Microsoft Aims to Fill Thousands of Open IT Jobs Through 10-Day Nationwide Blitz of Career Expos

REDMOND, Wash., Sept. 17, 1997 — Microsoft Corp. today announced a series of Career Expos to help match skilled IT professionals with the abundance of open jobs in the IT industry and to recruit new individuals into the field of information technology. The expos will be hosted Oct. 15-25 in 17 major cities across North America where computer labor markets are most in need. Each local Career Expo is expected to attract over 300 skilled professionals and 1,000 individuals interested in entering the computing industry. Employers attending the expos are Microsoft® Certified Solution Provider service and training organizations that currently have a combined 17,200 open jobs in North America.

“The Career Expos are part of Microsoft’s Skills 2000 initiative designed to significantly reduce the ‘skills gap’ by reaching out to individuals in the computing work force, as well as those interested in developing a career in information technology,” said Nancy Lewis, general manager of worldwide training and certification at Microsoft. “With the Career Expos, we are committed to helping our Microsoft Certified Solution Providers fill open jobs, as well as fuel the computer industry with trained professionals.”

Growing Job Market Demand for Skilled IT Professionals

Today, according to the Information Technology Association of America, 190,000 IT jobs are vacant across the United States. Microsoft reports show that within the Microsoft Certified Solution Provider channel, 17,200 technical jobs are available in North America, with each Microsoft Certified Solution Provider having an average of three technical jobs open at any time. Many solution providers say they could hire up to a dozen people today based on the demand in the industry for Microsoft-based solutions.

“The St. Louis Microsoft Career Expo was a huge success for us,” said Tom Michael, director of technical staffing for G.A. Sullivan, a St. Louis Microsoft Certified Solution Provider Partner. “The quality of candidates and the ease with which we were able to find them through the expo were extremely valuable services.”

Expos for All Levels of Candidates

The Career Expos are designed for both trained computer professionals and people who have experience in the IT industry but need additional training. Microsoft Authorized Technical Education Centers (ATECs) and Microsoft Independent Courseware Vendors (ICVs) will be available at the expos for individuals who need information about computer training to update their existing skills or to develop the skills needed to become an IT professional.

Microsoft Career Expos will be held in the following cities: Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Nashville, Tenn., New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C. For information on expo dates and locations, visit at (http://www.microsoft.com/trainingandservices/default.asp?PageID=training & SubSite=itcr) .

Microsoft’s worldwide training and certification programs have trained more than 1.2 million people this year. There are more than 146,000 Microsoft Certified Professionals worldwide.

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