TechSpective Podcast
TechSpective Podcast

TechSpective Podcast

Tony Bradley

Overview
Episodes

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The TechSpective Podcast brings together top minds in cybersecurity, enterprise tech, AI, and beyond to share unique perspective on technology—unpacking breakthrough trends like zero trust, threat intelligence, AI-enabled security, ransomware’s geopolitical ties, and more. Whether you’re an IT pro, security exec, or simply tech‑curious, each episode blends expert insight with real-world context—from microsegmentation strategies to the human side of cyber ethics. But we also keep it fun, sometimes riffing on pop‑culture debates like Star Wars vs. Star Trek or Xbox vs. PS—so it’s not all dry and serious.

Recent Episodes

Agentic AI and the Art of Asking Better Questions
DEC 23, 2025
Agentic AI and the Art of Asking Better Questions
I’ve had a lot of conversations about AI over the past couple years—some insightful, some overhyped, and a few that left me questioning whether we’re even talking about the same technology. But every now and then, I get the opportunity to sit down with someone who not only understands the technology but also sees its broader implications with clarity and honesty. This episode of the TechSpective Podcast is one of those moments. Jeetu Patel, President and Chief Product Officer at Cisco, joins me for an unscripted, unfiltered conversation that covers more ground than I could have outlined in a set of pre-written questions. Actually, I did draft a set of pre-written questions. We just didn't follow or use them at all. Jeetu and I have known each other for a while, and this episode reflects the kind of conversation you only get with someone who’s deeply immersed in both the strategic and human sides of tech. It’s thoughtful. It’s philosophical. And it doesn’t pull punches. At the center of our discussion is the concept of “agentic AI”—a term that’s being used more frequently, sometimes without much clarity. We unpack what it actually means, what it can realistically do, and how it differs from the wave of chatbots and content generators that came before it. More importantly, we talk about how these AI agents might change not just the tasks we automate, but how we think about work itself. Of course, with any conversation about AI and the future of work comes the inevitable tension: what gets lost, what gets reimagined, and what still requires distinctly human judgment. Jeetu brings a nuanced take to this, rooted in his experience leading product innovation at one of the world’s largest tech companies. It’s not a conversation filled with predictions so much as it is a reframing of the questions we should be asking. What stood out to me is how quickly we normalize the extraordinary. A technology that felt magical two years ago is now embedded in our daily workflows. That speed of adoption changes the stakes. It means we need to be more deliberate—not just about what AI can do, but what we want it to do, and what we risk offloading too quickly. We also touch on the philosophical implications. If AI agents really can handle more of the cognitive heavy lifting, what’s our role in the loop? Do we become editors? Overseers? Explorers of new frontiers? And how do we prepare for jobs that don’t exist yet, using tools that are evolving faster than we can document them? I think this episode will resonate with anyone trying to navigate this moment—whether you’re in product development, policy, marketing, or just someone who likes to think a few moves ahead. It’s about more than AI. It’s about how we adapt, how we define value, and what we choose to hold onto as the landscape shifts. Give it a listen. And as always, I’d love to hear your thoughts.
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53 MIN
Building Security for a World That’s Already Changed
DEC 19, 2025
Building Security for a World That’s Already Changed
There’s a question I’ve been sitting with lately: Are we prepared for what AI is about to expose in our organizations—not just technically, but operationally? In this episode of the TechSpective Podcast, I sit down with Kavitha Mariappan, Rubrik’s Chief Transformation Officer, to unpack some of the less flashy but arguably more urgent questions about enterprise security, AI readiness, and business continuity. If your organization is still treating identity as a login issue or AI as a future-state conversation, you might be missing the bigger picture. Kavitha doesn’t speak in clichés. She’s been in the trenches—engineering, scaling go-to-market teams, and now helping steer one of the fastest-evolving players in the data security space. Her perspective is shaped by decades of experience, but her focus is very much on the now: how to operationalize resilience at a time when every system, process, and even person has become a potential attack vector. One of the threads we pull on is the idea that resilience isn’t a fallback plan anymore—it’s the front line. And identity? That’s not just a security issue. It’s a dependency. If you can’t log in, you can’t recover. You can’t operate. You can’t pivot. The conversation touches on what it really means to build for resilience in a landscape where downtime isn’t just costly—it’s existential. We also explore what I’ll loosely call “AI exposure therapy”—not in the sense of experimenting with new models or shiny tools, but in understanding how AI is forcing companies to confront their structural weaknesses. What used to be