This chapter has looked at three important processes in career growth and development. Mentoring has been exhaustively discussed as a relationship between one person and a professional who has lengthy experience in an industry and who can give career growth and development guidance. The chapter has looked at the reasons why a mentor is important in one's life. Some of the listed reasons include mentors being sources of knowledge, giving insights on how to improve, giving encouragement, instilling discipline in your life, giving opinions, and giving advice. The chapter has also looked at the best ways of choosing a mentor and has highlighted that you should look at compatibility, strengths and weaknesses, contrast, expertise, and trust.
Networking has also been covered as a method of building relationships that help you to get information, guidance, and support. It has been described as a way of gaining social capital that can be used to build your career. The benefits of networking have been listed as getting access to job opportunities, getting a source of career advice and support, building your confidence, developing personal relationships, getting access to resources, and discovering new paths. The chapter has given a few tips that should be followed when networking and they include building genuine relationships, offering to help, varying the events you attend, and keeping in touch with your network.
Lastly, the chapter has looked at shadowing, which is a method of developing your career by accompanying a professional to a workplace and observing what their job entails. The types of job shadowing that have been highlighted include regular briefings, observation, and hands-on experience. Some of the ways that you can make the most out of a job shadowing exercise include preparing questions to ask, taking notes, picking the most appropriate times, and showing gratitude.
Venturing ahead, we will discuss how to set up a lab environment and carry out penetration testing in the next chapter. This will give you hands-on experience of cyber security lab set-up and to do self-assessment by getting acquainted with various technologies pertaining to this domain.