The number of job ads on the web have reached their highest
level for 18 months, with C# skills in especially hot demand. But
many salaries have fallen. Nicholas Enticknap reports.
The IT job market is now officially on the up, according to the
latest quarterly survey of appointments data and trends by SSL for
Computer Weekly. The number of jobs advertised on the web in the
first quarter of 2004 was up on the same period the previous year
for the first time since 2001. In fact job ads are at their highest
level for 18 months.
Jobs advertised in magazines, which more accurately reflect
recruitment activity by large users, rose for the third consecutive
quarter. The good news is completed by the freelance market, where
the positions on offer were up by more than a third.
Other notable highs include demand for C# skills up 197%, .net up
81% closely followed by Office up 78% on the first quarter
2003.
The encouragement provided by the raw statistics is echoed by
executives in the recruitment business. Cathy Walsh, managing
director of recruitment agency Triangle, senses a sea change. "You
can feel the confidence coming back. People are looking forward,
planning and anticipating. Last year it was more a question of
'I've got to get this done right now'. Businesses are confident
about where they are going to go."
For PC support staff it was a particularly good quarter, as ads for
this job title increased by the largest amount everywhere. On the
web, jobs were up by a third. Contracting positions rose by
three-quarters, while in the magazines the number of ads for PC
support jobs nearly quadrupled.
Developers, managers and technical support staff were also in
increased demand in all the markets.
Positions with traditional job titles such as programmer and
operator declined, though this is probably more a question of
nomenclature than a real decline. Programmers looking for new jobs
should call themselves developers, and operators should change
their job title to network technicians. Software engineering
professionals were the other big losers, as they have been since
early in 2002. This was the only job type in the contractor market
to show a decline, and on the web job ads were down by 13%.
The growth in jobs advertised on the web came largely from London.
In the capital itself, the number of jobs was up by more than
two-thirds (compared to the overall market growth of 12%), while in
outer London the increase was double the average. The only other
region to show an increase higher than the overall market average
was the north-east, the area where jobs held up best throughout
2003. In north-west England, Wales and the West, and Scotland the
recession still continues, though the decline from a year ago was
small in each case.
Inner London registered the biggest increase in the number of
contractor job ads, more than double the figure of a year ago. The
boom in London is probably a result of a significant increase in
recruitment by the financial sector. On the web, jobs here were up
by almost a half, while employers were looking for more than twice
as many contractors as a year ago. This has had an effect on the
skills in demand: those especially favoured by the financial
institutions, such as Sybase and Perl, feature in half as many job
ads again as they did a year ago.
Manufacturing industry did not share in the nationwide upsurge, and
jobs on offer in this sector were down in all the markets. On the
web, there was only half the number ads compared with a year
ago.
The web is most favoured by IT suppliers, which placed twice as
many job ads as all the user sectors combined. Software houses
alone accounted for 43% of all jobs advertised here, up from just
33% two years ago. In the magazines the user community remained
slightly ahead, despite a fourfold increase in software house
recruitment here.
The growth in recruitment activity has not fuelled a boom in IT
salaries, which are more or less the same as a year ago. The median
increase across all job sectors was just 0.7%, equalling the
all-time low set in the previous quarter. This is barely a quarter
of the headline inflation rate for February of 2.5%.
Developers did better than most. Salaries offered to team leaders
were up 8%, to senior developers up 3% and to ordinary developers
up 6%. PC support staff also saw higher than average increases of
4%-5%.
The revolution in development techniques brought about by the
simultaneous arrival of the web and of object-oriented programming
appears to be over, for the time being at least. The skills sought
by advertisers remain virtually the same: indeed there has been no
change in the identity of the top 10 skills for the past four
quarters. SQL and Unix have occupied the top two places since the
beginning of 2003, but there have been some small movements further
down the league table.
Java has moved back up to fourth from seventh a year ago, its
highest position since early 2001. This is being fuelled by renewed
interest from the software industry: Java is the most sought after
programming language there, and is in overall second place in that
sector's league table.
Office showed the highest annual growth of all the top 10 skills,
and is now in fifth place. Demand here in contrast comes mainly
from the user community: it was second in the financial, retail and
public sector league tables, and fifth in the media sector during
the quarter.
The top 25 skills are also the same as last time, though compared
to a year ago there is one newcomer - C# at 17th, replacing
Javascript which is now 28th. There was treble the demand for C#
this time, easily the highest increase of the top 25. The other new
wave Microsoft skill, .net, is also becoming more and more popular,
and is up to 13th this time.
In all, 20 of the 25 skills featured in more job ads this time than
a year ago (compared to 10 last time). The exceptions are a very
mixed bag - Windows NT, TCP/IP, SAP, Solaris and embedded.
Windows NT is clearly in decline because it is being superseded by
Windows 2000, which is now up to 14th. TCP/IP skills are less
sought after because the comms industry remains in deep recession,
though demand is still high in the retail and media sectors.
For SAP and Solaris the reason for the decline this time is less
apparent. Demand for both skills has fluctuated widely over the
past couple of years. In the case of SAP, the decline in
recruitment by manufacturing companies is playing a part. SAP was
this time most popular in the retail sector, where it was placed
seventh. In the case of Solaris a trend towards use of Linux may
provide part of the answer. Demand for Linux expertise was up by a
half this time, and it has risen to its highest-ever position of
22nd.
Expertise in embedded programming was in great demand during the
height of the recession, from 2000 to early 2003. Since then,
recruitment has notably declined. Comms companies have been the
biggest recruiters of embedded programming professionals, and this
skill is in third place in that sector league table. Even here,
though, demand is declining, accounting for a quarter of all
embedded jobs this time compared to nearly one-third of such jobs
last time.
One skill that has been unobtrusively rising up the table is the
project management technology Prince. Demand this time was double
that of a year ago, producing a 19-place rise in the table to 34th,
its highest ever position.
At the other end of the table, X.25 has disappeared completely this
time. This open systems packet-switching protocol seemed a huge
advance when it was first ratified in 1976, but now that the web
has taken over virtually all data communications it is rapidly
disappearing into history.
About the survey
This article is based on information contained in the SSL/Computer
Weekly Quarterly Survey of Appointments Data and Trends.
The survey analyses advertisements for IT professionals on the web
and in the trade press and the quality national dailies and Sunday
newspapers. It is primarily intended for recruitment agencies and
CIOs with a substantial recruitment requirement.
The posts advertised are broken down in the survey into 54 job
categories. Within each job category, the survey provides details
of the number of posts advertised and the average and median
national salaries offered for the last quarter and for each of the
previous four.
The survey provides further analyses within each job category by
platform type, industry sector and regional location. It also
offers a breakdown for the major job categories of the technical
skills most in demand. In each analysis, it again details the
average salary on offer for each of the past five quarters.
The price of a single issue of the survey is £250, and for an
annual subscription is £350. This covers four issues, and includes
a free copy of a Windows-based software product on CD which allows
selection of combinations of region, industry and software skills
for a specified job type.