Is there really an IT talent shortage or are we just hiring wrong?

.just let one man do the job of 3 or 4. This also leads to a discussion on efficiency.

This also leads to a lack of personnel redundancy (where redundancy is used in its positive IT connotation, as opposed to its negative HR connotation).

Segregation of duties is made much more difficult when 3+ discrete roles are consolidated to 1.

The risk of workers becoming disgruntled is increased when the workload is doubled/tripled in such an "efficient" way, and the impact of a disgruntled worker is magnified when they have many more responsibilities.

Outsourcing all your technology knowledge (and I'm not suggesting that outsourcing is inherently evil) will slowly strip away your organization's ability to add value. Not all tech needs are commoditized, but consolidation of IT staff will result in staff becoming commodities and not being able to push the technology envelope for your firm -- which leaves the firm dependent on external resources to make any technology advances.

These are just a few of the caveats and risks that need to be understood and mitigated in the pursuit of ultimate efficiency.

Agree with both points. Ideal situation, from an IT perspective, is an in-house IT manager familliar with the long term goals of the companies, mission critical applications and the specialized talents to carry out the company needs.

Outsourcing as a supplement to in-house talent is ideal. Let another company be the "generalist" and deal with break/fixes and general maintenance to free up the central talent pool of your IT department. You can have the most knowledgeable IT Director ever, but if they are dealing with maintenance 24/7 their talent is not being utilized.

Robin said: "IT, and technology in general, moves so fast that you need someone who is adaptable and enthusiastic over someone who has a list of qualifications the length of your arm."

Agreed, Robin. I would even go so far as to say, that you want people who understand the underlying concepts, and not just the flavor of the week, because they are better able to adapt to paradigm shifts due to their solid grasp of the fundamentals.

-ASB: http://about.me/Andrew.S.Baker

Could it be the advent of IT Support and Manged Services that began this trend? Companies are realizing that they can outsource their IT needs to an outside company and they will no longer have to worry about the hiring process, paying benefits, employees quitting, or not have the right in house skills.

Outsourcing IT needs to a local IT Support company can alleviate all these problems.

This transition decreases the demand for IT talent because what one guy used to do for one company...is now done by one guy for 3 or 4 companies as he can move between companies and diagnose and solve many problems remotely.

This whole model my be the solution if there is indeed a shortage...just let one man do the job of 3 or 4. This also leads to a discussion on efficiency.

I read many IT advertisements and could do many of them with ease, but the job advertisement would immediately prevent any success in my application due to ridiculous, and often inappropriate or irrelevant job requirements, obviously conceived by someone who doesn't know what they're talking about.

Tech of even 5 years ago may now be out of date, and I've seen ads asking for 15 years experience - at the time I read that example the experience required would have pre-dated the internet, at least 3 major iterations of Windows, seen the demise of many smaller platforms that were prolific in the late 80s/early 90s, and many other changes that make at least 7 of the 15 years required, out of date.

I think whoever writes these job ads needs to get a grip on reality, and consult someone who knows what they are talking about before writing an advert. They could maybe do with someone of technical proficiency on their interviewing board, too.

My CV would run to 100 pages if I tried to outline everything I could do. Box ticking is highly undesirable when hiring for technical positions of any kind and in my case, my qualifications don't get close to what I can actually do.

I'm one of these people that may not know what a certain tech is today, but you can bet I will by the end of the week, if I need it. IT, and technology in general, moves so fast that you need someone who is adaptable and enthusiastic over someone who has a list of qualifications the length of your arm.

Bob,

From experience, I can tell you that there are three branches of IT people: Road Warriors, Project Oriented, and Maintenance.

Maintenance programmers have always tended to stay put. They are comfortable doint the on-going maintenance that is a staple of the industry and pays pretty well with little risk. They are a very necessary group for companies to have around.

Project oriented IT people tend to be crative, skilled (often HIGHLY skilled), and easily bored by the routine maintenance. They tend to continually strive to improve, enhance, and push the envelope . . . and they can be very disconcerting for companies to have around. They are essential when the project is beginning and being developed but they will drive the CIO nuts if they cann't be allowed to continue to be creative.

Road Warriors are the ultimate in project oriented. These are the Hired Guns that are brought in to provide the ultra-high skillsets and the talents that the company can't afford to hire on a permanent basis. They are adaptable and can be used like Force Recon to bring a project under control or to get it done in a hurry. But, like the hired guns brought in to run the bad guys out of small western town, companies are often just as delighted to see them go as they were to have them arrive.

Maintenance programmesrs, as I indicated, typically don't have a lot of turn-over. Project Oriented IT people not uncommonly have resumes indicating that they average between 2 and 4 years per job. WRoad Warriors often have as many as 3 or 4 gigs a year but may have 2 or 3 per 2 years . . . depending on exactly what their skillsets are. So, it is kind of hard to establish an "average turn over rate" for IT as a whole. ;-)

Lately, many IT people have been enduring seriously unpleasant working conditions and even accepting wages that are as much as 25% or 30% below "market" because this has just not been a good time to jump ship. As the market heats up though, I would look for some major turn over . . . especially where employers have not taken care to provide training, timely reviews, or market wages or where employers have not treated their IT staff as the professionals that they are.

