Southwest Gas Cybersecurity Audit Professional of the Year – David Larsen
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Southwest Gas Cybersecurity Audit Professional of the Year - David Larsen
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Additional Info
Job title of nominated professional (or team name) | IT Audit Professional |
Company (where nominated professional or team is working) | Southwest Gas Company |
Website | https://www.swgas.com/ |
Company size (employees) | 1,000 to 4,999 |
Country | United States |
Headquarters Region | North America |
Overview
David is an accomplished Senior Auditor and passionate about Cyber Security. He is curious about all aspects of Security in general and will go the extra mile to study and research in order to understand the latest technologies, frameworks, changes in laws and frameworks being used.
He is regularly sought out for his perspective on various topics by other IT audit and compliance professionals because he has a unique ability to quickly comprehend and distill for others the most complicated topics. He will then utilize this information to mage insightful recommendations that result in significant changes to an organization. He is always willing to make time for others and is constantly looking for ways that he can help make their life easier and better.
He is not satisfied with the status quo and has demonstrated year after year resulting in his own development and maturation of the Company’s programs.
LinkedIn profile: https://linkedin.com/in/david-larsen
Accomplishments
Leadership – David’s excellent audit and technical acumen, as well as his integrity and passion led to his selection to co-lead the American Gas Association (AGA) / Edison Electric Institute (EEI) Information Technology (IT) Audit Director group that meets throughout the year to discuss topics related to IT and Cyber audit. David also recently led the most complicated and largest engagement the IT audit team has undertaken in recent years that resulted in meaningful results for others at the Company.
Partnership – David is recognized as a trusted leader, advisor and mentor because he builds teams and coalitions for positive change in all of his interactions. He regularly meets with professionals within and outside of Southwest Gas and acts as a change agent. He is regularly asked to present at conferences and enjoys setting up regular team building events between Internal Audit, Cybersecurity, Compliance, Information Services, and others that break the ice and work better together. Because of this, he has cultivated trust between many teams and has been critical in making breakthroughs and improvements in areas such as IT risk assessment, cybersecurity, attack and penetration testing, insider threat, vulnerability management, regulatory compliance (including recent TSA security directives), and hardening of critical systems.
Innovation - David has a natural talent for innovating and is driven to find better ways to accomplish tasks. He was crucial in rolling out Agile auditing on several IT Audit engagements last year, greatly improving the efficiency of engagement and improved the speed at which the Company could address recommendations. He is particularly interested Cybersecurity and looks for opportunities for improvement in everything. David's excellent research capability leads him to frameworks and authoritative materials that are relevant to projects that enhance the department’s ability to respond to rapidly changing circumstances.
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