After rating their level of proficiency for the skills in the survey, respondents were asked if they needed training in these same skills in order to do their jobs. If they said yes, then they were asked to select the level of training needed. The choices were none, basic, intermediate, and advanced.

As with the proficiency rating scores, several variables influence training demand. One of them is grade level. More senior technology professionals often have basic proficiency in key skills and need higher level training to advance their capabilities. Conversely, managers may not need highly technical training but instead need training that imparts conceptual knowledge about various topics. Job specialty has an influence as well. Those who specialize in a given area need higher level training in certain skills. At the same time, people in any one specialty may need basic knowledge about skills in other specialties in order to understand how the work they do fits with work done by others. In addition, training demand can vary according to the history, size, and mission of an individual’s organization. For all these reasons, the size and distribution of training demand varies considerably from one skill, or organization, or job type to another.

Table 7 illustrates the general training demand data for individual skills. It shows the ten technical skills with the highest training demand as measured by the total number of employees who say they need training at any level (Table E6 in Appendix E presents similar data for all skills in the survey listed in alphabetical order).

Table 7. Top ten technical skills by level of training demand

Skill	N*	None	Basic	Intermediate	Advanced	Percent who need training at any level
System security applications	2,696	1,418 (53%)	445 (17%)	546 (20%)	287 (11%)	47%
Website design & development	2,708	1435 (53%)	440 (16%)	503 (19%)	330 (12%)	47 %
Disaster recovery & planning	2,681	1,460 (55%)	411 (15%)	508 (19%)	302 (11%)	46 %
Intrusion detection	2,687	1,467 (55%)	487 (18%)	471 (18%)	262 (10%)	45%
Website management	2,678	1469 (55%)	468 (18%)	447 (17%)	294 (11%)	45%
Identity management & directory services	2,651	1490 (56%)	448 (17%)	448 (17%)	265 (10%)	44%
Encryption	2,662	1506 (57%)	494 (19%)	428 (16%)	234 (9%)	43 %
Web/IP	2,665	1514 (57%)	370 (14%)	480 (18%)	301 (11%)	43 %
Web servers	2,643	1506 (57%)	501 (19%)	389 (15%)	247 (9%)	43 %
Network configuration	2,665	1532 (58%)	345 (13%)	478 (18%)	310 (12%)	43 %

* Row totals may not equal 100 percent due to rounding

The highest levels of training demand are concentrated in basic or immediate level training. For example, many employees want to know something about a specialized skill like encryption, but do not express a need for advanced training in the subject. For a newer technology like web servers, more employees requested basic training than intermediate or advanced. On the other hand, figures for many of the general management skills and IT management skills show that the majority of employees want advanced training and few want basic or intermediate levels. This is consistent with the generally higher levels of existing proficiency reported for management skills.