Offshore software and IT services firms will double
their staff numbers in the next three years, but UK businesses are
still facing an IT “skills timebomb”, industry analysts have
warned.
A study of global sourcing by analyst firm Ovum has revealed
that the number of people delivering software and IT services to
the UK from offshore locations is set to rise sharply from 66,000
to 131,000 over the next three years.
At the same time, the number of software and IT services staff
employed in the UK – currently close to 250,000 - is set to fall by
around 5,000 a year as offshoring increases.
But senior Ovum analyst Phil Codling warned that although the UK
would see job losses in lower level technical roles, call centres,
helpdesk services and back-office corporate administration,
businesses faced a serious skills shortage in higher level roles
that require both business and technical skills.
“Potentially there is a skills timebomb there,” he warned.
“Business leaders really need to focus on developing those key
business and technical skills to develop the next generation of
programme managers and business architects who can really make a
difference.
“Although the overall demand for IT jobs will go down, some of
the really critical skills are going to be more and more in demand
and could become very scarce.”
He added: “You need local skills for those jobs – you can’t
bring it in from offshore.”
Vote for your IT greats
Who have been the most influential people in IT in the past 40
years? The greatest organisations? The best hardware and software
technologies? As part of Computer Weekly’s 40th anniversary
celebrations, we are asking our readers who and what has really
made a difference?
Vote now at:
www.computerweekly.com/ITgreats