SAIC Post-Course Review Part 2
The Security Analyst Introductory Course concluded its 3rd run on 11th April 2025, after two successful runs in March (link to blog post 1). We designed this course to cater to non-cybersecurity practitioners, and the initial feedback we got was that the course was too short and a little too advanced. This time round, we included some pre-reading material, which helped to provide a baseline for participants.
While we observed that the pre-reading material had some impact, most of the feedback points were echoed in the third run, highlighting the need for a little more time on technical content. Indeed, the course does cover quite a wide range, and it takes time to absorb the scenario content. In any case, here is some of the feedback:
Experience with KK
I totally enjoyed the course. KK was an excellent instructor, so much to learn from him that can be applicable to our work, either immediately or in future. More importantly, thought he demystified and sparked alot of love and appreciation for a field of work that seemed esoteric initially. Highly recommended!
Experience with the Course
Hands on practical portions were interesting as it gave a first hand experience into what red teams are doing, which analysts may never get a chance to see or do.
Ease of the Course
The course syllabus is relevant to my work as I have a non-technical background. In particular, the segments on understanding network, terminology and considerations for actions are useful for collaboration work with technical colleagues.
With the tweaks counterShell has made, we think we've found a good balance of difficulty in the course. However, the technical components perhaps need further time and emphasis, in order for participants to grasp key basic technical concepts and apply them. Hence, we will adjust the course content accordingly to cater for this need before we launch future runs of the course.
The security assessment of the simulated environment continues to be the highlight of the course, and we will continue to include such material in all the courses we develop. As a whole, we believe that people learn best when there are problems to solve, and such simulated environments are intended to provide training value and an avenue to exercise some level of creativity in the problem solving approach.
Separately, we've noticed that the course's technical content has "sparked joy" in some participants, and we'd like to continue to grow that spark into something more substantial. We will figure out how best to do that. :)
