A large number of businesses are looking abroad for IT staff as they try to match up the right skills with local business knowledge.
An international survey by Experis found that a quarter of businesses value workers from across the world for IT expertise to supplement local talent and knowledge.
It revealed that Development Solutions was the field affected most acutely by this trend, with 35 percent of businesses looking abroad for these skills.
When it came to the UK specifically, 32 percent of the businesses resourced internationally for Business Intelligence & Analytics skills.
Only 7 percent looked internationally for Information Security, however.
Geoff Smith, Managing Director, Experis Europe, said: "Achieving the right balance between local expertise and international flexibility is never a simple task. Modern IT teams are governed by fierce cost and time pressures which often forces them into creating diverse international teams to get the job done.
"New technology makes it far easier to manage and facilitate this, but there is still a need for long term planning that takes advantage of global talent pools, but keeps local knowledge at the core."
Commenting specifically on the UK findings, Smith said: "Despite a steady incline in the number of UK businesses looking for IT candidates over-seas, our research suggests that they are still able to address many of their resourcing needs locally."
Smith noted that this illustrated the calibre of UK-based candidates, but added that "businesses need to look ahead to the years to come, when demand will increasingly outpace supply. As IT moves from a cost centre, to more of a strategic function, this pressure on available talent resources will increase and the trend of sourcing workers from over-seas will likely accelerate at a faster pace."
The research surveyed 1078 senior managers.
