Fundamentals of information technology

¶ … Information Technology

Personal Skills for Computing Professionals

In the article Personal Skills for Computing Professionals, Dr. Luis Fernandez-Sanz convincingly states that for anyone to have a successful career in the Information technologies (IT) they must seek a balance of technical expertise and interpersonal competence. Citing his own research and studies from Spanish IT industry study Requirements for Employment in ICT (RENTIC), the author shows clearly that to progress from programming or purely technical roles in an organization to a CIO role takes mastery of interpersonal skills as well. The article also illustrates that the ability to influence outcomes in an organization through persuasive communication and the creation of alliances is critical. The article also makes the excellent point that for anyone to progress in their TI career they need to also excel at complexity management and the ability to be proactive and team-focused. The bottom line of this article is that for anyone to progress in their IT career they need to actively seek out interpersonal competencies and skills while keeping their technical expertise current.

Lessons Learned

This is an excellent article and needs to be read by everyone majoring in Information Technologies (IT)-related fields, from Management Information Systems (MIS) to Computer Science and Computer Engineering. The reason is that it uses empirically derived data to show the value of seeking mastery of social and group-based skills in addition to gaining expertise purely in technologies. This latter pursuit, the development of expertise and potentially world-leading knowledge in a specific area of IT is quite frankly worthless unless a person has the mastery of social and team-based skills to make use of it. This is allegorical to technical expertise being all the money in the world locked in a bank account yet the ATM machine to gain access to it requires mastery of social and team-building skills. All that wealth sits dormant, not being invested because it cannot be shared or accessed. It is unfortunately the case with many talented and brilliant engineers in IT. One other perspective emerges upon introspection of this article, and that is in the world of IT you get what you give. Perhaps that thought as the foundation, the catalyst of change to make interposal and team building skills required in IT, MIS and computer engineering programs is needed. The lack of these skills put a cap on salary and professional growth over the long-term in any IT career.