In the second part of July’s Eye on Privacy webinar, TRU Staffing Partners’ Founder and CEO Jared Coseglia and PrivacyCode’s CEO and Founder Michelle Dennedy answer participants’ questions and delve deeper into the latest data privacy industry trends.

A question from the audience asked how Michelle recommended breaking into the data privacy industry.

Dennedy: There are different opinions about how certain backgrounds can get into the privacy industry. Some people will swear you must be an attorney. While I happen to be one, when I set up a program, I try to NOT center it in the GC’s office—because it is limiting, and your office is then viewed as a cost center rather than being a core function.

If you are working as a contractor and want to get hired full-time, think horizon. What am I seeing as trends, what am I seeing that is successful, what are leaders curious about? As a contractor, you get to know from the inside, without sharing confidential information, you can see where things start. I have seen people get roles in different ways. Some came from marketing, others from the law. So many people came in as consultants, or from HR. What are the commonalities? Horizontal functioning. System of systems. Know what makes assets run efficiently. Privacy and private data. Data is about humans – it’s the thing that describes an employee or a great customer. So, as my dad used to say, the only companies that need to care about privacy are the ones with employees, customers, or who want either of those things.

If you want to be in the privacy game, understand what makes the system run and learn how to bring some of the specialization to it. There are a lot of certifications now: use what’s best for you. You won’t get a magic pill certification that will transform you, but you might meet colleagues you can network with.

Coseglia: It’s all about who you know whether you are in Hollywood or data privacy. Let’s move to the next slide.

• The job market for CPOs to make lateral moves into other CPO roles has been quiet for nearly two years. We see that trend persisting as new roles start to emerge and become defined.
• TRU is starting to see more full-time jobs posting but contract hiring still outweighs direct hiring throughout the industry. The speed of hire is very slow for full-time hires. TRU is placing contractors with a week’s time.
• The volume of candidates trying to break into the data privacy industry is at an all-time high. It’s interesting because it speaks to an article in the Wall Street Journal recently that specifically notes the drastic difference in salaries for jobs posted two years ago versus very recently. That dissonance is inspiring people to break into the industry. The problem is that hiring managers don’t want inexperienced candidates, they just want them for 30 to 40% less than they did just a few years ago.
• Almost 40% of TRU privacy contractors who started assignments in 2023 were offered direct hire conversions. That’s an astronomically high number.
• We saw more contractors convert this past May and June than we did in the last two years. Contract offer acceptances soared to five times their normal number in the past three months.
• Burnout: Burnout remains the top reason why candidates look for new roles.

Michelle, any comments or observations to any of these trends?

Dennedy: I encourage it when people want to reach out to chat about strategies. First, a posted salary on LinkedIn is not the salary you are negotiating for. So, don’t shut yourself down. I’ve heard many people say that they wouldn’t get out of bed for less than $250k. I would, and I’ve been in the business 30 years. The reality is once you get your boots on the ground and they see what you have to offer, don’t say no too soon. Always have them say yes to you! Second, don’t turn down contract positions. I know healthcare is expensive – while they are depressing our salaries, they are increasing the costs of our healthcare. Take that position to get into the complexity and the flow of the business. If you as a contractor come in and understand all the inner workings of a privacy program, you become very valuable. Then they will convert you to full-time.

Coseglia: Let’s look at a few of our data points. We’re still seeing a 60/40 split with contract work hires exceeding full-time hires. The reality is that firms can onboard contractors faster. I think you will see contract work go even higher as needs in the tech industry soar. I predict that next year, this will all stabilize, and we’ll go back to a 50-50 split.

Dennedy: And burnout from the last slide is huge thing. Everyone is feeling it. People are dropping out of full-time work, becoming contractors or setting up their own shops to fight the fatigue and gain a better lifestyle.

Coseglia: This same sort of thing happened in eDiscovery around the time the first set of civil rules came out in 2006. All these litigation support managers (some lawyers, some not) said the same thing.

Dennedy: Absolutely. And the privacy industry is going down in equality. When we first started out, we were the ladies, we were the brown people, we were the queer people. Why? Because we all experienced the direct harm stemming from the abuse of private information. That’s the truth. It wasn’t anything other than that. These were jobs no one wanted. We created them and pushed them into the executive suite because we would not be ignored.

Coseglia: That mission is what drives people into this business. Sometimes it’s good to lead with mission, and sometimes it’s good to lead with business impact. Let’s look at the speed of hire. You can see that the speed varies by role. It’s extremely fast at the executive, contractor, and program manager/director level, where we see a lot more volume. This is all because the demand is high.

Here’s the offer acceptance likelihood based on when offers are received. It shows that if you are faster getting someone an offer, you have a 70% chance the candidate will accept it. That rate has gone up. People aren’t waiting around to see if they get a better offer.

For the final statistic, remote versus hybrid, most of the full-time jobs are hybrid. The reason that contractor number has gone up is because of the extremely high number of contract jobs now – they are all remote. I predict remote jobs will increase because contractors will remain in high demand.

Dennedy: You can’t be in data privacy and not be an optimist. I am an optimist. Look at the spread of different roles, the diversity and types of roles for privacy pros to get into. It’s incredible. And, if you are starting to experience burnout, start volunteering for other things within your organization or your local not-for-profits. Get the experience. There are all sorts of ways to be creative to get the skills you want and meet the people you want to get to know. This profession has been so open-door for so long, you can reach out to just about anyone in data privacy and they will open their door to you and help you figure out your next move.

Conclusion

The gist of this month’s webinar is that data privacy is maturing and feeling its growing pains, but remains an essential, viable industry.