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| CURRENT SECTION :: Market Reports | UK's most visited IT Contractor Site - 250k unique visitors March 2008 |
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As you’ve probably gathered by the title, the predominant part of this week’s report is going to be about the database language that is so standard that people can’t even agree how to pronounce three bloody initials. Developed in the seventies from something a Dr. Codd developed, it has grown into one of the most used programming languages of all time. Beaten only by COBOL in its verbosity, it has held its own for a long time. And no doubt the supporters of object-oriented databases will say it’s had its day. But then they’ve been saying that for the last eight years or so. Anyway, thank you to those of you who responded to my call for a rally to arms against multiple reposters. The best idea I received was from Andrew Wallace who suggested that we should fight them at their own game and reply to every repost so that they get their own inboxes inundated. Of course, the reply should either contain rubbish or a protest message. He described multiple reposts as a new flavour of Spam, which got my mind wandering. Spam is Spam flavoured. But I knew what he meant really. So – to SQL. What’s the market been like generally over the last few months? Well, average rates have picked up after a low period in January when they were at £30/hr. Currently they’re around the £37/hr mark. More specifically, Oracle rates have been hanging around £38/hr for the last couple of months whereas SQL Server has pulled itself out of the £27/hr doldrums it was in in January and is now offering a tasty £35/hr. Teradata skills are the ones to have at the moment, however. Last month the average rate on offer was £43/hr. This month it’s currently £41. But, as I’ve said before, what’s the point of these rates if there are no contracts around? Well, over the last month there have been 1,100 postings for Oracle skills, 560 for SQL Server and only 4 for Teradata. So, I suppose if you’re one of the lucky four, you’re in for a good rate! Now let’s go regional. The demand for SQL skills in London has definitely been upward apart from, for some reason, last month. In September last year, there were about 150 contracts on offer. This month, so far, there have been almost 600. As I said, this has been a constant growth except for May when there were only 340 posted. In Birmingham, after an extremely quiet (i.e. no contracts posted for the last nine months) period, we’ve had 3 postings this month. Manchester, on the other hand has been a little more popular, although there have only been 4 posts so far this month. It was up to 8 in April. In Scotland there’s no trend at all in SQL requirements. In February it maxed at 81 contract postings and there have been 49 so far this month. Yet last month there were only 30. But in April there were 45 postings and 43 in March. In October last year there were only 11 postings. Does that make sense to anyone? Ireland has a similarly unusual requirement graph. This month is a good month for SQL. There have been 21 contract positions posted so far, compared to only 4 last month. Strangely, there were 10 requirements in April but 5 in March, 14 in February and 17 in January. In Wales, it’s a similar lottery. No SQL contracts were on offer last month, apparently, and yet this month there’s been 17, the most there’s been in 10 months! Rates-wise, in London they’ve been steadily rising from £33/hr in October to £44/hr now. In Manchester, there was a peak of £35/hr in March but this month the showing has been very poor with rates of only £18/hr. This might be because the only jobs being posted this month are support roles. But it’s strange because last month, the average rate was £34/hr and I have no idea why the rate has changed so much. In Liverpool I don’t have any rate information. This may be because everybody there is writing SQL software for charity or it might be because all the ads for contracts there say things like “market rate”. The same is true for Birmingham. In Scotland, after a dip in March and April of this year, and an appalling rate of £15/hr in November last year, we’re now looking at a fairly health £31/hr now. Down a little bit from last month where the average was £33/hr, but still not bad. In Ireland the rates have been all over the place! In April we had an average rate of £51/hr, £38/hr in May but only £19/hr this month. In Jan and Feb they were at £31/hr so I can only say that the market is a little turbulent at the moment. Obviously the Welsh don’t like SQL. They maxed at £34/hr in January, shrank to £18/hr in March and have only grown back a little to £26/hr this month. So that’s the look at the SQL contract market as it stands at the moment. I tried to look for object-oriented databases but there doesn’t seem to be a great demand. Well, none, actually. Of course, I don’t know any object-oriented database tools (which probably shows how popular they are) but even searching on Google gave me very poor results. Just out of interest, did anyone else experience strange technology glitches yesterday evening? I wonder if the sun is going through spot activity at the moment. Before I go, I came across this great story on silicon.com. Even the title deserves an award: Spam King ladies pants plans pulled down by meat maker. For a grin, go to silicon.com Alan Potter Jun 24, 2004 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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