considered internal inefficiencies are now potential vectors of attack. Technical debt isn’t just a performance issue—it’s a risk multiplier. Kavitha brings data to the table too—sharing insight from Rubrik Zero Labs on the alarming surge in identity-based attacks and why the majority of companies are still playing catch-up when it comes to securing what they can’t always see. It’s a wake-up call, but not a hopeless one. What made this conversation stand out to me wasn’t just the subject matter, but the way Kavitha frames the questions we should be asking: How do we architect for a world that’s already in flux? How do we define AI transformation when most businesses are still digesting digital transformation? And perhaps most critically, what needs to change inside the organization before the tech can even do its job? I won’t give away the full arc of the discussion, but here’s my pitch: If you’re leading, advising, or building for a company that handles sensitive data (hint: that’s all of us), this episode will challenge you to think differently about where resilience really begins—and what it’s going to take to build it into the DNA of your org. Listen to or watch the full episode here:
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53 MIN
Cybersecurity’s Quiet Revolution: What We’re Missing While Chasing the Hype
DEC 18, 2025
Cybersecurity’s Quiet Revolution: What We’re Missing While Chasing the Hype
There’s something happening in cybersecurity right now that’s both exciting and a little disorienting. As generative and agentic AI take over headlines, conference keynotes, and investor decks, it’s easy to assume we’re on the verge of some great leap forward. The reality is more complicated—and more interesting. In the latest episode of the TechSpective Podcast, I had the chance to sit down with Sachin Jade, Chief Product Officer at Cyware, for a conversation that cuts through the buzzwords. We cover a lot of ground—from AI’s place in the SOC to the underrated power of relevance in threat intelligence—but what stuck with me most was this: the most transformative work happening in security right now doesn’t look like a revolution. It looks like simplification. Not simplification in the marketing sense—fewer dashboards, “single pane of glass,” etc.—but simplification where it actually matters: filtering noise, streamlining analysis, helping human analysts do their jobs better and faster. There’s a growing recognition among smart security leaders that “flashy” features might demo well, but if they don’t reduce burnout, improve signal-to-noise, or give analysts time back in their day, they’re missing the point. We’re at a moment where AI can—and should—do more than just surface alerts. The goal isn’t to impress anyone with a cool interface or to simulate a brilliant security expert. The goal is to embed intelligence into the places that grind analysts down: filtering irrelevant threat intel, connecting disparate data points, recommending next steps based on context. Mundane, unsexy tasks—yes. But transformative when done well. Sachin offered a useful framework for thinking about agentic AI that goes beyond the surface definitions most people are using. We talk about where true decision-making autonomy begins, how it fits into layered workflows, and what it really looks like to “mimic” human reasoning in a SOC environment. Spoiler: it’s not about replacing people. It’s about enabling them. Another theme that emerged: relevancy. Not in a vague, feel-good way, but in the deeply practical sense of “does this matter to me, my company, my infrastructure, right now?” For all the AI talk, too many tools still struggle to answer that question clearly. Cyware’s approach, which Sachin outlines in the episode, puts a premium on reducing noise and increasing clarity. There’s no magic wand—but there is a very intentional shift toward making intelligence actionable, digestible, and contextual. That matters more than whatever buzzword is trending on social media this week. We also explore the idea of functional decomposition in AI—a concept that mirrors how most human security teams are structured. Instead of building a monolithic super-intelligent assistant, Cyware has developed a multi-agent model where each AI agent is focused on a specific task, like malware triage or incident correlation. It’s less hive-mind, more specialized team—just like the best human teams. That architectural choice has significant implications for accuracy, explainability, and trust. The full conversation dives deeper into how these ideas show up in real-world security operations, what CISOs are actually looking for in AI-driven tools, and why strategic use of “boring” automation may be the real game-changer for the next decade. If you’re someone who’s tired of the AI hype but still deeply curious about where it’s actually moving the needle, I think you’ll find this episode worth your time. We don’t spend 45 minutes tossing around acronyms—we get into how AI can help analysts cut through the clutter, why relevancy is the next frontier, and what it means to design intelligence that works the way humans actually think. Listen to or watch the full episode here:
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49 MIN
The Identity Problem No One Saw Coming—Until AI Exposed It
DEC 11, 2025
The Identity Problem No One Saw Coming—Until AI Exposed It
