IT Grads question: Work & Salary

MrSquishSquash · 08-06-2007 10:47AM #1

Hi everyone, I'm entering my final year of a CS degree in October. I'm just looking to hear what ( other Boards members who were IT graduates or from a similar field ) experienced in their first job? Main interests being the work involved( development or tech support)? which company? and the starting salary?

All feedback is appreciated, cheers!

08-06-2007 10:48AM

Where are you doing the degree?

hamsterboy · 08-06-2007 10:50AM

Hi MrSquishSquash
Best of luck with the course.
I took me two years to find an I.T. job so you might be luckier than me, but prepare to take a crappy job (as I did) to survive while you're looking

damnyanks · 08-06-2007 10:54AM

Hit the milkrounds which open up in September www.milkround.co.uk

MrSquishSquash · 08-06-2007 11:10AM

coolsmileygirl wrote:

Where are you doing the degree?

UCC.

pwd · 08-06-2007 11:24AM

contract in ennis - got it in spetember of graduation year. contract was about 3 months.
reviewed srs, wrote test strategy and test cases and completed testing of a piece of software in accordance with ISO standards.
salary: 1700 a month in 2002.
I had >1 year's experience in testing and development prior to graduation though thanks to placement and deferral.
2002 was a bad year to graduate an IT course.

cold_filter · 08-06-2007 11:30AM

Got lucky and got a junior PM job with a large mobile company, as i was working there at the weekend. Wages were fantastic as i was paid by the hour earned 2K a week for about 4 weeks 1600 for about 5 weeks and an average of about 1K a week for 4 months.
Project finished and there wasnt the opportunity to stay on, so now doing mediation engineering, pay is not great but only doing it 6 months, but made enough money doing the PM work to keep me going

pwd · 08-06-2007 11:33AM

cold_filter wrote:

Got lucky and got a junior PM job with a large mobile company, as i was working there at the weekend. Wages were fantastic as i was paid by the hour earned 2K a week for about 4 weeks 1600 for about 5 weeks and an average of about 1K a week for 4 months.
Project finished and there wasnt the opportunity to stay on, so now doing mediation engineering, pay is not great but only doing it 6 months, but made enough money doing the PM work to keep me going

wow. how did you manage that? It's unprecedented to get a project management job straight of college

giveth · 08-06-2007 11:39AM

MrSquishSquash wrote:

Hi everyone, I'm entering my final year of a CS degree in October. I'm just looking to hear what ( other Boards members who were IT graduates or from a similar field ) experienced in their first job? Main interests being the work involved( development or tech support)? which company? and the starting salary?

All feedback is appreciated, cheers!

Graduated Comp Sci in UCC (same as yourself?) in 2004. Got a development job that summer in a multinational in a town in the midlands starting at €25k. Was testing for a bit, then into deisign. Salary reviewed every year and has increased by about a third, so its not too bad especially as its cheap to live here compared to Dublin.

cold_filter · 08-06-2007 11:40AM

pwd wrote:

wow. how did you manage that? It's unprecedented to get a project management job straight of college

Basically i had pestered the call centre manager for a year and a half for something more challenging. This role came up and she put my name forward i got it and i must say i worked with a great bunch of people the work was hard but a great experience for me and great for the CV. and i made a shed load of money.

The problem is most companies think i am too inexperienced for a PM job, even a junior PM they want at least a years experience and i'mt oo expereince/technical for a project co-ordinator role. So i'm stuck doing mediation until i get prince 2 certified and hopefully i can get some PM experience in my current role

foxyboxer · 08-06-2007 11:44AM

2002 was a bad year to graduate an IT course.

Tell me about It!!!!!!

damnyanks · 08-06-2007 12:55PM

pwd wrote:

wow. how did you manage that? It's unprecedented to get a project management job straight of college

I did it as my work placement playing around with all sorts of funny money. It's difficult but not impossible.

Stark · 08-06-2007 05:04PM

Graduated in 2005 with Bsc. €27.5k starting salary (current graduate starting salary for the company is €29k). Been in development since I started.

