Are you worried about losing your most talented tech team members? BCS Organisational Membership can help you develop, challenge, retain and excite employees.
Has the great resignation swept through your organisation yet? If you’re not sure, here’s how to tell: you’re facing a gaping hole in your team and the near-impossible task of replacing exceptional employees who once brought valuable skillsets to your business. If this describes you right now then yes, you’ve been hit by the wave. And you’re not alone.
Coined – and ingeniously prophesied – back in 2019 by psychologist Anthony Klotz, the great resignation really got going in April 2021. In the three months following, 11.5 million Americans voluntarily quit their jobs (US Bureau of Labor Statistics). A further 4 million quit the next month, and 4.3 million the month after that. Since its initial surge in the US, the wave has been sweeping around the world, no continent or sector immune to the unprecedented rates of resignation it leaves in its wake.
But why? Analysts have provided various explanations for the phenomenon, generally arising from the seismic shift in working practices triggered by the pandemic and ranging from wage stagnation to COVID safety concerns. Professor Klotz has recognised four key pandemic trends which helped bring his prediction to life. These are:
- The backlog of unhappy workers who held off from quitting while times were so uncertain
- Increased levels of burnout
- People taking the opportunity to re-evaluate their lives in what Klotz termed ‘pandemic epiphanies’
- Employers implementing new working schedules for their staff.
What does it all mean for IT leaders?
While we may not be able to pinpoint the cause of the great resignation, we know for sure it’s been throwing down incredible challenges for business leaders, and none more so than in the tech industry. Recent Gartner research suggested that 31% of IT workers had been actively seeking a new role in the third quarter of 2021, the highest rate out of all the industry functions surveyed.
The IT skills gap was a well-documented concern long before we’d even heard of the word COVID. Exacerbated by these high resignation rates – not to mention the heightened reliance on tech now that hybrid working is our ‘new normal’ – the demand on already stretched IT departments is unsustainable for many organisations. In these fluid times, employers need help wherever they can find it. Fortunately for the tech industry, support is on hand from BCS.
Prevention is better than cure
If you’re still holding on to your top employees, you’ll be pleased to know there are preventative measures you can implement now with the support of your professional body to help you avoid any unplanned team attrition. They come in the shape of BCS Organisational Membership.
There’s more good news – if you’ve already experienced the mass exodus of your top tech people, BCS Organisational Membership will help you to attract equally talented individuals to fill their shoes.
How does Organisational Membership help?
BCS Organisational Membership gives you the opportunity to align your business with the Chartered Institute for IT and provide everyone in your tech team with membership of their professional body.
They gain access to a veritable wealth of career development and recognition tools, mentoring, networking opportunities and knowledge resources keeping them engaged, connected and switched on to the latest thinking in tech.
You cement your reputation as an employer of excellence, committed to professionalism in IT and to supporting the development of your tech workforce.
It's all in the code
The BCS Code of Conduct enables you to make this commitment formal. The code outlines the standards and ethics we observe as responsible practitioners and every member signs up to it when they join.
It’s a reliable way for you and your staff to call out your professional and ethical credibility and your pledge to working in the best interest of society. Not only are your top employees now confident and happy they’re working in an organisation that takes its responsibilities seriously, it also prompts your team to think about the part they play in shaping today’s digital society.
This means that, for any employees undergoing a pandemic epiphany, membership offers them clarity around the wider impact of their role in IT – their ‘greater purpose’ if you like. They get to stick their head above the parapet and understand more about the industry and their place in it.
A greater mission
Membership is at the heart of the BCS mission to build a competent, accountable and ethical technology profession. Every member plays their part. In return, BCS supports and promotes their continuing professional development (CPD) so they can fulfil not only their own potential but the potential of the evolving tech profession.
When your team comes on board, they’ll discover that the CPD support from BCS comes in many forms, from webinars and podcasts to personal assessments, business and soft skills e-learning. There’s also a year-long calendar of events and conferences. Our member-only interactive CPD events provide an immersive CPD experience for your staff and a discussion forum on key themes like sustainability and ethical AI. Staff will even receive digital badges in recognition of their learning.
The CPD hub is home to resources and guidance for practitioners at every career stage. Whatever their interests, however they prefer to learn, your digital professionals will see they have all the career development support they need in-house, and the opportunity to grow personally and professionally in their role. Why go elsewhere?
