 Hello and welcome to our one-year update on the Meet a Mentor program at Plutine Village. I'm Miteki, so I'm going to be talking about what's been going on with the program for the last year, and we're also going to have a couple interviews with Mentor-Mentee pairs who are willing to share their experiences with us. So you're probably wondering what this program is if you weren't with us last year. We started this program around DEF CON last year, and we wanted to help our mentees achieve their goals by matching them with mentors and give mentors a chance to broaden their own perspectives and also develop some skills. So the program works by a three to six month long mentor mentee matching. This is actually done via Python script based on options that people check off in an intake form. So a little bit of human interaction there. We always tried to review and think about pairs that would make sense. But generally speaking, we let people's interests speak for themselves. So we have an active Discord community. We have a public channel that you might have seen if you're on the Plutine Village Discord. And we also have a number of private text and voice channels as well just for kind of have this closed private community. So we have monthly meetups with panel discussions, rounds of lightning talks that both mentors and mentees can participate in, as well as happy hours, Plutine Village content and much more under development. So one thing that comes up when we talk about mentoring is what it is and what it isn't. The most important thing for us to focus on is the idea of a mentor being someone that gives guidance and advice, shares experiences, but isn't necessarily someone who is there for technical tutoring. And that's one thing that even the panel discussions we try to focus on is sharing how to do something in terms of how to learn it and how to develop skills and things like that rather than just how to build actual technical skills. And it's also important to stress that mentoring is a bidirectional relationship. So there's give and take both parties have responsibilities or have responsibility for timing, for participating, for doing work. And also both can learn from each other. It's not just the mentee always learning from the mentor. So we gathered some really interesting statistics at the start of the program. And that is, I think that the thing that stands out to me most is that the things that people want to learn are the things that others have learned and are willing to help others learn. So we have this confidence and technical skill acquisition. Those are things that our mentors have learned and are trying to help others learn. And that's a great match. This basically means that when we run this algorithm for matching that it's actually going to match quite a number of people. It's pretty cool. In terms of technical interests, it's really, really hard sometimes to match these things. And we try not to depend on that too much for the actual strength of a match, but it's always nice to have some common interests. And luckily those top two DFIRs kind of skills and, you know, SIM and logging stuff, as well as the threat hunting and intelligence are two kind of common things that pop up a lot. And then for career level, it's also an interesting spread as well. Probably little unsurprising to people that most of the people looking for mentors are actually early in their career or still in university. And most of the mentors are mid-late career and primarily in infosec roles. So I'm going to share just a couple of lessons learned before we moved on to the interviews. And first one of this is anyone can be a mentor and a mentee. So like I said, you know, this is this is not a one directional relationship. You know, a lot of times people just want to have another perspective. And, you know, when they ask, you know, another when I ask a mentor for a perspective, that mentor can also learn from that as well and rethink something that they thought they, you know, understood well before. But getting that fresh perspective is really beneficial for both parties. You know, and even mentors that have been in their career for 10 years can learn something from someone else who's just entering the job market. And that might have changed in, you know, in the time since the mentor was that entering the job market at that level. So really interesting bunch of experiences there that our participants have shared. And then the last part of the last thing on this slide is sometimes people just need someone to kind of be their champion and to boost their confidence, give them a little a little revving up and a little positive reinforcement. So that's something we like to see. And the next one. Wow, this this is a really important one for me personally, it takes a village to run this program. And it's, it's something that takes a lot of work if you want to do it right. So important lesson for everyone in life, myself, all the mentors on the mentees is to learn to ask for help. And, you know, there are always people that will be there to support you if you just ask for it. And also, you know, we've, we've benefited from a number of people who stepped into develop the program, and also the people that continually participate in it. And that there's so many different ways to participate. Some people are really great at thinking up ideas and thinking broader perspective longer term bigger picture. And then there are other people that are just absolute goal to rely on to just get the work done, like you give them a task and it's going to get done. And I think one thing I really learned to this program is that