Every organization faces a critical challenge: protecting sensitive information and valuable assets from the constant threat of malicious attacks. Whether it's financial data, confidential client information, or trade secrets, the stakes have never been higher. To ensure proper protection, organizations of all sizes must invest in developing a comprehensive cyber readiness strategy that includes hands-on skills development.

Here are five reasons why hands-on skills development is essential to a robust cyber readiness policy. 

Better Understanding of Cyber Threats

When individuals have a hands-on understanding of how cyber threats work, they are better equipped to identify and defend against them. This is because hands-on skills development provides individuals with a deeper level of understanding of the inner workings of cyber threats, such as malware and phishing scams. 

Hands-on skills development enables organizations to understand better the ever-evolving cyber threats they may face, so they can anticipate potential vulnerabilities and plan accordingly. 

Assess Skill Gaps in Your Team

By assessing the knowledge and expertise of personnel through hands-on skill development, you can determine if additional training is needed to ensure everyone understands the potential risks posed by cyber threats.  

During and after completing a few cyber-attack scenarios, you may find a few gaps in productivity. A key point, this measurement shouldn’t be used to “rat-out” the least productive; it’s to be utilized to improve the skill set of everyone on your team. 

Use your assessment results to focus on the parts of your team that need the most help, whether that be more training, more staff, or a shift in management style. Keeping your team’s strength consistent throughout is essential to keeping dangerous cyber threats at bay.

Upskill Your Employees

One of the most effective ways to strengthen your organization's cyber readiness is to utilize hands-on skills development to provide your employees with practical experience in dealing with real-world cyber threats. 

Depending on your cyber upskilling platform, you may have access to different tools and scenario engines. RangeForce, for example, is able to simulate real-world attack scenarios to test and train your team on a variety of specific attacks. 

These attacks can range from ransomware scenarios, data exfiltration, or web defacement. After these scenarios are completed, the real learning comes from viewing results and discussing improvements to make your team more coherent and confident.

Improve Collaboration and Communication

To effectively defend against cyber threats, individuals and organizations need to work together and communicate effectively. Hands-on skills development can help improve collaboration and communication by fostering a shared understanding of cyber threats and the best practices for defending against them. 

By teaching cybersecurity skills in an interactive manner, organizations can help their staff feel more comfortable discussing potential risks and vulnerabilities. This improved communication can lead to better solutions for problems or issues that arise during operations. Being able to quickly recognize potential threats, as well as being able to discuss and implement solutions, can save time and money for an organization.

In addition, hands-on skills development can help team members become more comfortable with one another. Through educational activities, individuals can learn to trust each other and build relationships. This improved teamwork can lead to improved collaboration and communication in the workplace. Organizations can better protect their assets from malicious activity with a shared understanding of cyber threats.

Increase Confidence & Critical Thinking

When employees are trained to recognize and respond to cyber threats through hands-on experience, they are more confident in their ability to defend against future real-world attacks.

 This increased confidence can help to reduce the fear and uncertainty that often accompany discussions of cyber security, and it can lead to a more proactive approach to defending against cyber threats. Along with confidence, your employee’s problem-solving skills will improve as well with the use of continued education and threat exercises.

“Hands-on experience is necessary to create workforce-ready professionals, yet it is underutilized by students and professionals of cybersecurity due to costs, availability, and ease of use.” - Idaho Cyber Research Project

In the fast-paced world of cybersecurity, it's essential to maintain a continuous learning mindset. By investing in rigorous yet rewarding hands-on training programs, individuals and organizations can develop the confidence and skills necessary to stay ahead of cybercriminals. 

With ongoing education and knowledge-sharing initiatives, cybersecurity professionals can keep pace with the evolving threat landscape, and protect their digital assets effectively.

Ready to get started? 

 RangeForce provides realistic cyber-attack scenarios that incentivize collaboration, teamwork, learning and safety above all else. Click here to learn more about our programs and services.