We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ken Underhill a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Ken, appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about serving the underserved.

Tens of thousands of people, around the world, would love to start in cybersecurity careers to help fill the current job openings. Unfortunately, not everyone can afford a quality cybersecurity education at universities or boot camp programs. In fact, ten dollars here in the United States is a cup of coffee, but in Bangladesh, it’s the average monthly salary.

Economic barriers should be lifted because we need skilled people to help us in the cyber fight.

Because of this, I wanted to do something different with our cybersecurity training company, Cyber Life.

While we train SMBs and enterprise teams, we have also built the Cyber Life School which offers low cost and free cybersecurity education to the consumer market.

Unlike many cybersecurity training companies that have investors to please, Cyber Life is self-funded and this affords us the opportunity to remain lean, profitable, and make the majority of our trainings geared toward the consumer market free, forever.

A past student was able to get his first cybersecurity job and afford to send his young daughters to school.

Democratizing cybersecurity education isn’t just about helping people get jobs.

It’s about having a ripple effect through global communities to make the world a better and safer place.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

Cheers!

I am Ken the CEO and founder of Cyber Life and the Executive Producer & Host of the syndicated Cyber Life television show. I have helped millions of people around the world learn IT and cybersecurity skills and have directly helped tens of thousands of people over the years get cybersecurity jobs.

Recently, I wrote my first best-selling book “Hack the Cybersecurity Interview” with two of my good friends, so we can help people prepare for cybersecurity job interviews.

I’ve been recognized with multiple awards over the years, including the International 40 under 40 in Cybersecurity, the Cyber Champion award for my work to support more women in cybersecurity, and the SC Media Outstanding Educator award.

I sit on the nonprofit advisory boards for Breaking Barriers Women in Cybersecurity (BBWIC), which provides a safe community for women to start and grow their cybersecurity careers, and the Whole Cyber Human Initiative which provides free cybersecurity education to members.

I also sit on the boards of several technology startups.

I am also a volunteer mentor with Black Girls Hack and volunteer with several programs for young women to get into cybersecurity careers in Nigeria and Kenya.

Cyber Life is a cybersecurity training provider, focused primarily on cloud security and a CompTIA authorized training partner. We are currently working to become a Cloud Security Alliance authorized trainer as well for their CCSK certification.

We also have the Cyber Life school, which offers low cost and primarily free cybersecurity education to students all over the world because we believe a quality cybersecurity education should not cost more than your house.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I am primarily active on LinkedIn because that is where my audience lives. My best two pieces of advice are to find out where your audience mainly lives and go there and focus on giving value to others.

Too many business owners are focused on themselves and that’s why very few people engage with their content or if they do, it’s faux engagement and when you put a CTA nobody buys.

Remember, likes and shares don’t pay the bills.

For me, I started out on LinkedIn trying every “hack” from Internet marketers and other self-proclaimed gurus online. What I found is that none of that stuff worked for me, so I deleted my account and decided to start over.

Instead of “hacks,” I focused on how I could give value to others. This is what quickly accelerated my growth on LinkedIn, and more importantly, built a loyal community.

In fact, some people are so loyal (and they have computer hacking skills) that I have to be extremely careful about my responses to haters because these people in the community will find out everything about the haters.

So, focus on the ONE social media platform your audience is the most active on AND where it’s easiest to get your content in front of them and focus on giving VALUE and you will see your business grow.

It doesn’t happen overnight, but if you play the long game, you CAN win.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

Cyber Life is a self-funded company. The easiest way to set aside capital for your business is to do it long before you start your business, even if that means working your corporate job for another 6 months while you build your business on the side.

I think where most business owners go wrong is they watch a show like Shark Tank and think their “idea” is fundable. It’s very difficult to get angel investors for equity or debt investing (and even more difficult to get VC funding).

A great book that I read years ago is Profit First by Mike Michalowicz. In the book, he describes a system where you (you guessed it) pay yourself profit first. I follow this same system for my personal finances, which is how I’m able to self-fund my own businesses.

The other thing I like about that system is it forces you to take a hard look at your expenses, which is critical in business. As I type this, I have already removed two software license expenses because we didn’t really need them in the business.

Remember, you likely built your business so it would bring you economic and time freedom, so don’t let your business eat up all of your money and time.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://cyberlife.tv/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenunderhill
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CyberLifeTV