Timmy_d · 08-06-2007 06:39PM

Lucky bunch hope 2009 is a good year!:D

Raskolnikov · 08-06-2007 09:54PM

Even in development roles, jobs seem fairly reasonable to find for graduates. The only problem is that salaries seem to vary wildly.

Oh, make sure you get a 2H1 minimum for your overall degree. 90% of employers offering decent jobs won't look at you otherwise.

Stark · 09-06-2007 12:00AM

Raskolnikov wrote:

Oh, make sure you get a 2H1 minimum for your overall degree. 90% of employers offering decent jobs won't look at you otherwise.

I'll second this. A 2H1 is essential for decent employment prospects.

damnyanks · 09-06-2007 12:24PM

And if possible avoid IT's and colleges. Big employers seem to look down on them.

matrim · 09-06-2007 01:39PM

If you want to land a dev role, try to get some experience now. Do some projects yourself, stuff like websites, open source. It will all stand to you when looking for a job.

stepbar · 09-06-2007 02:55PM

hamsterboy wrote:

Hi MrSquishSquash
Best of luck with the course.
I took me two years to find an I.T. job so you might be luckier than me, but prepare to take a crappy job (as I did) to survive while you're looking

Two years? :eek: WTF?

Timmy_d · 09-06-2007 05:43PM

damnyanks wrote:

And if possible avoid IT's and colleges. Big employers seem to look down on them.

Why would they do such a thing!

jackbhoy · 09-06-2007 09:36PM

You are definitely in a much better position than grads of 3/4 years ago as the market is improving all the time.

New grads (s/w engineers, operations/networks etc.) at my employer will be starting on min of 28k, in reality most will start on 31/32k, the best ones will be offered circa 33-35k i'd imagine. I've been there 18 months straight out of college, started on decent wage and have had two 8%+ raises and one promotion which also came with a seperate raise.

Every one of the dozen or so in my class that I have kept in touch with have decent jobs with ok money and good experience.

I'd start applying to all the Grad programmes (which open up for application from September onwards)and don't forget to include banks and non-IT companies as many of these have huge IT functions and take on grads every year.

easyontheeye · 10-06-2007 01:06AM

damnyanks wrote:

And if possible avoid IT's and colleges. Big employers seem to look down on them.

thats horse ****! i went to DIT amd i got a job with a "big employer" beating canditates who "avoided IT's and colleges"

nesf · 10-06-2007 02:34AM

damnyanks wrote:

And if possible avoid IT's and colleges. Big employers seem to look down on them.

Assuming one wants to work for a "big" company of course.

nesf · 10-06-2007 02:38AM

easyontheeye wrote:

thats horse ****! i went to DIT amd i got a job with a "big employer" beating canditates who "avoided IT's and colleges"

Straight out of college or after a few years work experience? I'm not trying to cut down ITs or colleges, it's just that I've not heard of anyone going straight from an IT into one of the big multinationals at anything over tech support level. Add a few years experience in and it's pretty much an even playing field though, from what I've heard.

There is nothing at all wrong working in the small to medium business sector though. I don't get why people dress up I.T. as only a "multinational" thing.

damnyanks · 10-06-2007 12:11PM

It's different in IReland as its a small community. If you go abroad its more difficult, especially in the UK as they know about the Universities and grade them but have no idea about the IT's and colleges thus will reject you at the screening process in most cases.

I know this as I had to do screening for a few hours while working at a place , they give you a big list of ratings for universities and what they are good for.

And as Nesf pointed out, thats only if you want to work for a big company which definitley is not the be and end all of things.

jackbhoy · 10-06-2007 02:08PM

easyontheeye wrote:

thats horse ****! i went to DIT amd i got a job with a "big employer" beating canditates who "avoided IT's and colleges"

I work for a company that have a very competitive and desirable IT grad programme and in my experience they regard ITs very highly, many ITs have more technical/hands on approach in teaching than the big Universities and produce more technically profeccient grads that can jump into programming roles pretty quickly.

