|
The Wall Street Journal’s BizTech blog had an interesting item that noted more than a dozen companies had changed chief information officers in the past couple of weeks.
Why the turnover? CIOs running out the door after collecting their year-end bonuses, companies looking to trim payrolls, and the need for different tech skills during an economic downturn were cited by the Journal as reasons for the year-end departures.
But chances are that those CIOs who left or lost their jobs won’t be out of work long.
There’s a shortage of chief information officers, according to the Society for Information Management (SIM), the national association of CIOs.
In a report released last year, which was titled “Grooming the 2010 CIO,” it noted:
“Pure economic growth pushes up the number of executives that are needed. In addition, several Fortune 500 firms that have traditionally had CIOs at the enterprise level now want CIOs at the strategic business unit (SBU) or division level, as well. Or, firms that were satisfied to have CIOs only at the SBU or division level now want an enterprise CIO too, to coordinate standards and governance. Even firms that outsource large portions of their IT retain an executive function. At some firms, particularly among firms under $1B in sales, first CIOs are being appointed. Finally, there is increased demand for individuals with CIO-like capabilities among IT service vendors, where business is growing very rapidly, as well as within non-IT functions like supply chain, shared services, or various IT-enabled operations.
“There are almost no concomitant forces driving up the supply of CIOs.”
Indeed, the pipeline of future CIOs is anything but full.
The following are findings, released in October 2007, from a survey of CIOs that was conducted by Jerry Luftman, a Stevens Institute of Technology’s Distinguished Professor, in association with the SIM:
“The market for IT professionals is the fastest-growing in the US economy. More than 1 million new jobs are projected to be added between 2004 and 2014. Six of the 30 occupations projected by the Bureau of Labor Statistics to grow the fastest in this time period are IT related. IT job prospects are expected to be good as demand increases because of rapid advancement in technologies, new business opportunities for leveraging applications, and the number of baby boomers expected to retire.
“But there may not be sufficient IT talent in the pipeline to meet this growing demand. The IT hiring downturn during the early part of this decade and the fear of offshore outsourcing have caused a drop in enrollment for computer science and information systems courses at many universities. In the past decade, the number of students majoring in computer science has dropped 40%. A report from UCLA's higher-education research institute shows an even steeper decline of 70% between 2000 and 2005 of freshmen who planned to major in computer science.
“The loss of IT skills and IT professionals will only accelerate the shift of IT jobs overseas. This inaccurate fear that IT jobs are going offshore has caused this shortage in the pipeline. If nothing is done to turn this trend around to meet the anticipated strong demand for IT workers in the United States, organizations will be forced to source their IT resources offshore. Additionally, there is a significant change in the type of skills required for IT professionals; with the softer (e.g., communication, marketing, negotiating, business, industry) skills clearly on the rise.”
So while a bunch of CIOs may have felt – or made to feel – that they weren’t needed, there continues to be a great demand for chief information officers and other talented information technology professionals. And there will be for the foreseeable future.
Only registered users can write comments.
Please login or register. |
