Career Abandonment Intentions among Software Workers

Within the software development industry, human resources have been recognized as one of the most decisive and scarce resources. Today, the retention of skilled IT information technology personnel is a major issue for employers and recruiters as well, since IT career abandonment is a common practice and means not only the loss of personnel, knowledge, and skills, but also the loss of business opportunities. This article seeks to discover the main motivations young practitioners abandon the software career. To achieve this objective, two studies were conducted. The first study was qualitative performed through semistructured interviews and intended to discover the main variables affecting software career abandonment. The second study was quantitative, consisting of a Web-based survey developed from the output of the first study and administered to a sample of 148 IT practitioners. Results show that work-related, psychological, and emotional variable are the most relevant group of variables explaining IT career abandonment. More specifically, the three most important variables that motivate employees to abandon the career are effort-reward imbalance, perceived workload, and emotional exhaustion. In contrast, variables such as politics and infighting, uncool work, and insufficient resources influence to a lesser extent the decision to leave the career. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

[1]  Norman E. Gibbs,et al.  A Mature Profession of Software Engineering. , 1996 .

[2]  Christina Ling-Hsing Chang,et al.  The study of the turnover of MIS professionals - The gap between Taiwanese and US societies , 2010, Int. J. Inf. Manag..

[3]  Soon Ang,et al.  Identifying the prototypical career paths of IT professionals: a sequence and cluster analysis , 2005, SIGMIS CPR '05.

[4]  H. Kaiser.  An index of factorial simplicity , 1974 .

[5]  David E. Avison,et al.  The paradox of information systems: strategic value and low status , 1999, J. Strateg. Inf. Syst..

[6]  P. Drucker.  Post-Capitalist Society , 1993 .

[7]  Michael R. Wade,et al.  The Resource-Based View and Information Systems Research: Review, Extension, and Suggestions for Future Research , 2004, MIS Q..

[8]  Edmundo Tovar Caro,et al.  The IT Crowd: Are We Stereotypes? , 2008, IT Professional.

[9]  Rory V. O'Connor,et al.  Development of a team measure for tacit knowledge in software development teams , 2009, J. Syst. Softw..

[10]  Marko Elovainio,et al.  Job strain and leisure-time physical activity in female and male public sector employees. , 2005, Preventive medicine.

[11]  Deborah J. Armstrong,et al.  Factors impacting the perceived organizational support of IT employees , 2008, Inf. Manag..

[12]  Zahir Irani,et al.  Coping and psychological adjustment among information technology personnel , 2007, Ind. Manag. Data Syst..

[13]  Ruth C. King,et al.  What causes stress in information system professionals? , 2004, CACM.

[14]  Jacob Cohen,et al.  Weighted kappa: Nominal scale agreement provision for scaled disagreement or partial credit. , 1968 .

[15]  Edmundo Tovar Caro,et al.  Identifying Technical Competences of IT Professionals: The Case of Software Engineers , 2010, Int. J. Hum. Cap. Inf. Technol. Prof..

[16]  Mariko Nishikitani,et al.  Relationships between Effort‐Reward Imbalance, Over‐Commitment, and Fatigue in Japanese Information‐Technology Workers , 2006, Journal of occupational health.

[17]  Joey F. George,et al.  IT Road Warriors: Balancing Work--Family Conflict, Job Autonomy, and Work Overload to Mitigate Turnover Intentions , 2007, MIS Q..

[18]  Christian Korunka,et al.  Quality of working life and turnover intention in information technology work , 2008 .

[19]  Aurora Vizcaíno,et al.  Tool to facilitate appropriate interaction in global software development , 2011, IET Softw..

[20]  Gilbert A. Churchill.  A Paradigm for Developing Better Measures of Marketing Constructs , 1979 .

[21]  P. Cappelli.  Why is it so hard to find information technology workers , 2001 .

[22]  J. T. M. van Der Zee,et al.  Alignment Is Not Enough: Integrating Business and Information Technology Management with the Balanced Business Scorecard , 1999, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[23]  Rudy Hirschheim,et al.  Houston, we’ve had a problem…… offshoring, IS employment and the IS discipline: perception is not reality , 2010, J. Inf. Technol..

[24]  Gary Blau,et al.  The measurement and prediction of career commitment , 1985 .

[25]  Jacob Cohen.  A Coefficient of Agreement for Nominal Scales , 1960 .

[26]  Anandhi S. Bharadwaj,et al.  A Resource-Based Perspective on Information Technology Capability and Firm Performance: An Empirical Investigation , 2000, MIS Q..

[27]  Tom DeMarco,et al.  Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams , 1987 .

[28]  Roger S. Pressman,et al.  Software Engineering: A Practitioner's Approach , 1982 .

[29]  Jen-Ruei Fu,et al.  Understanding career commitment of IT professionals: Perspectives of push-pull-mooring framework and investment model , 2011, Int. J. Inf. Manag..

[30]  Peter Hoonakker,et al.  Evaluating causes and consequences of turnover intention among IT workers: the development of a questionnaire survey , 2006, Behav. Inf. Technol..

[31]  Sharan Kaur,et al.  The Relationship between Organizational Commitment and Intention to Quit: The Malaysian Companies Perspectives , 2010 .

[32]  Bill C. Hardgrave,et al.  Emotional Dissonance and the Information Technology Professional , 2008, MIS Q..

