Offshore outsourcers are hoovering up vast numbers of UK
tech jobs every year and IT directors should do nothing to stop
them, contends an Ovum study.
UK firms will lose 6% of their tech staff – the equivalent of 5%
of the workforce – to offshore outsourcers over the next three
years. In contrast offshore jobs will double to more than 130,000.
Even though many of these UK techies will be hired by offshore
firms, not enough will move to halt the decline in tech staff.
Most of the offshored roles will be in low-level technical
roles, programming, call centres, helpdesks and back office
administration.
Rather than fight the trend, UK firms should beef up their
skills in other areas. The analyst firm believes it is critical not
just for IT firms, but banking, finance and all heavily
IT-dependent industries to shift their focus from technology to
business-centric IT skills.
But Ovum senior analyst Phil Codling is worried that UK firms’
neglect in workforce development will create a “skills
time-bomb”.
“Workforce development, including formal training and graduate
recruitment, has slipped down the agenda at many IT firms in the UK
in recent years.
“We face the prospect of a skills time-bomb in IT. It is not
clear where the next generation of highly skilled, experienced
programme and project managers will come from,” warns Codling.