Top-tier IT talent doesn't stick around in 'mid-market' organizations
- Reference: 1706185811
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/01/25/report_midmarket_organizations/
- Source link:
[1]The study surfaces a couple of key findings. First, only two percent of mid-market organizations can hold onto IT staff they rate as "excellent" for two or more years, and second, AI is something that many feel is out of reach, or not worth the bother.
The study defines a "mid-market" organization as one that lacks the budget of an enterprise but still requires enterprise-level tools and technologies. The 966 mid-market IT decision makers that participated in the survey were spread across the UK, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Iceland. More than half of the organizations involved had revenues between £50 million and £500 million ($64 million to $640 million).
[2]
The two percent stat is an indicator of problems. However, there is a wider set of mistaken assumptions. For example, almost half (43 per cent) of respondents thought that cloud providers would cover their data recovery costs, while 40 per cent reckoned that those same providers should refund the cost of stolen computing resources. Only 3 percent of respondents understood that a cloud provider is not liable for an organization's cybersecurity incidents.
[3]Infosec pros can secure IT, but have harder time securing job satisfaction
[4]Datacenters face double dilemma of supply issues and a need for speed
[5]Intel facing worker shortage for German chip plant
[6]Three quarters of UK tech pros are ready to leave their jobs
The talent turnover is, therefore, a significant issue. As well as the two percent hanging on to "excellent" IT staff, more than a quarter (28 percent) could only keep staff between one and six months, while one in ten confessed to having never managed to employ top-tier IT professionals.
There are many reasons why this should be, although the assumptions described above certainly play a part, as do a lack of budget and insufficiently resourced IT departments. Astonishingly, two percent of respondents admitted to having no security posture at all. The report noted: "They are in imminent danger. They just don't know it yet."
[7]
Another factor keeping top talent away is confusion over new technology and a lack of resource to implement it. For example, 81 per cent of mid-market organizations are currently avoiding AI – many don't see it as being able to improve productivity – and yet a third reckon their tech isn't future-proof because of a lack of AI knowledge.
Some mid-market organizations therefore recognize the importance of a coherent IT strategy, but don't know how to implement it, and lack the resources to do so.
[8]
The lesson is stark. Top-tier IT staff do not need to hang around and there still some fundamental misunderstandings within organizations around their cybersecurity posture (or lack thereof). If organizations want to deal with issues in-house, they need to budget accordingly. Or grit their teeth and outsource. ®
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[1] https://info.advania.co.uk/ebook/engage-the-core
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZbKTvhFYancHB1hCMqqb7gAAAI4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/02/infosec_pros_burnout/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2023/10/02/datacenter_industry_survey/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/27/intel_facing_worker_shortage_germany/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/11/three_quarters_of_uk_tech/
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZbKTvhFYancHB1hCMqqb7gAAAI4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZbKTvhFYancHB1hCMqqb7gAAAI4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Ladder
Many years ago... when the lad I was mentoring left, he told me that he could not work for the wages and told me his pay. I double-checked with my boss who confirmed it. 20% more than me!
My boss explained it was simple supply and demand, I was taken on just after 9/11 when I was unemployed due to the UK telecoms crash, and the lad had been taken on from a job 3 months before me.
He also actively got rid of people who had been transferred to his department, but who didn't conform to his social/ethnic/religious group.
And docked my wages when I was too ill (with a notifiable disease) to phone in sick before 9:00 every day I was off.
[RKT, Plumb Tree Cottage, will be recognisable by those who unfortunately had to work for him. And PO in HR was no better.]
Seems like some significant shortcomings in mid-market management.
Dog Bites Man
This isn't new, is it? When I started work in aerospace 40 years ago it was no different. Companies need bright young things but they thrive and survive on a base of comptetent staff with the "top tier" being a pretty small percentage of the workforce. It would be a nightmare running design, development, delivery and support of a range of products if all your staff were high-flyers - they'd get bored and bugger off pretty quickly. I used to view the constant movement of these types like insects pollinating plants, transferring new ideas, skills, methods, etc. around the industry as they fluttered about until they found a place to settle and grow a long grey beard.
Re: Dog Bites Man
Good management understands what their job is:
Provide resources
Clearly define objectives
Takes responsibility for their decisions
Understand that the tech is not stupid because they have different life objectives and interests than them
And, every tech is different and should be treated as such.
