Off the Wire: A Play by Play on Cybersecurity and Technology Issues

Anthony Kent & Tanner Greer

A bi-weekly podcast that helps you curb cybersecurity risk and tackle technology challenges

  1. 1d ago

    Building Better Partnerships: Chris Haas on Partnership, Alignment, and Preparedness.

    Building Better Partnerships: Chris Haas on Partnership, Alignment, and Preparedness. In this Off The Wire episode, the hosts interview Chris about what makes co-ops better partners to their vendors, especially amid merger-related change and uncertainty. Chris says great members stand out by being engaged partners, coming prepared with clear outcomes and detailed requirements, and communicating early rather than at the last minute. He highlights how unclear or poorly thought-out requests drive rework, and outlines three preparation essentials: internal alignment across teams, defining the desired outcome, and setting realistic expectations about value and effort. The discussion covers how collective, multi-co-op requests gain priority, why “minor tweaks” often create cascading work, and how misalignment during major migrations can waste time and money. Chris emphasizes encouragement and respectful feedback, noting relationships can drift with turnover, and recommends strategic planning and relationship-building to strengthen partnerships. 00:00 Flip the Script 01:54 Great Co-op Partners 03:46 Costly Behaviors 05:42 Three Keys Prepared 09:27 Strategy and Buy In 10:43 Too Little Detail 13:25 Misalignment Migration 18:45 Communicate Earlier 20:10 Roadmap Priority Rules 21:37 Feedback That Matters 23:51 Toxic Feedback Lines 25:09 When Partnerships Drift 26:36 Managing Turnover Handoffs 27:42 Lightning Round Rapid Fire 29:43 Merger Reactions And Anxiety 32:17 Deeper Partnerships Post Merger 33:24 Strategy Alignment With Vendors 36:33 Wrap Up And Podcast Plug

  2. Aug 10

    The Tech We Buy With Our Own Money

    We talk a lot about enterprise tech on this show. This week we flipped it: the tech we spend our own money on. Anthony and Tanner each built a top 5 list plus one honorable mention, and neither of us knew what was on the other's list. Real-time reactions, real gear, and a price range that runs from $36 to a few thousand dollars. Anthony's list ran cheap and practical. Tanner's ran toward infrastructure. Somehow we ended up at opposite ends of the spectrum on almost every single pick. ANTHONY'S LIST 5. Anker 65W charger bricks 4. Wyze camera system HM. AliExpress soldering station with heat gun 3. Bambu Lab P1S 3D printer 2. CM3588 flash-based NAS 1. OpenClaw AI agent server TANNER'S LIST 5. Segway Navimow robot mower 4. Tempest home weather station HM. Password manager (family plan) 3. EcoFlow battery and solar 2. Lutron Caseta smart switches 1. Ubiquiti network gear CHAPTERS 00:00 Intro and the rules 03:55 Anthony #5: Anker chargers 05:40 Tanner #5: Robot mower 09:15 Anthony #4: Wyze cameras 10:40 Tanner #4: Tempest weather station 14:15 Why co-op people are obsessed with weather 15:20 Anthony honorable mention: Soldering station 17:30 Tanner honorable mention: Password manager 19:55 Anthony #3: Bambu Lab 3D printer 22:30 Tanner #3: EcoFlow batteries 26:45 Anthony #2: Flash NAS build 29:20 Tanner #2: Lutron Caseta and the Wife Approval Factor 32:20 Anthony #1: Running your own AI agent 35:30 Tanner #1: Ubiquiti 41:00 Wrap up What's your number one piece of personal tech? Drop it in the comments. Got an episode idea, a question, or want to come on the show? Reach out on LinkedIn or email show@offthewirepodcast.com. Off the Wire covers cybersecurity, IT leadership, and technology for electric cooperatives and small business IT teams. Subscribe so you don't miss an episode.

