In an Age of AI, Companies Are Hiring IT Staff at the Highest Rate in Years

A larger percentage of IT departments have been adding staff than at any point since before the 2008 Great Recession. This comes as a slight surprise given that the year began with some high–profile tech layoffs, and many people predicted that AI might be a drag on hiring. For now, at least, the opposite seems to be true, as end-user companies are building talent to transform the enterprise and make it AI-ready. 
 
As shown in Figure 1-10 from the free executive summary of our IT Spending and Staffing Benchmarks 2026/2027 study, 64.0% of companies in our survey are increasing IT head count, and only 11.0% are decreasing the size of their IT staff. This is both the largest number increasing head count and the smallest number decreasing it since at least 2008. In contrast, only 48.0% of companies planned to grow their IT staff last year. 

It is highly likely that a significant portion of this hiring is driven by AI and machine learning. As organizations move from experimentation to implementation, they are expanding the teams required to support data-intensive and AI-enabled initiatives. We have seen growth in roles such as financial analysts, business analysts, and database professionals. This all seems likely to be a part of an effort to scale AI and the use of large datasets. This year, we also added AI/ML architects and engineers as a distinct staffing category in our survey. Already, these roles account for approximately 2.0% of IT head count on average, with variances by size and sector. 

“In addition to staffing growth, we are also seeing significant investment in technology designed to help companies get AI-ready,” said David Wagner, senior research director at Avasant, based in Los Angeles. “This includes data analytics and business intelligence, but also, more importantly, we are seeing a major increase in spending in recent years to upgrade legacy systems.” 

CIOs are bullish, too. Exactly two-thirds report that, despite modest budget increases, they have an adequate budget to support the demands of their enterprise. This is the highest level of budget confidence we have recorded in the past decade, surpassing last year’s previous high of 59.0%. CIOs are not only investing in growth but also feel increasingly equipped to support their organizations’ strategic priorities.

IT now sits in the middle of a great transformation. While AI is ubiquitous across the organization, CIOs are being increasingly tasked with leading AI strategy, deployment, and governance across the enterprise. Meeting those expectations requires new skills, new roles, and continued investment. The pace of change adds significant pressure, but the good news is that the transformation itself is generating its own momentum. Productivity gains, automation, and operational efficiencies are helping fund further modernization efforts. As a result, CIOs are reinvesting savings into transformation initiatives. This explains why budget adequacy has remained at record levels for the past two years. 

Avasant’s Computer Economics IT Spending and Staffing Benchmarks 2026/2027 study is based on a detailed survey of more than 750 IT executives in the US and Canada on their IT spending and staffing plans. The study provides IT spending and staffing benchmarks for small, midsize, large, and very large organizations and for 53 industry sectors and subsectors. These include two new sectors (life sciences and travel and hospitality) and five new subsectors—pharmaceuticals, medical devices, consumer goods manufacturing, hotels and lodging, and restaurants and entertainment. A description of the study’s metrics, design, demographics, and methodology is available in the free executive summary. 

This Research Byte is a brief overview of the findings in our report, IT Spending and Staffing Benchmarks 2026/2027. The full reports are available at no charge for Avasant Research clients.