Perceived IT skills shortage

ixoy

Given the level of knowledge expected, as well as the hours and dedication, I think it's quite poorly paid unless you're willing to specialise deeply and enter the precarious world of contracting. Do not go into it expecting a high wage. Do it because it's the job you most want to do, because it's something you'd willingly think about after work and not just while you're there.

pwd

DublinWriter wrote: »

+1

As someone with 20 years experience, the whole sector has been going down the pan since 2002.

Basically, these scaremongering stories about shortage of IT people are put around by the big Universities in the face of dwindling applicants for IT courses.

That's the year I graduated haha.
Things seem to have improved since then I think.

dave-higgz

Hmm some very interesting responses there.
I'm under the impression that in 10 years we'll be out of recession and that the "smart economy" will be calling my name. (just to be clear I'm not someone who believes everything the government says).
I had a look at some of these recruitment sites and I saw loads of Java developers and other high skilled programming jobs with BIG salaries. Unfortunately many required years of experience but considering we're in a recession to see so many jobs just in Dublin was quite a surprise to me.
There are only a max of 5 out of my year of 120 students who would consider a high skilled career in computers or who I believe would have the interest. The rest use computers but couldn't be bothered knowing how they work, half my class still haven't finished their ECDL with a month till graduation while I've been playing minesweeper in class since March. If this is the case across most of the teenage population then I believe this "shortage" of computer science graduates can only get worse.
Therefore I feel that even though I don't have a huge passion for computers and that the idea of programming all day in an office doesn't excite me greatly, the prospect of being in demand for what I hope will be an enjoyable job is the push for me.
Again I find it hard to believe that there won't be jobs in 2019.

DublinWriter

dave-higgz wrote: »

Hmm some very interesting responses there.
I'm under the impression that in 10 years we'll be out of recession and that the "smart economy" will be calling my name.

In ten years' time we'll be out of oil.

The phrase 'smart economy' was coined by politicians in order to make us feel better about losing our manufacturing base.

You'd be better off learning how to grow your own vegetables!

Webmonkey

DublinWriter wrote: »

In ten years' time we'll be out of oil.

The phrase 'smart economy' was coined by politicians in order to make us feel better about losing our manufacturing base.

You'd be better off learning how to grow your own vegetables!

Exactly. Smarter computerised eletric cars :pac:

DublinWriter

Webmonkey wrote: »

Exactly. Smarter computerised eletric cars :pac:

...made out of plastic, perchance?

stevedublin

DublinWriter wrote: »

...made out of plastic, perchance?

most plastics are made from oil as a raw material, so if we're out of oil....?

Collumbo

dave-higgz wrote: »

I'm 16 and I'm currently in Transition year. I have a keen interest in computers and I'm usually the guy who solves most of our school's computer cock-ups!
I am considering studying computer science in college and the supposed list of vacancies is an overwhelming argument for me to become a programmer or engineer in IT.
However in 10 years things could be very different. What is the likely-hood that there'll be big lists of jobs in the future. Could this recession crush computer science related jobs?

right i'm going to go against the grain here and say follow WebMonkey's advice. if you enjoy tinkering around with computers and aren't scared of a few dos commands, i would go for it. do it as your primary qualification anyway... and the institutes of technology system might suit you if decide to quit after 2 or 3 years as you'd walk away with at least a cert or diploma. fellas like you normally end up top of the pile and eventually get to where you want to be. and if you have an entrepreneurial head, you're ahead of the possy - look at the iphone bedroom programmers chancing their arms at the moment making a few quid.

comp. science is a great thing to study - gets you thinking for yourself (assuming you're not the cogging type)

smallBiscuit

dave-higgz wrote: »

What is the likely-hood that there'll be big lists of jobs in the future. Could this recession crush computer science related jobs?

It doesn't matter, go into IT if you love it. If solving that stupid problem matters more than eating or showering. If you find yourself at home of an evening and your gf is asking you to come have sex and you just have to try this fix before you follow her to the bedroom, if you roll out of bed at 3am because you think you have the solution.
If that's your mindset to IT, then wages, job security or anything else are irrelevant.
There is no job security for anyone doing anything. SO why worry about it?

John_Mc

I graduated 3 years ago with a BSC in Computer Systems in U.L. I had no problems getting a job because I had undertaken several projects in my spare time during college which allowed me to demonstrate my skills and programming ability. It also showed that I was self-motivated and interested in this type of stuff, so that surely helped my employment prospects.

I think this is crucial if you want to get your foot in the door after graduating, because the average graduate is a poor programmer and employers know this.

No employer wants to take on an employee who needs to be mentored & trained up. They want you to be able to read their documentation and get yourself up to speed without affecting the productivity of someone else. This is hardly an unfair expectation of a company who's objective is to make money.

So in summary, I think graduates who want to get into web or software development need to get a portfolio together which demonstrates that they're above the normal graduate in terms of ability in this area. Being able to bring a sample application which you've written yourself into an interview will certainly do you favours in my opinion. It definitely wont do any harm!

