Last updated at Mon, 31 Jul 2017 17:23:45 GMT

This blog post is long overdue as I joined Rapid7 in November 2014 and immediately started plugging away at building new services and augmenting customers' capabilities to perform effective threat detection and incident response.

Before getting into the seemingly never ending reasons why I decided to join Rapid7, understanding my background will help understand some key motivations. For the last four and a half years, I worked for Mandiant (now FireEye) in the Managed Defense business unit. I was fortunate enough to be the first full time endpoint threat analyst on staff when the organization was just spinning up in January of 2010. Through various roles in the organization including threat detection/incident response analyst, threat assessment manager (think CRM for breached customers), and manager of the operations support team I found a great deal of satisfaction in helping customers through some of the most stressful and trying times - the dreaded breach.

Prior to my time in Managed Defense, I was fortunate to land a role at Aol where my team and I were responsible for bringing application security principles into the existing SDLC. During that time, I performed a lot of community outreach, was involved with many external groups including OWASP and NoVAHackers, and generally had a blast helping Aol and the community with (at the time) emerging threats in the web application space.

The prospect of moving to Rapid7 came when my good friend (and now colleague) Josh Feinblum, VP of IT Security, connected me with Nicholas J Percoco, VP of Strategic Services. Nick and I had a number of conversations about his vision for Strategic Services and specifically in a space that I am very passionate about - threat detection and incident response. Hearing how Nick's vision included tid bits like "world-class", "customer focused", and "innovative" immediately peaked my interest and the only thing I could think about was how I could help Rapid7 and Strategic Services build these services.

Now, for some specifics...

The Team

I cannot say enough about the Strategic Services team. Every day since I've joined, this team continues to blow my mind. Whether spitballing new services with Nick, refining deliverables with Maranda, talking medical devices with Jay, philosophizing with Wim, IoT things with Mark, UserInsight with Guillaume, or the latest threats with Mike - this team is truly world class. I've had the opportunity to interact with the rest of Rapid7 and this company really understands how to close the gaps in the security space.

Leadership

I have been fortunate enough to spend a great deal of time with the Rapid7 leadership team. During my interview process, I was thrilled to discuss product strategy with Lee, people strategy with Christina, and services roadmap with Mike. Since joining, I've had the opportunity to discuss threats and response with Corey and finding that the way that I think about the topic are already reflected in the highest levels of leadership at Rapid7.

Unique Opportunities

Rapid7 has given me a unique opportunity to re-think how we go about dealing with threat actors. Not only have I been given the trust to build a new and significant business line, but I also get to leverage some cutting edge thinking that has been going into the UserInsight platform for a year prior to me joining the company. It is very difficult to find the exact recipe for success for revolutionizing an entire practice, but I'm confident that Rapid7 has found the right combination.

People First

Many companies use the "people first" or "people are our most important asset" tag lines, but very few show this resolve through their actions. In the short time that I've been part of the company, I've lost count of how many times I've not only seen the concept reinforced from leadership in concept, but also in reality. Rapid7 truly understands that its greatest assets are the people who live and breath the mission, vision, and values and deliver superior products and services to their customers.

In closing, I joined Rapid7 because I truly believe in the mission and cherish the recognition that a group of smart and dedicated people can move earth and oceans to influence the direction of an entire business.

To engage in conversations, you can find me @wadew on Twitter, or Wade Woolwine on LinkedIn. I look forward to hearing from you!