Attracting, Developing and Retaining IT Professionals

The increasingly global sourcing of IT work, the shift from exclusively IT services to business process services, pending baby-boomer retirements, and declining IT enrollments in U.S. and European universities are prompting fundamental changes in the availability of IT skills and capabilities needed in both client and service provider organizations. Your group should address the current and future needs of IT skills in the U.S. and beyond and the pipeline for talent (such as number of computer science and MIS majors in the U.S. and beyond, number of IT professionals worldwide, employment rates for IT professionals, salaries for different types of IT jobs, etc.). Much of this will be based on secondary material. Your group should also address, perhaps through a few case studies, how large organizations do/will recruit, develop, and retain IT professionals. What is their HR practices for hiring, training, and motivating IT professionals? What do IT career paths look like?

If you do a case study, provide the Company Background by including:

• Size of company in terms of sales and profits
• Major products the company sells
• General characteristics of their customers
• Organizational chart--who does the CIO report to?
• How many people work for the IT organization?
• What is the annual IT budget?

The case should include:

• IT Career Path in terms of job titles & reporting structures
• Job Descriptions of Opening Positions--is the company having trouble filling these positions?
• Recruiting Sources (job postings, headhunters,)
• Training
• Hot Skills areas
• Performance assessment
• Turnover rates

Lessons learned by the company in attracting, developing, and recruiting IT professionals.

I am sure that your group will have many creative ideas, so please feel free to discuss them with me.