How to use cybersecurity to build competitive advantage

The rise in cyberattacks and data breaches, from the Australian continent to the Caribbean island-nation of Jamaica, has forced companies and organizations to implement or upgrade their cybersecurity systems. Are these only crisis management-induced expenditures -mainly on IT overheads- to placate customers and regulators?

Cybersecurity strategist Dejan Kosutic recommends a more strategic approach to investment on cybersecurity infrastructure that can help companies achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Kosutic shares invaluable tips in his article: ‘How to achieve sustainable competitive advantage through cybersecurity’. Below is an extract from this article.

 “To be able to achieve long-term competitive advantage, companies must develop specific capabilities that competitors will not be able to match in the short term – these are called cybersecurity dynamic capabilities, and through my research I found that successful companies have the following 11 capabilities.”

 Cybersecurity dynamic capabilities

1. Informing – the ability of an organization to disseminate security-relevant information to all concerned actors within the organization and its supply chain.
2. Understanding technology architecture – the ability to recognize the direction in which the security technology is developing, and the company’s ability to choose the appropriate technology accordingly.
3. Making security easy to use and transparent – the ability to present and implement security rules and technology in such a way that anyone, even a layperson, knows exactly why they exist, and how to use them.
4. Brand building – the ability to embed trust as a key feature of their brand.
5. Balancing security and business – the ability to apply an optimal number of safeguards strong enough to address security risks, while being unobtrusive enough not to interfere with regular operations.
6. Managing a secure supply chain – the ability to keep data secure even when that data is not under the direct control of the company.
7. Prioritizing – the ability to focus on the most important cybersecurity activities and products to achieve strategic priorities.
8. Building expertise – the ability to build cybersecurity know-how within the company to get highly satisfied clients and protect their data.
9. Rewarding people – the ability to use KPIs and other measurement methods to stimulate security-relevant actors to contribute to the company’s cybersecurity.
10. Interpreting data – the ability to find patterns and trends in large amounts of data to make informed security decisions.
11. Embedding – the ability to make employees use security rules and technology as part of their regular daily operations.”

 Achieving all 11 of these capabilities is quite a challenge, but Kosutic says companies that have developed at least a couple of them have been able to build a good foundation for long-term competitive advantage.

 Read Dejan Kosutic’s full article on How to Achieve Sustainable Competitive Advantage Through Cybersecurity