[Hiring] Director of Communications @Cogent Security

Role Description

Cogent is building a world-class marketing team, and we're looking for smart, fast, exceptional people who are committed to our mission and bring a spark of creativity that sets us apart from traditional B2B marketing. As the founding communications leader, you'll own how Cogent shows up beyond our own channels: in the press, on podcasts and stages, with the creators and newsletters practitioners follow, and in the moments that define a company's reputation. Your job is to turn that substance into steady coverage, a founder the market recognizes, and a reputation that helps us sell and hire. The AI security news cycle moves in hours, so this is a hands-on seat: you'll set the angles, run the agency, prep executives, and move fast when a story breaks.

What You'll Do

• Media & Narrative
  • Own Cogent's earned media strategy: the angles, the story calendar, and the coverage plan for launches, research, and company milestones.
  • Run the PR agency: set its priorities, sharpen the pitches, and hold the bar on everything that goes out under Cogent's name.
  • Translate Cogent's work for two audiences at once: security practitioners who will test every claim, and business and AI press who need the stakes in one sentence.
  • Run rapid response. Watch the conversation across press, X, LinkedIn, and security communities, and when a breach, disclosure, or AI-security story breaks, get Cogent's take into the story while it's live.
• Beyond the Press
  • Build Cogent's presence where security buyers and AI builders now pay attention: newsletters, podcasts, creators, and the handful of voices each community trusts.
  • Run creator and influencer partnerships that put Cogent's research and point of view in front of audiences we don't own.
  • Shape how the AI research community sees Cogent, so the engineers and researchers we want to hire already know the story.
• Executive Visibility
  • Build the CEO's external presence: podcasts, conference stages, and press interviews that tie a founder to a category.
  • Build a spokesperson bench beyond the CEO, starting with the CTO and Cogent Research, and media-train each of them.
  • Book and prep every moment: secure the slot, write the briefing doc, and sharpen the message for the room.
• Moments & Milestones
  • Own announcement strategy: funding, marquee customers, partnerships, research drops, and the awards worth winning.
  • Partner with Product Marketing on launches: they own the product story and positioning, you own the coverage plan.
  • Write the playbook for hard moments before they arrive: a vulnerability in our own product, a customer breach, a competitor's attack.
• AI-Native Execution
  • Build the comms workflow on AI: media monitoring, briefing docs, first drafts, and coverage analysis.
  • Keep a living source of truth for approved claims, proof points, spokesperson briefs, and coverage history.
  • Measure what the work moves: share of voice against the companies we compete with, coverage in the outlets buyers read, and executive audience growth.

Qualifications

• 8-10+ years in communications or PR for B2B tech, with cybersecurity strongly preferred.
• Led communications for funding rounds, acquisitions, and major partnerships for a growth-stage startup.
• A record of coverage you drove: launches, funding, and research turned into stories in the security trades and the business press.
• Built a comms program at a small company: wrote the materials yourself, ran the agency, and got real results without a big team or budget.
• Sharp news judgment. You know what's a story, what isn't, and how to make one out of real substance without overreaching.
• Trusted counsel to executives. You've prepped CEOs for hard interviews and talked them out of the wrong ones.
• Strong writing across the communications surface: pitches, briefing docs, talking points, announcements.
• Fluent with AI in the actual work. You can walk through how you use it for monitoring, research, and drafting.

Requirements

• Crisis or incident communications experience, ideally in security.
• Experience turning original research into earned coverage.
• Built creator, podcast, or influencer programs, or grew an executive's audience on X or LinkedIn.
• Familiarity with vulnerability management, exposure management, or AppSec/CloudSec adjacencies.

Why Cogent

Cogent is redefining how AI can proactively defend organizations against evolving threats. Our mission is to empower security teams with cutting-edge AI agents and clear, actionable insights. You'll join a world-class GTM team where your work directly impacts the safety of some of the world's most sophisticated organizations.