Juliet Rodriguez

I started in IT and worked my way up over 10 plus years to get to where I am today. Currently, I am the Senior Principal Cybersecurity Engineer, leading and overseeing the entire cybersecurity and compliance department supporting the Commonwealth of Virginia. This is a great role that took my career to the next level, aligning me not just with cybersecurity, but also with leadership. The skies are the limits from here. Throughout my journey, I've worn multiple hats from being Information Systems Security Officer, Information Systems Security Engineer, and I was also acting as Information Systems Security Manager when the previous manager was gone from the program, so I had to step up. I do everything from vulnerability management, risk and compliance, risk assessment, and vulnerability mitigations. I just got on board in this current role about a month ago, and the team is wonderful. One of the reasons I chose this opportunity among multiple job offers was because of the vision - they want a contract where they take over all the cybersecurity for the state of Virginia, managing everything cybersecurity for all their agencies including state corrections and education. Our big boss has a vision of doing the same thing and expanding to other states. I'm very passionate about what I do, and I wanted to take that passion for cybersecurity and leadership further. In 2023, I became an adjunct professor at Seminole State College, where I teach cybersecurity and cloud security. I love teaching, especially when it comes to women. I want to mentor and be able to see more of us in the field and empower each other.