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July 5, 1999

Labor Intensive

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Al Galdi, CEO of Arcnet, a Holmdel, N.J., builder of wireless communications systems, recently gave 28 employees newly leased BMWs, including insurance--20 went to technology professionals. Galdi says if he can get staff to stay more than two years, he can make up the expense of the cars in savings on training.

Still, most companies prefer a more measured approach. Furr's Supermarkets Inc. in Albuquerque, N.M., has implemented a "rent-to-hire" program that lets programmers and other IT personnel work at the company on a trial basis to see whether they fit in. "We go to contracting companies and ask them to find us someone--an expert in Informix products, for example," says John Granger, VP of MIS. After six months, if employer and employee are happy, that person will be hired on a permanent basis. "It gives us a chance to find out about people before we hire them," Granger says.

The program has let Furr's move ahead with vital E-commerce and data warehousing projects. "It's not so much the availability of people, but the availability of people with specialized talents we need," Granger says.

An increasing number of companies are courting college students with special programs and training incentives. Baltimore Gas and Electric launched a scholarship program that lets University of Maryland computer science students work in IT jobs before graduation. The company pays for a student's tuition in computer science courses, as well as providing an hourly wage for part-time IT work; the student agrees to work for the company for a certain number of years after graduation. "This lets us see how they work and gives us an option to hire them full-time once they've graduated," says Holly Lash, director of IT competency management.

chart United HealthCare's LeFort is bullish on training. He has created a Learning Institute to help 3,000 of the company's employees develop new IT skills. Some of those who take the institute's IT courses are non-IT workers getting trained in three major areas: mainframe systems, client-server environments, and infrastructure. Subcategories include systems development, programming, and program management. Courses also teach workers about the health-care industry and the company's business overall.

The institute has taught technology skills to about 90 non-IT people during the last two years, LeFort says. He's been able to recruit 400 people a year into his IT department, both from within and outside the company, in part because of the benefits offered by the institute.

Companies in out-of-the-way locations have almost no choice but to rely on retraining. "We've had to recruit from inside our own business," says Brian Puffer, a senior program analyst at the Guilford Mills manufacturing plant in Schoharie, N.Y. "The tight labor market and the competitive salaries make it very difficult for us to find help."

The plant, a division of $900 million fabric design and manufacturer Guilford Mills in Greensboro, N.C., is the largest employer in Guilford county. But IT personnel are hard to come by. For the past several years, Puffer says, Guilford Mills has relied on five programmers when it needed 10 or 12. Puffer has had to look within his company several times, recruiting people from the front office and even the factory floor, then supervising their on-the-job training.

"We approach employees who already have a strong PC background, those who are literate with applications," Puffer says. The IT staff maintains four independent network systems, handles PC help-desk needs, and codes the custom-made programs used for production and inventory. One plant IT staffer is a former electrical engineer who now handles networking responsibilities and PC repair. Another is a former office support person with extensive Microsoft Office experience who's now an expert in Visual Fox Pro. "Most have had a basic understanding of computing principles, and yet they're very surprised when they realize they have a knack for IT work," Puffer says. But he's not complaining: "As long as you have the interest, you can learn anything."

Upside Of Y2K
One bright spot may be the large pool of programmers and others who've been toiling on year 2000 conversion and testing projects. As they complete Y2K work, some companies are shifting Y2K workers--including those who had IT responsibilities previously and those who were hired specifically for Y2K--to other IT jobs.

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