Some Common Trends in IT Jobs

Recruiters are telling me about some common trends they’re seeing in the IT job market.

First, more orders for contract positions rather than permanent hires. Where there is demand for full-time workers, companies are being very, very selective and taking their time with the hiring process.

Next, many clients are combining several job descriptions under one position – and the integration isn’t always logical. They want workers at cheaper rates and salaries. If they’re going to commit to a permanent hire, they want to make absolutely sure the person is the right “cultural” fit.

By and large, recruiters always try to give me the “glass-is-half-full” scenario. so I was surprised recently when a Seattle recruiter told me in blunt terms how tough his job has become:

Client are being extremely selective. They want people at much lower rates and it’s very difficult. In most cases, they are using the economy too much as a bargaining chip. I think employers are making a mistake because when the economy comes back, these people will be gone. There is nothing wrong with wanting to get people at a reasonable rate, but when you cut the rate too much the loyalty factor goes out the window.

Let’s hope we’ll see common sense return at some point.

Tech Holds its Own in Downturn

It doesn’t feel like a lot of comfort, but the trade group TechAmerica says the technology sector’s holding up better than other areas of the economy. Despite the avalanche of bad news at the end of 2008, high tech added a net 77,000 jobs in 2008, most growth coming in software services. That compares to 79,000 jobs added in 2007, 139,000 in 2006, and 87,400 in 2005. The biggest drops were in communications services and high-tech manufacturing.

Writing on MarketWatch, Jeffry Bartash says California still has the most tech workers of any region of the U.S.: 942,000. Texas is next, with 474,000. But:

…California only added 2,000 high-tech jobs in 2008, compared to 14,000 for Texas and 13,100 for Georgia.

“New hiring is certainly on hold,” said David Thomas, TechAmerica’s representative in Silicon Valley. “The venture [capital] community is waiting on the sidelines.”

Compared to the dot-com bust of 2001, tech is doing better this time around.

In the current downturn, the unemployment rate for workers in most high-tech segments is less than half the U.S. average, TechAmerica calculated. Annual wages are also much higher compared to the average private-sector job: $83,000 to $44,400 based on 2007 federal data.

No one, of course, is saying 2009 is going to be easy. But TechAmerica does think the industry will be a job leader as the economy comes back.

Tech Help Needed: In North Dakota

Anybody out there feel like moving to North Dakota?  A computer customer care services firm plans to close its shop in Minot, N.D., because it can’t find enough employees to work there:

Sykes Enterprises, which specializes in creating and maintaining computer customer care services for corporations, opened a telephone call center in Minot, North Dakota in 1996. Last May, management wanted to increase the number of employees to 450. Yet an unexpected thing happened: so few people applied for the Minot jobs that the Tampa-headquartered company will have to close the call center on May 10 — a cutback by Sykes that will result in 200 people losing their jobs.

The unemployment rate in North Dakota stands at 5.1 percent, the lowest in the nation. If you can just stand the cold, then you’ve got yourself a job.

New Local Market Reports

Though hit with layoffs, Dallas has pockets of IT demand in telecommunications, utilities, and manufacturing… Help desk, Java developers, SAP analysts still needed in Raleigh.

Read more.

Making the Move to Consulting

Here’s a well-phrased question for the IT army: “Consulting: Coping Mechanism or Career Path?”

That’s what IT Career Planet’s Esther Shein set out to study in a recent article about what consultants do and how newly minted consultants – some of whom never intended to go down that path – are faring.

While full-time positions are being lost every day, IT jobs experts say there is a silver lining and there are opportunities available, most notably, in consulting. Many companies find they still need to get projects done, but now they’ve got to be more creative, especially since, in many cases, remaining staff is too bogged down with day-to-day work.

Shein finds recruiters and IT market analysts say organizations want to proceed with scheduled projects, but on smaller budgets. One way to do so: Shrink their staffs and outsource the work to cheaper consultants who, as we all know, don’t get benefits.

Consultants are finding vibrant markets in places such as North Carolina’s Research Triangle, Houston, southern California, and Washington, D.C. Skills most in demand are data mining, project management, program management, and process improvement via skills like ITIL. Less hot: application development.

Read the entire article to learn how to turn what you might consider a desperate rebranding of yourself into a solid career that will yield project after project, even if doesn’t yield decent health insurance.

More on Silicon Valley’s Job Market

Last week we published an updated Local Market Report for Silicon Valley, which didn’t paint the prettiest picture of the employment situation there.

