In EnterpriseStorageForum.com, author Drew Rob discusses the current state of the data storage job market, laying out a pretty significant case for the rise of the IT generalist. The changes are impacting both existing data storage specialists and those with more rudimentary skills, particularly in mid-size organizations, where lower level jobs are being eliminated and specialists are asked to take on more responsibilities. Ultimately, these newly created generalist jobs will require a much broader skill set. Here’s what Rob and a few others had to say about the trend:
“’I’m hearing of organizations looking for staff, particularly in more specialized skills and hands-on roles, including cross-functional areas such as storage/virtualization, server and storage performance/capacity planning, networking/storage, mainframe/open systems and other combinations,” said Greg Schulz, senior analyst and founder of StorageIO Group.
Schulz sees the beginning of a trend toward IT generalists – people with a broader background that spans servers, storage, networking, hardware and software are much in demand, although more so based on actual experience than general familiarity.
And:
Mark Peters, an analyst with Enterprise Strategy Group, has also spotted the move toward the IT generalist. He thinks this trend will continue for some time as it’s not just born of economic necessity, but by the blurring of infrastructure tools. The advent of blades, for example, has led to the introduction of storage blades that can even host some applications if required. Further, virtualization is likely to extend this. Provisioning could one day be done on one screen without the need for any kind of specialist intervention.
And what does this change mean for today’s storage specialists, according to Rob?
“hose with highly specialized abilities in fields like Fibre Channel, backup and tape administration would be advised not to rest on their laurels. It might be a smart career move for IT employees to add wider experience to their resumes as a way of convincing job cutters to leave them alone and to increase their attractiveness in the event that they wind up back on the job market.
Tags: data storage
March 26, 2009 at 11:13 am |
This is a great article since I am beginning to see that my soft skills are now just as important as my technical ones. I feel I have alot to offer and I may begin to refer to myself as an IT Generalist: technical aptitude, organization, and soft skills such as asking questions and defining requirements. Thanks!