The Myth of 'Versatilists'

Computerworld - Computerworld recently took on the difficult task of forecasting the state of the IT sector in four years ["The IT Profession: 2010," July 17]. It was a thought-provoking package of forward-looking stories -- especially the report predicting the skills that tech workers will need to ensure long-term job security and marketability in a changing economy.

Looking into their silicon balls (crystal is so 20th century), industry experts predicted that those with tech knowledge and considerable business savvy will carry the day. Such "versatilists," the IT prognosticators claimed, will add business value by navigating a complex tangle of departments, projects and relationships both within and beyond the company that employs them. Success in IT will depend less on, say, development know-how or engineering savvy and more on a multilayered amalgam of business connections, strategic planning and marketing expertise.

Exciting stuff, almost enough to make you want to run out and enroll in an MBA program -- except for two small problems.

The first has to do with what industry leaders such as Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates say they need: specialized workers with advanced degrees in computer science and engineering. The second has to do with what those leaders are doing about this perceived need: lobbying Congress and the administration to try to increase the number of foreign technical workers allowed into the U.S. Their argument for raising the cap on H-1B visas is based on a claim that there aren't enough qualified U.S. workers to go around.

Confused? So am I. That's because we're hearing a classic mixed message. Even as industry moguls bemoan the shortage of technically skilled experts, they are predicting a future where candidates with focused technical expertise are less desirable than multitasking generalists. Trying to conjure an answer to what mix of skills and education is necessary to satisfy the employers of tomorrow would vex even Harry Potter.

Let's dissect the facts.

For more than five years now, job growth in the U.S. IT sector has been significantly weaker than industry leaders like to claim. According to a recent study by the University of Illinois at Chicago's Center for Urban Economic Development, fewer than one quarter (76,300) of U.S. IT jobs that were lost when the tech bubble burst have been recovered over the past three years.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of jobs have been shipped overseas to low-wage countries. If current trends continue, we can expect more than 3.3 million U.S. industry jobs and $136 billion in wages to move to countries such as India, Russia, China and the Philippines by 2015, according to Forrester Research.