Align with the global industry
CPD activity at BCS is aligned with the global IT skills competency framework, SFIAplus, as is membership itself. There are team capability development solutions you can also implement based around the framework for auditing, planning and accelerating career pathways for your whole team.
Membership will introduce your employees to the international BCS community, a thriving 60,000 strong network, where they can connect professionally and socially with like minds, find rewarding mentoring opportunities (either as mentor or mentee), debate the latest tech trends and methodologies. They can also learn from the experience and acumen of practitioners and leaders across the globe.
Your team will never have to look far beyond the BCS ecosystem for rewarding connections and valuable discussion with professionals across many disciplines. And since every member shares a passion for tech and a commitment to professional standards, you know they’ll be in good company.
Calling out the heroes
Another defining feature of your employees’ BCS experience is the boost to their professional recognition. They’re keeping their knowledge and skills up to date, they’ve acknowledged their ethical and social responsibilities – they’re in the best professional shape of their lives. BCS membership will help them shout about it.
For you
Be part of something bigger, join BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT.
Members enjoy letters after their name signalling that they’re a part of their professional body, responsible practitioners signed up to a code of conduct. They can then go a step further by becoming professionally registered; BCS awards a range of registrations including RITTech, FEDIP, and Chartered IT Professional (CITP) status representing the pinnacle of IT competence.
Each registration offers independent validation of your employees’ skills and experience and industrywide recognition with a place on a public register. It’s an important and fulfilling milestone for any tech practitioner. There’s registration at every level so everyone in the team will find a standard they can achieve or aspire to.
Your talented workers might raise their profile further by speaking at a BCS event or webinar. If they prefer the written word, they could contribute their expertise in an article or blog for our website or membership magazine, ITNOW. It’s a great way to develop their professional credentials – and their communication skills.
Presented with such a diverse spectrum of development opportunities, even the most ambitious of your star players will be sticking around, engaged, enriched and rewarded in their role.
Remember those pandemic epiphanies...
For staff who took time during the pandemic to re-evaluate their work and the bigger picture, they’ll be reassured to know that BCS does this too through their policy work. Membership connects your staff with the wider IT landscape, exposing them to the tech challenges facing the profession today, and the innovation that promises the solutions to our planetary problems.
Your team can develop their outlook and position on important topics like cyber security, net zero, digital healthcare, computing education, algorithm governance. They’ll get to have their say on these issues and the future direction of the profession – whether that’s by taking part in BCS surveys and research, joining the conversation at one of our Policy Jams, or contributing views to our government consultations.
It’s our members who are the voice of BCS and they’re listened to by government, policymakers and regulatory bodies.
After a more ‘traditional’ set of benefits?
It’ll come as no surprise that organisations in every sector are beefing up the benefits they offer to their staff to help them hold on to their key people, from private healthcare and wellbeing support to discounts on travel and training courses, even sleep pods for the office at the more innovative end of the scale.
While BCS membership is so much more than a ‘staff perk’, you’ll be pleased to hear it does provide your team with similar discounts on a wide range of services, saving you having to negotiate elsewhere. This includes discounts on private healthcare and training courses, also on top-brand hardware and software, indemnity insurance and more. (Sorry though, no sleep pods.)
Don’t resign yourself to the trend
The labour market is transforming. The workplace is evolving every day, while the great resignation is lapping at your door threatening the very dynamic of your talented IT team. But dig deeper under this shifting landscape and you’ll find the fundamentals of employee satisfaction are much the same as they’ve ever been. People want to feel valued and invested in. They want the opportunity to develop their skills and understanding. They want to be recognised and rewarded for doing a good job and to know that their work is relevant.
Through a partnership with BCS your staff get to check all these boxes, increasing your likelihood of holding on to your tech talent and sailing a smooth course around the great resignation wave. Your BCS partnership will position you as a progressive organisation with a culture of continuous learning that challenges and motivates its brightest stars. When it comes to recruitment, it could be the differentiator that pushes your organisation to the top of a candidate’s wish list. But it won’t come to that. After all, why would anyone want to resign from your team?
Want to know more about retaining your tech talent with BCS? Get in touch via this short form and we’ll get talking.
