Paul Clayson has an interesting and eclectic career history: he went from real estate to politics – including working for two US Presidents – then to corporate finance and investing. He tells Tom Fox about his experience working as CEO of several technology companies after which he moved into consulting. He first consulted for AgilePQ, his present company, and was asked to join as CEO. Paul joins Tom to discuss the top lessons he learned as CEO, as well as security for technology in the present and future.
Timely Intervention
“…Encryption and security technology has lagged the development of computers,” Paul tells Tom. Computers are becoming smaller but existing encryption is too large to fit on these small devices. As a result, very few IoT devices have security on them. Paul feels strongly that it’s time to “catch up”.
Leadership Lessons for CEOs
Tom asks Paul to share his top leadership lessons as CEO. Paul says:
- The CEO has more bosses than any other position in the company;
- Your job as CEO is to get the best people and then create the environment for them to perform at their best;
- Be transparent about everything;
- He lives by two principles. Firstly, make gut decisions after finding all the data to support it; and secondly, it makes no sense doing those things well that you shouldn’t be doing at all.
He explains that the difference between the board of directors and the CEO is oversight and fiduciary responsibility versus operation and execution.
Security for the Present and Future
Tom and Paul discuss Paul’s role at AgilePQ and the company’s prospects. “This product is needed; it’s just needed,” Paul emphasizes. He outlines the markets they are targeting, which even includes their competitors. “They don’t really have a full security system that can operate on the smallest of IoT devices,” he points out. “We have that so we can join with them, license to them our technology.” He tells Tom that their software not only protects the present but is ready for future technology as well. “We built [our software] not only to protect the IoT devices, but we built it so that when quantum computers become a reality – they will be able to process so much data so quickly they can break many of the encryption systems that are in the marketplace today – we built our technology to be post-quantum secure.”
“What do board members, CEOs, and companies need to be thinking about for 2025 or perhaps even further, around security and encryption?” Tom asks. “People have to recognize that hackers and bad actors in the digital world are multiplying faster in many cases than the development of technology itself,” Paul responds. “Businesses today really need to be focusing on security at every level of the computing stack … and they need to concentrate on multiple levels of security within each of those systems. He advises that security should be considered in the planning stage, not after you’ve already developed a product. “You need to think about it upfront and plan it as part of the operational aspect of the device… that you’re building,” he comments.
Resources
Paul Clayson on LinkedIn
AgilePQ.com
Call Paul Clayson at (336)380-2800
