Why Cybersecurity Training Fails to Engage - and How We Can Fix It

The "Oh, Behave! The Annual Cybersecurity Attitudes and Behaviors 2024-2025" report by the National Cybersecurity Alliance paints a stark picture for those committed to cybersecurity education. When nearly 89% of respondents dislike "online games or gamified experiences," 73% don't enjoy "interactive workshops held periodically," and a staggering 97% seem disengaged from all formats of traditional training, it’s clear there is a disconnect between how cybersecurity is traditionally taught and how it is received.

The Challenge: Misaligned Priorities

The core issue is not just about format but about the deeper misalignment between employees' daily responsibilities and the corporate expectation to participate in cybersecurity training. Today's professionals are pulled away from their core tasks—the roles they are passionate about and directly held accountable for—to learn about cybersecurity, a topic they often have no direct interest or connection to. Despite the industry's best intentions, forcing employees into training sessions, no matter how well designed, frequently leads to resentment rather than engagement.

What’s more, companies often fail to integrate the concept of shared responsibility for security into the cultural fabric of their organizations. As a result, cybersecurity feels like a burden rather than a shared priority. When training is viewed as a disruptive task to “check off,” it’s no surprise that employees aren't receptive, regardless of whether the format is gamified, interactive, or traditional.?

The Unhealthy Dynamic of Forced Learning

Adding to the challenge is the unhealthy relationship between security content creators and participants in cybersecurity training. Employees often have no choice in whether to attend. This fosters frustration rather than understanding. Organizers typically focus on meeting compliance requirements, while employees feel the disconnect from their real-world challenges, leading to an erosion of mutual respect.

?Rather than building trust and fostering a collaborative approach, this structure pits teams against one another. This causes individuals to fail to take the time to understand one another, further alienating employees from subjects that can be critical to the organization’s well-being.

The Way Forward: Redefining Engagement and Responsibility

To transform how cybersecurity knowledge and responsibility are shared within organizations, we must start by redefining relationships between security teams and employee with other focus areas by embedding security as part of the company culture rather than a task to be outsourced to a few.?

Here are some actionable steps to drive this transformation:

1. Incorporate Security into Daily Conversations: Instead of isolated training sessions, integrate applicable and relevant cybersecurity topics into everyday activities. Leaders can weave security considerations into regular team meetings or project discussions, where the relevance of security becomes clear in the context of each department’s goals.

2. Empower Employees through Shared Responsibility: Create a culture where core elements of cybersecurity are everyone's job, not just the IT or security departments. Provide frameworks where teams can own specific security challenges directly tied to their day-to-day functions. This gives people control over security decisions that impact their work and incentivizes them to care more deeply.?

3. Leverage Peer Learning: People learn best from those they trust. Instead of hierarchical top-down training, create peer-to-peer networks where employees can share their security successes, thoughts and challenges with colleagues, making the knowledge exchange more organic and less formal.

4. Use Metrics to Motivate: Employees are more likely to engage with cybersecurity when goals are measurable and directly linked to performance outcomes they care about. Setting clear, achievable targets that tie into broader company objectives will help employees see how cybersecurity strengthens their ability to succeed in their own roles.

5. Foster a Culture of Curiosity: This secret ingredient is essential for the future of cybersecurity engagement. Encouraging curiosity leads to a proactive rather than reactive mindset, where employees feel empowered to explore and understand cybersecurity in a way that connects to their everyday work. When organizations foster curiosity, they open doors to innovation, continuous learning, and a deeper sense of responsibility across the workforce, shifting the focus from compliance to active participation. This culture also helps build stronger cross-functional relationships, enabling teams to collaborate in solving complex security challenges.

Measuring Success: How to Motivate Change

Measuring success in cybersecurity training can be challenging, but we can achieve it by focusing on both individual and organizational improvements:

- Set Tangible Security Goals: Establish security milestones for teams, such as reducing phishing susceptibility rates or increasing MFA adoption. Celebrate these wins, both at the team and organizational level.

- Offer Incentives: Introduce reward systems for employees or departments that meet security benchmarks. Recognition can go a long way in making people feel like they are contributing to something meaningful.

- Track Security Awareness with Engagement Metrics: Instead of just measuring training attendance, track active participation and security improvements in day-to-day work. For example, do employees take more proactive security measures, report phishing attempts, or engage with security best practices?

Building a Future-Ready Cybersecurity Culture

The future of cybersecurity training lies in transforming it from an interruption to an integral part of how people work and think. When organizations move away from forced, one-size-fits-all solutions and instead foster a shared sense of responsibility, they create a healthier, more engaged, and security-conscious workforce.

Where Can You Turn For Help?

If you're ready to transform your organization's approach to cybersecurity education and foster a culture where curiosity and shared responsibility drive behavior change, I'd love to help. I specialize in creating engaging, interactive, and behavior-changing experiences that don't add unnecessary burden to your teams but instead integrate cybersecurity into their daily work. Together, we can shift cybersecurity from being a compliance checkbox to something your employees actively care about and enjoy. Reach out to explore how we can make your cybersecurity training more impactful, aligned with your organizational goals, and even enjoyable for your team.

The potential for cultural transformation is immense. When companies align cybersecurity with their overall mission and goals, and when every employee feels a sense of ownership in the organization’s security, the disconnects highlighted by the report will start to disappear. The goal is not to add another burden to already busy schedules but to empower employees to see cybersecurity as a natural extension of their work and their success.

By changing the way we think about cybersecurity education, we can build stronger, more resilient organizations—one in which security is everyone's business.