These days, security has to speak the language of business. These KPIs will get you started.

(Image: Moritz320)

Peter Drucker, aka the founder of modern management, is credited with writing, "If you can't measure it, you can't improve it." Over time, that has been broadened to, "If you can't measure it, you can't manage it," a statement that is taken as holy writ for most modern executives.

Indeed, business in the 21st century is all about metrics. Cybersecurity has plenty, measuring everything from port probes to login attempts. It's expected that cybersecurity managers will have a good handle on all of these metrics and know what they're saying about their organizations. But in today's business organization, these security metrics aren't enough.

In order to protect the business, security has to speak the language of business. The last decade has seen a growing, if sometimes grudging, acknowledgment of this by security professionals. The question for many security pros is, "Which business metrics should I know?"

Each organization may have its own unique key performance indicators (KPIs) to take into consideration. But certain metrics matter regardless of the particular business. To cover all of them is the subject of an MBA, but we've put together a list that includes some basics, some that might escape first notice, and some that have a particular interest from a security perspective.

In each case, these are metrics that cybersecurity pros should understand and pay attention to. Do you use them in your security practice? What other metrics do you think should be on this list? Let us know in the comments.  

About the Author(s)

Curtis Franklin, Principal Analyst, Omdia

Curtis Franklin Jr. is Principal Analyst at Omdia, focusing on enterprise security management. Previously, he was senior editor of Dark Reading, editor of Light Reading's Security Now, and executive editor, technology, at InformationWeek, where he was also executive producer of InformationWeek's online radio and podcast episodes

Curtis has been writing about technologies and products in computing and networking since the early 1980s. He has been on staff and contributed to technology-industry publications including BYTE, ComputerWorld, CEO, Enterprise Efficiency, ChannelWeb, Network Computing, InfoWorld, PCWorld, Dark Reading, and ITWorld.com on subjects ranging from mobile enterprise computing to enterprise security and wireless networking.

Curtis is the author of thousands of articles, the co-author of five books, and has been a frequent speaker at computer and networking industry conferences across North America and Europe. His most recent books, Cloud Computing: Technologies and Strategies of the Ubiquitous Data Center, and Securing the Cloud: Security Strategies for the Ubiquitous Data Center, with co-author Brian Chee, are published by Taylor and Francis.

When he's not writing, Curtis is a painter, photographer, cook, and multi-instrumentalist musician. He is active in running, amateur radio (KG4GWA), the MakerFX maker space in Orlando, FL, and is a certified Florida Master Naturalist.

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