Effective IT staffing is both a notorious challenge and an imperative for any organization that wants to thrive in today’s business climate. Luckily, there are solutions to even the most chronic recruitment and retention woes. Below we’ve outlined some common problems, and the most reliable solutions.

Retaining Top Talent

The competition for the best and brightest is fierce, and companies routinely poach top performers from their competitors. The loss of these exceptional professionals can have wide-ranging effects, and replacing the missing talent often proves to be impossible. The solution is to identify the professionals that are critical to your organization and prioritize retaining them. Higher compensation helps, but you should also consider more flexible scheduling, professional development opportunities, better benefits, and more exciting responsibilities at work.

Lifting Employee Morale

IT can be stressful work on a brutal schedule. The consequence is that morale quickly begins to dip, compromising productivity and often leading directly to turnover. If this problem doesn’t get addressed, it will simply return over and over. Solutions include improving the work-life balance for employees, making acknowledgment and recognition a priority, and adding new staff to relieve the burden on existing employees.

Recruiting High-Skill Applicants

The skills gap in IT is real, if somewhat exaggerated. It’s not that companies can’t find skilled workers, it’s that they can’t find workers with very specialized skills. One solution is to form partnerships with higher education and train up the employees of the future. Another solution is prioritize professional development and on-the-job training so that existing employees develop the necessary skills to pick up the slack.

Providing Competitive Compensation

Salaries in IT continue to rise, and for the best performers they can top seven figures. That places a huge strain on companies whose payroll can’t keep pace. It often leads to an employee exodus that can decimate a department. There is no way to produce money out of thin air, but companies can improve their compensation offers by offering other kinds of perks like more vacation days, free gym memberships, company stock options, or tuition reimbursement.

There is one final solution that must be mentioned because it effectively solves all the major IT hiring challenges – working with a specialized staffing partner. Outsourcing part of your recruitment efforts allows you to quickly connect with a pool of highly qualified candidates exactly when you need them. In practice, this strategy lowers costs and improves outcomes, turning recruiting into an opportunity rather than a challenge. Before your next vacancy appears, contact the team at RennerBrown.