I was browsing a recent copy of Information Week and in a recent survey of CIOs, What's your CIO worrying about?, the #1 concern they had was attracting, developing, and retaining IT professionals. Great news, right? Well, I’d like to think so, but there’s more to this then just offering training and some extra time off to keep your folks happy.

Every job I’ve ever had there was always an individual (or more) who didn’t pull their own weight (my apologies for the visual of that former or even current co-worker that just popped into your head). For top performers and hard workers alike, it’s insult to injury when they continually pick up the slack for others and don’t get rewarded. So while businesses need to hire quality IT pro’s they also need to decide which ones to let move on down the road … or better yet maybe it’s time to cut the deadwood. Because if you don’t think deadwood causes problems, you might want to check with the folks in San Diego. CIOs, listen up! Remove the deadwood, stop the sliding morale and take a REAL step toward retaining the best and brightest folks in your IT shop.