TECH FIRMS NOT MEETING PAY DEMANDS
Companies in region rank 3rd in U.S. for their CIOs’ belief they’re unable to offer enough
Finding enough technology workers continues to plague companies in the Denver region, and a new survey offers a glimpse into why: Denver doesn’t pay enough.
Finding enough technology workers continues to plague companies in the Denver region, and a new survey offers a glimpse into why: Denver doesn’t pay enough.
Robert Half Technology, a national staffing agency, surveyed 2,500 chief information officers nationwide and found that the biggest barrier to landing the best candidates was the inability to meet salary demands. At 51 percent, Denver ranked third highest for its rate of CIOs with this concern. Washington, D.C., was first, at 55 percent, with Atlanta in second, at 52 percent. The national average was 44 percent.
“Colorado’s unemployment rate is 2.3 percent. But if you get into really specialized fields, like IT, it’s 1 percent. I kid you not. It’s a war for talent,” said Dez Hill, Robert Half’s market manager for Colorado. “I cannot tell you how many offers we’ve had declined because (our clients) have low-balled these guys. Even after we tell the companies, ‘Here are the salary expectations,’ the mentality is they still think they can low-ball. That’s just not the case anymore.”
By “low-ball,” Hill said he means offering $14 to $15 an hour for a help-desk job. That was the going rate three years ago. “Now, we’re up to $18 to $19,” he said.
While certain tech skills are in high demand, other factors in play include Denver’s rising housing costs. Job candidates are negotiating for the future, so if they don’t get what they want, they go elsewhere.
In recent years, Denver has thrived as a startup hub for technology companies and workers seeking a more balanced life. Metro Denver salaries made news this summer when an annual compensation survey by the Mountain States Employers Council
found that employers expected to offer their first pay raises above 3 percent — or above the rate of inflation — since 2009.
But according to Robert Half’s 2017 salary guide, salaries for tech jobs have grown much faster.
Database developers and data scientists, for example, are up 7 and 8 percent, respectively, year over year. Denver’s overall tech salaries are up about 2 percent since last year, said the company.
“Think about it. The No. 1 and 2 reasons why people leave a company is salary and job satisfaction,” Hill said. “What we’ve seen is that candidates are more willing to decide that even if a company doesn’t have a great brand but are paying what they want, they will put some of those factors aside.”
Area tech companies contacted about whether wages are too low responded in different ways, although none shared salary data. Brian Nishi, the people and culture evangelist at GoSpotCheck, said his company focuses on being a great place to work. It won The Denver Post’s Top Small Workplace in 2017.
“We’re incredibly selective in the type of people we hire, and in a tight labor market for tech talent, it’s definitely a challenge. However, we’ve always been aware that attracting the best people takes a commitment across the whole organization, particularly from leadership, to be a top workplace,” Nishi said in an email, adding that GoSpotCheck employs roughly 35 software engineers. “Sure, you need to ask yourself as an employer, ‘Why would someone come to work here?,’ but more importantly you should ask, ‘Why would someone stay here?’ A bad employer reputation in a city like Denver can be crippling to a recruitment operation!”
Less of an issue among the Denver CIOs surveyed was finding enough qualified candidates, with 24 percent saying this was a major barrier. Forty percent of San Francisco-area CIOs said their top gripe is finding talent, while salary demands was at 36 percent.
Companies losing the good candidates should update their salary guides and speed up the overall hiring process. Even dragging it on for two weeks can be too long, said Robert Half’s Hill.
“If you wait a week or two, we’re talking about different job candidates,” Hill said. “This happened to us yesterday. A client interviewed four Java developers for one position, but they took 2½ weeks to come back and make a decision. By then, all four had already found other jobs.”