you need both types of people to really make a program like this work. And then the last one out of this is, you know, the community supports itself. I've watched this community over the last year and I think one of the things that really stood out to me is that, you know, someone asked a question. And then someone answers it and everyone else kind of like takes that and, and really digs into it. So we have some really fantastic interactions including like, you know, a mentee talking about a job offer and then other people sharing the perspective on it. For example, you know, there was someone was sharing some contractual issues with a with a with a job offer that they were a little hesitant about, and then they got that support from the community to say, yeah, this doesn't look like the good idea. And that, you know, that was a valuable perspective to have. And that kind of that kind of interaction pays forward to further interactions where people feel comfortable to share their own questions. Really amazing to see that. And in the end, the work is totally worth it. There are times when it's been a really exhausting kind of experience to to run meetups every month and to to try to put together aspects of the program. But, you know, and also to run through mentor mentee matches when, you know, there's just so many more mentees are available mentors. But looking back on it, you know, everyone that I've talked to has had some kind of benefit from this relationship and that, you know, that's gold right there. It's not even just mentor mentee pairs but also just the support the community is really beneficial for people that may not have another community locally that they can fall back on. You know, and the connections that you make will keep on giving back. And, you know, it's not just job offers and networking but also just just friendships. No, it's always really cool to see the last bit that I have to remind myself of is that there is always more work to do, but it's important to also sit back and kind of reflect on on everything that we've done so far. That's really hard to do when I know how much I want to do. But just looking at what we've accomplished in a year is is really something special and valuable. So with that, I'm actually going to hand over to the interview side of this and we're going to have some mentors and mentees share their experiences with us. So we are here with Selenia and Niko, who are one of the most active pairs I've encountered here in this program. So welcome. I'm going to throw a couple questions out because I think, you know, I've, I'm always a little interested in kind of how how these matches have worked out just kind of made by an algorithm. But I like to hear about the human relationships a bit. So I'm going to start directing question at Niko and this one is how has the mentor program helped you in your own career and professional or personal growth. I think it has helped me reinforce all the things I've learned in security. And it's given me an opportunity to share those back with the community and allowed me to continue to grow my knowledge and gain something out of it. So there were plenty of folks to help me and I'm glad to help somebody else out. Awesome. And you were on a panel too, right? Yes. Was that a fun experience? It was my first experience and I did enjoy it. Nice. Very cool. Very cool. And then for Selenia, what was one goal or growth area you had that your mentor helped you with the most and how did they help? Yeah, sure. Niko's really big on goal setting. And at the time I was not. And in fact, once we started talking kind of with initial conversations after we'd been paired up, I realized, oh, wow, this is really not only like mentally stressful, so professionally disadvantageous to me because let's say everyone else has a good goal in mind for either, it can be whatever you'd like, but let's say for a job that you'd like to have in the future, say as a pen tester. Since I don't have that, it's so much more difficult for me to not only answer interview questions like where do you want to be in three to five years, which I can't answer because I don't know. And to strategize and help me help myself and have others help me. So it's been a wonderful experience working with Niko to kind of set some of those goals and become more grounded in goal oriented, goal oriented approach to career growth. Nice. Yeah, it's kind of interesting because I've seen like a lot of different pairs either have a very cavalier just conversational approach to things. And some are a little bit more formal like kind of following a plan and helping set goals. So it's always interesting to hear who does it which way. And the next one I have access for both of you. Was there anything you got out of the program that you didn't expect. I'll start with Niko. I think just given everything that's happened over the last year, I should say with coven everything else. It was nice to have another person to connect to that had those interests and passions and that want to continue to grow. It's definitely, you know, something lacking for me because a lot of the folks that I tend to work with or I'm around or, you know, they've been around for a while and so it's, you know, necessarily want to, you know, poke and prod but you want to, you know, get more information and learn more and stuff like that so. And it's just also, again, continue to help push me to grow. Things that I didn't know, especially if there was a question it's like, you know what, I don't know that but let me figure that out. So, one of those things. Nice. Selenia. I'm speaking experience a couple of times