ClickAJob News

IT professionals need to possess management skills, one expert has said.

According to the managing director of Parity Training, Rick Firth, there are gaps between the business world and the skills IT managers possess.

"We believe that senior IT professionals must be business people first and have the commercial and management skills to manage teams of people, financial budgets and projects," he said.

Mr Firth remarked that many IT specialists lack business knowledge.

"Our research during the year has consistently told us that we need to address these skills shortages," he stated.

He added that to solve the skills crisis his company will focus on upgrading the management skills and IT business improvement.

Mr Firth commented that many firms have invested in technical knowledge but have not focused on developing professional abilities.

ClickAJob chief executive Yngve Traberg is all too familiar with such concerns.

"A surprising number of skills become necessary as one's career grows," he says. "Some are learned by example; many of them are crash-courses in hard experience."

"Which is when the problems occur," he adds. "As managers wrestle with how good their staff are at jobs that may have expanded beyond their initial capabilities."

His suggestion is to use online skills testing - coupled with psychometric personality testing to ensure a person's attitude is right for the job.

"Online tests are quick to organise and extremely effective at seeing exactly how far an employee's skill extends," he remarks. "Business tests, technical tests, they're all easy to access.

"Once completed, managers can determine what training is necessary to keep an employee fully up to speed in our rapidly advancing business environment."