It's good to talk, or so the saying goes. So, why aren't candidates for IT jobs talking to their recruiters, and vice versa? Recent survey statistics suggest that the two factions aren't on the same page when it comes to job requirements -- and that it is creating a skills gap.

The data, which came from a survey of 1560 IT professionals and 38 recruiters by CWJobs.co.uk, found a marked lack of communication between recruiters and candidates. That's going to hurt everyone, including the clients, in the long run.

The problem, according to recruiters, is that job candidates don't have the skills that they need. But job candidates feel that the recruiters are not very good at explaining what they want. 59.6% of candidates said that employers are not clear enough about the skills they expect when recruiting for technology roles. And, surprise surprise, 65.8% of recruiters felt that candidates are not clear enough about the skills they have when they apply to jobs.

This is leading to a mismatch in skills. Six out of 10 employers want C# skills, according to the survey, but 74% of technology professionals said that it wasn't an integral skill in the current market. 84.5% of them also said that ASP.NET wasn't an important requirement, and yet half of all recruiters want it.

So, in addition to some better communication skills, there clearly needs to be some retraining. IT professionals say that they need to retrain in SQL, .NET, Java, Oracle, and Linux. Recruiters said that SQL, .NET, and Java will be important skills over the next one to two years, in addition to C#, and PHP (which still didn't feature highly on job candidates' lists).

One interesting snippet is that recruiters cited soft skills such as business acumen and understanding user requirements as an important skill in the future. Perhaps this would also enable job candidates to communicate their skill sets more effectively. But recruiters need to do the same, and learn how to articulate what they want.

This is something we clearly need to fix. This IT skills gap has arrived just at the point when the economy is beginning to recover (if the Bank of England is to be believed). Companies are starting to invest in new projects, and will need the technical expertise to implement them. The jobs are apparently waiting to be filled, but the whole situation is like a bad date; although each party is looking for someone else to be with, they can't seem to hit it off, because they are not on the same wavelength.

Over the past three months, we've noticed a desire for job security among candidates with an influx of IT staff looking to work in SMEs. Over 70% of IT placements made by Computer People in the past three months have gone to Britain's small businesses. As the economic downturn deepens, it seems that  an increasing number of  IT staff are turning to SMEs to provide them with a different career path and new opportunities.

Though the IT industry isn't immune from the effects of the economic downturn, one thing we are seeing is that it is unlocking talent that would previously have been unavailable for firms at a certain level to reach. Much as we saw happening in the City at the tail end of last year, high-flying professionals are now reconsidering careers with bigger firms, and are instead considering the perceived security of SMEs.

With 13.5 million people working within small businesses in the UK, the phrase' good things come in small packages' is becoming more and more applicable. IT professionals in particular are keen for a greater level of responsibility, ownership and variety in their day-to-day job, something they believe the SME market can offer them.

Technology based SMEs have proven to be extremely attractive to candidates keen to take their career to the next level. SMEs offer professionals a chance to make their voice heard and see the benefits to the business first hand.

With businesses keeping an extremely close eye on all spending, departments are being asked to demonstrate tangible benefits from all of their investment. Analysts are required to monitor and report against credit risk, marketing campaigns and customer insight and loyalty among others. With this data they extract, businesses are able to understand their customers and clients in order to match their needs with more targeted investment.

Sectors such as financial, marketing, retail and utilities invest heavily in analytics, but in our experience, almost every sector can benefit from such insight.

For people looking to change careers within the IT sector, or for those entering the workplace after university, an analytics qualification can be a very desirable skill to acquire. The sector has been extremely buoyant and shows little sign of slowing down. Furthermore, the skills are extremely transferable and can allow for easy transition to working in many other sectors.

Those coming from a numerical background in particular, will find the transition to analytical work very natural. However, for anyone with a basic IT skill set, the addition of an analytical qualification can be a very wise investment which, in the long-term, can lead to a varied and rewarding career working within a broad range of opportunities.