6 Hot Skills for 2010 – Do your credentials and experience position you for success?

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According to Computerworld's 2010 Forecast survey, this year's hiring plans certainly aren't at 2009 levels. Less than 20% of the 312 IT executives polled said they plan to increase IT head count in the next 12 months, compared with 26% in the previous year. And nearly 20% said they plan to decrease their IT head count.

For IT professionals who are either looking to get back into the workforce or mulling moves to greener pastures, here are the six types of skills most in demand among survey respondents who said they expect to hire IT workers in 2010.

1. Programming/Application Development
Among companies that plan to hire, the top reason for doing so is to meet demand for new systems and projects. That could be why programming/application development is the skill set that's most in demand, by far, according to Computerworld's survey.

"We're actually seeing new projects get the green light," says Dave Willmer, executive director of IT staffing firm Robert Half Technology. Quite possibly, he says, these were projects that were canceled at the end of 2008, only to be revived for 2010. The wave of new projects is also leading to demand for application developers who can double as business analysts and project managers, Willmer says.

Specifically, companies will look for developers with knowledge of .Net, Java, Web development, open source and portal technologies such as Microsoft Corp.'s Sharepoint, says Willmer, who is a Computerworld columnist.

Demand is growing for people who know specialized programming languages like Ruby on Rails and AJAX. There aren't many jobs that require those skills, but the number of openings has increased since January 2009.

Employers would like to find a "hybrid" software developer who can also serve as a business analyst. They need someone who can talk to the business and be a requirements gatherer, project manager and software developer, all rolled into one. They also needs developers with open-source expertise - a rare talent, as well as professionals familiar with Microsoft tools for the ERP and marketing intelligence sides of the business.

Willmer says it makes sense that companies are looking for developers with skills in other areas, such as business analysis or even quality assurance, since employers are concerned about the cost of talent. Obviously, they're making sure they get the most out of their resources.

2. Help Desk/Technical Support
It's no surprise that there will be strong demand for the people who make the help desk hum in 2010, says Tom Silver, senior vice president for North America at Dice Holdings Inc., which operates Dice.com and other careers Web sites. The need for support technicians tends to reflect general business conditions, he says. "As the business starts to improve, companies hire more people, which increases demand for help desk staff," Silver explains.

Willmer says he's already seeing a rise in demand for help desk and support skills, especially among companies that cut too deeply in this area in 2009. "They can get away with it for a certain time period, but it eventually catches up and affects revenue," he says. Instead of offering full-time positions, however, some companies are hiring on a project basis, he adds.

3. Networking
The demand for networking professionals, Willmer says, is likely connected to the growing complexity of networks and to the stresses placed on them by virtualization and newly popular approaches to application delivery, such as cloud computing and software as a service.

Network will be a big area of focus in the coming year. Energy Northwest is making increasing use of video and voice over its IP network, so it will need network, voice and radio engineers to handle upgrades and ensure compliance with new federal mandates. One of those mandates requires the company to move from wideband to narrowband radio frequencies.

Scottrade will be dabbling with a converged infrastructure in the next 12 months, driving a need for people with a mix of server, software and networking skills to support networked storage and server devices contained in a single chassis. This will change the market for the type of people they need. It won't be just a guy who knows EMC and Hitachi storage, but someone who knows server, storage and networking all in one device. They will need a guy who says, “The network has a problem here.” But when he traces it down, the problem is due to a lock on a table in the storage device.

4. Project Management
Silver sees project management as an area that is growing in importance and a good avenue for technology professionals interested in building up their careers. Professionals who understand technology and how it fits in the overall business strategy are the ones who add the most value, get paid more and have the most fulfilling careers.

5. Security
Willmer sees a relationship between demand for security skills and the still-shaky economy. "The biggest threat to companies is breaches by their own staff," he says. "When you throw in changes to the staff and disgruntled employees losing their benefits or facing the threat of being laid off, you increase the chances of network fraud or security infringement."

Employers are concentrating on hiring people with cybersecurity skills. Ten years ago, they didn't worry about things like passwords. Now they are making sure they support complex passwords.

6. Business Intelligence
Computerworld's survey respondents ranked business intelligence skills as No. 6 in importance.

Employers would like to find data architect to help with conversion from nonstandard business intelligence system and miscellaneous reporting tools to an enterprise standard. More important than a BI expert, though, are programmer/analysts who can relate the nitty-gritty of data tables, database joins and data structure to business requirements. That's what employers are finding to be more valuable to them at this stage in getting BI established and used by a business.

So how do your credentials and experience stack up?
You will need the relevant formal education, certifications and experience to win these opportunities. Make sure your resume supports these requirements, your key words target the technology acronyms, your certification credentials are current and you will be positioned for success in 2010 – Best of luck in the new year – Denny