Of the dozens of grads in the last few years about half are from ITs and most of others are from DCU and UCC, both of which have well regarded Compauter Apps/BIS courses that have a long association with company in terms of work placement.

I think its complete BS and snobbery on many peoples parts in knocking ITs, I know our HR dept doesn't discriminate against and I know many very strong grads to come out of the ITs.

easyontheeye · 11-06-2007 12:52AM

nesf wrote:

Straight out of college or after a few years work experience?

yes straight out of college. From speaking to other university canditates during the selection process, I found some to have no common sense. In my experience (as i have worked with grads from both Uni and IT) I believe that in Ireland canditates graduating from non universities seem to perform better in the work environment, now im only basing that on the telecoms/software industry. 2 years out of college and im still in touch with alot of my college mates and many of them are in great positions consultants/developers/engineers/military Cadet training etc. We have often discussed the whole "IT Vs Uni" topic (being biased to the IT lol)

I suppose I would be a "uni basher" and im alittle bitter lol. But thats only because theres too many grads out there thinking because they have DCU or UCD or whatever behind them that they are better than any other canditate.

Go on the underdog

nesf · 11-06-2007 01:42AM

easyontheeye wrote:

yes straight out of college.

Cool.

easyontheeye wrote:

From speaking to other university canditates during the selection process, I found some to have no common sense. In my experience (as i have worked with grads from both Uni and IT) I believe that in Ireland canditates graduating from non universities seem to perform better in the work environment, now im only basing that on the telecoms/software industry.

In my experience, it's a mixed bag in both groups. That and you're seeing a subset of people who managed to get into your industry rather than judging the two groups as a whole if you know what I mean.

easyontheeye wrote:

2 years out of college and im still in touch with alot of my college mates and many of them are in great positions consultants/developers/engineers/military Cadet training etc. We have often discussed the whole "IT Vs Uni" topic (being biased to the IT lol)

I suppose I would be a "uni basher" and im alittle bitter lol. But thats only because theres too many grads out there thinking because they have DCU or UCD or whatever behind them that they are better than any other canditate.

Go on the underdog

I'm in a position where the courses I've done in UCC don't really have equivalents in any IT, having a pretty even split in my friends between IT grads and uni grads and having mostly worked in areas where college qualifications meant little. I find the whole Uni vs IT thing silly tbh. People aren't defined by where they did their course (in most fields) for that long after they graduate. After ten years in I.T. no one is going to care what your original qualification was, only what you've spent the last ten years doing tbh.

jesus_thats_gre · 11-06-2007 02:01AM

damnyanks wrote:

And if possible avoid IT's and colleges. Big employers seem to look down on them.

Disagree completely. Was actually discussing this recently and apparently alot of large companies have grave concerns about the ability of some University graduates being incapable to apply what they have studied in the real world and how as IT's and colleges then to do more practical work, their grads tend to get a grasp of things more quickly.

Out of everyone I hung out with when I went to college in DKIT, nearly every single one of them are working for the biggest companies in their sector - both on a national and international level and are earning very good money.

jesus_thats_gre · 11-06-2007 02:13AM

damnyanks wrote:

It's different in IReland as its a small community. If you go abroad its more difficult, especially in the UK as they know about the Universities and grade them but have no idea about the IT's and colleges thus will reject you at the screening process in most cases.

I know this as I had to do screening for a few hours while working at a place , they give you a big list of ratings for universities and what they are good for.

And as Nesf pointed out, thats only if you want to work for a big company which definitley is not the be and end all of things.

Should have read this.... Ah well...

damnyanks · 11-06-2007 09:38AM

The thing is - I'm not saying the graduates from IT's and colleges are poor but they just arent held in the same light as graduates from Universities. Compare the DIT and Trinity Comp sci courses for instance, both very different approaches.

The argument of the standard of grad's coming out isn't relevant in most cases as its down to the persons initiative to get the jobs they want and develop their own abilities.

IT Grads question: Work & Salary

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