actually. I'd always I've always been a lurker, like if you look at my Reddit account, it's like zero comments but has existed for a decade. Because kind of, that's my default right is to choose to stay involved at the periphery of things. Until recently, where I realized again I'm kind of doing a disservice not only to myself but to my peers and colleagues and to those who will come after us by not being more involved. And so I decided as a goal to myself a little less formal to take some baby steps outside of my comfort zone and to start putting myself out there a little bit more. And there were a couple of volunteering opportunities that actually came up some with Blue Team Village and one with the Diana initiative that I kind of jumped on, despite my previous context. And those ended up quickly evolving from, hey, we could use some help organizing this meeting to, hey, there's an opportunity to be a kind of a panel speaker, or a brief presenter at a monthly meetup would you like to. Yes. And I'm modestly confident in my public speaking skills, but I'm quite bad at taking that first step and getting over like the fear hump, or breaking out of my shell however you'd like to say it so I'm really glad that the mentorship program has kind of kickstarted me into being a bit more engaged, engaged full with the community a bit more engaged with my peers. That's awesome. I mean, I obviously as someone who's been involved with the Village for years and a huge proponent of volunteer opportunities, like they just do so much, just like mentoring does. So the last question I have. This is again for both of you and I'll start with Nico, and that's one major takeaway, or what is one major takeaway from this mentoring experience that you'd like to share with others. The biggest thing I would have to say is that you don't have to go it alone. There are tons of folks out that are out there that are willing to help, or they're seeking help. So, I know, few years back, I was seeking help I was trying to figure out how do you break into analyst work and things like that. I wasn't getting a whole lot of answers so definitely this program is helped with me being able to give that back to somebody else, and hopefully be there to help answer some questions or help throw some guidance somewhere. Awesome. Selenia. That was my point as well actually was that I've been so pleasantly surprised about how warm and supportive and advocate of people in the security space are. You know, while I think that for a mentee mentor relationship, the mentee should really take some proactive steps to kind of be the lead in that relationship. It's a little bit of you get out of it what you put into it. That being said, I completely agree with Nico and that not only are you more than welcome here. We have a really hard tough road ahead of us and could really use your help. So, as people start looking for next steps or trying to break into the space, or into different roles or evolve their careers in different way, I think that we can all, you know, take baby steps like I've done and like Nico sounds like have done during this relationship to break out of our comfort zones a little bit and tap that collective network and engaging with the broader community like we've spoken about. So, I, not only do I think that you'll be a little bit surprised about what you find, but I think you'll also be surprised about what you can offer and contribute back. That's definitely a point I always try to make. Well, thank you very much for your time really appreciated. And I'm just really happy that this has worked out and it's been a positive experience for everyone involved. So, thank you very much. Thank you. I am joined by scooby and Danny dev. And I think scooby is one of our core mentors and been with the program since we first started thinking of it. And I think I've seen Danny devs name pop up quite a bit from the very beginning. So, really awesome to have frequent flyer people here. I'm going to start with question for scooby and this one is, how has the mentor program helped you in your own career and professional or personal growth. I think it's mainly personal more than career and at that point because I was already doing some mentoring also at my job with professional life. And meeting those people with very different backgrounds and currently have three different mentees and Danny is the latest addition to the to the crew. But but as people from pretty much around the world. Danny is in the empty. I have people in Europe and one in the United States. So it really opens up sort of very different type of work compared to what I used to do before where I was mainly working with with people just in my local community. Right. So now I can start to understand how works work outside of Canada. So and I have I have some some now where I work I have some some people that are also Spanish background. So working with Danny also kind of helped me understand better how these people I don't want to see these people think with everybody but but I you can you understand what I mean that there's still a little there's a I don't know the right word in English but there's some some behaviors that that some people in some different country have and sometimes it's it's more it's easier for me to ask Danny for for his opinion than someone I work with on a daily basis, not where their feelings and stuff like that so that's definitely something that is present and and that helped me, maybe that's that's a pregnancy I said nothing professionally but I just said something. I think that's a really great point and I think one of the things that that I've really gotten