System iNetwork

In the late 1990s there must have been 100+ pages of jobs in each of these magazines. After the year 2000 the number of job pages dropped dramatically down to just 1 or 2 pages and the editorial reduced as well. This week there are 12 and 17 pages, not a huge number but a significant increase on the past. With the editorial we are now up to 70-80 pages.

And iSeries jobs? Nothing. Plenty of employers wanting various Microsoft skills, some SAP, management, security (you did not see that a few years ago), Oracle, networking etc. but nothing mentioning iSeries, nor mainframe for that matter.

In one paper there is a summary showing rates for both contract and permanent staff, by skill area. This is interesting in that the skill areas mentioned are: Apache, JDBC, Linux, Lotus Notes, Flash, Office, Sybase, and VoIP - what a strange selection of skills. The rates, especially contract rates, do seem to be increasing.

Also of interest, and this seems to be a recurrent theme, is that employers are concerned about a lack of skills. One survey reported that two-thirds overestimated their skills. Yet I wonder how many employers encourage their staff to improve or expand their skills.

Then you also read reports of the large number of work permits being given for people to work in IT. It is worrying when we have a large pool of labour that is unable to satisfy the demand from employers. Perhaps there are too many developers cruising along on their existing skill sets and not making any effort to retrain.