Nexus IT Group is your trusted recruiting partner for cybersecurity recruiting, connecting companies with security experts committed to safeguarding your assets. As one of the first staffing companies in the United States focused purely on cybersecurity jobs, we have extensive networks of network security, governance/risk/compliance, and asset and data protection experts who can help you assess your risk and identify vulnerabilities, preventing breaches before they derail your business and helping you recover more quickly if attacks do happen. This is critical because the top cybersecurity professionals aren’t actively looking for a job–in fact, they’re contacted so frequently by headhunters they’ve shut down the most common ways to get opportunities in front of them.
In today’s world, data is a valuable asset for a business. From the information you collect about customers to your proprietary systems and internal communications, a lot of data crosses your network that you wouldn’t want your competitors and other interlopers to see. Equally important is meeting compliance mandates designed to protect sensitive customer information. Our recruiting teams’ acumen and understanding of the cybersecurity industry let us balance all of these demands to bring enterprises the right employees for their needs. We can identify top talent at all levels, including executive search as well as individual contributors like security analysts, ethical hackers, and cloud or IoT security experts. The staffing services we provide at Nexus can help you build an ironclad cyber security team, giving you the peace of mind to know that your systems are secure.
Whether you’re a hiring manager with a set of difficult cybersecurity roles to fill or an online security professional considering changing jobs, we would love to chat about your needs and how our team of cyber security recruiters can serve as partners in your search. Similar to computer and technology roles across industries, the cybersecurity sector is evolving quickly, and having an experienced professional on your side can help you successfully navigate this changing landscape. Even if you just want some insights into how our recruiters help connect talent with cybersecurity opportunities, we hope you’ll reach out to our search firm so we can share our expertise and help your company or career continue to move forward.
81%
of our successful candidates are submitted within one week
92%
of our candidates will accept your offer
96%
of our candidates are employed with your firm after 12 months
We run retained searches for the security leadership roles that a company only hires once every few years, including CISO, VP of Security, Director of Information Security and Head of Security Engineering. These searches are usually confidential, since a sitting security leader is rarely told the search is happening, and they almost always involve a board or audit committee that wants to meet the shortlist. Our retained work holds a 96% candidate retention rate, which matters more in security than in most disciplines because a leader who leaves inside a year takes the whole roadmap with them.
Most security professionals are employed, hold an active clearance or certification they are in no hurry to move, and ignore job adverts entirely. That is why our cybersecurity recruiters work outbound rather than waiting on applications, and why we can put a shortlist of vetted security engineers, analysts or architects in front of you within 4 days of taking the requirement. We confirm certifications, clearance status and hands-on tool experience before anyone reaches your inbox, so the first conversation is about fit rather than verification.
Security work arrives in bursts. An audit lands, a breach needs containing, a SOC 2 or PCI deadline moves up, or a cloud migration needs an application security reviewer for six months. We act as both the recruiter and the W2 employer for the length of the contract, which keeps co-employment risk off your side and lets you end or extend the engagement without a further fee. Our contract placements hold a 94.3% quality of hire ratio, measured on contractors who complete the full term.
Some security teams need a steady flow of candidates rather than one search, particularly managed security providers and consultancies hiring analysts in tiers. Our Recruitment as a Service subscription handles the whole top of the funnel, so candidate marketing, sourcing, screening and delivery sit with us while your security leads only run the final interviews. We generate an engaged pipeline for a named security role in under 7 days, at a fraction of what the same volume would cost on a per-placement fee.
Cybersecurity is not one hiring market, it is six that happen to share a name. A detection engineer and a compliance analyst are both security hires, and almost nothing about finding them is the same.
The great thing about nexus IT group is that it has a smaller family feel, but they are able to deliver IT candidates better than the largest IT staffing suppliers that we work with. They have delivered high quality cybersecurity professionals for several years to our firm.
I’ve been in Talent Acquisition for 15 years and have used many IT staffing firms over the years. I highly recommend Nick and nexus IT group over any other IT staffing services. nexus’ commitment to quality and delivery is top tier. They take the time to understand your needs, provide thorough screening, and make sure that candidates have a positive on-boarding experience.
Working with nexus IT group has made my job much easier. Having a recruiting firm who specializes in IT and within my industry, and who understands our specific culture and hiring needs has been instrumental in our talent acquisition talent strategy.
Capital One has used nexus IT group’s recruitment services for a number of IT positions at varying levels, over the past 4 years. We’ve had a high success rate working with nexus IT group which is a testament to the caliber of their work and their internal sourcing and vetting practices.
I’ve dealt with a lot of hiring firms in my 18 years in the investment banking profession, and the majority of them have been awful to mediocre at best. Dealing with Nexus IT Group, on the other hand, was a breath of fresh air. After only one one opening, I was blown away by the quality and quantity of resumes I received. Nexus IT Group pays close attention to my demands and requirements. As a result, the individuals who were referred to me were excellent fits for our open positions. I appreciate the personal and professional expertise you offer to the process.
