they're all part of this defense in depth. And that's true for many technologies. All right, well, you have had a very successful career. I'm not going to give the years. I mean, I don't want to date you.

Sandi Larsen:

Thank you for that.

Carolyn Ford:

But I mean, you've done everything from security practitioner to the supplier side of things. You even mentioned your official title is sales. You've been part of several cybersecurity startups. In fact, you and I first met as part of the Raytheon turned Forcepoint Cybersecurity world years ago. So what inspired you to pursue a career in software development in this industry and specifically cybersecurity?

Sandi Larsen:

The cybersecurity part was a bit of an accident, and I'll explain what I mean by that. But I've always been interested in the intersection of technology and business. For me, the technology is exciting and I enjoy the fast paced ever-changing type of environment. And then on the business side, I like the relationships and driving towards results and the competitive nature in me of achieving a goal. So the blending of the two has always been something that I have been drawn to. And as you said, my career path has been very diverse and very unconventional. During college, I did an internship with Wachovia Bank, which is now part of Wells Fargo was one of their acquisitions. And that really set me up for a full-time position after graduation. And so I started as a developer working on the bank's payment systems.

Carolyn Ford:

What were you coding in? What was the language? Do we still use it?

Sandi Larsen:

You are really going to date me now. And oddly enough I say this, and the banks are probably not probably, I know they are still using applications in Assembler because it's the payment systems, it's check processing, how do we process checks? How do we process payments? And those, you don't really want to go in and mess with those if you don't have to.

Carolyn Ford:

If it's working.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah, the big iron. So yes, that's where I started and one could understand why that might have been a little bit, not the most thrilling way to spend a day at your desk. So I quickly moved from being a developer to being a developer team lead. So that was sort of my first step into being a leader. And I discovered that I enjoyed leading more than I did coding. And so I never diverted from that path. But I did a number of years and then had the opportunity to move from development into product management. And this was one of the steps in my career that I really enjoyed. I loved that environment of coming up with new ideas, working with the business to fulfill their objectives and meet their requirements, and then taking that and translating it into requirements for a development team. I like that middle role there that go-between.

myself, this is in the early: 2000

Carolyn Ford:

You and I were in product management at the same time. So I was one of the vendors probably that you were working with. So I was doing VPNs and remote access and some of the first ones. And I loved product management too. Figuring out, okay, this is what you need, now how do we translate this into the technology?

Sandi Larsen:

Exactly, exactly. And being exposed to lots of new technologies and building those relationships outside of the bank, that is what led to my next position was that I was approached to join a small startup from a person who was one of my trusted providers from IBM. He was leaving IBM to go be a salesperson at this startup. And he approached me and he said, "Why don't you come and join me and be my SE?" And I'm like, "You want me to sell stuff? I don't sell stuff. I build stuff." You know? And it turned out that I was employee number 30 and partnered up with this great salesperson that I learned so much from on how to sell the right way, how to be in sales and have integrity.

Carolyn Ford:

That is a big jump, man. You must've really trusted him to be an engineer for a salesperson. Love you salespeople.

Sandi Larsen:

And leaving the comfort of my position at the bank to-

Carolyn Ford:

For a startup. Which means you were doing a lot more than just a sales engineer, as if that weren't enough. You were definitely wearing multiple hats, weren't you?

Sandi Larsen:

Yes, for sure.

Carolyn Ford:

You were coding on the side.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah, exactly. Everybody was, the whole company was. We were all in it together, rowing together. It was a really, really positive environment, a really great culture to be part of. And we had a great team. John was the guy's name that I was partnered up with. We were the only two people covering the whole East Coast. I was like, pick your pick, go talk to anybody you want. But we had so much fun and the company was very entrepreneurial and fast moving, and the product was a great success, it IPO’d. And so as the company grew, my responsibility grew, and so I became the SE director for the East Coast. I was there at the company for 10 years, which is a long run for a startup.

And so then eventually that same rockstar salesperson, he left the company we were with to go join a financial services technology company. So a company that only sold software to banks, only financial services technology. And he recruited me to come over and go further to the dark side and be, he was a sales manager, and so he asked me to come try my hand at being a quota carrying salesperson. So anyway, fast forward to not belabor the point here, but that was my first position as a salesperson. Then I was successful as an individual contributor. And then through the course of several other opportunities after that, moved into different sales leadership positions, regional sales director and AVP, and now to the job that I'm in now. So it's been a wild ride, but a lot of fun, a lot of fun, and I've learned so much and different perspectives, like you said, being the person that wrote the check versus the person that's asking for the check and then also wearing the different hats in the go-to market has been invaluable to me.

Carolyn Ford:

Well, and now really zeroed in on the security side of things. Are you defining the security aspect at Dynatrace right now? So the applications, you're doing that?

