Stories by Sharon Florentine

Recent research from BambooHR shows that breaks, small talk and socializing in the workplace can actually help bolster productivity and employee engagement.

2015 was another great year for IT professionals thanks to low unemployment rates, more hiring and increased wages. For CIO readers, training, education, professional development, certifications and corporate culture topped the list of things that mattered most. Here are the 10 most popular IT careers stories of 2015.

In a world of bland resumes, color, graphics and creative formatting will get you noticed. But how much is too much? Award-winning resume writer and career coach Donald Burns helps one client successfully add personality in this month's makeover.

As older IT professionals age out of the workforce, companies need to ensure they have the right knowledge and skills to keep their legacy tech running smoothly.

Hiring back people who left your organization is never an easy decision, but more companies are saying yes to the right former workers. Find out why.

Firms like Deloitte and Accenture are making headlines with their decision to eliminate yearly performance reviews for their workforces. But in the absence of a yearly review, what will fill the gap?

Big data is helping managers more effectively hire and retain top talent, reduce turnover, and improve diversity in the workplace.

If your organization has adopted an agile methodology and you're frustrated by failure, it's time for a long, hard look in the mirror: Perhaps the problem isn't agile. The problem is your management style. How can you help teams succeed? First, you have to get out of their way, says Selena Delesie, founder and principal at Delesie Solutions, an agile coaching, consulting and training firm, in a workshop held at Agile Alliance 2015 last week in Washington, D.C.

It seems the debate about the IT skills gap has reached a consensus -- both IT leaders and IT workers believe the IT skills gap exists and that it negatively impacts IT operations. But debate remains about the root causes of the skills gap and how best to address them, according to a recent IT Skills Gap Survey released by staffing solutions, IT talent management expertise and IT services provider TEKsystems.

Benefits are an important part of any IT worker's compensation package, and while the 2015 Computerworld IT Salary Survey revealed that base salaries have risen over the last year, more and more organizations have eliminated at least some benefits from their compensation packages.

"We've always been reluctant to publish numbers about the diversity of our workforce at Google. We now realize we were wrong, and that it's time to be candid about the issues."

How long would you stay at a job, or in a career field, in which --regardless of your passion for the work and your talent, skills and achievements -- you were consistently bombarded with both overt and subliminal messages that you just did not belong?

The good news is that more businesses are planning to boost their IT hiring in 2015. The bad news? Many are struggling to find talent to fill vacant or newly created roles, especially for software developers and data analytics pros, according to a recent survey from HackerRank, which matches IT talent with hiring companies using custom coding challenges.

The class of 2015 has done its homework. According to research from the Accenture Strategy 2015 U.S. College Graduate Employment Study, new grads have responded to the growing need for STEM degrees. They're thinking about the potential for a long-term career before choosing their major. They're pursuing internships and ongoing training opportunities. And, for the most part, colleges are successfully preparing them for jobs and careers and are helping them look for work.

Finding talent with the right skillset for your company is not nearly as difficult as finding the right personality fit. As important as skills and technical know-how are, team chemistry is just as important - if not more so. One mismatch can cause a negative ripple throughout the organization -- or worse, it could negatively impact relationships with customers and, eventually, the bottom line.