By Gail Coury, CISA, CISSP, CISM, VP, GM Silverline F5 and board chair of ISACA's One in Tech Foundation

Addressing the IT Workforce Age and Gender Perception Gap

The tech workforce is highly recruitable and many will consider changing jobs in 2020. ISACA commissioned its Tech Workforce 2020 survey of more than 3,500 tech professionals to find out why people stay at their organizations, why they leave and how your company can retain its talent. From the results of this study, here are our predictions for 2020:

A big percentage of the tech workforce will be considered "in play" - open to being recruited.

In fact, 70% of tech professionals say they "definitely" or "may" foresee changing jobs in the next two years. Sixty-four percent say they experience stress or burnout in their current roles due to heavy workloads, long hours and lack of resources.

Those under 30, especially, will think about changing jobs.

Those under 30 are highly mobile, with 49% reporting that they have changed jobs within the past two years and 39% saying they will change jobs within the next two years. This age segment is more likely to leave a stressful environment than to tolerate it.

More women will be promoted into leadership roles.

There's some good news here. More women (74%) than men (64%) claim to have been offered a salary increase or job level promotion in the last two years. This may be a result of organizations actively addressing gender pay gaps. There's still work to be done, however: women report lower confidence levels when it comes to negotiating a raise or promotion, as compared to their male colleagues.

Talent will be retained when companies offer a good work-life balance.

Forty-six percent of respondents to the survey noted a good work-life balance as the number one reason for remaining in a current role. The findings suggest that organizational leaders must:

• Understand why staff depart. According to ISACA's data, the reasons in ranked order include more interesting work, better compensation, better culture and more upward mobility.
• Understand why staff stay. ISACA data shows tech employees stay for work-life balance, location, interesting work and compensation.

To read the entire Tech Workforce 2020 report, a related infographic and blog post, and listen to a related podcast episode, visit www.isaca.org/techworkforce2020.

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About the Author

Gail Coury, CISA, CISSP, CISM, VP, GM Silverline, F5

VP & General Manager of the F5 Silverline cloud-based security service offerings, including Silverline DDoS Protection, Silverline Web Application Firewall and Silverline Threat Intelligence.  Gail is a member of the executive leadership team for F5, reporting to the EVP of Corporate Strategy.  Gail's responsibilities include:

• Silverline executive leadership over sales, product management, marketing, architecture, engineering, operational delivery, and customer success
• Oversight of all aspects of the Silverline business including short- and long-term strategy with overall P&L responsibility
• Voice of Silverline both inside F5 and externally with customers and industry forums
  

Gail has over twenty years experience in information security infrastructure and network management, security technical consulting, managed security services, information systems auditing, and programming.  Industries include technology products and services, airline reservation systems, insurance, banking, and retail.  She is the former CISO of Oracle Cloud, CISO of PeopleSoft, and CISO of J.D. Edwards.

Gail has an Executive MBA from Stanford University and a bachelor's degree in computer science from Clarke University.  She is also a member of the following boards:

• One In Tech, an ISACA Foundation, Board Chair
• Ampex Data Systems Corporation Advisory Board
• Coalfire Cloud Security Advisory Board
• Clarke University Board of Trustees