Navigating the Skills Shortage: Causes, Trends, and Steps to Bridge the Gap

The IT bubble has “burst,” AI is “replacing jobs,” and some claim programmers are on the brink of extinction. Yet reality tells another story: companies struggle to fill positions, facing an IT skills shortage that slows down projects and growth. Even standard developer roles—not niche experts or top executives—often stay unfilled for months. The supposed oversupply of talent clashes with a stubborn truth: the tech talent gap keeps widening, leaving businesses stuck in a hiring paradox.

This is supported by the numbers: according to ManpowerGroup, 74% of employers worldwide face difficulties in finding skilled talent, with the IT sector experiencing a rate of 76%. Let’s explore the main causes of this situation. [1]

A quick scan of job boards shows plenty of experienced programmers and other IT specialists looking for new opportunities. Yet HR teams grapple with filling vacancies, and the divide expands as some top-tier talent pivot away from IT entirely, even accepting lower income.

At Timspark, we’ve identified five key factors behind this trend:

2. AI Side Effect on the Job Market

Strangely enough, the AI boom has sparked unprecedented demand for developers. This is especially true for roles like machine learning engineers and LLMOps engineers, who design, deploy, and fine-tune intelligent systems at scale. Demand has also surged for blockchain and AR/VR developers, as interest in these technologies has been renewed thanks to AI tools that help overcome previous bottlenecks. Cloud providers have kept pace with these trends, rolling out a range of boilerplate AI services. While this lowers the initial investment required for projects, it also creates a strong need for specialists such as cloud architects and Splunk engineers to implement and optimize these solutions effectively.

3. The Rising Need for Cybersecurity Experts

Another major factor contributing to the global talent crisis is the growing focus on cybersecurity. Artificial intelligence doesn’t just help legitimate businesses—it also empowers fraudsters. The rise of deepfakes combined with social engineering has made stricter security practices essential. While DevOps engineers handle many security settings out of the box and online services include built-in protections, cybersecurity professionals are in higher demand than ever.

The shortage is compounded by the fact that specialized education is still relatively young. Although some universities have long offered cybersecurity courses, dedicated undergraduate and postgraduate degrees have only become widespread in recent years. These educational programs are often aligned with industry standards set by the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and other organizations. In addition, cyberexperts must continually update their competencies to respond to rapidly evolving threats, including zero-day exploits. [2]

4. Niche IT Skills Shortage

It’s worth highlighting the persistent gap of niche professionals whose expertise is tied to highly specialized platforms and certified skill sets. Salesforce developers continue to be in strong demand across industries, with opportunities available for both remote and on-site roles. Similarly, MS Dynamics consultants are still critical for implementing and optimizing enterprise resource planning systems. At the same time, the need for 3D modeling specialists is steadily growing, fueled by the expansion of gaming and immersive technologies into business and enterprise applications.

5. Choosing Time Over Tech

Despite ongoing hiring challenges in tech, the industry faces another paradox: some top-tier professionals eventually leave IT altogether, often moving to lower-paid fields. The main driver is burnout. Poor management that prevents work-life balance, uncertainty about the future stirred by AI speculation, lack of feedback, and the constant race for new technologies at the expense of product quality all play a role. Many projects never even reach release, eroding motivation. According to Maslow’s pyramid, money alone addresses only basic needs, while recognition, purpose, and self-actualization remain unmet. As a result, people increasingly refuse to trade their most valuable resource—time—for just a paycheck.

Why Companies Cut Staff Despite Global Talent Crisis

1. Misconception About Training Costs

A prevalent belief among companies is that retraining employees is more expensive than hiring new talent. However, research indicates otherwise. The 2022 ILX Group study showed that companies could save up to £36,084 per employee by upskilling current staff instead of hiring new ones [3].

2. The Hidden Costs of Turnover

Beyond the obvious expenses of hiring and training new employees, turnover incurs hidden costs. A 2025 study by Applauz estimates that the total cost of replacing an employee can range from half to four times their annual salary, varying by job function and seniority. These costs include recruitment, onboarding, lost productivity, and the impact on team morale [4].

3. Workplace Discrimination

Age, race, gender, and even marital status biases can influence decisions about who is retrained or promoted. Older employees are often perceived as less adaptable to a younger team culture, while women with children and employees with disabilities may face systemic barriers. As a result, qualified employees may be overlooked for upskilling opportunities, further deepening the shortage of developers.

