DYNAMICS OF THE IMPORTANCE OF IS/IT SKILLS

U.S. business executives and educators need to be continuously aware of the knowledge and skills required for IS/IT professionals to meet current and future technological trends. This paper attempts to investigate the dynamics of the importance of IS/IT skills from the perspective of 70 IS/IT managers using latent growth curve modeling. The overall results suggest that 1) the importance of most IS/IT skills is continually increasing over time, 2) that wireless communications and applications, mobile commerce applications and protocols, IS security, Web applications, services, and protocols, and data management are the top five rapidly growing skills; 3) that IS security, data management, project management and other business skills, Web applications, services, and protocols, and wireless communications and applications are expected to be the most important five skills in the future. Based on these results, implications and recommendations for IS/IT educators, researchers, and practitioners are provided.