That demand offers opportunities to young IT workers with the right skills and mind-set, said Kaiser. She pointed to two former students who were promoted from programming to project management jobs in just two years rather than the five or more years such a climb typically requires.

"The time period one spends as a programmer is becoming compressed," Kaiser said.

"The average age of CIOs I meet today is five years younger than it was a decade ago," said Stephen Pickett, president of SIM and CIO at trucking company Penske Corp. in Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

Still, many young IT job seekers haven't gotten the message.

Many are less like Shah and more like Thomas Tanaka, a recent computer engineering graduate, also from the University of Illinois. Apart from some general economics classes, the 26-year-old avoided taking business and management courses. "My technical courses already took up most of my time," Tanaka said.