Brian Pereira: Hello, everyone. I'm Brian Pereira, director, global news desk at the Information Security Media Group. And with me today, I have Chandan Pani, chief information security officer at Mindtree. Chandan, welcome to our virtual studios. And thanks so much for taking the time to speak with us today.
Chandan Pani: Thank you, Brian, for having me today.
Pereira: Can you please begin by telling us about your current role and responsibilities at Mindtree?
Pani: I think you have already introduced me as CISO of Mindtree. I think the roles and responsibilities of a CISO are quite complicated nowadays. I believe there are books to define what exactly is the role of a CISO, but coming to what I do, I'm responsible for ensuring trust, reliability, security, compliance, information security, add to workspace, workplace and work. Also, I had a cross-functional team. Basically, folks with skills like cybersecurity, cloud in AppStack, information risk management and data protection. That's pretty much what I do.
Pereira: Pretty interesting. That's quite a lot. That's a plateful. You also mentioned cybersecurity, that's also getting a lot of importance these days. So Chandan, within all that, I'd like to ask you, what would you say are the top three accomplishments in the last, say, one year or one and a half year?
Pani: As you would know, last one and one and a half year was quite interesting, because of various reasons. Reasons such as COVID, post-pandemic hybrid work models, the new perimeter, the so called work from home, and so on and so forth. Probably, first thing I would like to call it out very clearly is the transformation of security from a reactive to a proactive business-enabling function. That is something that we have done in last couple of quarters. Second would be, enabling security and trust without compromising productivity during pandemic, that was my first priority when COVID struck. Third, platform-led security approach than a point product-based approach. That is something we have done in last couple of years as our transformation journey.
Pereira: Yeah, so you mentioned a lot of digital transformation initiatives, Chandan. I just like to ask you, what is the strategic edge you derive from digital technology? And how do you use it for transformational advantage?
Pani: So Brian, there are two questions you're asking in one question. The first one is, what I derive from technology. And second one is the transformational advantage, right? So let's go to the first one. Now, as you know, information security, cybersecurity, security, all this combination of security are driven by technology today. Now, the IT organizations, IT-enabled organizations with landscape of 40,000-50,000 people, it is all about how we can seamlessly integrate technology into their day-to-day work environment. Platform-led security approach, which we started the journey a couple of quarters ago, that helps us to seamlessly deliver certain things to our employees and our customers with less intrusive environments; with inability; and with the advanced solutions like AI, ML, probably data analysis that helps us to understand what exactly is required, how much is required, and where we need to focus to ensure that the right combination of security-productivity is there across the organization. Now, the second part of the question is slightly complicated when you say transformation. Transformation is I would say a buzzword. Now, lot of organizations, they do transformation. So if you move from let's say flat file to Excel sheet, that is a transformation. If you move from Excel sheet to DBMS or RDBMS, that's another transformation. But when I see transformation, I see it in different lens. Now, can I simplify certain things? Can I change certain things? Can I bring in better experience for my customer as well as my internal employees, including my board and executives? That is something transformational advantage for me. Again, going back to integrated solution approach, platform-led approach with integrating security solutions today to create a one pane helped me to, in some way, transform the entire experience from pre-COVID era to the current post-COVID hybrid, no-boundary era.
Pereira: Okay, in other words, it's all about adding business value.
Pani: Absolutely.
Pereira: And also improving experiences.
Pani: Improving experience.
Pereira: Yeah. So, another question here on customer experiences and employee experiences, which is much discussed these days. I see a lot of people using digital technologies for this. Can you share with us how you are using digital technologies to improve customer experiences as well as employee experiences, because today employees are everywhere, not necessarily on-premise?
Pani: Interesting question. See, automation is all about your customer and your employees. And fortunately, unfortunately, these two are two different sides of the coin. Customers, they need trust, they need transparency, they need compliance, and they also need respect that the data, the IP, the provider information that they give us for work is taken care at the highest integrity and highest order. Now, they also want the partner organization or the service delivery organization should be simple enough to explain them, what exactly is happening, how it is happening, and what are the different elements to ensure that the required integration is there in place. Now, because of compliance and regulatory requirements, customers are a bit paranoid; customers are also not very sure how this entire hybrid model is going to work. So while security and digital technologies are helping them to deploy certain changes. See, for example, I would say technologies like your zero trust technologies or your passwordless authentication, the new age VPN solutions, and the new age security solutions, these solutions are somehow able to pacify customers. They can see what exactly is there and how things are happening. Now, if you switch to the other side of the coin, that is, employee experience, that is slightly tricky, because right from the day of onboarding till the exit, that is what is an employee's life cycle. Now, how the employee is going to encounter the technology on Day One that is priority, which we saw during COVID. Everybody wanted to have the digital onboarding experience, Day One experience, and that was probably one of the differentiators between different companies, which happened during COVID. Now, because of platform-led approach, integrated solutions and hyperscalers, today, that experience is pretty seamless. Now, the moment somebody joins, we can ship a laptop, or we can create a VDI, whichever is required, probably in no time. Now, once he or she gets a laptop, in no time, they can be online. The images are already pre-built, the assumptions are already pre-provisioned, we just need to log in. Now, the connectivities are there, and they can seamlessly access the collaboration solution from there. The connectivities are there already established. So as I say, C for compute, C for connectivity, C for collaboration and C for culture, all these four aspects are there already with the employees now. And that is why the technologies are playing a different role altogether now to enhance that experience, both for customers as well as for employees.
Pereira: Thank you for that, Chandan, very interesting. The four C's that you mentioned - a nice way to summarize that. Now, Chandan, you are a part of the CyberEdBoard from ISMG, and I'd like to ask you, what is the value you derive from a forum like CyberEdBoard in terms of communication and collaboration with your global peers?
Pani: Well, I'll put it this way. We all are part of small battles in our own way. But as a community, as a security community, we definitely are at work against various cyber and digital adversaries who are out there. Now, we definitely need one platform to communicate, collaborate, unify and exchange our thoughts, our ideas and various technologies that we use today. Now, it is not that the technology adoption is seamless across the globe. Also, the understanding of technology is not same across different organizations. So, it is always better to have a collaborative platform like this to communicate, to help each other and take this war against the cyber adversaries forward. And I'm sure forums like CyberEdBoard definitely help us to take this fast forward.
Pereira: Well, thank you so much, Chandan, for sharing your wonderful insights, and it's wonderful to have you on the CyberEdBoard. Thank you for joining us today.
Pani: Thank you. Thank you, Brian.
Pereira: Well, you were just listening to Chandan Pani, who's the chief information security officer at Mindtree. For the Information Security Media Group, this is Brian Pereira. Thanks for watching.