SAIC provides government services to several federal agencies across the US. We needed to recruit several new cybersecurity talent for our growing practice area. Travis quickly understood our business and the requirements of each cybersecurity need. nexus IT group showed patience, flexibility, and expertise in the search process. If you’re looking for good cybersecurity recruiters then you can’t go wrong with nexus IT group.
It is hard to put into words what nexus IT group has done for our organization. nexus IT group knows exactly what we look for and they get the right candidates 99% of the time. Anyone looking to hire tech talent would be lucky to have nexus IT group on their side. They have great work ethic, responsive, and a wide array of market knowledge.
We’ve enlisted the help of a number of IT recruiting firms in the past. Nexus IT Group has contributed to the success of many great hires by working professionally, diligently, and efficiently. We contacted Nexus IT Group after being introduced to them, and we were instantly impressed by their promptness and ability to focus on our needs. We received 3 resumes the same day and 3 more the next day, and we were able to hire four people in less than a week. We added an additional individual through Nexus IT Group a few weeks later as a result of vast network, service and professionalism. I highly recommend working with Nexus IT Group.
Our client is an established company selling via retail channels and business-to-business-oriented delivery operations. It was a key position responsible for overseeing digital print operations, and it was especially challenging since the previous GM had given two weeks’ notice unexpectedly. Our team presented five top-notch candidates with exceptional experience in planning, directing, coordinating operations and change management within the first week.
A not-for-profit credit union that offers a full suite of financial products and services for individuals and businesses. An Information Security II position was open for 3+ months when CommunityAmerica approached nexus IT group seeking assistance.
They had 3 other recruiting vendors on the position for 3 months
Kept receiving under-qualified candidates and poor culture fits from other vendors.
Screened 50+ candidates
Submitted top 2 candidates within 1 week
Each candidate had spent 10+ years at current employer
Both candidates completed 3 rounds of the interview process
An offer was made and accepted 3 weeks after project initiation
One of the largest U.S. based electronic trading firms by number of daily average revenue trades. This partcular trading firm had a challenge finding and securing a Threat & Incident Manager so they enlisted the help of our cybersecurity recruiters.
Recruiting Challenges:
nexus IT group Solutions
Contacted 424 candidates across the US
Held meetings with 15 candidates
5 candidates submitted. 3 candidates were interviewed. 1 offer and 1 acceptance
Our client, a large supplier of aerospace services, structures, systems and support tasked our cybersecurity recruiters to identify a Security Analyst who would be involved in vulnerability management, looking at hosts and figuring out the critical patches needed, and escalating more advanced threats as needed. This was an immediate need with lots of visibility. Our cybersecurity recruiters sourced 242 candidates, submitted 5 candidates and the client hired 1 Security Analyst. Since then our cybersecurity team has gone on to fill 4 other IT Security roles.
Our client is a multinational financial services and asset management company headquartered in the UK. Its products and services include investment management, lifetime mortgages, pensions, annuities, and life assurance. Our client was referred to nexus IT group due to our prior experience with their VP of Talent. This Information Security Manager was their first internal cybersecurity hire in the US so it was important we got it right. Our cybersecurity recruiters quickly sourced 302 candidates, we submitted 6 candidates, and 1 candidate was hired.
A national milk marketing firm in the United States markets members’ raw milk and sells milk and derivative products to wholesale buyers both domestically and abroad. After trying to recruit for this client for 8 years they finally gave us a chance when they needed to grow their cybersecurity and network engineer team. They tasked us with finding and hiring 5 Network Security Engineers. Our cybersecurity recruiters sourced 656 network security candidates. Out of the 656 we ending up submitting 17 candidates and the client hired 5 candidates from us. Since then our relationship has expanded into several other skillsets to supplement their growing tech team.
To nexus IT group placement is an art—one that requires the proper alignment of talent with opportunity, experience with need, personality with environment, and aspirations with value. The Cybersecurity sector is fast-paced, highly competitive recruiting environment that offers big opportunities for cyber candidates. Our full-cycle recruiting system is a 51 step touchpoint process from start to finish. Our engagement process starts with a discovery call to understand the needs of the role. With this series of questions our cybersecurity recruiters are able to build a sales cadence that we will use to deploy a multi-touch recruiting cadence precisely and accurately to hundreds of candidates that fit the expectations of the role. Once our targeted search is executed, we spend a series of 3 calls to get to know the candidates’ needs, wants, and future career interests. Once we’ve created a shortlist of qualified and fully vetted candidates, we will deliver our top 2 to 3 candidates to the IT Security hiring manager. Once the interview process starts we work with the candidate and the hiring team to make sure communication is responsive and transparent. Once a candidate is placed, we stay in touch with the placed candidate for 2 years just to see how things are going.