  3. Jul 27

    Manage Yourself, Not Just the Work: IT Leadership Principles - Part 2

    Manage Yourself, Not Just the Work: IT Leadership Principles - Part 2 | Off The Wire In this Part 2 philosophical episode of Off The Wire, Tanner and Anthony discuss internal leadership temperament: adopting a “duck” mindset to let criticism and setbacks roll off, and a “bison” mindset to face hard situations head-on rather than avoiding them. They explore staying slightly unsatisfied as a leader while still enjoying wins, avoiding judgment of others’ intent without context, and remembering your roots by staying humble and authentic as you advance. They emphasize the patience required for long-term decisions, including a story about a delayed promotion that ultimately made sense because the speaker wasn’t ready. The conversation shifts to bandwidth and prioritization—every “yes” means a “no,” organizations must be ready for change, leaders should speak last, and effective work requires managing energy and making time to think. They preview an Apex Meridian Conference session on becoming better customers to vendors. 00:00 philosophy part 2 01:01 Be the duck: letting things roll off 03:05 Tattoo Versus Bruise 03:05 CLIP: Tattoo Versus Bruise 04:14 Be the bison: walk into the storm 05:04 Bison Into The Storm 05:10 CLIP: Bison Into The Storm 05:49 CLIP: Embrace The Suck 05:51 Embrace The Suck 05:58 Staying unsatisfied without burning out 08:21 You were preceded by good leaders 08:53 Preceded By Good Leaders 10:08 Intent versus actions 11:09 Judged By Intentions 11:09 CLIP: Judged By Intentions 11:58 Don't forget your roots 12:43 Walked Down The Hall 12:43 CLIP: Walked Down The Hall 14:57 Patience, and the promotion that didn't come 15:09 CLIP: TSA Job Description 18:23 I Wasn't Ready 18:23 CLIP: I Wasn't Ready 19:02 Prioritization: every yes is a no 20:14 Silently Saying No 20:14 CLIP: Silently Saying No 22:05 Speak Last 22:05 CLIP: Speak Last 22:48 Managing energy, not just time 27:56 CLIP: Multitasking Counter 28:08 One piece of advice for pre-leader Anthony 29:17 Don't Dwell On The Past 29:17 CLIP: Don't Dwell On The Past

  4. Jul 13

    Lead the People, Not Just the Tech: IT Leadership Principles - Part 1

    Leading IT Teams: People-First IT Leadership (Off The Wire, Part 1) How do you lead an IT team well? In Part 1 of this IT leadership series, Anthony Kent and Tanner Greer get out of the tech stack and into the people side of leading IT teams: managing people, giving feedback, taking blame, sharing credit, and earning your team's trust. Topics covered: why the golden rule fails at work and what to do instead, why a performance review should never contain a surprise, how to make IT's work visible to executives and the board, taking responsibility when things go wrong and passing credit when things go right, hiring people smarter than you and getting out of their way, and why recognition has to happen before you ask your team for extra effort. Off The Wire is a podcast for IT leaders, IT managers, and directors at electric cooperatives and small-to-midsize businesses. Real talk on IT leadership, cybersecurity, and strategy from two operators who do this work every day. Chapters: 00:00 Cold open: a leader takes the blame 00:28 Intro and episode framing 01:54 Why IT leaders avoid people topics 02:49 IT is getting a seat at the table 05:40 Treating people how they want to be treated 07:57 Reading people and figuring out what they need 09:01 Asking directly how someone wants to be led 12:17 Performance reviews should never surprise anyone 20:11 Defining the direction for your team 20:31 Taking blame when things fail, giving credit for wins 22:55 Making IT work visible to the rest of the organization 26:02 Get out of your team's way: hire people smarter than you 27:38 Do what you ask your team to do 29:52 The cardboard box story: character is always visible 30:49 Recognition: find something genuine for everyone 34:00 Replenishing the cup: earning the right to make demands Part 2 drops soon. Subscribe so you don't miss it. #ITLeadership #Leadership #TechLeadership

  5. Jun 29

    Business Continuity Plans: Why They’re Hard, Why They Matter, and How to Build One

    Business Continuity Plans: Why They’re Hard, Why They Matter, and How to Build One Tanner and Anthony discuss why business continuity plans (BCPs) are often one of the last cybersecurity “baseline” goals organizations complete, largely due to documentation burdens and the fear of committing to recovery metrics. They clarify how a BCP differs from an incident response plan, emphasizing that BCPs define how to maintain or restore operations after major disruptions using recovery time objectives and acceptable data loss. They outline practical ways to build a plan using NIST guidance, peers, and industry templates, and cover key components including defined roles with backups, tiering critical systems, backup/retention details, known alternatives, recovery strategies with dependencies and workarounds, communication plans with update cadence and message templates, and regular testing and review. They also note tailoring plans to each organization and avoiding unnecessary separate documents. 00:00 Intro & Why Business Continuity Planning Matters 01:59 Recovery Time Objectives and Metrics 03:56 Why Put Metrics on Paper: Fears and Benefits 06:07 Why Build a BCP: Reasons, Structure, and Tiers Overview 13:17 Risk Assessment and Incident Levels 16:10 Defining System Criticality Tiers 26:55 Building Known Alternatives into Each Tier 36:14 Wrap-up ABOUT OFF THE WIRE Off the Wire is a podcast on cybersecurity and IT leadership for the electric cooperative and small business world. Real operations, real tradeoffs, and the decisions that actually keep the lights on. Hosted by Anthony Kent and Tanner. Subscribe for new episodes, and if this was useful, leave a comment with how your team handles continuity planning. #BusinessContinuity #ElectricCooperative #ITLeadership #Cybersecurity #DisasterRecovery

