How did the recession impact the Software Development jobs market.

k2788 wrote: »

I'm interested to know how the landscaped looked in the peak recession after 2008. Was there a slowdown in the number of open position or the same number of positions but companies just weren't willing to pay as much ?

The IT recession was in 2001-2003, the rest of the world just caught up in 2008. Everyone is going to have a different perspective depending on how it impacted them - for me the 2001 IT crash was hell, ironically I did very well during the 2008 recession.

How did contract developers fare during these times?

I worked in a finance company that let half their permanent staff go - one permanent person (developer) was let go (displaced) from IT so IT could be seen to be doing their bit in reducing head count - none of the contractors were let go because each contractor could be justified as being there for specific projects and were outside staff head count. I'm sure in other organisations the contractors were probably the first to go.

Perhaps due to the nature of the growing tech industry, maybe a software developer was a recession-proof job

Did I mention the IT crash (aka dot com bubble?)

D.

k2788 wrote: »

I'm interested to know how the landscaped looked in the peak recession after 2008. Was there a slowdown in the number of open position or the same number of positions but companies just weren't willing to pay as much ?

It was fine 2008-2009, but contracting dropped off a cliff quickly after that, and stayed off the cliff until only last two years or so when rates began seeing hefty increases as supply vanished, though they've since stabilised. Most of my C++ contracting colleagues gave up 2011-2012 and went permie. Some have returned to contracting only this past year, but I think most won't.

So in short, there was a drop in headcount post 2008, but nothing like as bad with 2001. Permie jobs were still around, you just had to go the extra mile to get them (in my case, relocate to Canada). Times were tough, but far better to be a software dev than a builder. At least we had some choice.

k2788 wrote: »

How did contract developers fare during these times?

As with all things, if you were lucky enough to be in a long term contract role where your value add is widely recognised, you can survive the chop even as the permies get heavily reduced.

Mostly though contractors get chopped first. As we're on 6 month or 12 month contracts with no cost of firing, it's cheaper and easier and doesn't affect morale as much. And it can take some effort even when times are good to land new contracts, I've only had a month's income this year which is a particularly bad year even for remote only contracting. Just this week I've started looking to go onsite in London or Dublin to shore up this year's income. There are not many C++ contracts in all of Ireland, even onsite, so it's probably going to be a spell in London for me away from my family. But you do what you need to do.

k2788 wrote: »

Perhaps due to the nature of the growing tech industry, maybe a software developer was a recession-proof job

The tech bubble will burst again sooner rather than later. Though it may deflate more gradually this time. I think the last remaining recession proof jobs are the civil service and undertakers. Everything else forget about it, you're at the whim of the next random event, there's no income security until they bring in Basic Income.

Niall

2001 wasn't good for me, I left a good job for a start up and was let go 6 months later. Spent 2002 and 2003 travelling so I missed the worse of it. Spent 2009-2014 working in education and instruction technology overseas because, as a contractor, I was struggling to find work here.

I'm in a permanent position now.