Becoming a pentester: skills, paths and first role
How to become a pentester: what the job really involves, the foundations to master, the paths in, practising legally and how to land a first offensive role.
Cybersecurity recruitment
Hire security people who can do the job.
Cyber Recrut finds cybersecurity professionals for your team. A recruiter and a security practitioner run every search together, and each shortlisted candidate proves the skills your role needs on hands-on labs.
- No fee unless you hire
- Free for candidates
- Every cybersecurity role
Candidate B
Incident responder
7 years in IT operations, 3 in a SOC. Wants to move into incident response.
Lab results
- Investigate a ransomware intrusion on WindowsPassed
- Trace lateral movement in Active DirectoryPassed
- Write a timeline from EDR and event logsPassed
Recruiter notes
Clear communicator, available in 2 months, salary expectations within your range.
- SOC and detection
- Incident response and forensics
- Pentest and red team
- Application and product security
- Cloud and infrastructure security
- Security architecture and engineering
- GRC, risk and compliance
- CISO and security leadership
01The problem
Security hiring is hard to get right.
I
CVs don't show skills
Certifications and keywords say what someone studied. They don't say what that person can do on your systems today.
II
Generalist recruiters can't screen
Telling a detection engineer from a pentester takes security knowledge. Without it, the technical filtering lands back on your team.
III
The best people aren't applying
Strong practitioners rarely browse job boards. They train, compete in CTFs and get approached all the time, so a generic message gets ignored.
02Our approach
Recruiting craft and technical proof, in the same search.
- I
A recruiter who runs the search
One person handles your search from start to finish: defining the role, sourcing, approaching candidates, interviews, the offer and follow-up after the start.
- II
A security practitioner on every role
Writes the technical brief with you, picks the right labs, reviews the results and can join your technical interview.
- III
Skills proven on hands-on labs
Shortlisted candidates solve short, realistic labs matched to your role: investigating a compromise, exploiting a web application, hardening a cloud account. You get evidence, not opinions.
- IV
Access to the security community
Our Cyber CTF, Cyber Courses and Cyber Bench sites reach people who practise security every day, including career changers and people who aren't actively looking.
Lab: Active Directory intrusion
$ lab start ad-intrusion --role incident-responder
✓ Initial access found: phishing macro on WS-042
✓ Lateral movement traced: Kerberoasting, then PsExec
✓ Timeline submitted: 14 events, 0 missing
Skills proven on hands-on labs
03How it works
From your brief to a successful start.
- 01
Brief
We define the role with you: missions, technical stack, the skills that really matter and the salary range.
- 02
Sourcing
We search our network and the security community, approach people directly, and talk with every candidate ourselves.
- 03
Proof
Candidates who fit take a short hands-on lab built around your role, on their own machine.
- 04
Shortlist
You receive a few profiles, each with recruiter notes and lab results, ready for your interviews.
- 05
Hire and follow-up
We handle feedback, the offer and the notice period, and keep in touch after the start.
04Roles
Every cybersecurity role, from analyst to CISO.
Defensive, offensive, engineering or governance roles, junior to senior, for companies of every size.
- 01SOC and detection
- 02Incident response and forensics
- 03Pentest and red team
- 04Application and product security
- 05Cloud and infrastructure security
- 06Security architecture and engineering
- 07GRC, risk and compliance
- 08CISO and security leadership
05Who we are
Two jobs that rarely meet.
Most recruitment firms have the recruiting skills but not the security knowledge. Most security people can't run a search. Cyber Recrut brings the two together.
Recruitment
Recruiting expertise
An experienced recruiter runs every search and is your day-to-day contact: brief, sourcing, interviews, offer and follow-up.
Technical assessment
Security expertise
The team behind Cyber CTF, Cyber Courses and Cyber Bench builds the hands-on labs and reviews every technical result.
06FAQ
Questions companies ask us.
How do you charge?
A success fee only: a percentage of the hired person's first-year gross salary, agreed in writing before the search starts. No hire, no fee.
Do candidates pay anything?
Never. Our service is free for candidates.
What are the hands-on labs?
Short, realistic exercises that run on the candidate's own machine, built on the same platform as Cyber CTF and Cyber Bench. Each one checks precise skills, and candidates see their own results.
Where do you recruit?
In France, for on-site, hybrid and remote positions. We work in French and English.
Is it confidential?
Yes. We only share a candidate's profile with your company once they agree, and we keep your search confidential if you need us to.
07Journal
Notes on hiring in cybersecurity.
Pentester interview questions: a practical grid
Interview questions for a pentester, grouped by theme, with what a strong answer contains and the red flags to watch for before you make an offer.
Cybersecurity Certifications: What They Say About a Candidate
CISSP, OSCP, cloud certifications: what each type of security certification proves, what it does not, and how to use certifications when hiring.
Ready when you are
Tell us about the role.
A few lines are enough to start. We'll get back to you personally to define the search together.