The Book

Hacked or Hardened? A Modern Leadership Guide

Plain-English guidance for CEOs, founders, and boards. NIST-aligned checklists, real cases, and board-ready actions—without the techno-jargon.

Stop guessing about cyber risk. Start managing it like any other critical business risk.

Hacked or Hardened? is a practical playbook for leaders who know cyber risk is a business problem, not an IT project. It helps you turn vague fear into concrete, prioritized action.

The book breaks down complex frameworks like NIST into plain-language questions, checklists, and scenarios you can use in real meetings with your team, vendors, and board.

  • 6×9 paperback • 93 pages
  • NIST-aligned, leadership-focused
  • Board and executive checklists
  • Incident tabletop prompts and playbook
Author
Pete Hish
ISBN
979-8273563742
Format
6 × 9 in — Paperback
Published
2025 (KDP)

Inside the book

Hacked or Hardened? starts with a premise: leadership—not tools—is the deciding factor in resilience. You’ll answer three questions: Who owns cyber risk? Can your people run an effective tabletop? Do critical vendors have redundancies? If any answer isn’t confident, this guide shows you what to do next.

Want to preview first? Download the sample chapter .

Author: Peter Hish

About the author

Peter Hish is a law-enforcement cyber specialist and founder of Sentinel Vault. He advises executives on pragmatic risk decisions and trains investigative teams to bridge leadership and technical execution.

“A clear, usable playbook for leaders.”
— Senior CIO
“Exactly the language our board needed.”
— CEO, SMB
“Short, sharp, and operationally useful.”
— CISO, Financial Services

Brief your leadership team

Get a focused 90-minute executive briefing based on the book.