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Slashdot Asks: Which IT Hiring Trends Are Hot, and Which Ones Are Going Cold?

Posted by BeauHD on from the icy-hot dept.

snydeq writes: Recruiting and retaining tech talent remains IT's biggest challenge today, writes Paul Heltzel, in an article on what trends are heating up and what's cooling off when it comes to IT staffing. "One thing hasn't changed this year: Recruiting top talent is still difficult for most firms, and demand greatly outstrips supply," writes Heltzel. "That's influencing many of the areas we looked at, including compensation and retention. Whether you're looking to expand your team or job searching yourself, read on to see which IT hiring practices are trending and which ones are falling out of favor." What are you seeing companies favoring in the hiring market these days?

30 of 190 comments (clear)

  1. Clowns by turkeydance · · Score: 2

    have you seen that movie?

  2. Demand outstripping supply? by rsilvergun · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Unless we're talking H1-Bs I don't see that in the slightest. What I do see is several of my buddies in dead end jobs (and a few acquaintances rocking recent CS degrees stuck in crap IT jobs) while workers here on cheap visas and outsourcing dominate the industry. I suppose if they can keep this up though nobody local will go into IT (since you can't get work). I can tell you this, I just sent my kid to college to be a nurse. IT ranked below liberal arts degree on the list of things I wanted her to major in.

    --
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    1. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The key word here is "top." Every single business wants to higher the top of the industry elites....not just regular people who managed to get a degree.

      There is a difference in what top tier talent can deliver. Plenty of people consider themselves to be top tier talent until the real world hits them in the face. But that is a separate issue.

      There are three problems with retaining top tier talent:

      1) they are expensive, and businesses want top tier on the cheap.
      2) Other businesses want them, so their have competition luring them away.
      3) They don't like being overworked or otherwise made to put up with shit, and know they don't have to put up with it, and will quit when things get bad.

      These are the real reasons why demand outstrips supply. It has nothing to do with the total supply of IT talent, and everything to do with the much smaller supply of top-tier it talent that is willing to be underpaid and overworked.

    2. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by JohnFen · · Score: 4, Informative

      This depends a lot on where you are looking. There are tons of companies that have a great deal of trouble filling developer positions, but they aren't in the usual cities or (often) with companies that are well-known in the computer industry.

      They also tend to have the most interesting and challenging work. For example, do you want to work with room-sized robots tackling computer vision and AI problems? There are lumber mill equipment manufacturers who badly need you.

    3. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I'm not so convinced that most management teams would know actual "top tier talent" if it hit them in the face, nor would they know how to let new blood actually recommend improvements that go against company culture.

    4. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Chokai · · Score: 2

      I've seen this in particular with millennials and those who had helicopter parents getting hit by the real world for the first time. Some times hard.

      Oh the number of discussions I've had with folks over the last ~8 years that amount to: No you really aren't worth that much money yet, yes I know you graduated from xyz cse program. However doing good academically does not mean you are going to be as good in 2 years as the dev with 10 years experience that graduated from abc school's mid-tier cse program. In particular when he's spent that working here and understands the business in addition to the technology now.

    5. Re: Demand outstripping supply? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Females get harassed in programming anyway

      Sexual harassment exists in all professions. I have seen zero evidence that it is more common in programming. My company has dealt with dozens of complaints from the sales dept, from shipping/receiving, and even one from the accounting dept. Number from programming or IT: 0.

       

    6. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The dev with 10 years experience just turned 30 and is ripe to be fired and replaced by the new grad. The old dev will never work again, not anywhere, not ever. Experience is a curse, and if you don't believe it, you're next to be fired. Bye-bye!

      I second this. I did manage to find two short gigs after my main employer of 20 years closed our lab and fired everyone but I was replaced by H1B's, each time. Until we plug the H1B RATLINES coming into the country a CS degree is a one way ticket to serving french fries for the rest of your life.

