The ongoing cloud skills gap is impacting every corner of the tech space, as anyone aiming to hire Microsoft professionals right now will well know.
With the adoption of cloud technologies mushrooming to unprecedented levels, the talent pool needed to implement and operate these products has struggled to grow at the same pace.
The chasm between the demand for Microsoft skills and the available supply of professionals continues to widen, and organizations looking to add cloud talent to their teams are feeling the pinch. As businesses look to cloud tech to help them stay innovative and competitive in an increasingly digital world, the consequences of this skills gap are becoming ever clearer. Without the human capital required to support it, organizations are finding it impossible to keep the wheels turning on their cloud transformation.
According to a recent survey, the number one challenge faced by businesses during their Microsoft cloud implementation was a lack of appropriate skills in-house, with a huge 59% of respondent organizations citing this gap as a major hurdle. And it’s unlikely that these sparse market conditions will improve any time soon; it’s thought that the US could lose out on $162 billion in revenue every year unless it finds more workers to fill high-tech roles.
What makes the tech skills problem so difficult to tackle is that there’s no single underlying cause. Although the issue seems simple—lots of new jobs, not enough workers to fill them—the reasons behind it are numerous and complex. Working culture, education, inequality; all these things need to be examined if we’re going to create a new wave of talented tech professionals large enough to meet the rising demand for cloud skills.
There may not be an easy fix for these challenges, but there are things that businesses can do right now to give themselves a head-start in the battle for Microsoft talent. Let’s dig deeper into a few of the reasons why the squeeze on Microsoft cloud professionals is getting even tighter; and what you can do to beat it.
Challenge #1: Shortage of Microsoft professionals
The issue
Experienced Microsoft cloud professionals are in short supply, with open roles for those possessing skills in products like Microsoft Azure massively outstripping the number of tech workers available to take them. Microsoft’s own research suggests that there will be half a million unfilled roles in the US by 2025; and that’s just in cybersecurity.
Not only is the shortage of these professionals a problem for businesses, but their geographical concentration can present a challenge too. We’re seeing salaries for talent in major tech hubs rise consistently. Particularly in coastal tech hubs like San Jose, New York City, and Seattle, which have attracted the lion’s share of IT professionals in the US. Luring workers away from these hotbeds of innovation can prove difficult for businesses in other locations, even as burgeoning tech hot spots continue to spring up across the country.
The solution
Sourcing tech talent and convincing them to move closer to your business isn’t easy, but thanks to the global shift towards remote working, a scant talent market in your local area no longer needs to be a barrier to hiring great professionals.
Embracing remote working means throwing open the area that you can recruit from. Advances in collaboration software and better connectivity are enabling people to work from anywhere in the world, eliminating geographical restrictions on your talent search.
Offering and encouraging remote work significantly ups your chances of landing a great tech professional, so if you’re one of the few organizations that hasn’t already, be sure to invest in the digital infrastructure (and cultural change) you need to support it.
Challenge #2: Increasingly fierce market competition
The issue
The pandemic put a fire under a lot of organizations that had been dragging their feet on cloud adoption, catapulting digital transformation forward several years. The already colossal demand for tech professionals able to help businesses exploit cloud technology has increased, and more new jobs are being created every day.
Meanwhile, the talent pool simply hasn’t been able to scale at the same pace. There are nowhere near enough Microsoft professionals to go around, and this scarcity has created a desperate market where competition among potential employers is cutthroat.
Part of the problem is that most businesses, especially those that are new to the world of cloud tech, are looking in the same places for talent. With so many eyes on traditional hiring channels like LinkedIn, what few active candidates are out there are snapped up fast, often by the employer with the biggest hiring budget.
The solution
As more and more businesses crowd around the pond of existing cloud talent, competing for the attention of its inhabitants and throwing blank checks into the water, the obvious answer is to find a new fishing spot.
Tapping into new streams of talent and looking beyond the usual places for candidates enables businesses to access tech professionals that other businesses haven’t discovered yet.
Partner with schools and colleges to create graduate schemes. Implement returnship programs that target experienced professionals who have taken a career break. Connect with networking groups for tech pros from underrepresented demographics. Engage with nontraditional training providers like coding camps and offer on-the-job training for self-taught techies.
