Demand for skilled professionals is strong in many areas of IT, as companies seek to address new demands, such as the growing use of cloud computing and mobile devices, while keeping hardware and software systems up-to-date.

Companies seek professionals who have hands-on experience with new and evolving technologies such as Windows 7, Cloud, .NET 4.0, VMware and mobile application development.

Requirements for certain IT positions vary across industries and regions, but firms are seeking the following types of candidates:

• System and networking engineers: IT professionals who are experts in cloud computing, Software as a Service and Virtualization are in demand. Those with combined skills in server, software and networking are most sought after.
• Developers: Those skilled in .NET, Java, PHP, Silverlight, Flex, MySQL and portal technologies, such as SharePoint, are in demand.
• Quality assurance professionals and business analysts: With more dollars available for IT projects, managers are focusing on quality control and assembling more accurate project requirements. Quality assurance professionals can relieve developers so they can focus on coding, while business analysts can help build trust among stakeholders and serve as go-betweens for technology and business.
• Data warehousing and business intelligence professionals: Firms need immediate information that can help them move their business in the right direction. That's why they seek business intelligence and data warehousing professionals who can gather increasing amounts of data from various streams.
• Security professionals: Data security and protection, especially in industries such as banking and healthcare, will continue to be an in-demand area within technology. In fact, 24 percent of CIOs polled by our firm cited security as their top professional concern.