InformationWeek

The shortage of IT workers in the United States--or flip that around and make it the increasing demand for IT talent--has forced companies to reconsider every aspect of the employer-employee relationship. Salary, benefits, hours, working conditions--they're all on the table when hiring or trying to retain talented IT workers. But one aspect of the equation that until now has been pushed into the background is beginning to play an increasingly critical role: location.

On the one hand, talented IT workers, especially young people like Oueida, gravitate to the "hot technology" sectors of the country such as Boston, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, and Silicon Valley. Part of the reason for this is the changing nature of the workforce, and part of it is a changing value system. "The days of getting your gold watch from IBM after 25 years are over," says Mike Phelan, human capital advisory services leader for the Texas region at consulting firm Deloitte & Touche. "Location has become increasingly important to today's workforce because many of them are looking past the current offer on the table to their next career move."

On the other hand, a pre-IPO dot-com in Silicon Valley may wave a fistful of stock options, but not every IT worker is willing to sit in traffic for three hours every day for a chance at hitting the IPO lottery. Good schools and ample recreational amenities, combined with challenging work and a competitive local salary, are sometimes what keeps talented IT workers in seemingly less-glamorous regions.

It all adds up to a competitive landscape for IT resources--one that demands flexibility. Companies in the hot technology sectors have to contend with a cutthroat competitive environment; worker turnover is common, rapid, and disruptive. Companies in the less-attractive areas of the country--the Rust Belt, the Deep South, the Great Plains--have to offer creative options to attract and retain talent, such as relocation, telecommuting, and branch offices. So, while different cities and regions of the country offer a range of IT job opportunities, employers increasingly compete for IT talent based on what their location can offer employees in terms of quality of life.

The hot technology sectors undoubtedly get the most attention. "The market is so busy that, to the disadvantage of some of our clients, we have to turn down some assignments in regions where people are less likely to go," says Paul Daversa, president of Resource Systems Group, an IT recruitment firm in Stamford, Conn., that handles talent searches nationally. "We won't take a client unless we know a move is likely," he says. Examples of hard-to-place areas: Oklahoma and parts of Michigan.

While those places may be tough for IT recruiters, the need for IT talent in those areas is great. Although the Midwest and parts of the South may not immediately conjure up futurist tech images, those places are the hungriest for IT talent due to their size and their population of both user and technology companies. The Information Technology Association of America, an IT trade group, says the South and the Midwest combined are home to more than 6 million IT jobs--more than the Northeast and the West Coast, which combined have less than 4 million.

Regardless of geography, the majority of IT jobs don't come from technology companies, but rather from user companies, says ITAA president Harris Miller. There are about nine IT-related jobs at user companies for every IT-related job at a technology company, according to an ITAA research report released in April and titled "Bridging The Gap: Information Technology Skills For A New Millennium." That translates into about 1 million IT jobs at U.S. technology companies and more than 9 million IT jobs at non-tech companies. Those figures don't include government IT jobs or IT jobs at nonprofit or small entrepreneurial firms, the ITAA says.

When considered by region, the disbursement of IT jobs across the United States is eye-opening. The South has 3.45 million IT jobs, more than any other region, according to the ITAA. Surprisingly, there are more IT jobs at technology companies in the South than there are on the West Coast, which has Silicon Valley, San Francisco's Multimedia Gulch, and the Los Angeles media factories. The West Coast, in fact, has the second-fewest number of overall IT jobs: 2.2 million.

The second-largest number of IT jobs--2.87 million--reside in the Midwest, according to the ITAA. That's because the Midwest has a high concentration of nontechnology companies, particularly large manufacturers such as automakers and steel manufacturers, says Harris. Among the differences in the regional mix of IT talent: The Midwest uses more programmers and software engineers than any other region, while Web developers and administrators are used slightly more in the West, the ITAA's findings show.

Although the Northeast is home to Boston's famous Route 128, the high-tech regions around Washington, and New York's advertising and multimedia firms, that region has the smallest number of IT jobs, about 1.5 million. It also has the smallest gap between demand and job vacancy. The ITAA estimates there's a demand to fill 277,079 IT jobs in the Northeast, but a "skills gap"--or shortfall--of 145,272 IT workers.

Finding new talent is often easier when you're close to the breeding ground. "Proximity to educational systems is key to finding IT talent," says Victor Janulaitis, president of Positive Support Review, a management-consulting firm in Santa Monica, Calif.

E.P. Rogers, VP and CIO at Mony Group Inc., says the financial-services company's ability to recruit for its Syracuse, N.Y., IT hub has been enhanced in part because "there are about 20 private and public colleges and universities within a two-hour drive." That also brings recreational and other perks to Mony employees, says Rogers. "We have college basketball, lakes, streams, the symphony--there's a little bit of everything here," he says.

A recent study by Carnegie Mellon professor Richard Florida indicates that college graduates are drawn to IT jobs in regions that offer a variety of recreational, cultural, educational, and environmental amenities. His report, released in January and called "Competing In The Age Of Talent: Quality Of Place And The New Economy," finds that quality-of-place, particularly natural, recreational, and lifestyle amenities, are "absolutely vital in attracting knowledge workers and in supporting high-tech firms and industries."

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Illustration by Jim Dandy