Webmonkey

John_Mc wrote: »

I graduated 3 years ago with a BSC in Computer Systems in U.L. I had no problems getting a job because I had undertaken several projects in my spare time during college which allowed me to demonstrate my skills and programming ability. It also showed that I was self-motivated and interested in this type of stuff, so that surely helped my employment prospects.

I think this is crucial if you want to get your foot in the door after graduating, because the average graduate is a poor programmer and employers know this.

No employer wants to take on an employee who needs to be mentored & trained up. They want you to be able to read their documentation and get yourself up to speed without affecting the productivity of someone else. This is hardly an unfair expectation of a company who's objective is to make money.

So in summary, I think graduates who want to get into web or software development need to get a portfolio together which demonstrates that they're above the normal graduate in terms of ability in this area. Being able to bring a sample application which you've written yourself into an interview will certainly do you favours in my opinion. It definitely wont do any harm!

This is a good point.

My final year project is working me wonders. Make sure you do something worth while and a bit unique. As well as that, working with likes of Linux and being familiar with it is a big plus to have because employees know you are more than the average graduate.
Start messing with projects, make it open source - throw it on sourceforge. I bet that will get the employers interested.

Another tip, join proper mailing lists if you require help on your project. Help others on the mailing lists. It is there you will get in contact with companies directly and if they are impressed enough they'll spot you.

You're final year project will get you places if you invest hard work into it. It will be what employers will be most interested in when you are a recent graduate attempting to get a job.

aare

I want to say this on behalf of the late Barry Tumbleton, who used get rabid about it.

IT is an area that represents a level playing field (or better) for a lot of physically disabled and high function autistic people, for some of them it is even the ONLY level playing field.

Since 1999 FAS went to European job fairs to recruit IT staff...whilst refusing to even consider employing, facillitating, or training disabled people for these positions. All they were prepared offer instead were little jobs in garden centers or stacking shelves in supermarkets...or failing that, "pretend work" on CE schemes...which were often, far less suitable, or even impossible, for the individuals concerned, on any level.

Ten years on we have a shortage of IT staff, and disabled people on welfare without any realistic hope of ever supporting themselves beyond barest subsistence.

Now what kind of sense did that make?

...and yes, he did TELL THEM SO...but who listened?

thebman

I don't think we have a shortage of IT people.

I agree it is a shortage of good IT people with experience and graduates aren't doing projects or getting work experience as part of their courses.

However from talking to work mates with this experience or closing in on it, they are all leaving because they are fed up of the way employers treat them. There are plenty of graduates and if employers can't find decent employees then they only have themselves to blame. There are good IT people out there as well as the crap.

MysticalRain

thebman wrote: »

I don't think we have a shortage of IT people.

I agree it is a shortage of good IT people with experience and graduates aren't doing projects or getting work experience as part of their courses.

However from talking to work mates with this experience or closing in on it, they are all leaving because they are fed up of the way employers treat them. There are plenty of graduates and if employers can't find decent employees then they only have themselves to blame. There are good IT people out there as well as the crap.

Exactly. It's one of those chicken and egg scenarios where employers don't want to hire graduates and people with < 2 years of experience. That discourages/prevents people from entering the industry. Then employers complain about not being able to find enough suitably qualified people. They only seem to want to hire those mythical uber-geeks whose lives will revolve around computers. Incidentally, that also has a knock on effect of generally ruling out the 50% of the workforce who happen to be women which further limits the pool of potential hires. I'm not saying there aren't women geeks out there. But there tends to be a lot fewer of them than there are of men and there's more to working in IT than being a geek. It's ultimately the IT industry's loss for discouraging women from entering the profession.

I know employers will say "that's just business". But that doesn't change the fact that the industry is gradually going down the toilet and the best and brightest are avoiding it altogether. So I expect the whining from employers to actually get worse in the future.

aare

MysticalRain wrote: »

They only seem to want to hire those mythical uber-geeks whose lives will revolve around computers.

Not mythical...FAS just sent 'em all off to stack supermarket shelves instead...

...and that IS for real...

Ok...I know...time to calm down and think of other things too...but I couldn't resist that...

jmayo

DublinWriter wrote: »

In ten years' time we'll be out of oil.

The phrase 'smart economy' was coined by politicians in order to make us feel better about losing our manufacturing base.

You'd be better off learning how to grow your own vegetables!

You sound as cynical as I feel

stevedublin wrote: »

most plastics are made from oil as a raw material, so if we're out of oil....?

Chemical engineer perchance

BTW will all these smart cars in the future be built by SMART ?
Surely there will be a copyright infringment lawsuit otherwise

IMHO study IT related course, computer engineering, etc if you like the area, but be warned during most courses you will end up doing subjects that you will probably never use the rest of your working days.
They are always fillers in the schedule.

BTW in the real world there is more to "IT" industry than programming or developing and no I am not counting data entry :rolleyes:
Also you will find very few who want to program for the rest of their lives and thus they become managers :eek::eek::eek:
You often find that they may have been great developers, but f**king hell they make awful muppet managers :eek:

As regards our village idiot politicans, they lump in anybody that accesses a computer half the time as being IT, just like they consider anything that uses electricity to be part of their "smart" or "knowledge based" economy.

dvpower

John_Mc wrote: »

I had no problems getting a job because I had undertaken several projects in my spare time during college which allowed me to demonstrate my skills and programming ability.

