Seats are limited on purpose. Our Secure Anchor team is opening 10 seats in the October CISO Intake. Every deliverable you turn in is read and graded by a person, so we cap the seats. Applications close September 30, 2026, or as soon as those seats are filled.
We call each monthly Intake a Case Study group. It is self-paced, not a live class. What makes it a group is that a real person reads every piece of work.
Our goal is simple: to help you become the person the company trusts to decide.
That means three things:
- A seat at the table where the security budget gets decided
- Proof on paper that you already think like a CISO
- Two paths: the title, or a vCISO practice of your own
And you get there without stacking one more certification, without going back to school, and without waiting for the person above you to retire.
You’ve already done the hard part. Now we’re going to make it count.
You work in security, and you have for years.
You have run the incidents and written the policies. You have fixed the things nobody else could fix.
Maybe you lead a team. Maybe you are the senior engineer everyone calls when it breaks.
Maybe you asked for eight million and they gave you two. Nobody told them what the other six was for.
Or maybe you watched the seat above you go to someone else. Someone from outside. A name you had to look up.
You asked yourself what they saw in that person that they could not see in you.
Good. You’re exactly who this program was built for.
In your first five weeks, we’re going to change how the room hears you.
Most security pros try to get promoted by getting better at security.
They add a cert, then another tool, then another late night. Then they wait for someone to notice.
We do it backwards.
We start with the part nobody trains you for: how a chief officer thinks, talks and decides.
By week five you build your first piece of proof. It is a Defense Roadmap, a plan you could put in front of an executive team. Pat Gorman reads it and grades it.
Don’t worry. You don’t need to be interviewing for a CISO role yet. You don’t need a board meeting on your calendar.
We just need evidence that you can think at that level. Then you put it on paper.
(And that’s just the first five weeks…)
Boards do not promote the best technologist.
Most security professionals build their careers by going deeper.
More tools. More frameworks. More letters after their name.
That’s the technologist game.
It makes you very good at the work. It also keeps you in the room where the work gets done and out of the room where it gets decided.
We play the chief officer game.
Boards promote the person they trust to decide. So we build that person on purpose. You learn to speak money, weigh risk against cost, and own the call.
That makes you harder to pass over, easier to trust and worth more to the business.
Think about a CFO for a second.
The CFO is not the best accountant in the building. Nobody expects that.
The CFO is the person who can tell the CEO what the numbers mean and what to do about them.
Security works the same way.
You are not a CISO. You are a chief officer whose portfolio happens to be information security.
Read that again.
That’s the game we’re playing.
Who is behind this
Secure Anchor is the CISO department of Career Path Partners. The method comes from our Secure Anchor team, built on the work of Dr. Eric Cole.
Every deliverable in this program is read and graded by Pat Gorman. Not a quiz. Not an auto-grader. A person who reads what you wrote and tells you where it holds up and where it doesn’t.
But this isn’t about our careers.
We’re here to move yours.
We keep this group small on purpose. A real person reads every piece of work you submit, and that only works with a few seats.
This won’t work for you if you…
- Don’t work in security today
- Have less than three years in the field
- Are only gathering information and not ready to decide
- Live outside the United States or Canada
- Want an exam-based industry certification (this is not one, and we say so up front)
- Need live classes or someone chasing you to do the work
- Think joining makes someone else responsible for getting you the title
But if you…
- Work in security now, with three or more years behind you
- Lead a team, or do the work of someone who should
- Have been passed over, or can see it coming
- Want the executive seat, or want to sell security leadership on retainer
- Know you are capable of more than your title says
- Will do the work on your own schedule and turn it in
- Know that you are the one who gets you the result
…then keep reading.
October could get interesting.
You get all 13 modules on day one. You get a 12-week plan that fits around your job, and three graded deliverables that turn what you know into proof. You get the executive language, a CISO-grade resume, the interview prep, and a plan to launch your own practice.
The plan is simple:
Phase 1
Executive Foundation
Week one is not about security. It is about you.
Most security engineers talk about the wrong part of their work. They describe the tools and the tickets, not what it meant for the business.
So we start by rebuilding how you see your own career. You go through Introduction to CISO and Becoming a CISO. You learn what the seat actually asks of the person in it.
It changes who you are in the room. An engineer asks for resources. A chief officer decides where they go.
That’s Phase 1: a new identity, a new language and a clear picture of the seat.
Phase 2
The Security Core
We’re not going to waste your time on basics. You already know security.
This is not about more hacking, more tools or more certifications.
This phase is about the business end of being a CISO. The board does not want your threat model. It wants to know what the risk costs and what fixing it costs.
You know slide fourteen. The one where you lost them, and you knew it while it was happening. This phase is about slide fourteen.
Learn the business side.
Weeks two through four cover Cybersecurity, The Business End of Being a CISO, and Dismantling the CISO Problem.
Build the plan.
