IT skills in the context of BigCo

This study of the IT skills and needs of BigCo, Inc., Corporate IT group assesses both the present IT skill levels and the perception of skill needs now and three years in the future. In the pursuit of data to reflect on this question, this paper reports on a case study of the IT skills and needs at one site. This work relies on a categorization drawn from both academic and professional literature regarding skill needs for IT professionals. In doing this work we draw on surveys, interviews, focus groups and archival documents to build a rich and detailed perspective on skill needs for the IT professionals at BigCo's Corporate IT group. Findings show that there is an implicit set of conceptual IT skills that are expected of IT professionals. The non-IT skill needs are presently very important and are expected to grow to be even more important. Finally, there are important department-level, experience, and gender variations in these responses that suggest that IT roles are growing both more numerous and more specialized.