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Despite a decade of hiring, there are still significant skills gaps evident in the U.S. labor market. A recent report from the U.S. Chamber identified the most impacted industries, and found that there are significant gaps across the financial services and professional and business services industries.
Both of these sectors have a plethora of open roles, but not enough qualified candidates to fill them.
“The industries with lower-than-average unemployment rates have fewer experienced candidates to choose from when filling their job openings,” the report says. “This situation leads to heightened competition among businesses in these industries as they vie for the limited pool of available talent.
5 cybersecurity jobs to apply for now
- Cyber Training Specialist, Senior, Booz Allen, Fort Meade ($84,600 – $193,000)
- Cyber Triage Analyst, Booz Allen, Stafford ($60,400 – $137,000)
- Cyber Threat Analyst (DCO), Alaka`ina Foundation Family of Companies, Honolulu
- Director Technology & Cyber Risk, Comerica, Farmington Hills
- Cyber Security Analyst, Brooksource, Indianapolis
One area that is particularly impacted is cybersecurity. A new report from CyberSeek found that there are only enough workers to fill 83% of available jobs. While there are 1.25 million workers in cybersecurity roles nationwide, around 265,000 additional workers are needed to fill current staffing requirements.
“After the pandemic-fueled IT hiring spree, cybersecurity job demand has stabilized close to pre-pandemic levels,” says Will Markow, vice president of applied research at Lightcast.
There are a number of reasons why this is happening, and include the slew of layoffs and belt-tightening that has been experienced right across the tech industry over the past two years.
Additionally, the pandemic fueled the accelerated adoption of web-based services, and with more and more daily activities like banking, food delivery and shopping happening online, there comes a greater need for security.
Scams are also on the rise. The Better Business Bureau (BBB) has found that the average amount lost by victims of investment scams rose from $1,000 in 2021 to almost $6,000 this year.
A new Consumer Security and Financial Crime Report from Revolut points to Meta platforms as the biggest source of all scams (62%) in the first half of 2024. Revolut identified that Facebook had fraud volumes (39%) which were more than double that of WhatsApp (18%).
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is also widening the skills gap for cybersecurity workers. CyberSeek’s report has found that over the past year, cybersecurity job postings with some requirements for AI skills have increased from 6.3% to 7.3%.
Developing cybersecurity talent
“Narrowing the supply-and-demand gap for cybersecurity talent is a significant challenge and a promising opportunity,” says Amy Kardel, vice president, strategy and market development, academic at CompTIA.
“It requires changes in mindset and approach; understanding that there are many pathways to employment; seeking out job candidates who come to the workforce via alternate routes; and a stronger focus on retraining and upskilling of current employees.”
Ultimately, more skilled workers need to be developed. According to Rodney Petersen, director of NICE at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, new ways of developing that talent need to be actioned outside of a traditional college route.
“The workforce gap underscores why we promote alternative pathways to careers in cybersecurity during Cybersecurity Career Week to broaden participation from individuals with diverse backgrounds and experiences.
“Closing that gap will require diversified approaches and investments, including education, training, reskilling and upskilling, and Registered Apprenticeships.”
The opportunities are there for talented tech workers at all levels. The report found that entry-level cybercrime analyst roles have seen a 23% increase in job postings from Q2 to Q3 of this year. Mid-level incident and intrusion analyst jobs are up 9.6%, with jobs for advanced level cybersecurity engineers showing an increase of 10.2%.