An example:
Management tells tech to do whatever it takes to secure the network, provides no training or funding and then whines and blames the tech because it places a burden on the work flow or they get hacked.
If management does their job, they will tell the tech that the company (the management) assumes the liability for any items they don’t want that level of security. They are techs, not scapegoats.
We understand this partnership and have guy’s that have working for us for years. 2 years is not “excellent”. It is a management failure.
Re: Dog Bites Man
Also, good managment listens when you say that what they are asking is infeasible/impossible to do as stated, especially when the minion can think of other means to achieve most if not all of the end objective.
No surprise
Everyone knows to get the best salary you have to move every couple of years, but it's such a hassle. If you've been around for a while - and I've been around for far too long with various takeovers - the holidays are admittedly nice.
A couple of takeovers ago the company at the time openly stated the reason they did not offer market leading salaries was because people should stay employed for a couple of years, gain experience, and then move on. There's a huge amount of institutional knowledge lost if everyone does that as those types of company provide insufficient time to document and create turnkey systems.
To be fair - I have no problem with staff doing a decent job and moving on after a couple of years, and can think of a few people who did precisely that. Unfortunately too many people don't do a decent job, they're simply in search of a better wage or new skills and have no interest in completing the work properly. It's then up to the staff that remain to deal with the fallout.
It's not just about the pay. Too many companies fail to offer transferable skills, and then are surprised when employees don't want to stick around.
Re: No surprise
"There's a huge amount of institutional knowledge lost if everyone does that as those types of company provide insufficient time to document and create turnkey systems."
It's also insufficient time to build a solid understanding of a system to be able to work effectively and propose efficiency improvements that fit in with the current system.
All too often, new starters will propose changes they'd encountered or thought up of from their previous employment: These sound great except they rarely fit with the existing systems at the new company Same for mergers: Both companies think their systems are best, but it's one company that will dominate the other and enforce it's ideas, because that's what they've developed for them so it must be best for the other company, too. Erm... not always: You have to understand why the other company went their route, and normally that's because of different priorities and experiences.
The other side of this is: How long do you need to work for a company before you are an asset rather than a liability? Well, it seems it's six months just to get up to speed, and a year before you're breaking even - so two years would put you at the point you've become an asset. At which point you leave and the company is back to square one and training a new employee, hoping that one will be as good as the one who is leaving.
That last one is for employers who think that not investing in staff is a cost saving.
Re: No surprise
"Institutional knowledge" is a problem every where.
When I left my last company I told everyone who needed to know where all my electronic log books and guides were stored. There was 20 years of knowledge stored in the guides. Everyone left or forgot and I got a very panicked call from the new Software Manager a few years later who had to upgrade an embedded OS in a range of products I had looked after.
The call was longer on 'pleasantries' than on knowledge transfer. I got him to open the index of my guides on his browser, pointed him to the one that said "upgrading the OS" and told him to follow the instructions. The first of which was to download a VM with the complete development environment, and the last two of which were to upload a new VM image and update the guides.
It is actually quite simple to avoid "institutional knowledge", but people think that sharing their knowledge makes their job less valuable. I think that it is the opposite and if every I run into that software manager again (and I might as I work for the embedded OS company) I will get nothing but praise.
Re: No surprise
"A couple of takeovers ago the company at the time openly stated the reason they did not offer market leading salaries was because people should stay employed for a couple of years, gain experience, and then move on."
Which is an open admission, of which their customers should take note, that they only employ inexperienced people and those too incompetent to move on.
> Astonishingly, two percent of respondents admitted to having no security posture at all.
Only two percent? I find that hard to believe.
>Only two percent? I find that hard to believe.
admitted
Knew and admitted?
Not retaining good staff. Being mid-market.
Which is cause and which is effect?
Ladder
only two percent of mid-market organizations can hold onto IT staff they rate as "excellent" for two or more years
The only meaningful way to get better pay is to quit and find a new employer.
If you stay with your current employer, you are unlikely going to get a raise beyond inflation. If you are looking for 2 digit % jump, then new employer desperate for talent is going to offer that.
Sometime you can find that your current employer is going to offer newbies 15-30% than you currently get.
Such a paradox.
One theory is that employers don't want workers to stay over 2 years, so they don't acquire more employment rights and lack of pay incentives is designed to nudge people to quit before 2 year mark.