Beancounters at analyst outfit Gartner say that corporate executives are now worried about IT talent shortages.
With projects like digital transformation, GDPR, cloud, AI on the books Gartner has found the lack of specialists has made talent a number one concern.
Gartner said for most of last year cloud computing was the main problem that customers were grappling with. But in Q4 of 2018, talent shortage moved to the top of the list as firms looked to bring on fresh talent to help them digitally transform their operations.
The other risks identified by users included accelerating privacy regulation, the pace of change, lagging digitalisation and digitisation misconceptions.
The problem is that to deal with those problems, an organisation needs to have access to cloud, security, privacy and infrastructure skills.
Managing vice president and risk practice leader at Big G, Matt Shinkman, said that organisations were facing huge challenges from the pace of business change, accelerating privacy regulations and the digitalisation of their industries.
“A common denominator here is that addressing these top business challenges involves hiring new talent that is in incredibly short supply.”
Gartner found that financial services, manufacturing, consumer services, public sector, retail and hospitality were all suffering.
“Organisations face this talent crunch at a time when they are already challenged by risks that are exacerbated by a lack of appropriate expertise”, said Shinkman.
“Previous hiring strategies for coping with talent disruptions are insufficient in this environment, and risk managers have a key role to play in collaborating with HR in developing new approaches.”
Gartner said that outfits needed to train up the people they already have, rather than risking on going into the open jobs market and fighting it out with everyone else for talent.