out of this program to is just when I look and see how many different people we have participating from so many different countries cultures and backgrounds it's. It's really amazing and I mean you know we've been stuck in a pandemic where we can't travel so much so it's kind of a nice opportunity to have some some cross country across cultural connections without needing to fly anywhere. And I was a very added traveler before that so being stuck here for that long is is really hard. Hopefully, maybe next year. So the next question is going to be for for Danny. And this one is what was one goal or growth area that your mentor helped you with the most and in what way. Oh, one of the goals or the way scoby helped me was in management side. Once I entered to this mentoring program I was just an analyst, and if our first session, I was promoted to a manager. So, one of the key parts in this in this conversation in this session with with the scoby was management. This was fairly new for me, manage one team, manage people, you know, because I always focus focus in myself on resolving problems with solving with handling with computer that would. So scoby helped me in that part looking the looking from from another perspective, looking at things from another perspective on how to manage a team and resolve that particular particular problem. Yeah. That's awesome. Congratulations on the promotion to. Thank you. So the next question, she's got the last one to know we're a little short on time. I'm going to direct this one back to scoby to start and I'll come back to Danny as well. And this one is what was one major takeaway from this mentoring experience you'd like to share with others. I know as Danny asked some questions and we're very similar roles right now. It really makes me see the parallels of what I'm doing so by him asking questions that I might not have asked myself. Sometimes it makes me to reflect on some things and sometimes find solutions or find the things that that I need to improve where I work where I didn't even know they needed to be improved. Right because he sees it in his own ways and he has his own challenge and sometimes they relate almost one for one and I just didn't realize with all the other things that that that we have to do that. What I'm trying to figure out is actually something that I should start being like caring about as well and implement where I work. So it's it's really a two way relationship, I think. No, that's great. And Danny. As I said before, looking the problem from another perspective now that I'm working with the stakeholders and more from management point of view, I need to, to one of the things that I learned I need to see the problems from another perspective. See what's not the stakeholders where they are what what what are their needs, not only focusing in the technical part, but what the stakeholder needs so those are one that that's at least for the past sessions. That's my take away from this, and it's helping me a lot as well the team to grow in the company that I am now. No, that's awesome. It's really, I mean, I think from the start it really stuck out to me that for a lot of people this is a, it's a two way relationship. You know mentor doesn't just just mentor for the sake of helping the mentee but also to develop themselves and that's, that's become very clear through all the interviews I've had in just the past year of interaction with people. So thank you very much for your time. It's really appreciated and I'm glad that you've gotten to share your experience with everyone else. Thank you. See you then. Thank you, thank you everyone. Right, so now we're here joined by Ali and and her mentee serial killer. So I'm going to actually kick off with a question for Ali. And I'm really excited to hear the answer to this one. And that is what motivated you to become a mentor. Well, I actually was asked by one of the folks to join as a court mentor. And I was so excited and so honored to be asked, especially seeing as I don't have a traditional, you know, technical background I have more of a business type of experience to lend to the program. So I was really surprised and I was so honored. And I absolutely like said yes, without even hesitating or thinking about my other obligations. I said yes to sound so awesome. And I knew that I was going to give it my all for whatever that required of me just because I really believe in the mentor mentee type of structure and really how much that is needed especially in this industry. Right, so for serial killer. What were your goals and hopes for the mentoring experience when you signed up for it. I think my goals overall was just to have a better connection to the Infasa community. Like I'm not really that much involved or I haven't been in the past and it's something that I wanted to do to progress and make her and to help out inside the community. And so on that note serial killer I'm going to ask you what was one goal that your mentor helped you with the most during during this process and how did they help you. I think my one goal was to be more outwardly focused and to become a better communicator so that I could provide some sort of input into the Infasa community and Ali has definitely helped me lift up my confidence because I suffered a lot from imposter syndrome. Yeah, that's definitely something that comes up quite a lot and I think we've had probably like five or six panel discussions where that has come up at this point so definitely a common theme and I'm sure a lot of people watching are going to be able to relate to that one. So Ali, did you have a structure for mentoring or were you like