Paper Type
ERF
Abstract
Organizations are experiencing severe project failure rates driven by poor risk management and escalating cyber threats. Despite the critical need for hybrid leaders capable of navigating these high-risk environments, there remains a distinct lack of standardized guidance and research defining the exact competencies these professionals require. This study investigates the intersection of traditional IT project management and cybersecurity methodologies through an exploratory labor market analysis with real-world job posting data from Lightcast. Using Python-based analytics, we systematically evaluated 5,841 cybersecurity project manager and 155,436 IT project manager job postings spanning the twelve-year period from 2014 to 2025. Our preliminary findings reveal concentrated employer demand for dual-domain certifications and interpersonal and team skills. Together with a planned market basket analysis, this research aims to offer theoretical insights for adapting existing methodologies and frameworks, and deliver actionable strategies to help organizations recruit, train, and integrate modern cybersecurity project managers.
Paper Number
1190
Recommended Citation
Boodraj, Mahesh; Fairbanks, Jared; Davies, Chance; and Akcakaya, Onur, "Beyond the Firewall: The Rise of the Cybersecurity Project Manager" (2026). AMCIS 2026 Proceedings. 2.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2026/sig_itpm/sig_itpm/2
Beyond the Firewall: The Rise of the Cybersecurity Project Manager
Organizations are experiencing severe project failure rates driven by poor risk management and escalating cyber threats. Despite the critical need for hybrid leaders capable of navigating these high-risk environments, there remains a distinct lack of standardized guidance and research defining the exact competencies these professionals require. This study investigates the intersection of traditional IT project management and cybersecurity methodologies through an exploratory labor market analysis with real-world job posting data from Lightcast. Using Python-based analytics, we systematically evaluated 5,841 cybersecurity project manager and 155,436 IT project manager job postings spanning the twelve-year period from 2014 to 2025. Our preliminary findings reveal concentrated employer demand for dual-domain certifications and interpersonal and team skills. Together with a planned market basket analysis, this research aims to offer theoretical insights for adapting existing methodologies and frameworks, and deliver actionable strategies to help organizations recruit, train, and integrate modern cybersecurity project managers.
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