April 30, 2008 6:07 AM PDT

The best way to retain top IT talent

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Baseline Magazine suggests eight ways to find and retain top IT talent. Citing Gartner, Baseline comes up with some solid strategies, but misses the one that I keep hearing over and over from savvy CTOs and CIOs: Open source.

As Jon Williams, CTO of NBC's iVillage, told attendees at the Open Source Business Conference, open source is an "incredible staff retention tool," helping to motivate and retain top talent. They want to go where the most interesting projects are. Open source is the epicenter of interesting IT.

So, while Baseline suggests "providing lunch or offering soft drinks can create a positive environment," the reality is that open source will probably do far more to motivate employees to stay. It's also a great way to identify the most promising developers upfront, because code speaks louder than a resume.

Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay.

Topics:: Strategy

Tags:: open source,; employment

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About The Open Road

Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to the Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is general manager of the Americas division and vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.

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