From dishwasher
to cybersecurity community leader.

The janitor who wanted to understand how computers worked.

Efren Salazar grew up in Sacramento, California, surrounded by an environment where the odds were stacked against anyone who did not have the right connections, the right neighborhood, or the right last name. When Efren looked for work as a teenager, nobody would give him a job. Not even part-time.

So he found his own way in — volunteering wherever the door was open. One of those doors led to the Calling Teen Center in West Sacramento, where his first official position was janitorial work and dishwashing. Not glamorous. But it put him in the building.

Inside was a program called Computers for Kids, led by Lewis Bair. Efren enrolled — not for the free computer, but because he wanted to understand how the machines worked. Lewis noticed that curiosity and invested in it.

Access changes everything. Not charity — access. One person who believed in him enough to open a door. That is exactly what he is now committed to creating for everyone who walks through the door he is building.

His cousin showed him the vision was already real.

His cousin, Rojelio Salazar, had a quality that is hard to manufacture — humble, always lifting the people around him. Rojelio was already living the exact vision Efren carried inside himself.

Then Rojelio passed away. In the grief that followed, something clarified: "I can't be like this. I have to wake up." That phrase became a compass — a promise to himself and to the memory of someone who had always believed in what he was becoming.

One message. One shared vision. Seven years, two locations.

Erick Arauza reached out on Facebook: open a store together. As the business grew, Erick's brother Pancho joined. Together the three built The Cell Phone Fix, Computer and Cellphone Repairs into one of the most recognized repair shops in Sacramento — customers drove up to six hours to use its services. Both locations are still operating today.

Efren stayed seven years, mastering marketing, content creation, video production, website development, and community engagement — the exact foundation everything he builds now stands on.

He left the business to learn what it couldn't teach him alone.

Efren entered the corporate world intentionally at the entry level — GRC, cybersecurity, network infrastructure, enterprise IT. Starting at the bottom is not a setback. It is a strategy. Today he holds a working foundation across marketing, IT, networking, and infrastructure, building toward cybersecurity at enterprise scale.

He never stopped showing up — just with a larger purpose.

Efren started as an ISACA Sacramento volunteer, became Chair of Communications, then took on the Governance Chair role. He attended RSA Conference 2026 with a specific mission: put Sacramento and ISACA on the national map. He is currently a candidate for Communications Director of ISACA Sacramento.

Education. Community. Access. For everyone who was told no.

The platform is more than a podcast — a community with real training resources, courses, and a space that reaches people at every stage: the elderly learning technology, young people finding their footing, professionals looking for permission to start over.

His future goals are specific: cybersecurity consultant, founder of a Managed Security Service Provider, community leader bridging Sacramento with the Bay Area and Southern California — training programs that close the gap between where people are and where this industry needs them to be.

Every episode is documentation of a journey and proof of one truth: it does not matter what certification you hold or where you're starting. If you have hunger, ambition, and the drive to keep showing up, you can build something that matters.