Employers who have a hard time hiring IT replacements may be suffering from the "what goes around, comes around" syndrome of having mistreated their IT staff before they departed . . . and IT is a surprisingly small and communicative group.

Dan, it doesn't matter if there is a talent shortage or not since most employers hire for competence and fire for poor job performance. This behavior by most employers ensures that there is enough talent to fill the needs of employers who hire for competence and job performance.

Read my quotes in "HIRING HIGH POTENTIAL TALENT? Learn how to improve your success rate" From the desk of Sue Todd...

http://www.corpu.com/weekly/article/hiring-high-potential-talent/

Hiring successful employees is not hard to do but you do have to know how to do it.

To underscore all the points above, and to provide a chuckle, this is cut and pasted from the ol' inbox this am:

******************
Dear Candidate,

For our client, a division of a Fortune 500 company, we are looking to fill the following position:

Senior IT Security Consultant

- Ability to Deliver Secure Development Training
- Threat Modeling
- Security Design Review
- Source Code Review for Security (Java, .NET)
- Web, Mobile and Client-Server Based Application Vulnerability Assessments
- Ability to Assist with Risk Mitigation Strategies
- Vulnerability Scanning

Must have highl-level, in-depth, extensive corporate level IT security and audit/compliance experience; CIEE preferred.

Term: 6 months
Compensation: Competitive
******************

Note to HR:
A) Have a tech mgr proof HR reqs (CCIE--CCIE)
B) Purple Squirrel reqs are so 2010.

Great topic! Enjoying the discussion.

Marsha

Double post.

In many instances, I have seen job postings that, as Andrew initially said, want the whole Justice League rolled into one person. When that "person" can't be found, then the company screams, "IT Talent Shortage" and goes for either outsourcing or an H1B (or L-1) Visa holder. I have applied for Development DBA positions only to have 90% of the questions and testing be for Core/Production DBA skills or, even more confusing, web- or application-development. When I _was_ a developer, I got test and questions on PHP, Java, and other languages in the midst of applying for Delphi, COBOL, or PL/I jobs . . . as though a skilled developer were supposed to be skilled in _every_ language out there.

I will admit that there has been a slight improvement in the HR-driven postings in that it has been several years since I saw a posting for a "COBALT" programmer when they really meant "COBOL. ;-)

Essentially, if you write your job specs right, you can either prove that there is nobody out there who has the IT skills you need or you can hire someone who has the IT skills you _really_ need. It all depends on whether or not you want to justify your H1-B/L-1 Visa request. It may also depend on whether you have decided that you should be able to operate with 1 network guy, 1 database guy, 2 developers, and an IT Manager even though you area a multistate/multinational company.

@Marsh, as a parting observation, Purple Squirrel reqs are so LAST CENTURY!

There is definitely a shortage of IT TALENT, and , as these posts reinforce, that shortage has been caused, in great part, by the management of IT resources.

1- Ticking Boxes- You may not find exactly what you are looking for if you want all the boxes ticked. The key is to hire a talented individual who can tick the 'big item' boxes and who has demontstrated an ability to evolve.

2- Just-In-Case vs Just-In-Time: Too often we hire for JIT needs, when we should be looking at the broader Just In Case skills that indicate future potential. You can 'train in' a new coding approach, but you can't 'train in' curiosity. You can adapt skills in financial services to meet needs in healthcare, but someone who lacks a grounding in general business concepts is unlikely to develop.

3- Defining Employment- We are still heavily invested in 'full time employee' concepts. Companies that take a broader view of employment allow themselves access to a much richer and more diverse talent pool. Must your IT talent be on-site each and every workday? Must a workday begin at 8 or 9 am and end at 5,6 or 7 pm? Do all team members need to be co-located? Must 'employment' constitute an on-going commitment of multiple years?

The shortage in IT talent has been largely addressed by leveraging technology and tiemzones to allow outsourced and offshore access to technology job requirements. We've widened teh talent pool, and to good effect. What has yet to be addressed is the on-goig impact of that change. Offshore talent is being developed through education. Lower labor costs are driving an increasing reliance on offshore education. At some point, offshore's competive labor costs will rise (already begun) and we will again need to address the issue of education.

A 3 prong talent approach which employs the best use of the available talent market (including outsourcing, co-sourcing and globalization), a creative approach to employment(including part/flex/short time as well as traditional FT) and an on-going link to education and development will allow an IT employer to effectively eliminate their talent shortage challenges.

Stephane,

I think your first sentence is slightly in error. It should be rephrased as "There is definitely a PERCEIVED shortage of IT TALENT . . . " And, "while perception may be reality", I believe that there is not truly a shortage of IT talent but a shortage of IT talent being accepted for what it is rather than being expected to be all things.

Ralph, do you know the IT industry employee turnover rate? I'm not sure but I suspect it may be high enough so that employers that keep hiring and replacing employees think there is a labor shortage. The problem may be their hiring process. If we hire and keep who we hire, talent will be bundant.