IT hiring prospects remain healthy, say CIOs

Chief information officers plan to expand their teams in the second half of 2014 as 14 percent say they will add more staff and 76 percent say they will only hire for open IT roles, according to a Robert Half Technology survey.

In addition, the percentage of CIOs who are putting hiring plans on hold or cutting staff has decreased from six months ago. Robert Half is an IT staffing firm and its survey is based on interviews of more than 2,400 CIOs.

Here's a look at the hiring forecast and skills in demand:

Other key points:

• 61 percent of CIOs say it's tough to find talent. 
• 17 percent say it's hardest to find application development, networking and security pros. 
• 71 percent of CIOs are confident they will invest in IT projects over the next six months. 
• Hardware upgrades are the first priority (44 percent of CIOs) followed by software upgrades (21 percent).