Celebrating Women In Security With Brónagh Healey
Bronagh Healey is a Senior Security Awareness Lead who specialises in changing online security behaviours and cultures.
Bronagh also has an interest in personal development and developed her business B.He.Li Coaching.
Through her business Bronagh offers life skills coaching to help you take control of your own life and live life by your own design.
What challenges have you faced as a woman within your industry?
I work in security, which is a male dominated industry, only 20% of the global work is female with small numbers of women in leadership or managerial positions. As a young women joining the security profession, it was evident I would have to fight for my place. In my early days my work was often dismissed and on several occasions I was overlooked for promotion, dispute having the same credentials, experience and expertise as my male counterparts parts. Thankfully I am head strong and know my worth, I believed in my skills and abilities and have worked my way into a senior role. I now use my voice and visibility to question the stereotypes in security and to help influence change in the toxic cultures that exist in the industry. I have come through many gender based challenges and feel it’s my duty to create change for the many talented females who will come after me into the profession.
Who is your female role-model and why?
Katie Taylor the female boxing champion of the world is one of my favourite female role models. What she has done for the female boxing community is amazing, she has single handedly put her sport centre stage. Katie’s determination, ambition and desire to succeed is infectious. Her belief and self discipline is amazing. But what really inspires me about Katie is her sight of the bigger picture, beyond the realms of boxing, she knows her scope of influence and knows so many young children and women around the world look to her as a role model and she shows up as that role model every day in her authentic approach to her lifestyle. I think she is amazing and both women and men can learn a lot from her.
What advice would you give to the next generation of women, and what can they do to make a difference?
My advice to the next generation would be get to know yourself and question everything. It’s so easy to follow the crowd and go with the flow, I did it for years, but I wasn’t truly happy, I was living by others people rules and expectations. It was only when I was 26 and went travelling on my own that I really found out who I really was, I spent time on my own, and I got to know what I really liked and and in some cases why o really disliked. I comfortable in my own company, and learned to love myself for who I was, not what others wanted me to be. I can’t explain the benefits I’ve experienced across multiple areas of my live purely by investing time in getting to know myself. I would encourage the younger generation to do the same, take time to understand who you are and what you want from this life, learn to put yourself first, because when you do that, everyone around you wins too, because they get the best version of you.