DIRECTDEFENSE - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Regional Vice President of Sales, Central
Justin Karnousky leads the central region of the US, as Regional Vice President of Sales. He is hyper-focused on customer outcomes and solving complex problems. Justin has many years of cyber-sales experience ranging from products and services to security as a service while building and growing teams.
Prior to DirectDefense, Justin served as VP of Sales, Central and East for Defy Security. Before that, Justin served as Regional Vice President in the TOLA region for Critical Start / CyberOne. He has also held Account Manager roles at Proofpoint and Websense, Inc. (Forcepoint), where he exceeded sales goals year over year and was named to their President's Clubs.
Justin and his family reside in Prosper, TX. Outside of work, Justin is a father to five girls and one boy, all under nine years old. He can be found doing handy work at a dance studio, MCing swim meets, or coaching his kids' sports teams. When he's not helping the kids, the honey-do list gets some attention too. Justin loves exploring new cities with his wife, Carly.
Justin's mission statement is to build and lead the finest sales team in the nation at DirectDefense, with the goal of achieving national brand recognition and becoming a dominant national player. Justin serves to empower our employees while delivering the best customer outcomes possible.
Mr. Beau Shahriary has nearly two decades of experience in computer security consulting. He has performed security assessments, security remediation, and strategic planning for a host of Fortune 500 companies. At DirectDefense, Beau is responsible for the establishment and development of sales and marketing efforts.
Prior to joining DirectDefense, Beau was a founding member of the AccuvantLABS organization and performed and managed numerous assessment engagements. Before AccuvantLABS, Beau worked for Foundstone as a Consultant, and later as a Senior Managing Consultant and Project Manager for the professional services group. In that capacity, he managed and performed security assessments and vulnerability resolution on enterprise networks and web-based applications. Before Foundstone, Beau spent several years as a Consultant with Internet Security Systems' (ISS) X-Force professional services, where he performed services ranging from security assessments and penetration testing to enterprise security infrastructure deployment and network and process integration.
Due to Beau's extensive level of knowledge in most areas of security implementation and management from both a technical and managerial level, he is a consistently sought-after and in-demand consulting resource. Beau has taught many of the Foundstone Ultimate Hacking courses to both private audiences and government agencies. Since coming to DirectDefense, Beau has contributed to the growing needs of our organization by engaging our customers on large projects with unique requirements. His ability to adapt and exceed the customer's needs has led to many return engagements.
Job Titles:
- Director of Talent Acquisition
Mr. Christian Juan leads the Talent Acquisition initiatives for DirectDefense. Christian joined DirectDefense in 2015, and brings with him more than 20 years of recruiting and talent management experience in the cybersecurity, IT, and engineering space. Christian oversees the sourcing, recruitment, screening, selection, and placement of the highest caliber cybersecurity talent for DirectDefense and its clients.
He has developed robust sourcing strategies to identify quality candidates, creating a first-class candidate experience, paying careful attention to fit when matching candidates, and communicating transparently with all internal stakeholders and clients throughout the placement process.
Prior to his time at DirectDefense, Christian served in senior recruiting roles at Samsung, Ericsson, and Hilton.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Strategy
Mr. Christopher Walcutt has more than 20 years of experience in network design, information security, risk analysis & mitigation, and compliance in the energy, financial, higher education, and manufacturing sectors. Chris is involved with several research initiatives involving the University of Central Florida, Soar Technology, and DARPA, serving as a subject matter expert for energy, smart integrated infrastructure, and critical infrastructure security.
Chris is a coach of the CyberPatriot Team NetRunners, which are two-time national finalists and 2016 National Champions. Chris is a nationally-recognized Cyber Security speaker and the Air Force Association's 2016 CyberPatriot Mentor of the Year.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Business Development
Mr. Jared Ballou has spent the last 15 years in the security industry. Jared's focus on rapid client delivery and collaborative deal structuring has led to extensive growth and repeat business.
In 2018, Jared joined ObserveIT where he was responsible for growing a world-class sales organization while continuing to help build a company founded on a high-energy and high-integrity culture. In 2019, Proofpoint (A Thoma Bravo company) acquired ObserveIT. Jared led the Information Protection Business Unit, extending Proofpoint's people-centric security portfolio by augmenting Proofpoint's DLP capabilities with Endpoint, CASB, Web Isolation, and SASE solutions while continuing to collaborate with new and existing customers and partners to maximize their success to drive new business.
Before ObserveIT, Jared served as VP of Sales & Alliances at MixMode.ai, where he oversaw sales operations during the critical transition from stealth mode to public product launch.
Earlier, Jared served in various roles at Rapid7 (NASDAQ: RPD) from 2006 to 2016. He was the twenty-seventh employee to join the company in 2006. During his decade-long tenure at Rapid7, Jared helped architect a sales model that leveraged strategic partnerships to routinely drive record-breaking year-over-year growth.
At DirectDefense Jared is responsible for developing and fostering new and existing relationships that will drive new lines of revenue for the company.
Mr. Jim Broome is a seasoned IT/IS veteran with more than 20 years of information security experience in both consultative and operational roles. Jim leads DirectDefense, where he is responsible for the day-to-day management of the company, as well as providing guidance and direction for our service offerings.
Previously, Jim was a Director with AccuvantLABS where he managed, developed, and performed information security assessments for organizations across multiple industries, while also developing and growing a team of consultants in his charge.
