Cybersecurity Employer Experience: Working with People with Autism

By Raza Nowrozy

My name is Raza Nowrozy. I am a Melbourne based Cybersecurity professional presently working for Untapped, leading a team of talented individuals who are employed as contractors by National Australia Bank. I am extremely proud of the efforts produced by the team who have assisted National Australia Bank to support its day-to-day security activities and deliver successful projects.
Proudly, I am the Cybersecurity Expert Ambassador for the Genius Armoury (GA) Group and I am delighted to share some of my professional experience working with individuals on the Autism spectrum.

I joined the Dandelion Program in May 2019 and have had the pleasure of working with a group of talented autistic young adults as part of the DXC-Untapped Neurodiversity Program. I joined the program as the Cybersecurity Tech Lead whereby I am responsible for the training and leadership of the team, as they require holistic and specific needs with their learning curriculum. Soon after being introduced to the team I fell in love with the program and felt a sense of connection to the wonderful people who are a part of it.

The team consists of six extremely talented and skilled individuals who joined the program as Cybersecurity Trainees. My role as a Cybersecurity Tech Lead is to provide training and mentoring to these individuals by developing their technical skills according to the DXC-Untapped Curriculum. I work collaboratively across a variety of areas at National Australia Bank to find suitable secondments for them, ensuring that they are exposed to differing technologies and working environments thereby enhancing their knowledge and increasing their employability. Based on my experience with individuals so far, I am confident that the DXC-Untapped team members have sufficiently demonstrated themselves as intelligent, dedicated, and hardworking young adults.

DXC-Untapped Trainees are passionate about growing their professional technical skills and educational development because they are so dedicated to the program. After meeting the members of the Neurodiversity team, I witnessed their continual focus on building their tech knowledge – particularly in the Cybersecurity domain. Additionally, besides technical learning, I believe from my experience that it is essential to educate individuals on the autism spectrum with more professional social and communication skills. Ideally with additional social skills it can lead to much more positive education and employment outcomes.

I thoroughly enjoy working with people on the autism spectrum because of their genuine personality and grounded straightforwardness. Autistic people tend to have a wonderful capability to convey their authentic self – mainly because they come forward with such sincerity by removing the social rules that can occasionally get in the way of just being themselves. This is the main reason I fell in love with the program and those that are participating in it.

As I continue working and engaging with people on the autism spectrum, I am continually amazed at their intelligence and learning capabilities. I regularly witness great improvements with their professional progress, both technically and socially, as they are very quick learners and are always extremely focused on the tasks and responsibilities at hand.

Whilst working with the team over the past 12 months through the Neurodiversity program at National Australia Bank, I have witnessed strong Cybersecurity knowledge, great passion in learning and sound educational development among the trainees. My team are consistently open and respectful to the feedback I provide in terms of their learning and the additional resources that the Neurodiversity program can provide them.
Finally, based on my experience with those on the autism spectrum, I believe they can possess higher intelligence and very sound work ethic. I feel absolutely honoured to be a part of such a program which gives me the opportunity to work with such gifted colleagues.