      Thank god I put LOTS of money in my 401K. Sorry about you new folks just coming into the workforce. The rock stars will find jobs for a few years, the rest of you are screwed.

    7. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by p4nther2004 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Egads. Here I am nearly 50 and I'm still programming. (And I worked with a guy who literal wrote a book on C++ and he was still doing daily programming in his 70s) The work is out there..

    8. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      AC, because I'm a coward.

      Find where your HR posts the H1-B notices, and complain to the DOL if you can't find them. Read them, and complain to the DOL if the salary is unrealistic or if you know someone domestic who is capable and willing to take the job.

      It is not racist to look around at a sea of foreigners, think about your underemployed self or friends, and quietly ask yourself WTF. It's a broken system that doesn't benefit you or the H1-B workers.

      This is particularly important if the workers are coming from Infosys or Tata. These are egregious offenders and treat their workers like prisoners.

    9. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Yeah, sure, Wilbur.
      Finding a job is not ever easy, anyone who says that it is, is speaking of personal experience, and I bet by the next job or two in their future, they'll be like "WTF, why is this so hard, it never was before, must be ageism"

      But it is not. It is the way it is supposed to be. I've not found it super hard to find a job in my 40s with 23 years of experience than I did in my 30s. I admit in my 20s I found it dirt easy to find a job, but that was during the dot com party, and that was a serious outlier, if you think that's normal, you really need to adjust your attitude. So, hard but not impossible. Also if you can be flexible where you live, that helps too. Maybe right now isn't the best in TX, but in Pittsburgh, as it is booming, so move to Pittsburgh. Then in 3-5 years, move to Boston.

      Also salary expectations is way the hell out of line. Yes some get those expectations fulfilled, but that too is an outlier and more an indicator of luck than real skill.

    10. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Also, they often don't know why, where or when they need to recruit top talent. Many jobs don't require rock star talent and can be filled by IT staff who are merely good.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    11. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by russbutton · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The dev with 10 years experience just turned 30 and is ripe to be fired and replaced by the new grad. The old dev will never work again, not anywhere, not ever. Experience is a curse, and if you don't believe it, you're next to be fired. Bye-bye!

      Really? I've been doing UNIX/Linux systems admin, now called DevOps work, since 1989. The job keeps changing and evolving, but it's a lot of the same kinds of skills being called for. Of course in that 28 years I've been let go one way or another 7 times and 10 of the companies I've worked for no longer exist. One company laid me off on a Tuesday, the bank seized the company on Friday and my last check bounced. I eventually got paid, but you just had to laugh.

      I'm now 66 years old and still get calls from recruiters almost daily. I have yet to see anyone turn me down just because of my age.

      The truth is that you have to keep your skill set current. The old standbys of UNIX/Linux savvy, regular expressions, problem solving, and most of all. a willingness to jump in on stuff you know nothing about and figure it out on the fly. That's your bread and butter on a day-to-day basis. Be able work in puppet/chef and have some hands-on with AWS is what everyone wants today. Tomorrow it'll be something else. Ya gotta keep an eye out for what's coming next and get a taste of it.

    12. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by luis_a_espinal · · Score: 2

      What I do see is several of my buddies in dead end jobs (and a few acquaintances rocking recent CS degrees stuck in crap IT jobs)

      Being in dead end jobs or being stuck in crap IT jobs at the start of a career is a given. The trick is to GTFO, hunt niches and develop a career. Easier said than done, but it is not impossible. The process can take years, but it can be done when pursued with diligence and purpose.

      There are some people who are really complacent and lack agency, and as result end up in such jobs. But most people stuck at them aren't necessarily lazy or stupid. It is a matter of circumstances combined with a lack of direction.

      Falling into a dead end job is almost an inevitability if you work in IT/software (or any field for that matter). Staying in one forever, it is not. I implore people not to look at the later option as an inevitability.

