The First Security Hire's Survival Guide
Chris Honda
BSides Seattle 2026 · Day 2 · Track 2
Chris Honda, currently the sole security person at Plotly and a veteran of BSides Seattle (fourth year attending), delivers an honest and personal talk about surviving as the first and only security hire at an organization. This is not a technical talk -- Honda states this upfront and gives the audience explicit permission to leave. Instead, it addresses the human and psychological challenges of being the person responsible for all of security at a company with no existing security program, no team, and often no clear expectations about when help is coming.
AI review
A heartfelt personal talk about the emotional and organizational challenges of being the first security hire. Zero technical content -- no tools, no exploits, no architecture, no data. This is therapy and career advice for security practitioners, not a security research contribution. I respect the honesty but there is nothing here to evaluate technically.