Our candidate sourcing can be described in 3 words: Identify. Engage. Toolstack. Typically, the best job prospects are those who are passive. This indicates that they are not actively seeking employment. As a result, they are not surfing the Internet in search of online job postings. And because they are not viewing online job postings, we have developed a robust and 100% outbound recruiting strategy. We begin our sourcing strategy by creating a candidate persona. Once we have successfully created the candidate persona, we will then create a content strategy that will attract top talent in the cybersecurity space. Once we’ve developed our cadence we will use a number of sources to scour the web to get our message in front of the right candidates. Strategies includes searching our database, sourcing for referrals, sourcing from specific organizations, LinkedIn, Meetup, Angel List, Dice, alumni boards, and many other niche sites. We craft highly personalized messages that drive above industry reply rates. Our recruiting strategy is to begin conversations with passive candidates to learn about their future career interests, needs, and wants and align those needs with future openings with a high-touch approach
Quality of Hire is very important for nexus IT group and our cybersecurity recruiting team. Currently our cybersecurity recruiters hold a 96.08% quality of hire ratio. This is measured by any contractor who successfully completes their contract, and/or a direct placement candidate who is at our client for at least 6 months of duration.
Currently our 1 year retention rate with our cybersecurity clients is running right at 96.2%
The Cybersecurity hiring space is fast-paced so our team of cybersecurity recruiters are trained to work swiftly. The time required to send qualified candidates to the cybersecurity hiring manager, varies on the position you are seeking to fill and the challenges we will face such as lower than market compensation, bonus concerns, slow feedback, onsite expectations, etc. We can deliver applicants on the day of contract signing, within a few days, or within a few weeks.
We’ve spent a great deal of time in early-stage recruiting and have had the distinct pleasure of collaborating with a number of amazing VCs and founders. From our perspective, the Musks of the world represent the future of technology, and we are major believers and investors in technology because, of course, it is the future. However, recruiting for Seed and Series A/B early-stage firms presents a distinct set of obstacles.
Cybersecurity recruiters specialize in a specific market sector. Every day, our IT security recruiters contact a specialized set of cybersecurity candidates. When starting a new search, our team has a pool of personally-known candidates to call immediately. The point is that specialized startup recruiters sprint out of the gate more effectively than staffing firms that go back to the drawing board for each search.
When employers receive a resume from a cybersecurity recruiting firm, there is a high probability that they are familiar with the individual. Our clients trust that we have thoroughly screened the candidate over a series of multiple conversations, and that they will be worth the hiring managers time to interview.
Another benefit of using a specialized cybersecurity recruiting firm is you will experience less of a “resume broker” relationship and more of a “sector expert.” We spend countless hours every day conversing with IT security prospects and cybersecurity employers, making us more “in the know” about the IT security space. Cybersecurity recruiters can provide insight into the landscape of IT security employment, equity, current pay, and the most recent candidate challenges.
Ultimately, cybersecurity recruiters have access to a concentrated pool of candidates, resulting in increased efficiency during the hiring process and the ability to establish long-lasting relationships with the industry’s top talent.
Though we have several different practice areas such as government IT staffing, digital marketing staffing, private equity staffing, devops staffing, cloud staffing, data science staffing, and software development staffing. Our cybersecurity recruiters are hyper focused on clients in the IT security space. Our cybersecurity recruiting team has successfully worked with clients ranging from budding startups to Fortune 50 organizations.
Whether you’re recruiting for a IT Security Architect, Data Security, DevSecOps, or IT Security Analyst – our recruiting solutions have you covered. Our hires range from just about anything you can imagine that a company would need when hiring cybersecurity talent — including non-tech roles like Head of Security, VP of Security, CSO, and many more—with a niche focus in cybersecurity staffing.
Our cybersecurity recruiters use a series of stages to make sure we minimize candidate fall out during the recruiting cycle. Our recruiters will perform an in depth conversation where they work to uncover the needs, wants and desires of their next career move. We ask candidates specific skillset questions. If the team feels that there’s a fit then another person from our team will speak with the candidate. If the 2 nexus reps feel that there’s a good fit then we ask the candidate to complete a 4 question feedback form so we can better understand if the role is a good or great fit. Once we receive the candidates feedback then we will perform a “Lockdown” conversation where we ask a series of questions around counteroffers, interview stages, target salary expectations, and much more. If this goes well then we will submit the candidate for client review.
First, it is incredibly difficult for a IT security hiring managers with little time to receive responses to job ads. Second, an increasing number of professionals do not respond to recruiters, particularly in the cybersecurity field. They prefer to hear directly from the Chief Security Officer, which brings us to the third challenge: recruitment is a full-time, highly specialized profession for which IT Security hiring managers do not have time for.
Our cybersecurity recruiting fee is 22% to 25% of the candidates first year base salary. We do our best to find a payment structure that works best for your team.
Our cybersecurity recruiters are paid by the companies for which they place candidates. Your startup recruiter does earn a commission if you are hired, but the commission is paid by the company that hires you. Our recruiting fee isn’t taken out of your salary, and it doesn’t lower the salary that you would be offered. Another misconception is that if you are presented by a recruiter, and another candidate is not, that you would be at a disadvantage because you have a fee associated with you getting that role. In our experience companies are seeking the best person for the job, and they are not concerned about a fee being paid at that point. In fact, candidates that work with recruiters actually tend to make more than those who job hunt alone.
