Communications of the ACM
It Talent Shortage: gly Truths
Credit: The Economic Populist
One problem exacerbating the IT talent shortage is that IT leaders are treating their IT workers as disposable commodities rather than as assets in an industry where it can take decades to develop the requisite knowledge, wisdom, and experience. Instead of investing in and renewing the IT talent relationship, they are watching the smartest, best people walk away. In some cases, young people are passing up IT entirely. In short, the best people won't stand for being treated as disposable. The pressure for business and operational speed within the IT industry is affecting all sides — IT leaders, HR pros, recruiters, and job hunters: Companies spin up IT projects quickly and hire people — often as contractors, sometime as employees — keyed to those projects, but do not think about building long-term relationships.
Job hunters say the hiring process has become inflexible to the point of being broken. In addition, 30% of hiring managers agree that the process is broken. In many cases, hiring managers would rather hire IT contractors than invest in internal talent development programs such as mentoring, career-development plans, and rotations for emerging stars. All of that gets harder when you are working on an agile development schedule that prizes "velocity" above all else. Is it any wonder people start to feel like disposable commodities in this kind of environment? Likewise, can you honestly inspire young people to pursue IT careers if this is the way they will be treated?
From Information Week
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