Top Tech Skills for 2012

Salaries are poised to rise this year for IT workers with skills and experience in six different areas, a new study suggests.

The 2012 hiring guide study by tech staffing firm Bluewolf predicted that national salaries for certain types of IT skills will grow this year. Senior software developers, for example, will likely see an increase of 6 percent in salary, with an average high of $99,000 per year. Average annual salaries for Android, iPhone and iPad developers also will jump to $98,000, the study found.

Data analysts and BI Professional salaries will creep past their pre-recession levels, rising 5 percent to 6 percent, while top tier ERP, BI and CRM developer salaries will rise from $84,000-$105,000 to $88,000-$110,000. Front-end user experience technologists, particularly those with HTML5 experience, will see salaries between $89,000 and $127,000. Finally, security analysts, not surprisingly, will see significant increases in salaries ranging from $94,000 to $125,000 per year, according to the study.

"This year, IT managers in all industries will experience the challenge of hiring and retaining top talent," the report states. "As demand for hot technology skill sets increases across every industry, the market for talent has become very competitive. With the retirement of baby boomers and a nationwide talent gap, the pool for IT pros and leaders is shrinking fast."

In the D.C. metro area, IT executives like CIOs and CISOs also will likely see salary increases, but IT directors and CTOs are likely see flat salaries in 2012. The D.C. market will be most in demand of Salesforce, Sharepoint and SAP developers as well as information security analysts, SQL database administrators and .NET developers, the study found.

How do your skills and salary stack up?