2025-08-05 –, Florentine B
Let’s be real: your resume isn’t getting you the job. It’s just the ticket into the arena. The real boss battle? The interview itself. FIGHT!
This session is for anyone who’s ever left an interview and thought, “Well… that could’ve gone better.” We’re skipping the slide deck (except for some juicy memes) and jumping straight into battle-tested, no-BS advice on how to stand out in interviews and actually get hired. Whether you’re a brand new SOC analyst, a mid-career pivot-er, or someone who’s been ghosted more times than a mall perfume salesman - this talk is for you.
It’s not death by PowerPoint.
It’s a conversation.
With memes. Come laugh, learn, and leave ready to be the candidate they remember.
Resumes are fine. But they don’t get you hired - you do.
In this fast-paced, no-fluff talk, cybersecurity hiring manager and mohawked chaos gremlin John Stoner breaks down how to stop bombing interviews and start showing up like the badass candidate you are.
With 25+ years in national security and cybersecurity - and hundreds of interviews under his belt - John will walk you through what actually works in an interview setting, based on real-world hiring across federal and commercial roles.
We’ll cover:
• Why resumes don’t matter as much as you think
• How preparation (not memorization) makes you stand out
• What stories to rehearse—including your two-minute “tell me about yourself”
• How to answer both technical and non-technical questions without sounding like a robot
• What questions you should ask—and why you're interviewing them, too
No slides, just memes, tough love, and the kind of advice you wish someone had given you sooner.
John Stoner is a US Army veteran and highly accomplished cybersecurity leader, threat analyst and consultant, bringing over 25 years of experience with 15+ focused in cybersecurity. He is CISSP and PMP certified, with deep competency across the US Intelligence Community (USIC), SLED and commercial verticals. His strengths include Cyber Threat Intelligence (CTI), program management, cross-functional cybersecurity consulting, course development and instruction. He gives back to the cybersecurity community volunteering with The Diana Initiative and BSides events. John is also a volunteer DEFCON G00N. He is the Vice Chair of VetSec.