Every once in a while, a conversation forces you to stop and rethink something you thought you already understood. Recording this latest TechSpective Podcast episode with Semperis CEO Mickey Bresman did exactly that—and it has everything to do with how AI is quietly rewriting the rules of identity security. If you’ve been following the industry for a while, you know the story: hybrid environments are the norm, identity is the new perimeter, and permissions hygiene is the decades-old chore nobody has enough time—or patience—to do well. None of that is breaking news. What is new is what happens when you drop modern AI into the middle of that reality. We’re not talking about sci-fi leaps or theoretical risk models. We’re talking about something much more immediate: AI tools that can surface old data, forgotten data, and misconfigured access paths you didn’t even know existed. Years of “we’ll fix that later” suddenly become a living, breathing attack surface the moment AI starts connecting dots faster than any human ever could. Mickey and I unpack why this shift is so significant and why organizations often misunderstand the real implications. We also get into the emerging gray zone of agentic AI—systems that operate like users, make decisions like users, and introduce a whole new category of identity no one had to account for before. It’s an area where the guardrails are still being built, even as the tools accelerate. I won’t spoil the conversation here, because part of the fun is hearing how Mickey frames the problem—and the opportunities—through the lens of someone working directly with organizations grappling with this right now. Let’s just say the old assumptions don’t hold, and the path forward involves more than bolting AI onto existing processes. If you care about identity, security, or the rapidly approaching future where AI plays a central role in both offense and defense, this is a conversation worth your time. Check out the full episode here: And as always, stay tuned. At the pace things are evolving, this probably won’t be the last time we revisit the topic—and the next wave may hit sooner than any of us expect.
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43 MIN
Exploring the Future of Identity Security and Agentic AI
DEC 3, 2025
Exploring the Future of Identity Security and Agentic AI
Every once in a while, I end up in a conversation that hits at exactly the right moment—when the industry is shifting, the vocabulary is changing, and everyone is quietly circling the same questions. This new episode of the TechSpective Podcast is one of those. Art Poghosyan, CEO and co-founder of Britive, joined me on this episode of the TechSpective Podcast for a fluid and surprisingly energizing dive into where identity security meets agentic AI. If you’ve followed the podcast this year, you know the pattern: gen AI defines the early hype cycle, but 2025 belongs to agents. Not the fantasy version where they automate your whole life, but the real-world scenario where they reshape what “digital responsibility” even means. Art has more than two decades of identity and access management experience, which gives him a grounded way of thinking about the moment we’re in. As we start talking, the first big theme that emerges is how fast the definition of “identity” is expanding. Identity used to be about people—employees, contractors, admins—and the occasional service account someone documented at 4:59 p.m. on a Friday. Now? Agents complicate all of that. A non-human autonomous system with access to a SaaS platform or a data lake behaves a lot like a user, even if it isn’t one on paper. Treating it as “just software” is exactly how we recreate the same exposures that powered the breach headlines of the last decade. One of the threads we tug on is the question of trust—not the fuzzy philosophical kind, but trust as an operational decision. An agent making decisions on your behalf needs to be verified every time it touches something sensitive. You need visibility into what it’s doing, controls around how long it can do it, and a way to shut it down when it starts operating outside its lane. These aren’t hypotheticals anymore. They’re the next generation of identity security problems, and Art offers a sharp perspective on what modern tooling needs to look like to keep up. The conversation also wanders into the human side of this shift. Everyone loves to frame the future as “AI versus AI,” but the real tension right now sits in the messy handoff between human intent and autonomous execution. Most organizations are easing into agents the same way you learn to drive a car: one cautious tap of the brakes at a time. That slow acclimation matters as much as any new feature or model. And yes, without giving anything away, we do acknowledge the part people sometimes treat like an afterthought: attackers get the same toys. They’re using them already. Ignoring that reality doesn’t make it go away. What I appreciate about this episode is how it holds the middle ground. It’s not hand-wringing about a dystopian future, and it’s not an AI pep rally. It’s a pragmatic, curious look at a technology that’s maturing faster than the guardrails around it. Art brings a thoughtful, steady view of where identity security is heading and what happens when autonomous systems stop playing by human rules. If you’re trying to understand how agentic AI fits into your world—or how identity security has to evolve to keep pace—this is a conversation worth hearing. Watch the full episode on YouTube and see where the discussion takes your own thinking next.
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52 MIN