Competition is especially fierce for skilled tech workers in Mass.
Massachusetts ranked as one of the most difficult states in the country to hire tech workers, according to an index published by the Massachusetts High Technology Council, a trade group in Waltham.
It’s not uncommon for skilled tech workers in Boston to receive 20 phone calls per day from hiring recruiters, luring them to other companies with promises of better pay, flexible work hours, or even perks like rooftop decks and basketball courts, The Boston Globe reports.
That’s because the demand for tech talent has never been this dire.
This year Massachusetts ranked as the most difficult state in the country to hire tech workers, along with Maryland and Virginia, according to an index published by the Massachusetts High Technology Council, a trade group in Waltham. Compiled with Worcester Polytechnic Institute, jobs site Monster.com, and New York research firm Wanted Analytics, the index is based on data like job postings and local unemployment rates.
Massachusetts’s ranking is both good and bad news.
“The level of demand and hiring difficulty are an indicator of the tech sector’s strength,” Mark Gallagher, the high tech council’s vice president for public policy and communications, told the Globe, “but if unaddressed could be a constraint on the region’s ability to expand and remain a leader.”
The reason the demand is so high is due to the rapid expansion of young companies like Needham-based travel site TripAdvisor Inc. and Cambridge’s digital marketing firm HubSpot, Inc.
While this growth is great for software developers and network engineers fresh out of college who stand to make starting salaries upwards of $90,000, it’s creating a hiring crunch that is affecting more than just startups and tech companies.
Publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Co., for example, told the Globe it’s been a struggle hiring software developers for its expanding host of digital offerings because of the competition from so many well-known tech companies in Greater Boston.
Read the full Globe story here.
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