Challenged Recruiting STEM Professionals? You Are Not Alone.

Yes, we know that talent shortage is an issue.  The media is always on the rampage, hammering the United States for not producing enough STEM graduates to meet the rising demand.

America’s position is threatened, as comparatively few American students pursue expertise in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics -- STEM — and an inadequate pipeline of teachers skilled in those subjects doesn’t bode well for the future, either, chimes in the department of education.

But what specifically is hard to recruit?  According to our recently published Buyer Survey,  the most frequently cited hard-to-recruit skill is IT professionals who could manage and modify company-wide enterprise software. This problem cropped up last year as well. Second on the difficult-to-hire IT skill list was Java programmers.  This was also an issue in 2013. Then came project managers, business analysts, mobile developers, .net developers and network security experts.  (This list does not include buyers of healthcare staffing services who face different skills shortages.)

Within engineering, the toughest skills to recruit are very specific slots revealing the highly specialized nature of this segment.  A stress engineer cannot do the job of an aerospace engineer and vice versa.

But the concern is not confined to STEM. Buyers of industrial/logistics have their own challenges, saying it was tough to get forklift operators, welder and truck drivers, to name a few.

Staffing firms that can fill these gaps will be raking it in. Not only will they be fulfilling their client’s demands, they would also be helping America to maintain its leadership role in today’s economy.