Week five is Technology and Solutions Roadmap. Watching isn’t experience. So you use your own workplace, or one you know well, and build a real plan.
Turn it in.
This is Deliverable 1: your Defense Roadmap. Pat reads it and grades it. It is not a checkbox.
If you can’t fill all four columns for every line of your roadmap, you don’t own it yet. Go do more work.
That’s Phase 2: the business case, the roadmap and your first piece of proof.
Phase 3
Landing the Title
The goal here can be the CISO title where you work now, the same title somewhere else, or your first executive role.
An interview for the seat is not a test of what you know. It is a test of whether they trust you to decide.
Set the foundation.
Week six. You get clear on the role you want and the story that gets you there.
Build the resume.
Week seven. This is Deliverable 2: your CISO-grade resume. Most security resumes read like a list of tools. Yours will read like a record of decisions. Pat reads it and grades it.
Win the room.
Weeks eight and nine cover Nailing the Interview and Securing a CISO Position. That means the conversation, the offer and the negotiation.
That’s Phase 3: the story, the resume and the offer.
Phase 4
Building the Practice
Not everyone wants one employer. Some of you want to sell security leadership on retainer, to companies that need a CISO but can’t hire a full-time one.
This is the second path.
Week ten is Business Mindset and Launch Plan. Week eleven is Sales and Marketing Your vCISO Practice. Week twelve is Cybersecurity Operations.
This is Deliverable 3: your Practice Launch Plan. Pat reads it and grades it.
Even if you take a full-time seat, you finish knowing how to stand on your own.
That’s Phase 4: the practice, the pitch and the plan.
The format
How It Works
All 13 modules unlock on day one. That covers all three Secure Anchor bodies of work: CISO Certification, Becoming a CISO and vCISO. There are no tiers and no path to pick. You get everything.
A 12-week plan, with 12 months of access. Everything is on demand, so it moves at the pace of your job, not a class calendar. There are no live classes. The 12 weeks are a plan, not a gate. The October CISO Intake plan starts October 5, 2026.
Three graded deliverables, read by Pat Gorman. A Defense Roadmap in week five. A CISO-grade resume in week seven. A Practice Launch Plan in week twelve. Each one is reviewed and graded, not just submitted.
Day 84: a certificate of completion from Secure Anchor and a portfolio of proof. It is not an exam-based industry certification. We say so here rather than let you find out later. A certification proves you studied. A board wants proof you can decide. The portfolio is what you put in front of one.
When a budget ask isn’t landing, run the Four Columns.
Our Secure Anchor team teaches that executives want four things on one sheet:
- Risk. What could happen?
- Likelihood. How likely is it?
- Cost if it occurs. What does it cost the business?
- Cost to fix. What does it cost to stop it?
Then one more line: who signs off on the risk you don’t fix.
Find the empty column and fill it. Another certification can’t do that for you.
The investment
Build Your Path to the CISO Seat Over the Next 12 Months
This program isn’t built to hand you a certificate and send you on your way.
You follow the 12-week plan. Then the full program stays open to you for the rest of your 12 months. It is there when the interview, the negotiation and the first board meeting come.
It starts with a $1,500 fully refundable deposit when you apply. If you are not accepted, we refund it in full.
If you are accepted, you pick one of two ways to finish:
Pay $8,000 when you are accepted. That makes your total $9,500.
Or pay $8,500 over 12 months, $708.33 a month. That makes your total $10,000.
One program. No tiers. Everything included either way.
Some students ask their employer to cover it from a training or leadership budget.
Career Path Partners is the only place the full program runs.
One more time
Like we said, it’s a small group. So if you…
- Work in security and have three or more years behind you
- Want the executive seat or a vCISO practice
- Are tired of being the most correct person in a room you don’t get to decide in
- Will do the work on your own time and turn it in
- Want proof, not another certificate to stack
The October CISO Intake starts its 12-week plan on October 5, 2026, so if that sounds like you, here is what to do next:
- Step 1: Click here to apply for one of the 10 seats in the October CISO Intake. It takes about 10 minutes.
- Step 2: Our Secure Anchor team will review your application and let you know within 24 to 48 hours.
Applications close September 30, or sooner if all 10 seats are filled. If you miss this Intake, you’ll need to wait for a future opening.
Somebody gets the seat when it opens. It may as well be you.
The Secure Anchor Team
Secure Anchor, the CISO department of Career Path Partners
P.S. If you skipped all the way to the end, that habit may be part of why the seat went to someone else. The people who get the seat are the ones who read the whole file. They do the slow work that nobody sees until the day it counts. Quick fixes don’t put you in the room. A plan does. So go back and read this whole letter. It takes ten minutes. The next seat that opens could depend on it.
Career Path Partners does not guarantee results, employment, promotions, titles or income. The certificate is a certificate of completion from Secure Anchor, the CISO department of Career Path Partners. It is not an exam-based industry certification, and it is not accredited.