A number of major businesses have announced this week that they plan to increase hiring this holiday season as they anticipate greater demand in the wake of the economic recovery. According to the Associated Press, UPS is going to hire up to 95,000 workers, Kohl's will add 67,000 jobs, FedEx will bring on 50,000 new employees and Wal-Mart will hire 60,000 people. It's still very early so it's likely we'll see a number of other big-name organizations make similar announcements.
The question is, how many of these jobs will have tech-related responsibilities? That information isn't known at this time, and while many of these positions will be filled to meet demand in logistics or customer service — two areas of great need during the holiday season — technology, particularly information security, should be a high priority. Last year, Target suffered a massive security breach during the holiday shopping season. Retailers cannot afford to suffer a similar fate this year.
Of course, some retailers may not have the resources to hire employees specifically for tech purposes. Even if smaller organizations have to hire more help, they may only be able to invest in customer-facing needs, which means they may have to seek outside assistance for their customer information security initiatives. VARs and MSPs can help, but they too may need to increase hiring to meet the demands of the holiday season. VAR Staffing can help with this process by identifying and recruiting smart and talented IT security professionals to help VARs and MSPs meet the needs of their clients during the holiday season.
