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It’s no longer enough to say that the papers are full of doom and gloom: the reality of a troubled economy has hit, with belts being tightened across the board. Banking is obviously in turmoil, but this has a knock on effect on all the supporting industries, including recruitment, IT and training. ‘Recession fever’ is causing immense volatility in the market, and unrest among IT professionals and their employers alike. However, despite the onset of recession, there are jobs out there, especially for people with desirable skills and experience. And organisations, having become dependent on IT to do their business over the last 20 years, cannot suddenly turn off mission critical systems or end projects vital to their survival. So, can an IT professional still plan their career in the UK, and what impact is the credit crunch having on organisation’s personnel and training needs? While any kind of forecasting is becoming out of date before it is published, CIOs do still need to make plans – for riding the current storms, retaining the talent that will see them through to the end of 2009 and preventing the haemorrhaging of the skills vital for their own business and the industry at large over the next four to five years. IT and skills in demand IT is a vital enabler in how organisations flex to manage the change recession brings – be it in going global, undergoing M&A activity or pushing vital projects to a speedy completion. This leads to increased demand for enterprise project managers, IT transformation specialists and process experts. As a result, certain skills are increasingly in demand. Hot roles are around architecture, as organisations undertake data integration projects, and application integration, especially process integrations. Nearly a third of the people we’re placing are in managerial roles. Programmers and software developers are still heavily in demand. However, it would be naïve to say that IT jobs are not at risk. In the medium term, M&A activity will lead to duplication in operational staff and infrastructure roles, and to longer hardware refresh cycles. At the same time, specialists will still be in vogue, especially those who can execute customer-facing strategies. IT professionals need to ensure their skills are honed, not generic, and that they are adding value to their organisation – otherwise, as the recession bites, they may find they become dispensable. The impact on training Some have said that the recession will lead to an increase in the number of teachers. While this is a somewhat flippant response, there is definitely appeal in finding a recession-proof job. However, you don’t have to become a teacher to do this – getting the right training can make you highly employable, even if the recession goes in to 2009 and beyond. Training is often counter-cyclical to the normal economic trends, as people seek to build up their skills to counteract uncertainty in the market. At the same time, training budgets will face cuts in many organisations in the short term, as the board looks for any opportunities to cut costs. Any outlay on training must show a clear return to the business, delivering value to its core people and operations. We will see an increase in best practice in training buying, as HR teams are forced to build clear business cases. Wise businesses will use the next few years to ‘skill up’ their people, knowing that training is cheaper than buying in more staff, and is key to retaining top talent and preserving the business through the tough times. Training in demand It’s well known that one of the biggest barriers to adult learning is finding the time, and that’s true more than ever in a recession. It is clear that training delivers real business value in the current climate but the days of asking to go on a course, and your manager signing it off on a whim, is over. Courses must be qualified by business need and the results proven afterwards. Ultimately, training has to provide value – now more than ever. IT in the UK The last downturn, brought on by the dot com crash in 2000/2001, had a massive impact on skills in IT in this country. Young people saw the cuts in jobs and were put off from studying IT. As a result, in some areas there is still a skills shortage and, despite the looming recession, employers are prepared to pay more for experienced specialists. This time around the recession will be different for IT, and we need to communicate that: far from being the cause of the recession, IT has the potential to deliver a way out of it. IT is about driving business efficiency, increasing workforce productivity and providing the infrastructure for change and growth. It’s at the heart of the way businesses will pull through the recession, and needs a skilled, UK-based workforce of IT specialists and project managers to make it a success. If IT in the UK is not invested in through training that adds value and opportunities for the best staff, UK business will be weakened, and the UK’s ability to compete on the world stage will suffer. Alwyn Welch is the chief executive of Parity, the UK-facing IT and business services company. Dec 24, 2008 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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