Report reopens debate about shortage of IT workers - HR Update - information technology workers - Brief Article - Statistical Data Included

HR Magazine, Sept, 2002 by Bill Leonard

New estimates have renewed the debate over how serious the shortage of information technology (IT) workers is.

U.S.-based companies will have 1.1 million IT jobs to fill from this October through next June, according to the report, Bouncing Back: Jobs, Skills and the Continuing Demand for IT Workers, from the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA). But more than half of those jobs will remain vacant because of a shortage of qualified candidates, says the Arlington, Va.-based industry trade association.

Harris Miller, president of ITAA, says he was surprised by the size of the expected shortfall because more than 500,000 IT workers lost their jobs in 2001. He adds that the problem may be that employers aren't finding the applicants they want. "Revenue growth in the IT industry stalled in the past year, and now we know that IT employment lost ground," he says. "We believe the situation will be short-lived, with employers filling positions they were forced to cut in the recession. However, many workers just don't have the skills employers are now demanding."

But management professor Peter Cappelli, director of the Center for Human Resources at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, expresses a different view. Cappelli, an analyst of IT labor market trends, says he thinks the study's projected shortage stems from managers setting overly high expectations for job candidates and an unwillingness to pay higher salaries for qualified workers. "Let's say I wanted to hire a chef for my restaurant but either didn't want to or couldn't pay the salary that a qualified chef demands," Cappelli says. "So when I can't fill that job, that doesn't automatically mean there's a shortage of qualified chefs."