With the advent of globalization and opening up of the economy in the
nineties there has been an unprecedented boom in Information Technology sector all
over the world. The impact of this boom was all pervasive in social, economic,
educational, cultural and developmental aspects of the society. The rapidity with
which the changes were thrust upon the unprepared IT sector left little time for
adaptability. This led to stress both 'on' and 'off' the field.
As businesses embrace the 'New Economy', a plethora of new information
and communication technologies and software solutions are continually becoming
available to them, all of which espouse to ameliorate a firm's competitive advantage,
be it by adding value or simply reducing the costs associated with activities and
processes. This has resulted in many firms increasing their investments in information
and communication technologies to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of inter
and intra-organizational business systems and processes (Irani & Love, 2002). Yet,
according to Baldwin et al. (2001) and Currie (1998) some firms have adopted a less
engaging business strategy and sought to outsource their dependency on information
technology (IT). This has placed increasing pressure on IT personnel as they jockey
for their position within organizations. According to Gartner (2001), many businesses
have been expecting more (i.e. longer working hours) from their IT personnel without
a commensurate increase in remuneration. Not being able to take a vacation or having
it cut short due to IT related problems has been identified as a major problem relating
to the retention of employees (Gartner, 2001).
