A survey conducted by Monster.com for the recruitment company Technisource last week found that most HR managers plan to hire IT workers in 2011, but the majority don't expect to hire a whole lot of them. Fifty-six percent said they'll take on fewer than 10, and 37 percent say they expect to hire between 11 and 50 new IT workers.

The Technisource-Monster.com survey findings appear fairly consistent with the latest hiring index from Robert Half Technology, which is based on interviews with CIOs. Only 3 percent of the CIOs queried said that they expect reductions in the IT staff in the first three months of 2011. Further good news: An overall increase of 8 percent in anticipated hiring is the highest projection in a year, the company said.

The latest Robert Half forecast differs from the Technisource forecast in projecting which IT jobs will be in greatest demand, however. According to the recruitment firm's research, most companies expecting to hire tech workers next year need to fill jobs in applications, project management and infrastructure. According to the Robert Half group, network administration continues to be the area of greatest IT demand.