...

I think this is crucial if you want to get your foot in the door after graduating, because the average graduate is a poor programmer and employers know this.

Another bit of advise for people trying to get into software development.

When choosing college projects go for something a bit mainstream (a bit of database design, maybe a web service or two, some UI work ... that kind of thing).

Most dev jobs out there are for common or garden business software, so employers don't necessarily want to talk about your cool syntactic pattern recognition (or whatever) project.

In my experience, when CVs come in they are scanned by devs and HR people. The HR people usually have no clue what the position entails, so if your CV has keywords that match the jobspec this increases your chance of getting through.

At first interviews, in most companies, the interviewers are probably senior devs and maybe a HR person. The decision to get you through will mainly fall to the developer. As a graduate, your CV is going to be pretty light, so you need to make it easy for him to get to the questions whose answers get you ticks on a form, and the projects you have worked on are an ideal tool for you to use here.

ionix5891

Im sorry i am after reading the whole thread and its rather amusing

Heres my story (for any prospective IT/Eng/Sci students, since this thread is very negative and misleading, seems we have a few wasters here (there are plenty in IT) who are blaming everyone but themselves for their positions)

---

Graduated in with bachelors in science from major irish uni in IT related degree, had alot of fun in college and the course was interesting (tho there were people who just floated thru who wouldnt tell their CPU from Ram or variable from a constant :P )

Was turning down jobs left, right and center after graduation

Got offered a paid research masters in Eng jumped on it, had a bomb of a time, learned alot more

Started own IT services company following on from a project i started in undergrad and thouroughly enjoy doing (yes i am a geek)

Still turning down jobs nowadays

No I am not rich but I got good education, and still pay taxes and make reasonable living (that rare breed called taxpayer nowadays)

I enjoy my work and have very flexible hours (pretty much work when i want and how i want) and most of the time dont even have to leave my home office, can "work" anywhere theres an internet connection

Overall i am very happy about the path i followed and not listening to carreer guidance teacher back in school who was pushing everyone to become accountants and bankers (the irony!)



so any secondary students considering IT all i can say is if you enjoy computers its well worth following your interests and theres is alot of money to be made while having fun and most importantly you will learn new things everyday

.

dave-higgz

ionix5891 wrote: »

so any secondary students considering IT all i can say is if you enjoy computers its well worth following your interests and theres is alot of money to be made while having fun and most importantly you will learn new things everyday

.

Great to see some balance in this debate. :pac:
However I feel you are quite lucky in your career. I wouldn't be the entrepreneurial type and so I want to know the prospects for the average programmer/developer.

Webmonkey

I think I want to go down the post grad and entrepreneurial route as well, funnily enough a lecturer yesterday told me to do a post grad and a lecturer today said to start off a company and get funding in the college. Special building there for it.

Might do both haha - lots of work but I enjoy it.

jank

Wouldn't mind setting up my own IT delivery services company some day down the road.

Starting and getting the initial contracts must be a balls though!

Webmonkey

jank wrote: »

Wouldn't mind setting up my own IT delivery services company some day down the road.

Starting and getting the initial contracts must be a balls though!

Well if you well in with the lecturers and they start recommending, I'd say word of mouth could travel fast. To be honest I think more people should be encouraged to start enterprises, we need it here.

jank

Yea, maybe! I have a relative that teaches in CIT. Went there myself and I know alot of the admin guys out there as I did a bit of work in there, never mind my CCNP BSCI night course. It is good to keep contact alright.

Webmonkey

Ah cool, what department they in, dont suppose I might know them.

Yeah lecturers can be handy alright when it comes to contacts.

ionix5891

Webmonkey wrote: »

I think I want to go down the post grad and entrepreneurial route as well, funnily enough a lecturer yesterday told me to do a post grad and a lecturer today said to start off a company and get funding in the college. Special building there for it.

Might do both haha - lots of work but I enjoy it.

yes there are 4th level opportunities to get paid and do a masters thru' "innovation partnership"'s with the likes of Enterprise Ireland, you would be shocked at the sort of useless "projects" they are throwing money at (speaking thru' experience)

your lecturer is right but its quite hard to get funding thru the likes of Ercset i hear only 10% approval rate from all the applicants? being on good terms with lecturers and having them remember you will get you a long way (especially if your interviewer was previous student as well of same lecturer )

.

jank

He is in the IT department. Mostly teaches Computer Architecture last time I was talking to him.

me_right_one

Hmmmm, all very interesting.......

Webmonkey

jank wrote: »

He is in the IT department. Mostly teaches Computer Architecture last time I was talking to him.

I think I know who you are talking about, if same guy he was the guy that was recommending me to do the post grad! Get on great with him. Very nice guy.

AARRRGH

We are actually having trouble getting staff.

Apply if interested, even if you don't meet all the requirements:

http://www.staff.ie/company/887.html

jank

AARRRGH wrote: »

We are actually having trouble getting staff.

Apply if interested, even if you don't meet all the requirements:

http://www.staff.ie/company/887.html

eh?