Interim Security Manager (3-Month Contract)

About Phorest

Would you like to create the future of a product used by thousands of businesses and millions of consumers? Phorest Salon Software powers over 11,000 hair and beauty salons in Ireland, UK, Germany, Australia, Finland, USA, Canada, UAE and Netherlands and the platform processes 7 million appointments a month for hair and beauty consumers. Phorest is the number 1 salon software brand for premium independent salons in those markets and our next goal is to become a platform upon which other companies can build applications for premium salons.

Our system touches every point of the salon experience. We have the in-salon software desktop application, Phorest Go (the native staff application), online bookings website for salons, and custom native apps per salon. In a typical month, Phorest processes 3 million appointments and we send over 3 million SMS and 4 million emails. We process 200k online bookings per month and over 150 custom built white label native apps.

At Phorest, we create products our clients love and build and run exceptional systems that Phorest and its customers can rely on, helping salons, spas and aesthetic clinics run successful businesses and grow with confidence.

The Opportunity

We're looking for an experienced Interim Security Manager on a 3-month contract to provide hands-on security leadership and operational cover. You'll step into a well-established function from day one, owning day-to-day security operations and incident response. You'll report to our Head of Engineering and work closely with our Foundations (infrastructure) team and our IT and security colleagues. This is a hands-on role for someone who is comfortable in AWS, calm when an alert needs chasing, and able to build trust quickly with engineers and non-technical teams alike. It's also a chance to leave something behind. Alongside day-to-day operations, you'll help us build a clearer view of our security risk and document how we work.

What You'll Do

• Own day-to-day security operations.
• Be the first point of contact for security and infrastructure questions that arrive through direct messages, IT tickets and our security mailbox. Keep a simple record of recurring questions so the team can spot patterns and improve guidance.
• Triage cloud security alerts. Monitor AWS GuardDuty and CloudWatch alerts alongside the Foundations team. Separate routine noise from the alerts that matter, and investigate anomalies through to resolution.
• Oversee endpoint and IT security alerts. Keep on top of endpoint protection findings and IT security alerts. Guide our IT team through investigations and give them a steer when a judgement call is needed.
• Protect our public endpoints. Manage AWS WAF rules and related controls for our public-facing services, and respond quickly to unusual traffic or abuse.
• Stay ahead of threats and vulnerabilities. Monitor threat intelligence feeds, work out whether we are affected by new vulnerabilities or compromised third-party packages, and work with engineering owners to get fixes made.
• Lead incident response. Run triage, escalation and communication for any security incident, and keep our business continuity procedures current.
• Review new third-party tools. Assess vendor requests through our security review process, checking compliance posture such as SOC 2, ISO 27001 and GDPR, and balancing risk against how urgently the business needs the tool.
• Support compliance. Keep our PCI DSS evidence in good order. Support HIPAA and GDPR activity and our compliance platform, and provide security input on authentication and new product work, including threat modelling.
• Support the IT and security team. Provide day-to-day technical guidance and coaching, and work in close partnership with the IT lead and the Foundations team. Expect this to be largely hands-on, with time in the mix for incident response, investigations, writing documentation and technical guidance.

What Success Looks Like

The main goal is simple: keep our security operations stable and effective. Within that, we'll look to you for three things.

• Stable operations from week one. Take over alert monitoring, security questions and incident response during an initial handover period, getting fluent in our alerting first, and building regular working rhythms with the Foundations and IT teams.
• Documentation others can use. Turn what you learn into short, practical runbooks for core security operations and a record of common questions and how they are best answered.
• A clearer view of risk. Start mapping our most business-critical services and the third-party dependencies behind them. Propose practical ways to measure risk and to strengthen shared ownership of security across engineering teams.

You'll also contribute ideas on how our security function can evolve.

Who You Are

Experience: Proven experience in information security or cybersecurity, with 2+ years of people leadership or team leadership. You can step in at pace with minimal onboarding.

Qualifications: A recognised security qualification (for example CISSP, CISM or Security+) and/or equivalent hands-on experience.

Cloud security: Strong working knowledge of AWS security, including GuardDuty, WAF, CloudWatch, IAM and Service Control Policies.

Security operations: Experience running day-to-day detection, triage and response, and using security tooling such as EDR, antivirus and vulnerability scanners.

Incident response: Experience planning for and leading incident response, with clear escalation and calm communication under pressure.

Compliance: Experience contributing to compliance programmes such as PCI DSS, ISO 27001, HIPAA and GDPR, including audit evidence and client-facing security material.

Secure development: Familiarity with secure SDLC and software supply chain risk, including how to work with engineering teams on dependency vulnerabilities.

Communication and influence: Able to explain technical risk clearly to non-technical colleagues, build trust quickly, and gain momentum across Engineering, IT and Product without relying on formal authority.

Mindset: Pragmatic, proactive and curious. You stay engaged with the security community and take ownership without needing to be asked.

Preferred Experience

• Experience with PCI DSS v4.0 or later.
• Previous interim or contract security leadership, including structured handovers.
• Experience working in SaaS businesses with a remote-first engineering team.
• Experience with threat modelling for new products, particularly those handling payments or financial data.
• Experience with vulnerability and attack surface management, and with overseeing penetration testing and remediation.
• Experience managing VPN, endpoint management and web application firewall configuration.
• Experience using AI tools to automate security monitoring, triage or vulnerability tracking.

Benefits

Your wellbeing is important to us - we provide private healthcare, 2 Wellness Days, an employee assistance program and a free online GP service. As part of our Financial Wellbeing, we provide competitive Compensation, an Employee Share Purchase Scheme, Pension, Life Assurance, and Income Protection. We help you travel by providing a bike to work scheme as well as tax saver transport tickets. We support the women who work in Phorest by offering 2 weeks leave for Fertility Treatment, Pregnancy Loss and Menopause. We care for your family and provide Enhanced Maternity and Paternity Benefits. We grow our own timber! We provide a great learning environment and extensive development opportunities. We run development programs and provide access to many online resources including LinkedIn learning. Moving house? Phorest employees get 3 moving days.

Want to learn more about Phorest? Check out nothingventured.rocks for our blog and Insights on building an evergreen company from the team here at Phorest. Phorest is an equal opportunity employer. For this position, flexi-time and working from home is possible. We are also open to remote work. Get in touch to ask for more information or to chat about your future with Phorest!

Research shows that while men apply to jobs when they meet an average of 60% of the criteria, women and other marginalised folks tend to only apply when they check every box. So if you think you have what it takes, but don't necessarily meet every single point on the job description, please still get in touch. We'd love to have a chat and see if you could be a great fit.