NEWS

Speaking to Monique Craine, you might initially question why she needed Cyber PATH’s Security Awareness Training! After all, she is an articulate business owner and a councillor in her community in South Powys. Not only that, but she built the website for her Neurodiversity Training Consultancy business, Neurodivergent Matters. But Monique’s reason for seeking training is more common than you might think.

While most small business owners are exceptionally good at delivering their particular expertise, this doesn’t mean they are fully aware of the ever-changing cyber threat landscape. Indeed, Monique is probably more diligent than many; she recently experienced an apparent ransomware attack and was sufficiently suspicious that she ignored the requests and instead reported it to the police. However, the incident was enough to encourage her to seek some awareness training. 

Through her role as a councillor, she did have access to some online training, but it was too basic and didn’t match her requirements. That’s when she contacted the Cyber Resilience Centre for Wales about Cyber PATH’s Security Awareness Training and subsequently booked the session.

The Security Awareness Training was precisely what Monique was looking for, and the content matched her knowledge level and explained the things she needed to know in clear and understandable language. Monique found the one-to-one approach particularly helpful because it enabled her to ask questions that were relevant to her business. Speaking about the training, Monique said: “I thought the presentation was brilliant, relevant and accessible. The cyber professional and the Cyber PATH student were brilliant; their presentation style was easy to follow, and they took plenty of time to answer my specific questions, of which there were many!  

“The content covered during the session was pitched perfectly at my level of understanding and it was very relevant to my business and how I use the internet. I will be recommending it to everyone I come into contact with.”

Monique’s personal story is fascinating. It shaped her business and highlighted some of the challenges facing many people, both business owners and employees, in relation to cyber threats. Monique describes herself as Multi-Neurodivergent; she is Autistic, Dyslexic, and has ADHD.

Her consultancy business offers assistance to businesses, large and small, in embracing neurodiversity in the workplace. And it’s not only about educating people about neurodiversity; it’s also about helping to identify neurodivergent employees who may not even be aware that they are. 

She also educates organisations about the positives to be derived from neurodiverse workers and the range of attributes that help them to be highly accomplished in certain types of work. Optimising their performance is about listening to them and educating the people around them. For example, there is little point in telling a dyslexic person to focus on scrutinising the exact sender’s address in a suspicious email; instead, they have to be able to use audible tools. This is a simple but enlightening example.

Monique’s favourite analogy for helping people understand neurodiversity is to ask what would happen if you tried to install an Apple operating system on a Windows computer or vice versa. Neither would work, but neither is better than the other; they are simply different operating systems. Or, as Monique puts it, “We’re wired differently”.

Monique learned a great deal about security awareness while working with our Cyber PATH team. Still, we also learned a great deal from chatting with her after she kindly volunteered to provide us with a wonderful testimonial. Knowledge sharing at its best; thank you, Monique.