Monday, April 28, 2008

How We See It

Hiring, talent are the issues still at top of tech execs' minds

You're only as good as your people. So we ask: If you're in hiring mode, don't you want the best people you can attract?

Despite the doldrums of the larger economy, our latest quarterly survey showed that 64 percent of New England-based technology companies plan at least some workforce growth this year. That means chances are good you're focused on the talent issue.

And "issue" is an understatement. As New England's overall work force ages and fewer students graduate in science and technology-related disciplines, finding the top talent to run the region's world-leading institutions will become an ever-harder challenge.

The Maine Technology Institute this week released a call to action for Maine to focus more heavily on the graduate programs of its universities and for its businesses to put a higher priority on "people." It identified Maine's best economic-growth prospects as biotech and IT business.

While graduating more scientists and engineers is a good long-term solution, a shorter-term solution continues to get short shrift at the federal level. The federal H-1B visa cap of 65,000 specialized foreign workers for the second half of 2008 was reached on Jan. 2 -- which means that companies looking to fill technical positions for which no local talent emerges are out of luck until 2009. Such delays are unacceptable, and Congress must act to address the talent shortage before talented foreign workers look elsewhere and we lose access to that talent for good.