Think Creative - Issue 7

Creative Life

As both an HQ employee and field staffer, Naseer Ahmad has supported Creative programming in his home country and around the world.

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Growing up in Afghanistan, Naseer Ahmad would ask his dad to bring home small elec- tronics so he could take themapart and rebuild them. Today, he has much larger electronic puzzles to solve: protecting Creative from cyberattacks. Naseer is Creative’s Information Security Spe- cialist andHelp DeskManager, overseeing the HQ and field offices’ IT support. On the cyberse- curity side of his job, he’s safeguarding Creative’s systems fromcyberattacks and training staff on how to protect themselves fromwould-be hackers. “I identify and analyze potential and actual security incidents to safeguard our informa- tion. The human factor plays amajor role in making companies vulnerable, because we all makemistakes,” Naseer says. “Unfortunately, most cybersecurity attacks are designed to take advantage of these human errors.” Naseer started out in Creative’s D.C. office about four years ago and has worked his way up from a network administrator position. But his Cre- ative career began back in Kabul in 2009, when he took a job as an IT assistant and supported several of Creative’s programs in Afghanistan. For Naseer, the connection to the development industry is personal. As the conflict in Afghanistan erupted, Naseer lost classmates and neighbors to rocket strikes at school and near his home. “I remember when a rocket landed next to our home, and we were just wondering who had been killed— if it was a child or a friend,” he recalls. His family was forced to pack up a few belong- ings in a friend’s car and flee to a refugee camp in Pakistan. Despite the hardships at home and in Pakistan, Naseer managed to continue his education and worked after school in a tailoring shop to pay for his and his siblings’ school fees. He took as many courses as he could in IT— a skill he hoped to use to help his country rebuild. The family was able to return to Kabul in 2005, whenNaseer’s father got a job offer froman international NGO Naseer Ahmad Serving others through a career in IT Staff Spotlight

Harley Black, Creative’s Senior Procurement and Database IntegrationManager. Black told Naseer about an open network administrator position at Creative and encouraged him to apply. In the years that followed, Naseer advanced his career at Creative, bought a house in Virginia and recently earned his master’s degree in cybersecurity. And he’s had the opportunity to return to Afghanistan to support current pro- grams, including Afghan Children Read. Naseer’s IT and cybersecurity skills could be applied to any number of industries. But he finds working in development themost rewarding. “I like the way Creative helps people, because I came from the same background. I was one of those people,” he says. “When I work for a company like Creative that supports education in other countries, I feel like I’mhelpingmy own classmates.” And what’s next? Naseer says his dad has some ideas: “I was talking to him last week and he said, ‘Hey, Naseer, start thinking about your Ph.D.” n

serving refugees. And with his IT experience, Naseer followed suit, working for a fewNGOs, as well as for Creative. “I wanted to contribute to Afghanistan. I wanted to work for my country,” he says. But in Afghanistan, working with international organizations comes with its own risks. Naseer’s father was imprisoned by the Taliban for several days, and he decided to leave his job for the safe- ty of his family. The Talibanwould later threaten Naseer, too, and demand that he quit his work. With a wife and family of his own by that time, Naseer applied for a special U.S. visa for Afghans who work with U.S. organizations or themili- tary. Hemoved to Connecticut in 2014, starting over in an unfamiliar place. “I started everything fromzero,” he says. “We had a lot of challenges.” But Naseer’s drive and experience in the devel- opment industry quickly led him to D.C. and his first U.S. job with an international develop- ment organization. There, he reconnected with

Photo by Skip Brown

26 | Think Creative | Spring 2020