[33]  J. Nunnally.  Psychometric Theory (2nd ed), New York: McGraw-Hill. , 1978 .

[34]  David C. Chou,et al.  Innovation outsourcing: Risks and quality issues , 2011, Comput. Stand. Interfaces.

[35]  Graham Leslie Bradley,et al.  Job tenure as a moderator of stressor–strain relations: A comparison of experienced and new-start teachers , 2007 .

[36]  Soon Ang,et al.  Turnover of Information Technology Professionals: A Narrative Review, Meta-Analytic Structural Equation Modeling, and Model Development , 2007, MIS Q..

[37]  T. Chandola,et al.  The measurement of effort-reward imbalance at work: European comparisons. , 2004, Social science & medicine.

[38]  J. Grzywacz,et al.  Demography , 1986, Prehistoric Fisherfolk of Oman: The Neolithic Village of Ras Al-Hamra RH-5.

[39]  Sanjay Misra,et al.  Culture dimensions in software development industry: The effects of mentoring , 2011 .

[40]  Jing Quan,et al.  IT certifications, outsourcing and information systems personnel turnover , 2010, Inf. Technol. People.

[41]  Kenneth L. Kraemer,et al.  Executives’ Perceptions of the Business Value of Information Technology: A Process-Oriented Approach , 2000, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[42]  Biswajit Mahanty,et al.  Manpower shortage crisis in Indian information technology industry , 2007, Int. J. Technol. Manag..

[43]  R C King,et al.  The moderating effect of organizational commitment on burnout in information systems professionals , 1997 .

[44]  Rolph E. Anderson,et al.  Multivariate Data Analysis with Readings , 1979 .

[45]  Peter E.D. Love,et al.  Influence of job demands, job control and social support on information systems professionals' psychological well‐being , 2007 .

[46]  Ritu Agarwal,et al.  Enduring practices for managing IT professionals , 2002, CACM.

[47]  J. Siegrist.  Adverse health effects of high-effort/low-reward conditions. , 1996, Journal of occupational health psychology.

[48]  Irit Hadar,et al.  Why and how can human-related measures support software development processes? , 2008, J. Syst. Softw..

[49]  Macarena López-Fernández,et al.  Human Resource Management on Social Capital , 2010, Int. J. Hum. Cap. Inf. Technol. Prof..

[50]  R. Sitgreaves.  Psychometric theory (2nd ed.). , 1979 .

[51]  Steven Westlund,et al.  Leading Techies: Assessing Project Leadership Styles Most Significantly Related to Software Developer Job Satisfaction , 2011, Int. J. Hum. Cap. Inf. Technol. Prof..

[52]  Christina Ling-hsing Chang.  Ethical Values of IT Professionals in Chinese Cultural Societies , 2009 .

[53]  Elizabeth Chambers,et al.  The war for talent , 2001, Tijdschrift voor HRM.

[54]  M. Wade,et al.  Review: the resource-based view and information systems research: review, extension, and suggestions for future research , 2004 .

[55]  Mayuram S. Krishnan,et al.  Human Capital and Institutional Effects in the Compensation of Information Technology Professionals in the United States , 2008, Manag. Sci..

[56]  Hossein Saiedian,et al.  Software Engineering Programs: Dispelling the Myths and Misconceptions , 2002, IEEE Softw..

[57]  Gwo-Guang Lee,et al.  Influence of CIO'S knowledge-sharing behavior on the quality of the IS/IT strategic planning (ISSP) process in Taiwan , 2011 .

[58]  Edmundo Tovar Caro,et al.  IT Professionals' Competences: High School Students' Views , 2009, J. Inf. Technol. Educ..

[59]  Jo Ellen Moore,et al.  How to turn around `turnover culture' in IT , 2002, CACM.

[60]  R. Zmud.  An Examination of Push-Pull Theory Applied to Process Innovation in Knowledge Work , 1984 .

[61]  Gary Klein,et al.  Perceived career incentives and intent to leave , 2003, Inf. Manag..

[62]  Steve McConnell,et al.  Professional Software Development: Shorter Schedules, Higher Quality Products, More Successful Projects, Enhanced Careers , 2003 .

[63]  Jo Ellen Moore,et al.  One Road to Turnover: An Examination of Work Exhaustion in Technology Professionals , 2000, MIS Q..

[64]  Ricardo Colomo Palacios,et al.  An Empirical Analysis of the Relationship Between IT Training Sources and IT Value , 2010, Inf. Syst. Manag..

[65]  Aybüke Aurum,et al.  Antecedents to IT personnel's intentions to leave: A systematic literature review , 2011, J. Syst. Softw..

[66]  Guy Paré,et al.  The Influence of High-Involvement Human Resources Practices, Procedural Justice, Organizational Commitment, and Citizenship Behaviors on Information Technology Professionals' Turnover Intentions , 2007 .

[67]  Younghwa Lee,et al.  The Competitiveness of the Information Systems Major: An Analytic Hierarchy Process , 2006, J. Inf. Syst. Educ..

[68]  Ricardo Colomo Palacios,et al.  Software product evolution for Intellectual Capital Management: The case of Meta4 PeopleNet , 2011, Int. J. Inf. Manag..

[69]  Jacqueline Day,et al.  Strangers on the train: The relationship of the IT department with the rest of the business , 2007, Inf. Technol. People.