Skilled tech enthusiasts can be found in all kinds of places other than job boards, if you know where to look. Plus, hiring through these innovative channels, away from the competitive battleground of the tech jobs market, is often cheaper, and gives you the chance to instill the skills your business needs in enthusiastic professionals with fresh perspectives.
Challenge #3: Soaring costs of hiring tech talent
The issue
The shortfall of talent and the growing battle to attract it has another inevitable but no less daunting consequence; salary inflation.
Last year, average salaries for tech workers hit a record high. Skyrocketing demand for cloud skills is driving up pay, as hiring companies try to outbid one another, and employers who already have the talent they need offer raises to get them to stay.
These steep hikes in salaries are pushing companies without bottomless piggy banks out of the race, especially as so many industries are still recovering from the economic impact of the pandemic. If only the largest, most established organizations can afford cloud talent, the ability of other businesses to grow, innovate, and compete will suffer enormously, to the detriment of us all.
The solution
After a global pandemic brought the world to its knees, workers everywhere are rethinking what they want from their careers. For many, that means having more flexibility to balance home and work. Others have decided that they want to do work that makes a positive impact. Some have thrown in the towel and moved into totally different lines of work.
The bottom line is that money isn’t everything. Professionals are looking beyond their paychecks in search of career satisfaction, and that’s great news for businesses that want to hire the best talent.
In a recent survey of Microsoft cloud professionals, just 17% of respondents stated that they’d be happy to work in an office five days a week going forward. Hybrid working, flexible hours, unlimited vacation time, a four-day week; are all enticing perks for an in-demand tech professional, so think about what you can offer other than more cash.
What will employees gain by working for you? An innovative, supportive culture? The chance to work on exciting and meaningful projects? A passion for lifelong learning and upskilling? Consider what makes you unique as an employer and make sure you’re selling those things to candidates.
Challenge #4: Evolving candidate expectations
The issue
As evidenced by the rising salaries on offer, it’s a candidates’ market out there. Tech professionals are finally being treated as the valuable resource they are, and when they’re on the hunt for a new opportunity, they don’t spend long on the job market.
If you’re courting a Microsoft professional, you can be sure that you won’t be the only one. Great tech talent doesn’t need to wait around for you to make a decision or move the hiring process forward. Poor communication, outdated timescales, and over-complicated hiring processes are sure-fire ways to lose out on candidates.
The solution
If you want to hire cloud professionals, it might be time to revamp your hiring processes. Be proactive, responsive, and don’t waste valuable time or keep good candidates on the hook without being transparent about next steps.
The fact is that you need tech talent more than it needs you, so you need to make the process as easy and painless as possible for those you’re trying to recruit.
That means no asking applicants to fill in countless forms that include the same information that’s on their resume. No unnecessary tests. No three-or-four-stage interviews where the candidate has to repeat the same answers for several different people.
Remember, the hiring process is just as much about a candidate sizing up an employer as it is the other way around, so put your best foot forward and don’t give a candidate any reason to doubt your commitment to them.
Challenge #5: Surge in talent poaching
The issue
With active job seekers few and far between, many companies (including some of tech’s biggest names) have turned to poaching passive Microsoft candidates from competitors.
Ask any skilled tech professional how many messages, calls, and emails they receive every week from both internal and external recruiters, and the number may well be more than the number of hot dinners you’ve had. But sliding into a professional’s LinkedIn inbox with the promise of a higher salary or better perks isn’t just ethically questionable, it’s unsustainable.
The growing use of poaching as a key hiring strategy creates an endless arms race of offers and counteroffers, which is a problem in itself. But there’s also nothing to say that a poached employee won’t be re-poached by another competitor, no matter how much money you threw at them initially.
The solution
There are alternative ways to onboard talent without worrying about them being poached by other employers.
At Revolent, we create net new Microsoft cloud talent by cross-training experienced tech professionals in platforms like Azure, Dynamics 365, and Microsoft 365. Our certified Revols are then contracted to work with us, and our clients, for up to two years; they can even stay on with your business once their contract is up at no additional cost.
Our Microsoft talent is dedicated to upskilling and committed to making an immediate impact on your cloud projects. Our innovative cloud talent creation program gives you cost-effective, flexible, hassle-free access to high-quality tech professionals, and boosts your retention rate in the process.