4. Legal and Logistical Challenges

Location and legal constraints also play a role. For instance, companies operating in the EU must follow GDPR rules, which limit the transfer of sensitive data outside the region. This can reduce opportunities for remote work or collaboration across borders, making it harder to deploy retrained employees. In some cases, employers may even have to let people go if legal requirements around staff location change.

Major Hiring Challenges in Tech

Amid the global talent crisis, HR and recruiting teams often feel like they’re racing against the clock, trying to find a needle in a haystack. Here are some of the main roadblocks that make filling positions so tricky:

1. Planning Horizon

One of today’s biggest hiring challenges in tech is the shift from long-term hiring strategies to agile talent rotation. What once worked—yearly staff planning—now slows growth. Today you may urgently need enterprise Java developers, and tomorrow you’re short on machine learning engineers. The planning horizon has shrunk from years to months, and keeping rare specialists on payroll is costly and inefficient. Freelancers may help in the short term, but they often lack consistency and reliability. Partnering with an outstaffing company may be a better way: they assemble the right team within weeks, ensure continuous upskilling, provide work-life balance through smart processes, and foster strong cross-team collaboration. Developers focus on coding, QA secures product quality, and DevOps engineers maintain solid infrastructure—so you get high-performing teams without the overhead.

2. Miscommunication in Hiring

HR teams don’t always catch the finer details of technical requirements, which means great specialists sometimes don’t even make it to the interview stage. On the other side, many highly skilled candidates struggle to “sell themselves” in a resume or cover letter. AI tools can speed up the first screening, but only if they’re set up wisely—a CV might miss a specific buzzword while clearly showing the right experience through related skills. And sometimes AI resume scanners act like dating apps—swiping left on perfectly qualified candidates with 7+ years of experience just because it exceeds the 3–6 year range. To avoid such a situation, it is wise to involve real technical experts who work alongside recruiters, so the best talent is spotted quickly and engaged effectively.

3. Hunting for a Mythical Specialist

Everyone’s chasing unicorns—the “full-stack wizard” who codes like a pro, designs slick UIs, runs DevOps pipelines, and can somehow speak fluent business with every stakeholder. Sounds great, right? But here’s the catch: unicorns are rare, expensive, and usually get scooped up by the next shiny startup. Build your team around them, and you risk a never-ending hire–fire cycle driven by short-term pressure. The smarter move is upskilling strong engineers who can grow with your product over the next 3–5 years. A professional outstaffing company can do both—finding rare experts when you truly need them and breaking job requirements into realistic roles without stretching your budget. After all, unicorns don’t come cheap… and they definitely don’t scale.

4. Candidate Location

The pandemic showed that remote work can be highly effective, but finding the right developer isn’t always simple—especially when they’re in a different city or even country from your business. Legal requirements, payroll rules, and taxes vary, and your HR team may not fully understand the laws where the candidate is based. Likewise, the job seeker may not be familiar with your local payment and tax practices. These gaps are a common source of delays or breakdowns in hiring negotiations. That’s why working with an outsourcing partner can be so beneficial. 

For example, at Timspark, we provide flexible, agile teams that scale based on your needs—delivering the right talent, in the right location, without legal headaches. While our development centers are geographically diverse, we primarily focus on EU/UK-based specialists, which ensures full GDPR compliance, clear legal frameworks, and smooth payroll.

Trends in Tech Employment

The future of the IT job market looks anything but boring. A survey conducted by the World Economic Forum estimated that around 78 million new positions would be created by 2030. The fastest-growing opportunities are for AI/ML, big data, and cybersecurity professionals, putting these roles firmly in the spotlight of today’s high-demand technology sector. [5]

But the picture isn’t the same everywhere — regional dynamics are shaping the demand for tech talent in different ways. In the US, for example, the market for IT professionals is set to soar. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects IT occupations will grow much faster than average through 2034, with roughly 317,700 openings each year. This will be driven not only by new roles but also by the need to replace retiring workers [6].

