Globally there is an increased demand for qualified technology talent and a shortage of workers. This spans across all IT sectors—from computing infrastructure to security—and is affecting business growth and organizations’ ability to remain competitive. While most companies want to adopt new tech as part of their post-pandemic recovery, the talent shortage is affecting 64 percent—up from just 4 percent in 2020—of new and emerging technologies. The worldwide labor skills shortage is predicted to reach 4.3 million workers by 2030 and roughly $450 billion in unrealized output in the technology, media, and telecommunications industry alone.

So what’s contributing to the heightened demand for tech candidates and how can your organization find the talent that you need to grow and remain competitive?

Heightened demand for tech talent

The COVID pandemic caused organizations—across all industries—to accelerate their digital transformation programs and take a more strategic and innovative approach to solve problems and create process efficiencies. Traditional office-centric companies had to evolve into geographically distributed organizations by embracing a hybrid work model. This model requires technologies that can support information transfer between physical and virtual locations creating an increased need for infrastructure security. To meet these requirements and modernize IT and business operations, organizations have sought candidates that are agile, creative, and well equipped to improve their technology capabilities. Many business and tech leaders today are seeking candidates with skills like big data analytics, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cybersecurity.

Shortage of qualified IT candidates

While the demand for employees with digital skillsets is high, the number of workers that possess the required abilities is low. The IT field requires years of training and organizations are struggling to keep pace with the new technology methods and languages that continue to be introduced. There’s been an increased focus on cloud and automation skills. Myke Miller—dean of the Deloitte Cloud Institute—has found that workers with deep cloud engineering and architecture skills in general, and cloud engineering abilities in industrial IoT specifically, are becoming more difficult to find. And while the industry is experiencing a skills shortage, 72 percent of IT workers in the U.S. are thinking of quitting their jobs in the next 12 months.

Ongoing talent attraction challenges

As the demand for tech talent continues to grow in the months ahead, companies will undoubtedly face challenges in not only recruiting new candidates but retaining current employees. With a widening gap between the supply and demand of qualified workers, tech candidates will continue to control the labor market in 2022 and will use it to their advantage. Below are some of the challenges you’re up against when attracting tech talent.

• Compensation: As demand rises, so does cost—making compensation for skilled IT workers fiercer than ever. The average tech salary increased 9 percent between 2020 and 2021 and exceeded six figures ($104,566). At the same time salaries are increasing, nearly half of tech workers feel they are underpaid.
• Flexibility and autonomy: A large percentage of the tech population is comprised of millennials that are looking for perks and incentives that are meaningful to them such as increased autonomy, flexibility to work when and where they want, and time to work on projects they are passionate about.
• Unlimited PTO: To boost morale and encourage a healthier work-life balance, companies like VMware, Roku, and Sony Electronics are offering their employees unlimited PTO. If it doesn’t interfere with their ability to get their work done, an unlimited PTO policy allows workers to take as much time as they choose.

Summary

As new technologies dominate all aspects of our lives, the need for advanced tech talent will only continue to grow. Prospective tech candidates are heavily courted by potential employers while internal demand within companies continues to increase. With heightened competition to secure premier tech talent, traditional recruitment methods are no longer sufficient.

Consider partnering with an RPO provider

Quality tech talent is available—it’s just becoming more difficult to find. A capable RPO program can provide a customized, consultative, and flexible recruitment solution—one that can seamlessly adapt to your organization’s ever-changing tech talent needs. Whether providing front-end sourcing and screening support to an in-house recruiting team or owning full-cycle recruiting for assigned geographies, groups of positions, or business units, your RPO provider can tailor its levels of service to enable maximum scalability. If your company is struggling with finding qualified tech talent, leveraging RPO services can bring value and generate proven results for your organization.

Want to learn more about Broadleaf’s FlexRPO solution? Contact us today.

This blog was written by Broadleaf Senior Director of Business Development Gregory Gary.