New study on how frequently tech folks quit in the first year #yikes

Bye bye bye

Here’s a fun fact: 40% of employees quit their jobs within the first 12 months of their employment, according to go2HR.ca.

This level of turnover is especially problematic for developers, who are extremely valuable (and expensive) to employ in the modern workplace.

A study showed

For example, “If a software developer making $130k, his or her employer will lose between $65-95k in the recruiting and training costs invested.” That’s because “the technology labor market is experiencing the lowest unemployment rate in years–recruiting and retaining talent is becoming consistently more difficult.”

These revelations come from a study by Develop Intelligence, a company that reports on the best ways to attract and retainer developer talent.

According to the surveryors, “the study shows data collected by more than 800 software developers regarding factors leading to them leaving their employers. These developers shared useful feedback, which is key to helping human resources professionals and IT managers plan differently when it comes to training and professional development.”

So, what should you know to keep your developer happy?

Training woes

For starters, tech folks aren’t getting enough formal, on-the-job training. According to the findings summary respondents spend seven hours per week. On average, of their own time learning new skills necessary to do their jobs.

On the other hand, on average they spend just two hours in formal training opportunities. Even worse, respondents reported that 71% of employers do not provide formal training opportunities for their software developers on an annual basis.

The methods of training also matter.

Both junior and senior developers prefer reading as the primary form of training. However, while senior developers would prefer instructor-based training, junior developers prefer videos and peer-to-peer instruction.

In spite of the differences in learning methodology, the vast majority of respondents rated private, instructor-led teaching as the most effective way to learn.

Can’t live without

So, what skills do developers deem necessary to their job and career progress? Front-end skills dominate the skills gap here. Over half of the respondents (55 percent) wanted more experience with Javascript.

Rounding out the list of the most-needed skills are HTML5 (43 percent), Responsive Web Design (38 percent), CSS3 (34 percent) and jQuery (30 percent). The good news is, these are all foundational developer skills that will evolve but never vanish.

Hypothetically

What if you helm a bigger company with a greater need for analytics and big data? Survey respondents indicated that MongoDB, MySQL and NoSQL are the most popular big data skills for training.

#TechTurnAround