The Apex Program helps visually impaired people work in cybersecurity

Tapping into an underutilized talent pool to fill critical jobs in cybersecurity

The unemployment and underemployment rates are high for people with visual disabilities. This program is working to change those statistics.
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The unemployment rate is over 70% for people who are blind or visually impaired. To address this, and the equally high rate of underemployment in the population, a Wichita-based company has created a training and certification program in high-demand careers, including cybersecurity.

Our latest WorkingNation film – Empowering the Visually Impaired in Cybersecurity – takes a look at the Apex Program created by Paul Andersen, CEO of Novacoast, a cybersecurity company specializing in IT services and software development, and David Mayne, the director of the program.

Anderson and Mayne tell us that they designed the program to address the untapped potential in this talent pool with the goal of 100% job placement for everyone who goes through Apex.

In just 10 weeks, students obtain certifications in Network Plus and Security Plus programs, key skills for all cybersecurity professionals, roles with more than 600,000 openings nationwide.

The film shares Mayne’s own personal journey, as well as that of Curtis Jackson.

Mayne lost the vision in one eye after an auto accident. The father of four was unable to continue his previous job as a mortgage broker, so he went back to school and reinvented himself as a cybersecurity analyst.

Jackson, who has been blind since birth due to congenital glaucoma, found himself being labeled and placed in special education classes due to his blindness. Trapped in a low-wage telemarketing job, he was struggling to provide for his family. Through the program, he was able to secure a job as a cybersecurity position, becoming Novacoast’s first direct hire through the Apex Program.

The program is open to people who are blind, visually impaired, or have another disability, as well as to veterans.

This short documentary showcases triumph over adversity, highlighting the positive impact of embracing change and creating opportunities for the visually impaired in the cybersecurity field.

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Empowering the Visually Impaired in Cybersecurity was produced through the support of Google.org.

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Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.