| June 2007 |
| IT employment is shifting away from mostly technical jobs toward roles that require more business skills. Here's how to position yourself for the change. |
| By Leslie Stevens-Huffman |
While offshoring frequently gets the rap for revolutionizing IT employment, the biggest influencers today are the changing nature of technology work and the continued shift toward the service industry and knowledge worker positions in the U.S. While that movement is resulting in fewer traditional tech jobs, it's also opening doors to new career opportunities.
Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reveals that five of the top 10 fastest growing jobs through 2014 will be in IT. However, you have to take a close look at where those jobs are - and the sector's bigger-picture trends - in order to spot emerging opportunities - and take advantage of them.
"What we are seeing is that there are two types of IT professionals," says Michele Royer, curriculum development specialist with Bellevue Community College in Bellevue, Wash. "The jobs that have been considered core IT jobs that support the network infrastructure - such as network administrators - are actually shrinking by 30 percent. Employment growth has shifted away from entry-level, mostly technical IT jobs toward higher level business-facing roles and management positions."
What's hot
As the IT industry reaches its first stage of maturity, it's trending toward decentralized information management supported by IT professionals who are embedded in business units. In fact, Royer says, a growing number of positions in human resources, finance and marketing require specific functional experience as well as IT knowledge. This phenomenon is creating new jobs for tech workers who have a broader skill set, bachelor's degrees and business experience.
"There aren't as many applications being developed from the ground up and business is relying on more data," Royer explains. "This is resulting in more need to customize applications, so there's an increased demand for integrators and applications customizers, and they are required to understand business."
Royer recently completed a five- to 10-year trends assessment for the National Workforce Center. According to the study, some of the top emerging fields in IT are business intelligence (BI), which cuts across all industry sectors, health care informatics, and global and public health care informatics, which is growing both in the U.S. and abroad.
The top jobs in BI will include network administrators, programmers and database developers, as well as administrators who can perform data mining or analysis on extracted information and apply it to particular business models.
Health care informatics is the integration of information technology systems, tools and processes with the delivery and administration of health care. It encompasses everything from diagnostic information to payment processing and dissemination of medical data. Growth jobs include IT liaisons, clinical analysts, IT-health integration mangers and application support specialists.
A need for greater technological capabilities to spot and monitor international health trends has turned global and public health informatics into an emerging field, as well. IT jobs in demand here include biostatisticians, digital information disseminators, information analysts and applications developers and testers.
Finally, the need for IT management is expanding beyond the traditional roles of chief information officer, vice president and director. Program and project manager positions are growing rapidly as former programmers take jobs managing small teams of peers in business units and at outsourcing vendors.
Cashing in
To keep up on trends and related employment opportunities in IT, read industry trade publications and monitor press releases and white papers authored by analysts such as the Gartner Group and Forrester Research. Also, consult sources such as the National Workforce Center for Emerging Technology and the Society for Information Management. Subscribe to opt-in newsletters and read blogs.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (at www.bls.gov) publishes regular statistics on job growth, and both major universities and community colleges publish studies that compile valuable data from internal and external sources.
Most importantly, investing in non-technical education - such as a bachelor's degree in business or an MBA - will help position you to benefit from emerging opportunities. Seek new or lateral positions that will develop your business expertise, so you'll be successful in team-based environments. Also, Royer says, employers will increasingly come to view IT certificate programs at two-year colleges as necessary technical augments to bachelor's degrees.
Required Skills
In addition to formal educational requirements and experience, the top skills required for employment in emerging IT careers are:
- Communication and teamwork
- Business and process knowledge
- Customer interface and negotiation
- Systems analysis
- Design and project management
- Adaptability to change
Work experience and training programs that offer certificates in these areas will help position you for the new opportunities.
Leslie Stevens-Huffman is a freelance writer based in Irvine, Calif. who has more than 20 years experience in the staffing industry.
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