In today’s increasingly digital world, the lines between virtuality and reality are gradually diminishing, which brings with it a lot of challenges !
Salil Singh, our next pathbreaker, India Team Lead at Palo Alto Networks, helps their India team that secures global customers from malware, hacking and phishing attempts 24/7.
Salil talks to Shyam Krishnamurthy from The Interview Portal about being interested in the security domain along with his passion for social entrepreneurship.
For students, always remember that a career should be a diverse mix of your interests, skills, and vision for the future !
Salil, Your background?
My father is a retired banker with a research background in Genetics and mother is a housewife and a social worker.
I have played professional badminton and table tennis which is also my hobby along with vivid interests in reading, writing on different fields and issues.
My undergraduate degree period was bit tumultuous, there was a financial issue in the family due to the 2008 sub-prime mortgage crisis. I tried for engineering like any other student of science background, but was not able to get a good rank. So I decided to do commerce for graduation from Sikkim Manipal University and in my spare time, try my hands at small business such as organizing events etc.
I decided to focus on a good master’s program.
What did you do for graduation/post graduation?
I have a masters in Economics with specialization in Agri business from Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune and a Bcom.
What made you choose this career?
My thought process was to get into a prestigious masters program which will also secure me financially . A management degree wasn’t something I was looking for.
And then, reading about economic philosophy, about choice in various aspects suggested me the importance of economics.
My initial interest was in the security domain as a career. Initially, I tried for the armed forces, but I think the strenuous physical training part discouraged me to go for it. Also, doing my masters in Economics paved the way for higher studies.
Tell us about your career path
After dropping my PhD, I started working for a small magazine after which I moved to digital marketing. After working for a while, I took a break from the job and started a job portal in Ranchi Jharkhand. Here, we were trying to help bring unorganized sector workers to the organized sector, as ample studies show that transition from unorganized sector to organized sector can help in upward mobility. But unfortunately, Covid happened followed by a family emergency, and we had to shut down the venture. I had to move back to Delhi to find a job again. After working for a fintech and app development company, I got a call from Palo Alto Networks.
Struggle will always be there and that’s what makes it worthwhile. Though specialization is important, if you aren’t a specialist type of a person there is no harm in being jack of all trades, eventually generalists have better chances of getting into managerial positions.
How did you get your first break?
So, my manager was looking for someone with a non-technical background for an experiment. He wanted someone with a leadership tilt who can help build the Indian team of the company. They found my interest in academics and research suitable for the role.
What were some of the challenges you faced? How did you address them?
Major challenges were the lack of marketable tech skills, and half baked research background which kept me in between corporate and academics.
In the end, corporate won. I took more of a research role in a corporate.
Where do you work now?
I work for a cybersecurity firm, Palo Alto Networks.
I help the India team that we are building that secures our global customers from malware, hacking and phishing attempts 24/7.
Basic skills needed are good understanding of logic and sound technical mind. Since the job is more training based, hence, all the skills were provided in a rigorous 1 year training.
How does your work benefit society?
We help keep people safe from cybercrime attacks. It keeps them financially safe along with their privacy being intact. We give them a sense of security that their money along with their crucial information will always be safe. Our job is like police work, but in the digital space, if we have good police, society also feels secure. Same applies here.
Tell us an example of a specific memorable work you did that is very close to you!
It may sound nothing but during my college, I organized a sports fest which not only had elements of equal opportunity but also of outcomes.
Your advice to students based on your experience?
Always be a student
Future Plans?
Right now, there is a social entrepreneurship project in the materialization process which I have been working on for a while. Here, I am trying to bring people from different backgrounds to a platform. People from theoretical physicists to sociology work upon some pressing issues of the society.
Also, now that UGC has dropped the condition of PhD, I may even think about some teaching work as well.