    13. Re:Demand outstripping supply? by JohnFen · · Score: 2

      I won't name the specific company I know about, because they don't do direct hires. They use a placement agency -- specifically because they can't find candidates on their own. This is because to work there, you're going to have to live in a rural area, about 3 hours from the nearest largish city. Their competitors are similarly located.

      Over the years, I've noticed that there are more companies than you'd think that need talent, pay well, and work with interesting tech -- but exist in the middle of nowhere, so have problems hiring. Someone who is OK with relocating to a rural area can do very well.

  3. Two Letters .... by dasgoober · · Score: 2

    AI .... whether it's really AI or not is immaterial

  4. Hiring Chief Security Officers with music degrees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Definitely in a downtrend.

  5. One thing hasn't changed this year: by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Most firms are still offering too little money for the positions they want filled. Translated, this means most companies do not value IT staff.

    The companies with management that believe "demand greatly outstrips supply" are earning the security breaches in their futures.

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    1. Re:One thing hasn't changed this year: by HornWumpus · · Score: 2

      Claiming to be understaffed, but still wasting at least half of everyone's time.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    2. Re:One thing hasn't changed this year: by JustNiz · · Score: 2

      >> most companies do not value IT staff.

      Assuming you really mean the IT department, most of them are fucking useless anyway, because they nearly all see their job as being a gatekeeper rather than an enabler.

    3. Re:One thing hasn't changed this year: by swb · · Score: 2

      Most of the time IT is in a gatekeeper position because they're held responsible for systems that malfunction due to overconsumption of their limited resources, yet at the same time requests for more resources go unheeded.

      I've literally been in the meeting where I've been chided for poor performance due to oversubscription and also told no, we can't spend more money on it, either. What are you supposed to do besides ration resources when demand exceeds supply?

    4. Re:One thing hasn't changed this year: by DarthVain · · Score: 2

      I'll add two similar comments. The first is that your first statement is completely correct. In first hand experience I was in a temporary position for some time, it finally came up for permanent, and I competed for it. After it was all said and done the cancelled the entire thing. When brought in by several managers to tell me the fun news, I noted that there had been other positions that had been posted after, and successfully filled within that time. I was told the reason point blank that my position was not part of "core business". I was flabbergasted. I mentioned to them if the systems I manage go down or have issues, none of those "core business" people are doing any work whatsoever. I received a bunch of blank stares and that is about it. It was only through a later reorg I got out of that area and onto better things where I appear to be more valued.

      Secondly, which is really a combo of the two points, in many cases, your value is only in terms of a current or particular project. No one wants to keep staff on, they just want things done and move on. Which means you get short term tenure, a revolving door of IT. I wouldn't be surprised in the case of Equifax that the security setup and the rest was all done by either external consultants, or by folks brought on for that particular "project" all of who have since moved on. They probably indicated that a system like that needs to be constantly maintained and monitored, and management said "yea sure", and handed it off to the handful of overworked general IT boffins they use to do everything. It could be that patching the security vulnerability was on their "to do" list but when your work is basically an ever expanding exercise in triage, and you tend to do things your immediate manager cares about (which isn't some security patch which *might* be an issue) it could be that they just didn't have the time to get around to it, a couple of months can fly by pretty quick. So yeah, you earn your breaches.

  6. Infrastructure is a dead end street by Gussington · · Score: 3, Insightful

    A good trench digger might dig 20% more earth than an average one, a good plumber might lay 20% more pipe, or save 20% through a clever approach . But a good technology person can deliver a lot more than an entire team of their more average peers. But corporate pay grades never reflect this.
    If the good people were paid what they are actually worth you would have no problem attracting them.(Free market etc...)

    Oh and Infrastructure is dead, dev and design is where it's at.

    1. Re:Infrastructure is a dead end street by HornWumpus · · Score: 2

      But you're the kind of guy that writes his own framework....

      It's not how fast you code, it's how well you design (to be modified later), it's how well you execute that design, it's how well you split the work with the rest of the team.