While the 12,000 or so tech jobs lost there last year is but a fraction of the 200,000 created and then decimated by the dot.com boom and bust of 2000 and 2001, the positions being eliminated now represent a cutting to the bone by flagship companies that in some cases have never imposed layoffs before. The past couple of months have brought news of 6,000 cuts at Google, 5,000 or more at Intel (after a 90 percent drop in fourth-quarter income), 600 at Adobe, perhaps 3,000 at Yahoo!, and 1,000 at eBay. Things are changing, and changing fast.

You can say that again. Today, The Wall Street Journal reports Joint Venture Silicon Valley and the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, two nonprofits representing businesses, government agencies and philanthropies in the San Francisco and San Jose areas, found in 2008 employment dropped and per-capita income declined there for the first time in several years. According to the Journal, Silicon Valley posted a 1.3 percent job drop in employment in December from the previous year for the first time since 2005.

In addition, Silicon Valley’s per capita income declined 0.8 percent to $63,880 in 2008 while per capita income in the U.S. broadly rose 0.2 percent to $37,979. It was the first time since 2003 that the region’s per capita income fell, according to the study.

Venture capital investments also slid 7.7 percent in the region in 2008, the first decline since 2005. Furthermore, the overall number of patents being filed in the region also fell slightly, according to the study.

I suppose none of this is a surprise, given all that’s going on in the world right now. Now, we’ll have numbers to measure the impact of the stimulus package.

Detroit’s IT Brain Drain

Not too long ago, tech was considered a bright spot within Michigan’s dismal economy. For instance, mainframe specialists used to be a lucrative career track for IT workers in Detroit. That’s because the banking and auto industries, along with their suppliers, maintain a lot of legacy systems.

But those companies have been offshore outsourcing their work during the last few years. Just ask Sheila Raybin who’s been a mainframe programming analyst in Detroit since 1985. She sums up the job market there this way:

If you are an American IT worker in Detroit, forget it…there are a lot of people moving out of the area. There are a lot of split homes, where the husband is taking a job in another state just to get work.

Others confirm the brain drain going on in Michigan. According to The the Michigan Department of Labor and Growth, the state has lost 6,100 technical and scientific jobs including engineers, computer programmers and researchers within the last year. The majority were shed in the latter half. And employment in scientific research and development has dropped 17 percent, or 4,300 jobs, in the last two years.

The situation’s not likely to get any better. According to The Detroit News, the hardest-hit tech firms have been those tied to the automakers. And there’ll be more reductions as Detroit’s Big Three streamline operations due to reduced demand for cars and trucks.

And so it goes.

Media Says (Gasp) Recession in Silicon Valley

Back in September 2008, I wrote a that Silicon Valley’s recruiters and tech executives were upbeat about the local job market, even with the economy rapidly developing some downhill momentum. Recruiters talked about opportunities for Web 2.0 applications developers, networking engineers specializing in security, Java developers, SAP and Oracle engineers, and wireless and mobile application developers. As for start-up executives, one said:

Contract rates are high, and it’s hard to find good talent because they get snapped up so quickly. Four years ago, it was more of a buyer’s market. I would have had more candidates (applying for a job) than I could screen myself.

Fast forward to 2009. Reuters now reports the recession has hit Silicon Valley. Tech giants like Intel and Microsoft are laying off thousands , while start-up companies are letting people go in smaller numbers as they struggle to survive with fewer customers and venture capital dollars.

Analysts expect more job losses this year. A dramatic fall in venture funding last quarter is putting pressure on small compabnies to stretch their capital for longer periods.  The one bright-ish spot, as we noted in our news wrap-up this morning, is in clean technology.

None of this is a surprise, of course. Now it’s time to watch for what kind of impact a government stimulus package might have both on IT in general, and green technologies in particular.

Dice Wants to Interview Some Techies

Dice News regularly publishes Local Market Reports focusing on the state of the IT job market in 20 cities around the country, including Silicon Valley, New York and Boston. (Like Mark said, we just posted new reports on Baltimore and Los Angeles.) We try to interview recruiters, companies and IT workers as a way to get a good sense of what’s happening. Presently, I’m working on reports focusing on San Diego and Philadelphia. I’m interested in speaking to any IT worker who’s familiar with the job markets there. Let me know if you’re willing to be part of the story. I can be reached at sonia.lelii@dice.com.

New LMRs: Baltimore and Los Angeles

Help desk support, .NET and server virtualization skills are in demand in Baltimore. In L.A., there are opportunities in healthcare, and emerging technologies. Check out these and our other Local Market Reports.