more go with the flow like how did you approach this. I guess in the very beginning gosh it's been several months now so thinking back to the very beginning. I really wanted to really just maximize the time in the process with my mentee. And at first I was like okay I need some type of like structure so that we can sort of get down who we are how are we communicating through what channels throughout mediums, the frequency of our communications, and then also sort of like the goals and and the real next because I just wanted to really do the best that I could do to actually help someone, not just kind of, you know, I don't know sort of glaze over things but really really help them. And after talking with my mentee it was pretty clear that I could definitely be their cheerleader and help them with their goals and so I guess in the beginning it was a little bit more structured. Hopefully not to any detriment, but I think that was good for the beginning to really sort of kick things off because we were strangers you know we literally never knew each other before. Although it sounds like we were actually in at least one of the same rooms at DEF CON in 2019 which is funny we didn't even know it. Anyway, so it was definitely more structured in the beginning I made this worksheet that kind of laid out the goals and the next steps and sort of like that you do who's doing what because not everything was on my mentee you know I did a lot of stuff to to help them in terms of like research reminders etc so it was nice to have everything laid out and like when is the next time we're meeting, you know what channel is that and I think that was good and then eventually we got into a very natural flow where, you know, we meet every Sunday at four o'clock eastern and like that's just our thing. And that was really cool because it's like a nice set set meeting that we both have to know. Okay we have this time to check in so it is still somewhat structured but it's honestly kind of I would say more go with the flow. That's awesome. It's funny because we actually still use that template and you're kind of have to provide the kind of a blank version of it and it's really helped a lot of people solidify goals, which is something that we try to emphasize for people like mentoring should have some amount of like, you know, it's a goal oriented type of relationship that eventually settles out into friendship, which is definitely an upside to program connecting people that wouldn't have connected otherwise. Or maybe they would. I don't know. Definitely. Cool. Well, thank you for that. And then last question I have going to direct both of you and I'll start with serial killer and that is what is one major takeaway from this experience that that you would like to share with others watching. The biggest thing for me at least was to, if you're looking to get help, it's okay to ask for help. Like, that was my, like, I was very nervous when I first signed up for the mentor program, because I'm not one to ask for help almost ever. And that was stopping me from doing a lot of things that I wanted to do. I am sure that that resonates with a lot of people, myself included. And then I'll direct the same question to Ali to close it out. Gosh, it's funny because for as much as I felt I was sort of giving to my mentees knowledge and things to think about and things to work on, etc. You know, they also really taught me a lot of things too in the process seriously. And not that I was shocked by that by any means, but I guess there were even things that we would talk through that would make me think about, you know, how does this apply maybe in my life, right. And so I guess the biggest thing that I learned through this experience is honestly just all of the things that that go into this relationship and this process and these goals is something that like I actually want to reflect on myself as well. And that was, I guess, a little bit surprising just that I had actually some stuff to think about once it was prompted. So in a way, my mentee also kind of mentored me. And I love that. That's a really great way to put it. I definitely share that experience too. Well, we're out of time, but thank you so much for your time. It's really appreciated and I love hearing everyone's perspectives on this. So really, again, really appreciate it. Thank you guys so much. Thank you. So I wanted to drop a thank you for all of the core mentors who have developed this program. And I've helped run it for the last year. Tall Wireless, Stax, Plug, Hayley Hansen, Litmus. Oh, Montague, that's me. No hack me. Packets, Cuisines, Rando, Rubik's and Scooby. And a huge thank you to all of our amazing mentors and mentees. I mean, you know, this program wouldn't be complete without the people that actually participate in it. So huge thanks to all of you. You're all amazing. And I can't wait to see what we do in the next year. To the Booty Village staff and all of our sponsors for helping make this happen as well. And then, of course, a huge thanks to our interviewees for sharing their experiences today. And of course, a very special shout out to Kim for the recording and video. You're awesome. Thank you so much. I would not have been able to deal with all the AV on my own. So much appreciated. And the last thing, please, if you're interested in becoming a mentor, we absolutely need way more mentors. And of course, if you're interested in being a mentee as well, we do have a space for you as well. So please visit the links and feel free to drop any questions in the Blue Teen Village Discord channel. It is the need a mentor public channel. And thank you for watching.