Prior to AccuvantLABS, Jim was a Principal Security Consultant with Internet Security Systems (ISS) and their X-Force penetration testing team.
Jim has also developed and provided training courses on several security products, including being a primary author of the CheckPoint Software Software CCSA/CCSE/CCSI training program, as well as creating and delivering numerous client-focused training programs and events.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Product Management
- Product Management Executive
Mr. Kevin Overcash is a veteran product management executive with over 30 years of experience in software engineering and product management, including over 2 decades building industry leading products and services in the information security industry.
Kevin manages the development of DirectDefense's ThreatAdvisor, which provides a platform for delivering penetration testing, vulnerability management, and event monitoring services.
Kevin brings a wealth of experience in product management processes and strategic design to deliver intuitive products providing complex and technical services.
Prior to joining DirectDefense, Kevin began working in the information security industry in 1997 and has led product management, building products and service platforms at a number of leading companies, including: the security testing services on the Fusion platform at Trustwave, the managed scanning and domain service platform at NCC Group, the security testing platform at Accuvant, the Web application scanner and Web application firewall at Qualys, the Web application scanning platform at Whitehat Security, the WebDefend Web application firewall at Breach Security, the WebInspect Web application scanner at SPI Dynamics, and the Internet Scanner network scanner and RealSecure IDS at Information Security Systems.
Before working in the security industry, Kevin worked as a software engineer at NASA, Coca-Cola, and Radio Free Europe.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Professional Services
Mr. Phil Brass brings more than 30 years of experience in security consulting and software engineering, including 5 years of writing security assessment tools and more than 15 years in consulting. Phil is a subject matter expert on application security programs, secure development lifecycle, assessment technologies, code review, and manual testing of application security, and leads a large consulting team delivering all of these services and more.
Prior to joining DirectDefense, Phil served as Director in Optiv's Threat Management community. Before joining Optiv in 2009, Phil was employed at Internet Security Systems (ISS) as a Windows security expert, X-Force researcher, software engineer, and team lead on the Internet Scanner 5 project. He also spent two years managing software engineering projects at ISS.
Phil has extensive knowledge in software engineering, programming languages, network communications protocols, relational databases, and all things in security as they relate to those technologies.
Prior to his time at ISS, Phil worked as an Application Engineer and Software Architect in the health care information systems sector, where he focused on protocols and communications with diverse hospital systems, data warehouse implementation, and high-level architectural design of distributed inventory management systems.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Marketing
Mrs. Kelly Kish leads DirectDefense's worldwide marketing initiatives. Kelly joined DirectDefense in 2017, and brings with her more than 10 years of marketing experience for global cybersecurity companies.
Prior to her time at DirectDefense, Kelly served in senior marketing roles at FireEye, Elo Touch Solutions, Dell SonicWALL, and GE Energy.
Job Titles:
- Director of Strategic Alliances
Ms. Hannah Godwin leads DirectDefense's efforts in developing new technology and channel partnerships and fostering strategic alliances. Hannah joined the company in 2012 as National Account Executive and later served as Channel Account Manager for North America in 2021, serving more than eight years at DirectDefense. Prior to joining DirectDefense, Hannah served as Account Manager at Optiv.
Hannah graduated from the University of Colorado, Boulder with a B.A. in International Affairs. In her free time, she loves spending time hiking in the mountains or relaxing on the beach and spending time with her family and dogs.
Job Titles:
- Vice President of Operations
- in 2014 As the Director of Operations
Ms. Jennifer Anderson joined DirectDefense, Inc in 2014 as the Director of Operations. As the Vice President of Operations she is responsible for overseeing all operational functions of the company and has been an integral part in the company's evolution to calculated decision making based on readily-available, accurate data and in providing insightful business analysis to managers, executives and the board.
Jennifer has been involved with the operational side of the cybersecurity industry since 2004. At her previous employer, she assisted in developing and implementing multiple scalable processes in an ever-changing and growing industry during her 10-year employment.
Jennifer earned her Bachelor of Science in Business Administration at Colorado State University. She received her PHR certification in 2010.
Ms. Nina Haimoff leads the sales and account management team at DirectDefense. Nina joined DirectDefense in 2016, bringing 9+ years of sales and account management experience, with 5+ years specifically in the cybersecurity space.
Prior to joining DirectDefense, Nina worked with enterprise accounts at Rapid7. Nina graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Colorado at Boulder and loves to head up to the mountains to ski in her spare time.
Rick Tillery serves as MSSP Director for DirectDefense. Rick manages the DirectDefense team of Security Analysts who are focused on the detection of cyber security events and is responsible for the management of detection infrastructure and response to cyber security incidents.
Rick has worked extensively across the globe with various energy companies and law enforcement agencies including the Department of Defense, Denver Police Department, German Bundespolizei (Federal Police), in rail traffic, airports, ports, and several other special duties assessing, developing, and implementing a plethora of cyber security business transformations. His efforts have resulted in greatly reducing risk exposure and savings, ranging from $5 million to $500 million per year.
Rick was instrumental in re-developing, implementing, and managing Cyber Security Operations within the Department of Energy. Rick has spent more than 20 years in the US Military and industry, where he acquired deep cyber forensic and cyber security knowledge and skills, holding leadership positions working with various agencies' capital projects, turnarounds, reliability, maintenance, operations, and consulting. He is a recently retired Chief Warrant Officer 3 from the U.S. Army.