* Robert Half Technology IT Hiring Index and Skills Report
Last week, I shared the results of a survey from CareerBuilder.com indicating that managers expect hiring to increase. Yet another study from Robert Half Technology points to stable IT hiring in the second quarter.
According to Robert Half Technology IT Hiring Index and Skills Report, 12% of executives plan to add full-time IT staff in the second quarter while only 3% anticipate staffing cutbacks. The net 9% increase is on par with forecasts for the current quarter as well as the second quarter of 2004.
“As the economy improves, the job market is slowly shifting in the candidate’s favor. Businesses that may have found it easy to recruit IT staff a year or two ago are discovering there is now greater competition for the most-qualified applicants,” says Katherine Spencer Lee, executive director of Robert Half Technology.
The poll is based on responses from more than 1,400 CIOs who work for U.S. companies with 100 or more employees. Here are some of the findings:
When asked what skills are most needed within their IT departments, 83% of CIOs chose Microsoft Windows administration expertise. Wireless network management was cited by 51% of respondents, and 49% chose SQL Server management. (Multiple responses were allowed.)
What’s more, networking was also the hottest specialty, as sought by 20% of respondents. Second was Internet/intranet development as chosen by 14% of respondents, and help desk/end-user support and applications development each garnered 13% of the response.
Hiring activity is expected to be highest in the Mountain states of Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming. In that region, 25% of CIOs expect to add IT staff and 3% project cutbacks, making for a net increase of 22%. Significant growth is also forecast for the East South Central region encompassing Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee. There, 21% of CIOs expect to add staff and only 1% anticipate cutbacks for a net hiring increase of 20%.
For more information about the survey, go to https://www.rht.com/PressRoom