  6. Jun 15

    Your Headcount Request Isn't a Staffing Problem — It's a Sales Problem

    How to Get an IT Headcount Proposal Approved: Speak in Risk, Value, and Data The hosts discuss how IT leaders can successfully propose adding staff when teams are overextended and work keeps piling up. They emphasize starting with the real problem—unmet business value, security/compliance risk, cyber insurance requirements, ticket backlogs, and burnout/retention risk—then backing the request with data such as project lists, vulnerability and compliance gaps, device and ticket growth, peer staffing comparisons, and feedback from other departments. They advise focusing on responsibilities and business impact rather than job titles, researching comparable organizations carefully, and presenting alternatives like contractors, interns, or part-time roles with true fully loaded costs. The conversation also covers delivery tactics: have an in-person sit-down, be confident and prepared, time the meeting well, seed the narrative in advance, rehearse tough questions (including via AI role-play), and keep a tiered fallback plan with follow-ups if the answer is no. 00:00 Intro 02:04 Keep the List 05:10 Start With the Problem 08:00 Do Your Research 10:19 Responsibilities Over Titles 13:40 Weigh the Alternatives 17:16 The Real Cost of a Hire 18:24 Delivering the Proposal 20:52 Timing the Ask 22:20 Plant the Seeds Early 25:20 Rehearse It (and Use AI) 28:15 Have a Fallback Plan 31:53 Final Thoughts 33:40 Outro Keywords: IT headcount proposal, how to justify new IT staff, IT staffing business case, getting headcount approved, building a business case for hiring, IT budget proposal, IT leadership, IT management, IT workforce planning, understaffed IT team, IT burnout and retention, cybersecurity staffing, compliance risk, cyber insurance requirements, ticket backlog, fully loaded cost of an employee, contractors vs full-time, presenting to leadership, executive buy-in, electric cooperative IT, utility IT, SMB IT, Off the Wire podcast #ITLeadership #Cybersecurity #ITManagement #ITStaffing #ElectricCooperative #SMBIT #ITStrategy #OffTheWire

  7. Jun 1

    Hardware Quotes Are Expiring in Hours: What’s Going On?

    Why Hardware Prices Are Skyrocketing in 2026 (RAM, SSDs, Servers) — and What You Can Do Hardware budgets are breaking. Quotes that were good for 30 days are now expiring in hours. That $80k workstation quote? It's $160k now. That server quote near $1M? Already $1.3M — and climbing. In this episode, Tanner and Anthony break down what's actually driving the spike in RAM, SSDs, hard drives, servers, and networking gear — and it's not just tariffs. AI data center buildouts are pulling manufacturers toward high-margin HBM memory (roughly 10x the margin of standard DRAM), leaving everything else fighting for supply. With only three major players (Samsung, SK Hynix, Micron) and factory expansions that take 2-3 years, relief isn't coming fast. More importantly — what do you do about it right now? They cover practical steps: faster approval cycles, buying ahead, standardizing hardware, right-sizing, considering refurb and used gear, extended refresh cycles, cloud compute, and leasing. Plus how to brief leadership before the budget conversation catches you off guard. This one's for anyone managing IT budgets at a lean organization — co-op, municipal, small enterprise. The volatility is real and it's not going away anytime soon. 00:00 Truck Price Shock Skit 01:54 Hardware Quotes Going Wild 02:46 Real World Sticker Stories 04:36 Why Memory Costs Surge 07:01 HBM vs DRAM Margins 09:08 Factories Tariffs New Normal 13:44 Beyond RAM Storage Crunch 16:53 Quotes Expire Faster Than Ever 20:23 Practical Ways To Cope 26:36 Refurb Longer Cycles Cloud 32:21 When Relief Might Come 37:01 Wrap Up Lead With Communication Off the Wire is a cybersecurity and IT leadership podcast for practitioners at small-to-medium organizations and electric cooperatives.

  8. May 18

    The SaaSpocalypse: How AI Is Killing (and Reshaping) SaaS Tools

    The SaaSpocalypse: How AI Is Killing (and Reshaping) SaaS Tools In this episode of Off The Wire, Anthony and Tanner discuss the “SaaSpocalypse”—how AI is disrupting and potentially replacing many SaaS products—citing examples like Figma being hit after Claude Design launched, reduced need for Canva due to AI tools, and vulnerable niche apps like Grammarly as Copilot and Google tools bake AI directly into core suites. They debate whether AI pricing is currently subsidized, noting high API, hardware, and power costs that could drive subscriptions much higher over time. They explore how AI could become the primary interface layer, reducing the need for traditional web UIs and even replacing documentation platforms by querying SharePoint-backed datasets through an agent. For IT leaders, they recommend evaluating SaaS at renewal time, starting with narrow tools, moving gradually, and prioritizing cost savings while accounting for change management and human behavior. 00:00 SaaSpocalypse Explained 00:14 Figma And Canva Wakeup Call 01:35 SaaS Vendors Racing To Add AI 02:53 Why AI Pricing Will Rise 07:25 Which Tools Are Most Vulnerable 11:20 AI As The New Interface Layer 16:47 Advice For CIOs And IT Leaders 25:10 LinkedIn And The AI Slop Problem 31:00 Final Takeaways And Wrap Up

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A bi-weekly podcast that helps you curb cybersecurity risk and tackle technology challenges

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