Gearing up for the New York Metro Forum, Part Two - Keynotes

The only thing separating us from IANS’ 12^th NY Metro Forum is one sunny and warm weekend! The IANS office is busily putting printed agendas and badges in boxes, making the final touches to presentations, and preparing for a great two days in NY.

The NY Metro Forum will kick off early Monday morning with an opening address by IANS SVP of Research Chris Silva. During his presentation, Chris will outline some of the security trends we’ve seen and heard from our end user clients, supported by a glimpse into key data from IANS’ benchmarking survey.

Following the opening, attendees will head to the roundtable session of their choice, detailed here. Our Steering Committee members and select CISO clients will attend a separate CISO track this year, led by Hart Rossman. The Steering Committee is an integral part of the planning process for all IANS Forums; members provide direct and real-world feedback on our proposed agendas so that we can ensure our curriculum truly resonates with Forum participants. In return, IANS creates a CISO track that reflects the top topics that are on the minds of the Steering Committee. Prior to the Forum, we polled the Steering Committee as to their preferences and, not surprisingly, received a list that included mobile and consumerization, social media, cloud computing, and APT. In the CISO track, Hart will lead a (hopefully) very interactive and vibrant discussion around these four central topics. On the second day of the Forum, to close out the event, a subset of the Steering Committee will share a recap of their experience in the CISO track with the entire audience.

Kick-starting the second day of the Forum is Jeffrey Ritter with his keynote, “Governing Security: Charting a Path Forward.” In his talk Jeffrey will present his perspective on how security professionals can cut through what he’s termed “consult-speak” in order to better work with senior management, vendor partners, and customers. This keynote is a repeat performance, first given at IANS Mid-Atlantic Forum in March, and promises to earn high remarks as it did following the D.C. address.

Always one to stir conversation among our attendees, Peter Kuper will also give a keynote address on May 3, 2011. Peter’s lunchtime presentation this year will focus on how the economy is dictating what is going on in the VC community, which in turn is affecting which security firms are getting funded and/or acquired, which by proxy is influencing innovation in the space. We anticipate that many attendees will have a lot of opinions on the topic and can’t wait to hear the Q&A that will follow Peter’s prepared words.

In fact, we hope ALL of the tracks and sessions will spur great conversation and inspire out-of-the-box ideas for participants. Those of you who have attended IANS Forums before know that the best sessions are those in which attendees jump in and offer up their own personal experiences working in or managing a security organization. If you’re not already signed up for the NY Forum – send us a message! We still have a few spots left and would love to see you there!

Remember, some of the most valuable conversations at IANS Forums are ones that start organically, so we invite you to join your peers virtually in conversation using our event hashtag #IANSNY and keep the conversation going after the event, online with our IANS Delegates group on LinkedIN.