Sandi Larsen:

I help with that. I mean, obviously we're two and a half years in, and so we went from a small team to now a much more substantial team. We have people that are in those roles, but we all collaborate together. I do much more than managing to a quota and my sales team and talking to customers. That's certainly an aspect of my job that I love. I absolutely love. But yes, I'm involved in the conversations around product direction. And because we truly care about the customer voice right, and so we're the ones that are hearing that. And so the ability to take that back to our R&D team and help shape the direction that we're headed, obviously our CTO and the leaders we have have a vision, but they definitely want that input. So I feel very heard as far as being the voice of the customer and making sure that we are keeping a pulse on that.

Carolyn Ford:

So I want to talk about, this is a little bit of a pet peeve of mine to even say this, to say you're a woman in technology rather than just you are in technology, but I want to talk about your experience being a woman in technology. I found something that you said, I think it was International Women's Day that you were on a panel, so I'm going to read this quote that I found. You said, "Women have a unique challenge of being viewed as too aggressive when they're assertive or too soft when they are nice." I mean, I've heard versions of this for years and yes. And I'd like to have you talk some more about being often the only woman in the room through your career. And I'm right there with you. Even though I'm in marketing now, I'm still often the only woman in the room. And before that, as a product manager, I was the only woman sometimes it felt like at the company.

Sandi Larsen:

I definitely can relate. That first company when I was the SE, I was the only female SE in the whole company. And many times been the only female sales leader in the whole entire company at a certain level, depending on what level I was at. So I definitely feel that. I'll never forget, one time I was at a conference for a major partner of ours, I won't name the name, but I literally walked in the room and there had to have been 40 males in the room. That was probably the most disparate, awkward moment that I can recollect with the biggest difference in outnumbering. And it shapes you a little bit, especially those volumes. I was just like, okay, this is awkward. I think that we have come a long way because there's more awareness, but it's still an uphill battle and we have so much further to go.

So back in the early: 2000

And I think as far as my challenges go, I've had some really unpleasant experiences, but I've also had some really, really great experiences where I have had mentors, both female as well as male, and probably three of my strongest mentors, not only from a personal level of speaking one-on-one with me and letting me get their input and share advice, but also opening doors and encouraging me. Not only opening doors, there's some that have opened the door and there's some that have allowed me to talk to them about an opportunity and encouraged me to walk through the door where I was apprehensive saying, I don't know. I'm not sure.

Carolyn Ford:

I've had similar experiences like you say that. I think about who my handful of mentors have been and top three men. Which isn't surprising. You just gave the numbers. When we first started in tech, we were in the single digit representation. So of course they were probably men. And to your point, encouraging me and saying, why aren't you stepping through that door? You should be doing this.

Sandi Larsen:

Right, exactly. And it's really been pivotal. I can literally look back on my career and I can see specific moments in time where a decision changed the whole trajectory of my career. Even the salesperson I was referring to was not one of those mentors, but still a very positive force in my career. But even him encouraging me to step over into sales, that wasn't a gender thing, that was a role thing. Do I want to go from building and creating things to selling things? And he encouraged me to do that, and it's been a great fit for me. I guess you just can't sleep on the pivotal people in your career, whether they're ahead of you or beside you or even behind you. I've been inspired by people that I've been mentoring where I'm like, that's a great way to think about that. So just being cognizant of that and taking it all in.

And I agree with you, I really dislike the whole term and concept of women in technology. We're people in technology and we're not past that yet. So I'm not naïve to it by any means, but I do try to go in to any situation, assuming the best of people, and then be smart, do my research, do my legwork, be prepared. Without a doubt I do sense that there are different bars, different metrics or ways of measuring or assessing for women versus men just in the language that society uses. Not necessarily everyone has ill intentions with that. It's part of the way we've been programmed and that's prevalent. Even myself, I find myself doing things like apologizing for something that I don't need to apologize for and circumventing my own power. So it's something that I slip into myself. And so just being aware and cognizant of that, but again, assuming the positive and assuming the best and then navigating those situations as best as possible.

Carolyn Ford:

You just gave some really good advice in there. If you could sum it up like this takeaway for our audience, what would you leave us with?

Sandi Larsen:

I guess first and foremost, especially if you're new, starting out earlier in your career, find mentors, females, males, find mentors. They are just invaluable and will be throughout your whole entire career no matter what stage you're in. At the beginning, at the middle, later in your career, they will always be indispensable for you. And then in general, I would say speak up. Just have a voice. And if that voice in your head is planting doubt, don't listen to it. If it's coaching you on what to say and what not to say and being wise about that, listen to that. But if it's planting seeds of doubt, you have to push it aside and you have to take that step because if you don't, you might be missing out on the next best thing. So being able to squish those doubts, imposter syndrome is real. Got it right here. There's no doubt about that.

And so it is definitely an ongoing effort, even for me personally that I battle that. And I know so many other women do that I've talked to. So just figuring out what's real and what's not real, self doubt that's plaguing you versus things that you need to get better at. Sometimes the voice says, “Hey, you're not quite as prepared as you need to be.” Well, okay, go get prepared, but don't not speak up or have a voice in the room because you are concerned about what others would think.

