Research shows 62% of IT leaders expect to see an increase in non-tech people joining the industry

According to recent research IT leaders believe the most valued skills are leadership (93%), understanding business objectives (95%) and project management (92%). The top three skills for IT workers were web development (90%), mainframe management (90%) and database administration (87%). Interestingly 62% of the 1000 IT workers and 200 Senior IT Managers surveyed by Experis, said that they expect they expect to see an increase in people from non – tech background entering the workplace within the next 2 years. As a result it is no surprise that 90% of IT leaders asked said that the ability to learn new technology skills is as important as existing knowledge.

Geoff Smith, Managing Director of Experis, commented: “The prevailing narrative of the IT skills crisis is that we need more skills in specific tech areas in order for businesses to embrace emerging technologies, innovate and remain competitive. However, our research suggests that the problem is growing. IT leaders and HR must become more agile and identify candidates and existing team members that possess wider business skills and leadership qualities as well as those able to learn new tech skills.”

Training is a running theme throughout Experis’s research, which showed that 97% of IT leaders believe the most successful IT teams of the future will be those that support continuous learning and that have a training strategy responsive to emerging technology trends.

However despite this 48% of IT workers say their training programmes are reactive and a shocking 15% say they have no training provided at all.

When making investments towards staff training for the next two years mobile apps and devices topped the list at 59%, followed by big data management (52%) and virtualisation (48%). IT Managers recommend that new training investment should be aimed at new and emerging skills.

You can read the full report from Experis here.

Source: Onrec.com