Profile: Liz Morton, Field CISO, Axonius

Liz’s career path into information security was anything but linear. Starting out as an art school graduate during the dot-com boom, she quickly pivoted to technology, driven by curiosity and a knack for problem-solving. Early experiences with firewalls, security engineering, and IT operations sparked her awareness of information security as a discipline, but she candidly admits she hesitated to pursue it fully at first.

That changed during her time at Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), where she spent nearly a decade working across IT and closely with the InfoSec team. When the opportunity arose, she stepped into her first full-time InfoSec leadership role, encouraged by mentors who saw her potential even when she may have questioned it herself. That role cemented her passion for the field, and she describes her ICE years as a “PhD in getting things done” where she solved hard problems, led with urgency, and thrived in a high-pressure environment.

Today, as a Field CISO at Axonius, Liz embraces a role that is both dynamic and unstructured. One day she might be speaking with executives at a Fortune 500 company about vulnerability management; the next she’s hosting a community dinner, advising venture capital firms, or sharing insights on stage. What makes her perspective unique is that she brings the mindset of a practitioner and an InfoSec leader, not a salesperson. “I talk about people, processes, and technology because I’ve lived it,” she explains. This allows her to connect authentically with prospects and customers, translating technical value into real-world outcomes.

Career Resilience and Pivots

Throughout her nearly three-decade career, Liz has navigated challenges and turning points that shaped her leadership. Taking the leap into her job at Axonius was, as she describes it, one of the first times she made a career move without overthinking, a deliberate shake-up that has brought her both growth and renewal.

Her resilience is not just about endurance but about learning when to step away, when to say yes, and when to finally give herself permission to say no. She is candid about these moments because she believes aspiring leaders need to hear that success isn’t always a straight line; it’s often built through setbacks, risks, and reinvention.

Leadership with Confidence and Realism

Liz’s leadership is rooted in empathy, accountability, and pragmatism. Having spent decades as the only woman in the room, she’s built confidence in her voice and insists on owning every space she walks into. She challenges traditional advice like “fake it till you make it,” instead encouraging women to play to their strengths and reshape the game if it doesn’t work for them. For those starting their careers, her guidance is clear: say yes often early on, learn relentlessly, but don’t be afraid to eventually curate your path and say no. “If you don’t want to take the notes in the meeting or handle the grunt work, don’t. Focus your energy where you can add the most value,” she advises.

She also underscores the importance of negotiating salary without apology. “Don’t give a range. Say the number and let them figure it out. You need to be paid fairly.” This directness is part of her philosophy of ownership, taking responsibility for her career trajectory and modeling that same confidence for her mentees.

Community and Mentorship

Beyond her role at Axonius, Liz is deeply committed to mentorship and community involvement. She has worked with organizations like the City of Refuge, where she helps guide and empower individuals building their careers in technology and cybersecurity. For her, these opportunities are not just about giving back but about ensuring the next generation feels supported in ways she often did not when she was starting out.

She is particularly passionate about helping women in cyber navigate challenges around visibility, workload, and self-advocacy. Liz often reminds her mentees not to accept all the “office housework” tasks such as note-taking, grunt work, or low-visibility projects, these often fall on women in technical roles. Instead, she encourages them to claim the projects that matter most to their career goals and to advocate for themselves unapologetically.

A Thought Leader on Industry Trends

From her vantage point at Axonius, Liz has a wide lens on the evolving cybersecurity landscape. She has been struck by how conversations around data quality have become central to AI adoption. In her view, the rush to adopt artificial intelligence will only succeed if organizations focus on the quality, normalization, and reliability of the data feeding these tools. Without that, AI becomes less of an enabler and more of a risk.

Another shift she has observed is the industry’s move from traditional vulnerability management toward what is now being called continuous threat exposure management. Instead of treating security as a set of static checklists, organizations are beginning to adopt a mindset of ongoing evaluation and improvement. This mirrors practices in IT operations and represents a more holistic, iterative way of safeguarding systems.

She also notes the growing urgency around identity and deepfake challenges. With AI now capable of producing convincing synthetic voices and images, Liz sees identity verification becoming one of the defining issues of the next decade. The question is no longer just about authenticating accounts, it is about verifying whether the person on the other end is truly who they claim to be. These emerging threats, she emphasizes, will demand both technological innovation and industry-wide collaboration.

Looking Ahead

For Liz, the beauty of her current role is perspective. After years of solving problems within one organization, she now advises many, gaining insights into different industries, team structures, and approaches to cybersecurity. “It’s almost like an in-place sabbatical,” she says. “I’m learning as much from customers as they learn from me.” That balance of expertise, humility, and curiosity defines her work and her voice as a leader in the cybersecurity industry.