Dive Brief:
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With 2018 half over, the technology job market is booming, led by high demand for IT services and custom software development fields responsible for 70% of the 71,800 IT industry jobs added this year. In July, IT services, custom software development and computer system design added about 8,300 positions to the 14,500 total IT jobs added in the U.S., according to CompTIA analysis, based on data from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.
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About 300 jobs created in July were for data processing, hosting and other related services. Nearly 3,000 jobs were in computer, electronics and semiconductor manufacturing.
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General employers across industries added about 75,000 core technology positions last month, which offset a decline in recent months, according to the report.
Dive Insight:
Some sectors in the IT job market are thriving. Demand for software and application developers grew more than any other jobs from June to July, indicative of more cloud-based IT environments. The unemployment rate for IT jobs was remained at almost 2% in July, according to the report.
Companies in tech, consulting, financial services, retail, healthcare and defense are ooking for more tech talent to round out their business and seek more creative ways to compete in their markets.
Though having the right tech talent is invaluable, it is also difficult to retain employees. Companies that have set themselves up as "digital laggards" frustrate more than half of their workers while the same is true for only 6% of employees at "digital leader" organizations.
The slow move from legacy technology serves as a double blow of keeping employees and attracting new ones. A company's standing in technology is a deciding factor for job candidates, in and outside IT-related work.
The companies scooping up the most tech talent are Amazon and Walmart for this year. Amazon announced 3,000 new positions in cloud computing and machine learning, but those jobs are in Vancouver, Canada. And 1,000 AWS positions are going to its Dublin offices.