Carolyn Ford:

I like that. And I like that you said be prepared. Know your stuff. We certainly don't want to talk just to talk. And we all know people like that. Not gender related.

Sandi Larsen:

Not at all.

Carolyn Ford:

All right, well, all great words of advice. I really appreciate you sharing your personal journey with us, and we're going to move to our Tech Talk questions. So these are just quick questions, kind of fun, a little bit silly. But the first one I'm going to ask you is, this one's a hard one for you because you've kind of done everything. What's an occupation other than your own that you would like to try?

Sandi Larsen:

Oh, well, I couldn't try it without a lot of education, but in another life I could see myself being a veterinarian. I would love that.

Carolyn Ford:

Really?

Sandi Larsen:

Huge animal lover here. So I might hate the hard parts of it. I don't know. I'd have to probably have some training to figure out if it was a good fit, but in my head it sounds like a great idea. But secondary to that, a chef. I know I would love to be a chef. I would love that.

Carolyn Ford:

So are you like an amateur chef at home now?

Sandi Larsen:

I wouldn't say amateur chef, but I love to cook. It's a creative outlet for me. I love challenging myself with things that I haven't made before that are a little bit more advanced. So yeah, it's entertainment for me. I love to cook and I love to eat, which works out great.

Carolyn Ford:

Tangent here. Have you seen The Bear?

Sandi Larsen:

No, I haven't.

Carolyn Ford:

I think it's on Netflix. I think you might enjoy it. So it's a comedy dramedy about a chef, like award-winning chef that goes home to, I think it's Chicago, to run the family business, which is like a dumpy sandwich shop.

Sandi Larsen:

Okay, that sounds interesting. I would definitely have to check that out.

Carolyn Ford:

All right, what is the first piece of technology that you remember owning?

Sandi Larsen:

Oh, aside from the teenage years with the clunky Walkman, I would say probably the one that I felt most advanced was I had one of the very first BlackBerrys.

Carolyn Ford:

You did?

Sandi Larsen:

I did.

Carolyn Ford:

It was like a brick?

Sandi Larsen:

Yes, yes. And the bag cell phone. Totally dating myself for sure with all of that. But yes, those are the ones that sort of stick out in my head.

Carolyn Ford:

rys really making it big like: 2005

Sandi Larsen:

Before that, oh, and actually it just came to my mind, I didn't even think about this. Probably the one before that was the PalmPilot. Do you remember the PalmPilot?

Carolyn Ford:

Oh yeah, I had one of those. I could never, I was just like, no.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah, it didn't stick with me as much as the BlackBerry, but yes, yes. I had a very early version of the BlackBerry.

Carolyn Ford:

Okay. Yeah, the PalmPilot man, I thought it could replace my notepad. My notepad is still my number one companion. If I don't write it down, it doesn't happen.

Sandi Larsen:

Well I'm the same way. I like that. I write notes down, I write lists still. I don't know, it's very tangible. I still like hardcover books.

Carolyn Ford:

Me too. But I do love my Kindle for traveling.

Sandi Larsen:

Yes, yes, definitely. The convenience of that, for sure.

Carolyn Ford:

All right, so last question. I gave you something to go check out to watch. Now I'm going to ask you to share what you like to listen to. And it doesn't have to be work-related, honestly, it can be what you do for leisure. So podcasts, TV, books, movies. What do you like to do just for fun?

Sandi Larsen:

So I'm a big podcast person, just whether I'm walking the dogs and listening, or if I'm driving to a meeting or avoiding taking an airplane to go to Atlanta or whatever. So I love podcasts. One of my favorite podcasts, it's not just work related because I find you have leadership in many aspects of your life, but it's the Maxwell Leadership Podcast by John Maxwell. So he's an expert speaker, an author, and basically just focuses his platform on sharing experiences and knowledge around leadership. He does incorporate faith-based principles, so in teaching leadership development. So as a result, it's really great for anyone that is also having a faith walk as well. So I like that. I also like the Tim Ferriss show, another leadership type of podcast.

Carolyn Ford:

I love Tim Ferriss.

Sandi Larsen:

Yeah. And I love movies. That's the other form of entertainment. I have teenage kids, a son and a daughter. So we love the movies. We always go see all the movies that are coming out. So that's a form of entertainment for all of us that we can enjoy.

Carolyn Ford:

Well, thank you for sharing a little slice of your personal life, and thanks for your insights on layered and defense in depth, zero trust. And thanks to all of our listeners, please like this episode and share it with your friends, and we'll talk to you next week on Tech Transforms. Thanks so much, Sandi.

Sandi Larsen:

Thanks Carolyn.

Carolyn Ford:

Thanks for joining tech Transforms sponsored by Dynatrace. For more Tech Transforms, follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.