Although St. Louis isn't considered a tech hotspot, Abby Cohen and Andrew Brimmer had no trouble finding IT workers to fill jobs at their health IT startup in the city. _500.png)
When Abby Cohen and Andrew Brimmer decided to locate their health IT company, Sparo Labsin St. Louis, neither saw a Midwest location as a challenge to attract top tech workers.
“You can grow a great company anywhere as long as you get the right people as part of your team,” said Cohen, whose company develops hardware and software that allows people to track and monitor their asthma in real time using a smartphone.
This theme is echoed by other Midwest tech and recruiting professionals. While the central part of the U.S. may lack the technology of its coastal counterparts, IT professionals are drawn to the region's growing startup movement, abundance of top companies, sense of employer loyalty and more affordable cost of living.
To challenge the idea that technological innovation happens mostly on the coasts, companies based in the Midwestern suburbs are opening offices in the cities to attract young employees interested in working with modern technologies.
Cohen considered settling in San Francisco or New York. But the opportunity to contribute to the burgeoning startup scene of St. Louis, an array of talent provided by area schools like the University of Washington and the opportunity to help people in a part of the US with high rates of asthma kept the company in Missouri.
Employees are drawn to the company's mission and projects, he said, and “location, while important, is not the limiting factor.”
Selling job candidates Whirlpool's The small-town location can prove challenging, said D'Anthony Tillery, director of talent acquisition at the Benton Harbor, Mich.-based appliance maker, which sits on Lake Michigan about 90 minutes from Chicago.
To overcome this issue, the company emphasizes in its growth, soft factors such as local schools and cultural diversity and Whirlpool's use of leading edge technology.
“We recently launched Google as our email platform, which I think is more progressive than Microsoft Outlook,” he said. “We're trying to foster collaboration and help us continue to move quickly to market. This attracts IT talent because they want to be on the cutting edge.”
But a brand-name technology company, which the Midwest lacks, would help draw attention to IT jobs in that part of the country, Tillery said.
“You don't have bigger brands that are recognized in the market from a technology perspective,” he said.
The area has major companies that employ technology workers, including heavy equipment maker Caterpillar in Peoria, Illinois, a host of automakers in Detroit and health IT company Cerner in Kansas City, Missouri. What's missing, Tillery said, is a business synonymous with IT, an Apple-like company. Google has an office in Chicago, and that presence helps highlight Midwestern tech jobs, he added.
But even without a well-known IT company calling the Midwest home, “when you think about tech talent in the Midwest there's an appeal because of the opportunities in certain markets,” especially those near big cities, Tillery said.
Being located in a major metropolitan market like Chicago helps companies attract workers, said Joe DeCosmo, chief analyst at Enovabased there.
Chicago's lifestyle rivals those in other tech hubs, DeCosmo said, and, with a lower cost of living, keeps employees from defecting to companies on the coasts.
“The people we attract here from the coasts end up coming out ahead because we pay quite competitively and combine that with the lower cost of housing, it's a benefit to come here,” he said.
And with Chicago's tech scene growing, a company across town may prove to be a bigger threat to tech talent than a company from across the country.
“We haven't lost too many people on the coasts,” said DeCosmo, whose company offers financial and credit services products. “I don't feel like we're fighting much on that front these days. When we have lost technology talent it is mostly to others [Chicago] start-ups. The tech and startup community in Chicago [have] really stood up. There is more competition than ever.”
Chicago's startup and tech scene has grown stronger over the past five years, with the help of GroupOn, a site that offers members daily discounts on lifestyle items, and GrubHub, an online food ordering company, both located in city, DeCosmo said.
“In the past a startup scene and tech innovation, those things weren't as vibrant,” he said. City officials have taken note, too, and have begun pushing big data initiatives in recent years, including appointing a director of data analytics in 2012. In July, the city began adding sensors to light bulbs to collect air quality data and pedestrian density, among other metrics. Those programs put Chicago at the forefront of technology and data-driven cities, DeCosmo said.
Excluding Chicago, because its status as a metropolitan city makes it easier to attract top talent, there is a perception that Midwestern companies lag behind in innovation compared to businesses in coastal cities, said Larry Williams, senior vice president of IT recruiting at a staffing firm. Addison Group.
“I see a little more creativity in coastal cities,” he said. “Some Midwest companies are very rigid and don't want to change the way they do business, which is fine. The way Midwest companies have been able to solve this is through innovation labs.”
Those labs are located in Chicago as well as downtown St. Louis and Milwaukee, and are typically staffed by younger tech workers who live in the city and work on projects involving new technologies, Williams said. Companies with innovation labs also operate head offices in the suburbs where infrastructure and IT services professionals, many with families, are located.
However, even Chicago's robust tech scene may not prove to be a challenging enough environment for the most skilled tech workers.
“It's a narrow niche,” Williams said of those candidates whose advanced skills won't match Chicago's tech companies. “Usually we attract innovative startups or we'll make some calls to Silicon Valley and talk to some companies in New York,” he added, about how his company recruits and places job candidates.
The Midwest may work best for IT professionals who are more interested in solving business problems rather than consumer-focused projects like video game development, said Zach Brandon, president of Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce.
“Consumer technology has taken root and grown offshore, but the enterprise software opportunity is a differentiator for the Midwest,” he said.
Madison, Wisconsin, has emerged as a health IT hotspot given its proximity to Verona, home of electronic health record software company Epic Systems. Several health IT startups have set up shop in Madison, as well as tech heavyweights like Microsoft, Amazon and Google, all of which operate software development offices there.
IT workers choosing a career in the Midwest will find a culture where workers change jobs less often and companies use their stability as a selling point.
“This resonates because the IT market has been very volatile over the past 14 years,” Williams said. “It makes sense that companies will invest more in you from a long-term basis. I don't want to say that workers are unfaithful offshore, but I see people changing jobs more often offshore.”
Developers are generally cooperative because they realize that solving problems sometimes requires another set of eyes, Sparo Labs' Cohen said. Combine that with their desire to grow the Midwest tech scene, especially in St. ” he said.
“If you come here, you have an opportunity to really excel and become better at your trade,” Cohen said.
Fred O'Connor writes about IT careers and health The IDG News Service. Follow Fred on Twitter at @fredjoconnor. Fred's email address is fred_o'connor@idg.com
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