Gartner Expert

Aaron McQuaid

Sr Director Analyst

I am a Network Security Analyst. I provide advise and insight to clients in the following areas:

Network Firewalls

Macrosegmentation

Microsegmentation

Hybrid Cloud interconnection Design

Network Access Control

IDS/IPS

SSE

I also contribute to and write research notes related to Network Security topics.

Previous experience

I have worked at vendors (Cisco TAC 9 years), VARS (Eplus 2 years), large healthcare vendors (Allscripts 2 years), and Large Financials (Truist 2 years). Over my career I have moved from Customer Support Engineer, to Managed Service Engineer, to Principal Engineer, and finally Lead Enterprise Architect. With each move the scope of my responsibility increased and I grew closer to the nexus of technology and business. I went from how does the technology work to how does it enable the business function.

I hope to use this experience going forward at Gartner to help Gartner clients make the correct technology decisions in order to create optimal business outcomes.

Professional background

Truist Financial

Lead Enterprise Architect for Network Security

Allscripts

Principal Systems Engineer

Eplus

Managed Services Engineer

Areas of coverage

Security Operations

Infrastructure Security

Education

Bachelor of Science in Information Technology - St. Mary's University of Minnesota

Masters of Engineering in Internetworking - Dalhousie University

Masters of Engineering Management - Duke University

Masters of Science in Information Security Engineering - SANS Institute (degree candidate)

Cisco Certified Internetworking Expert - Security

Certified Information Systems Security Professional - CISSP

Certified Cloud Security Professional - CCSP

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Top Issues That I Help Clients Address

1Network Security Architecture review

2Network Security meets Network Engineering

3Implementation and Operation of Network Security Solutions

4How do I select network security products among multiple vendors?

5Cloud Security and Network Interconnection Strategy