      Team friendly? Building the team is the key skill, sometimes that requires you NOT be friendly. If someone has got to go, that's it. If you're handed a well functioning team, you are lucky indeed. Most teams suck.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
  7. Run Logan, Run! by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    TFA: "In terms of job opportunities, it's probably no surprise that Millennials have the edge. Those between 25-30 years old get the most job offers, reports Hired's 2017 State of Global Tech Salaries. After the age of 45, the average salary and number of job offers decline. After 50, most IT pros see a significant decline in salary in line with their experience."

    Just like the NBA: churn and burn. It may be better to become a domain expert with IT knowledge rather than a "direct" IT expert. For example, accounting and chemistry don't change nearly as quick as direct IT. Thus, domain experience is more likely to be valued after age 45. I don't see bunches of accounting and chemistry fads equivalent to IT fads. There's no "Quarks are Obsolete! Learn NoQuarksNeeded 2.0 in 21 Days Head First Unleashed" books in the chemistry section. (Hmmm, maybe there's room for con artists in those industries.)

    IT is closer to the clothing fashion industry than real topics. That's why they want younglings. I've seen several dozens of way to do plain old CRUD screens over the years. Do we really need 38 ways to do the same thing and throw out #1 thru #37 to get 38? Plus, they often grow more complicated over time, not less. De-evolution. "It's agile functional separation of scale-able and cloud-able concerns that provides nimble global synergy..." Yeah right, shuddup[1]. The cloud, for example, is often used as an excuse to do really stupid unproven shit in order to out-buzzword your conpetition[2]. Con artists rule over IT.

    [1] and git off my lawn
    [2] misspelling intentional

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:Run Logan, Run! by swillden · · Score: 2

      I've seen several dozens of way to do plain old CRUD screens over the years. Do we really need 38 ways to do the same thing and throw out #1 thru #37 to get 38?

      Seems like the thing to do is to reach for bigger and more interesting problems and leave the CRUD screens to the newbies. If you've been around long enough to see so many variations, you have too much experience to be wasted on such things. At most you should be doing the code reviews.

      --
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    2. Re:Run Logan, Run! by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 2

      If you've been around long enough, you need to take a little time to show the newbies how to do a CRUD screen instead of letting them reinvent the wheel and come up with Method #39 on their own. Proper coaching or even code reviews in IT seem to be rare. And perhaps it's related to the fact that experienced technical staff aren't valued.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
  8. Sysadmin vs IA/Security by nobuddy · · Score: 2

    Sysadmin jobs are dying off fast, but system security or Information Assurance jobs are growing fast. Same skills, different focus.

  9. Re:Hiring Chief Security Officers with music degre by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 2

    Definitely in a downtrend.

    I would've used the term decrescendo.

    --
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  10. Problems with the search for "top talent" by codeButcher · · Score: 3

    1. The first obvious problem with companies looking for "top talent" is that they often are not able to recognize them when they see them (mainly because of caving in and hiring what comes along, due to project pressures, who then get to think they are "top talent" and hire others like them). I know because I've been employed by 2 or 3 of these.

    2. A lot of interviews/tests focus on technical skills. But I find that people skills, time management skills (uhmmm, I'm on /. while I should work...) etc. make up a good proportion of the skills needed in the modern workplace. No use if you could code circles around the next guy if you can't negotiate with your client around what's feasible, or get along with your BOFH team lead to work around ambiguities.

    3. So you want to hire rockstar programmers? Where's the groupies and drugs?

    The more realistic view IMHO is that most companies do not absolutely need top talent for all their job functions. It's more realistic to develop (and retain) the talent inhouse. Talent is overrated. Talent can be learned up to a level that is sufficient for operational needs. But you need to keep your people for those 10000* hours and keep challenging them (* I mention the figure just as a nod to Gladwell's book, although I do not necessarily agree with the exact figure or some of his points.).

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