"Skills shortage" is largely due to sidelining SMEs
Due to the number of mergers and acquisitions over the past 15
years, the number of IT supplier companies has reduced and the size
of those that remain has increased.
As with all sectors, the larger the organisation the more pressure
is exerted on costs, which is why many large IT service
organisations have sought offshore resourcing. However, the cost
advantage of using offshore resources is less than what is often
claimed, and it can introduce language and cultural issues.
As the UK services sector consolidated through the 1990s, a
mid-tier gap was created between the largest suppliers and the UK's
growing population of small and medium-sized enterprises.
The SME community now finds it difficult to do business with
larger organisations both on the supply and demand side of the
industry. When skills are sought for larger projects and
programmes, commentators too readily hail the onset of another
skills shortage.
This is not a real skills shortage, but a lack of visibility of the
skills in the local IT market. A mid-tier on the supply side is now
missing, which encourages UK-based organisations to
outsource.
Thriving digital industries
Cities such as Manchester and Liverpool have thriving digital
industries with hundreds of SME suppliers in their own "clusters"
representing considerable capability that is simply not visible to
the corporate purchasers in large IT service providers.
The West Midlands even has its own trade association which has a
significant voice in directing the Regional Development Agency's IT
investments, out of which have come funded programmes such as
OpenAdvantage, which promotes the use of open source software in
business.
What is needed is growth and re-establishment of the mid-tier of IT
service companies in the UK in order to recreate the supply chain
for IT skills. After all, a strong indigenous IT capability is
essential to growing and sustaining a strong knowledge-based
economy.
Plugging the gap in the mid-tier would significantly improve the
supply of skills throughout the industry and reinforce the onshore
market.
To start to tackle the situation, three strategies come to mind.
First, government and venture capital communities' assistance
should be targeted at developing IT service companies in the
mid-market.
Second, the UK government should address its own procurement
guidelines to stop discriminating against SME suppliers, many of
which are immediately disqualified from tendering for work simply
because of their size.
Third, the government could insist on IT certification and
accreditation schemes that make visible the quality in the growing
ranks of the SME IT community, thereby enhancing their business
potential both with clients and larger suppliers. This would also
help to reduce discrimination against SME suppliers.
Training burden
This need not increase the burden of training/certification for the
supplier community as many qualifications and quality marks are
already available for specific skills. What is needed is an
umbrella supplier standard or scheme to enable the purchasing
community to know what the present plethora of qualifications means
and understand the scope of each qualification.
It remains the case that the UK's universities are not
undersubscribed for students wanting to study computing or other
disciplines in which IT features. The NCC believes a balance needs
to be struck between in-house resourcing and outsourcing in the
development of corporate IT capabilities.
To ensure that we do not have a skills shortage in the future, a
key issue to overcome is that of improving the perception of IT as
a career.
A priority here, given its visibility, must be for the government
to be an exemplar of best practice. But let's face it, it is not
that there are no project failures in the private sector, simply
that the public sector comes under considerably more
scrutiny.
Supporting the government's agenda for professionalism represents a
significant step forward to making IT the career of choice for the
UK knowledge-based economy.
Michael Gough is chief executive at the National Computing
Centre