Across Europe, the picture is similar, but the urgency is even greater. The EU had around 10 million ICT specialists in 2024, yet Brussels aims to double that number to 20 million by 2030. [7] This signals a massive wave of hiring and reskilling in the coming years. The challenge? Over half of EU companies that tried to recruit ICT talent in 2023 reported difficulties filling roles — a stark indicator of a widening tech talent gap. [8]

Meanwhile, Israel’s IT ecosystem shows remarkable resilience. [9] According to Greenberg Traurig, the Israeli AI market is projected to reach $4.6 billion by 2030, fueled by applications in healthcare, cybersecurity, and fintech. Strong government initiatives and a skilled workforce are helping the country maintain its position as a global leader in AI innovation. [10]

Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) remains a hot spot for nearshoring. Projects from Western Europe and the US are pouring into Poland, Romania, and neighboring countries, creating a strong need for a wide range of software developers. Beyond AI roles, in a world where software ages fast and systems are becoming more complex with many moving parts, reverse engineering experts and DataOps specialists are in higher demand than ever. With competition for top tech talent heating up, salaries are only going to keep climbing.

Understanding AI Talent Shortage

Although the talent gap affects nearly every field, vacancies in artificial intelligence stand out as among the most exciting yet hardest to fill. Bain & Company reports that AI job openings have been growing at about 21% per year since 2019. Yet, almost half of business leaders say their projects are stuck in slow motion simply because they don’t have the right people on board. [11]

Why is this happening? Just like we saw with cybersecurity professionals, the boom in artificial intelligence came fast — much faster than universities or training programs could adapt. By the time a new course is designed, the technology has already moved on. At the same time, many newcomers in AI focus mainly on prompt engineering or reusing pre-built tools. While that can be useful, it’s not the same as designing scalable, production-ready systems that can handle real-world demands. Even the tech stack creates challenges: many projects still rely heavily on Python, which, while popular and easy to use, consumes far more energy for large-scale AI tasks than languages like C++. [12]

What team do you usually need for an AI-based project? 

• Cloud architects lay the foundation with scalable infrastructure. 
• LLMOps engineers ensure that large language models function effectively in production. 
• DataOps specialists build and maintain the pipelines that collect, clean, and organize raw data, ensuring it is reliable and high-quality. 
• Data scientist hiring ensures that your team has experts who can analyze the data, build predictive or prescriptive models, and create actionable insights to guide decisions. 
• At the heart of it all are machine learning engineers — the specialists who take models from prototypes to production-ready systems, designing, training, testing, and deploying them so artificial intelligence delivers real value. 

Additionally, you may involve Splunk engineers to track massive streams of operational data so nothing critical gets lost.

Staffing a full AI project team can sound complicated. For small or medium-sized businesses, keeping all these specialists on board while also providing continuous skill development can be nearly impossible. That’s where outstaffing companies come in: with access to a large pool of specialists, they can help fill the gaps caused by the AI talent shortage.

Your Shortcut to Top IT Talent

Excited about the potential of IT but want a smoother path to success? Partnering with a reliable outsourcing team can make your journey easier. Timspark has a huge pool of specialists across multiple regions, especially in the EU and UK, with top-notch AI expertise, strong cybersecurity skills, and experienced DevOps engineers to help you scale fast without hiring headaches.

We keep things transparent—clients can reach out anytime with questions about developers. Our specialists constantly upgrade their qualifications, each has a dedicated Tech Lead for guidance, and our CTO oversees everyone’s expertise. We provide tailored profiles, giving you just 2–3 handpicked developers for your needs after extra interview layers—no CV overload.

Timspark also offers flexible rates, a trial period with no notice required for the first month, and specialist replacements if needed. We carefully monitor where developers are working from to ensure compliance and security. Don’t let skill gaps slow you down—contact us and future-proof your tech team today.

References

1. Global Talent Shortage 2025. ManpowerGroup, 2025.
2. Higher Education. National Cyber Security Centre, 2025.
3. Upskilling vs hiring? There’s a clear winner on cost. theHRDIRECTOR, 2022 
4. The Real Costs Of Employee Turnover In 2025. Applauz, 2025. 
5. The Future of Jobs Report 2025. World Economic Forum, 2025. 
6. Computer and Information Technology Occupations. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2025.  
7. Digitalisation in Europe. Euristat, 2025. 
8. ICT specialists – statistics on hard-to-fill vacancies in enterprises. Eurostat, 2025. 
9. 2025 High-Tech Employment: Status Report. Israel Innovation Authority, 2025 
10. 5 Trends to Watch in 2025: AI and the Israeli Market. Greenberg Traurig, LLP., 2025. 
11. Widening talent gap threatens executives’ AI ambitions. Bain & Company, 2025. 
12. Green AI: Which Programming Language Consumes the Most? Roberto Verdecchia, Computer Scientist, TT Assistant Professor at UniFI.