When product managers hear the word 'cybersecurity,' most instinctively think of it as an engineering concern. Nick Boucart from Sirris challenges that assumption head-on. At PR_D_CT DAY 2025 in Ghent, he argued that cybersecurity is fundamentally a product management problem, and that PMs have a direct role to play in designing for trust.
Drawing on his experience advising Belgian software startups and scaleups, Nick walked the audience through a practical framework for thinking about security from a product perspective. His central message was simple but powerful: build products that users love and customers trust.
Original Presentation Slides
Download the slides from this talk as presented at the gathering.
The Shifting Trust Landscape for Belgian Startups
Nick opened with context on how the trust conversation has evolved for Belgian startups and scaleups. Before 2018, companies mostly relied on trust in the team and the solution itself. Then came a wave of regulatory and market shifts: GDPR, Covid, NIS2, DORA, the AI Act, and several high-profile security incidents that made the news. The result is that cybersecurity and trust now land on the table much earlier in the buying process.
