Applicants may have an advantage as IT job listings lead to location flexibility and increased demand for digital transformation roles.
For IT and cybersecurity professionals who are comfortable working from the couch: you may not need to quit anytime soon, even if you plan to change jobs. With the ongoing talent shortage, the market remains attractive to applicants with the kind of skills that the Covid-19 pandemic has put a premium on.
Not only are prospective employees able to seek jobs in regions that used to be too far from where they live, but there is also increased demand for the technical skills needed to support the ongoing transformation of work-life arrangements across the country.
Skills in demand: Gartner research has shown that IT has the most opportunities for remote work of all the job functions its tracks. It found that 37% of IT job postings in the U.S., U.K., and Canada from November 2021 through February 2022 advertised some combination of fully remote, temporarily remote, or hybrid work models. Skills related to software development and cloud computing, such as continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD), Docker, and React, tend to be the most flexible regarding location.
Alex Michaels, a senior consultant at Gartner specializing in cybersecurity and risk management, asserts that remote work has made it easier for cybersecurity professionals to find employment, primarily because the hordes of other telecommuters have resulted in “greater prioritization of cybersecurity by the business.”
He added that factors driving these changes, including digital transformation, new cybersecurity regulations, and the shift from project-centric to product-centric delivery, have increased the need for security analysts and engineers to have non-technical skills. That could mean end-user interaction or supporting business priorities rather than security projects.
Gartner further tracked increased demand for “specialized roles in awareness, insider threat, third-party risk, and endpoint security in its client base to meet the increased risks associated with remote work.”
Not all remote opportunities are equal: there is a clear outcome of remote work for IT/cybersecurity leaders and other senior staff. “Qualified senior technology executives, even those actively seeking, know that if they turn down an opportunity that requires relocation, their next opportunity may allow them to remain remote without uprooting their family.”
According to Computerworld, research by fintech firm Carta has found that startups are another popular category for telecommuting, with median pay in some cities trending toward San Francisco rates.
Fully remote work means companies can tap into talent pools in new locations. Still, it also means employers nationwide must compete with Silicon Valley for the most promising candidates, according to Gartner HR research director Jamie Kohn. But that “may not be a huge jump in opportunity” for all IT applicants, as salaries at smaller companies may not be competitive.
