Wanted: Business-savvy IT staff

Gaining a seat at the business leadership table will continue to be an uphill task for technology departments unless information and communications technology (ICT) leaders upskill and add critical business skills to their skills profile.

According to new study conducted by Hudson, ICT hiring managers across Australia identified most IT specialists today lack those non-IT skills that are vital to the future success of the department.

The study polled IT hiring managers on the top broad business skills IT departments should have in the future. The top three responses were innovation and strategic thinking, stakeholder management and communication.

These were followed by project management, commercial thinking, customer insights and IT management.

However, when it came to identifying the current biggest skills gap in their respective IT teams, the same three responses topped the list – only in a slightly different order.

Stakeholder management came out on top, with communication coming in second and innovation and strategic thinking in third place.

The report also found that 33.5% of IT professionals were not given people management training before reporting.

One in two of IT professionals rated the people management skills of their IT managers as ‘average’, while only 6.4% of them rated the people management skills of their managers as ‘excellent’.

“It comes down to chief information officers being able to demonstrate really strong stakeholder management skills and communication skills,” Tim Davis, Hudson ICT director, said.

“The ones that are very good and sought after in IT are the ones who can grab the attention of the heads in business who have money to invest and explain that, if the business were to invest in technology, it would deliver a solid return on investment.”

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