In an unexpected turn, the US IT job market has seen over 100,000 unfilled jobs being eliminated, according to a report from management consulting firm Janco Associates.
“In a startling turn of events CIOs and hiring managers of IT professionals have seen the elimination of over 100K jobs from the open requisition for those positions,” Victor Janulaitis, CEO at Janco Associates said in the report.
The elimination of IT jobs is being considered unexpected as the US’ Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data showed that the country had added 223,000 jobs in December, including 17,600 positions at technology companies, despite layoffs at high-profile technology companies dominating the month.
Initial reading of the data from sources such as BLS showed that most positions eliminated during December were administrative and non-technical in nature, Janulaitis said, adding that a second deep-dive into the data revealed the negative impact on IT roles.
“Reviewing the data, we now see that CIOs and hiring managers not only eliminated those non-technical positions but have also started putting the break on IT projects,” Janulaitis said. This has led to cutbacks across production and IT operations, while developers were not as hard hit.
Janco’s report also cited IT consulting firms and independent consultants, pointing out that new initiatives across companies have been put on hold and their teams are being asked to justify additional extensions.
“In general, this may be an omen that the good times are about to end. The turn from optimism to pessimism has been profound and quick,” the report said, adding that CIOs were pulling back on anything that will increase headcount.
CFOs have been under pressure to perform cost correction and are asking every departments to make cuts on any resource that is not “totally necessary”, the report noted.
Middle management at companies have also been asked to justify their team members or existing staff, Janulaitis said, adding that human resource teams been told to hire only key personnel for running operations or businesses.
Janco is expected to put out a new report examining the immediate negative impact on IT job market after BLS data is released later this week.
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