While IT leaders express dissatisfaction in their ability to fill open IT positions with qualified candidates, they do not perceive diversity initiatives as a potential solution to address talent need, a survey released by TEKsystems indicates.
The survey found 48% of IT leaders identify diversity as a business initiative at their company and 39% have a formal diversity program in place. And of IT leaders indicating a formal policy is in place at their organizations, 75% are from companies with revenues greater than $1 billion.
Additional results from the survey found 70% of IT leaders are not concerned with being audited for diversity compliance. TEKsystems believes this indicates many IT departments view diversity initiatives mainly as a non-enforced workforce compliance requirement.
Of the IT leaders surveyed, only 18% indicated they actively reinforce the need to address diversity as part of the ongoing fulfillment process. However, almost three-quarters of IT leaders, 70%, find it difficult to fill open roles in their department and only 17% indicate they are highly satisfied with the candidates they receive for those roles. This, coupled with the low adoption of diversity programs within IT, indicates that IT departments are struggling to staff their teams with qualified IT professionals and don’t use diversity programs to address the issue, according to TEKsystems.
“While IT departments struggle to find qualified IT workers for their teams, our data indicates that most have yet to leverage diversity programs to help solve that challenge,” TEKsystems Director of Diversity and Inclusion Michelle Webb said. “In our conversations with clients regarding diversity initiatives, we’ve found that IT departments are less aware of the value that diversity programs can play in their skills sourcing efforts when compared to human resources or business leadership. With the shortage of qualified IT workers likely to increase, organizations need to add diversity programs to their arsenal to address their hiring needs.”
The survey included 250 IT leaders such as chief information officers, IT vice presidents, IT directors, IT hiring managers.
