Put yourself in the shoes of a hiring manager for a second who is tasked to hire candidates to fill vacant IT roles. The talent shortfall and skill shortages can make your life difficult. Add higher salaries and perks and the ability to switch from one company to another and it becomes a daunting challenge for businesses to hire and retain IT talent.
If you really want to win in a highly competitive IT job market, you need to understand its trends, patterns and where it is heading into the future. This will not only put you in a better position to respond to industry and candidate demands in a much better way but also enable businesses in hiring the right talent and retaining them.
In this article, Anti-Dos will highlight seven hiring trends that are shaking up the IT job market right now.
7 IT Hiring Trends You Should Keep An Eye On
Here are seven hiring trends that will revolutionize the IT job market in the near future.
Most Businesses are Hiring DevOps Engineers
Let’s start with job titles that are in high demand. If you closely look at the most popular job titles that businesses are hiring for you will find DevOps engineers, software engineers and site reliability engineers at the top of the list. IT operation engineers are also not far behind.
According to a Upskilling IT survey report 2022, 60% of respondents said that there are hiring for IT operational engineers and 48% of survey respondents said that they are looking to fill Ops roles. Additionally, DevOps engineer (34%) and software engineer (34%) are the most popular job titles businesses are hiring for closely followed by site reliability engineer (31%). All this data clearly shows the growing demand for DevOps engineers and software development engineers. Don’t expect that trend to die down soon as it will only grow in popularity in months and years to come. We are also seeing businesses invest in DDoS protected dedicated servers for added safety.
Exponential Rise In Skill Development
With the ever growing talent shortfall and skill gap in the IT industry, both businesses and individuals are pushing for skill development. At a business level, they are training their employees to take up new roles by encouraging them to learn new skills. On the flipside, IT professionals want to fill in that talent gap and make them relevant for new vacant positions by learning a new skill.
This has led to the boom in skill development and forced organziations to leverage skill development. We are seeing more and more employees learning a new skill while others are looking to polish their existing skills. The real challenge is to apply the skills they have learned.
Time and Financial Constraints Are Hampering Skill Development Prospects
Despite being a top priority for businesses, skill development comes with their fair share of challenges and hurdles. When inquired about the biggest barriers in skill development, here is what the respondents have to say.
- 53% consider lack of time as the biggest obstacle in their skill development program
- 47% terms lack of budget as the biggest barrier in skill development
- 32% blamed lack of offerings for their poor skill development
- 20% terms lack of leadership interest as the biggest hurdle in the success of their skill development program
Declining Trend In Application of Skills
Even though more and more businesses are focusing on skill development of their employees, there’s still a lot of room for improvement when it comes to application of those skills. Data showed that individuals who learned a new skill are at all time high (95%) but individuals who applied their newly learned skill are at all time low (33%). This is concerning as it nullifies the impact of learning new skills especially when you are not going to implement it. Businesses should take steps to encourage employees to apply the skills they have learned in order to get real benefits from skill development programs.
Hiring Managers Value Technical Skills Over Soft Skills
Ask any IT hiring manager whether they give more weight to technical skills or soft skills when hiring IT staff and they will tell you that they value technical skills more. Yes, this might come as a surprise to many who think that hiring managers are slowly but surely shifting their focus from technical to soft skills.
Statistics show that 50% of hiring managers prioritize technical skills while only 33% of hiring managers give more weight to human skills. With IT teams having to fulfill compliance, governance and risk regulations, it is important for IT professionals to understand and take steps to fulfill these requirements.
Certification Carries More Weight Than Ever
IT certifications that prove your mastery over a specific skill or tool is in high demand. Businesses are actively looking for IT professionals who not only have hands-on experience with a particular tool or technology but also have a certification to back up their claims.
For instance, if you specialize in DevOps, you need to have a DevOps certifications that shows that you not only know about its principles but also understand how to execute it in real world environments. From an IT candidates standpoint, it will help you stand out from the rest of the applicants and increase your chances of securing your dream job.
Employee Satisfaction and Happiness Are Relative
Another common issue prevalent in the IT industry is work related stress and employee burnout. This forces many IT professionals to quit their jobs, switch jobs or retire earlier than expected. According to a study conducted by Haystack Analytics, 83% of developers admitted that they experienced employee burnout during the pandemic. Excessive workloads, inefficient processes and fuzzy goals are three most important reasons behind employee burnout.
Despite this, if you conduct a survey of IT professionals asking them about their job satisfaction, you will end up getting mixed results. So, it is difficult to give a final verdict as happiness and job satisfaction are quite subjective and vary based on different factors. Which hiring trend will create the biggest splash in the IT job market in the future? Share your thoughts with us in the comments section below.
