1. ConsultantsLet’s face it, all but the largest enterprises would prefer to not to have any IT professionals on staff, or at least as few as possible. It’s nothing personal against geeks, it’s just that IT pros are expensive and when IT departments get too big and centralized they tend to become experts at saying, “No.” They block more progress than they enable. As a result, we’re going to see most of traditional IT administration and support functions outsourced to third-party consultants. This includes a wide range from huge multi-national consultancies to the one person consultancy who serves as the rented IT department for local SMBs. I’m also lumping in companies like IBM, HP, Amazon AWS, and Rackspace, who will rent out both data center capacity and IT professionals to help deploy, manage, and troubleshoot solutions. Many of the IT administrators and support professionals who currently work directly for corporations will transition to working for big vendors or consultancies in the future as companies switch to purchasing IT services on an as-needed basis in order to lower costs, get a higher level of expertise, and get 24/7/365 coverage.
2. Project managers
Most of the IT workers that survive and remain as employees in traditional companies will be project managers. They will not be part of a centralized IT department, but will be spread out in the various business units and departments. They will be business analysts who will help the company leaders and managers make good technology decisions. They will gather business requirements and communicate with stakeholders about the technology solutions they need, and will also be proactive in looking for new technologies that can transform the business. These project managers will also serve as the company’s point of contact with technology vendors and consultants. If you look closely, you can already see a lot of current IT managers morphing in this direction.
3. Developers
By far, the area where the largest number of IT jobs is going to move is into developer, programmer, and coder jobs. While IT used to be about managing and deploying hardware and software, it’s going to increasingly be about web-based applications that will be expected to work smoothly, be self-evident, and require very little training or intervention from tech support. The other piece of the pie will be mobile applications — both native apps and mobile web apps. As I wrote in my article, We’re entering the decade of the developer, the current changes in IT are “shifting more of the power in the tech industry away from those who deploy and support apps to those who build them.” This trend is already underway and it’s only going to accelerate over the next decade.
Please read the whole piece. Much of what is detailed in this piece is already well underway. Equipment has become smarter. Managed switches increasingly mesh themselves by default. Routers and ATM’s the same. Equipment manufacturers now have service arms to assist IT shops in deployment and long term maintenance. eMail services of all types are moving to the cloud in a land rush. The ability to contract out or build your own clouds means that there will be fewer needs for managing individual servers. They will be treated like disposable peas in the pod.
So is the future bleak? No. But it does ratchet up the competency level of IT staff. Twiddling a wrench will still be requried, but the chance one will use the tool bag on a regular basis for core staff will dwindle. More likely that staff member will spend their time using MS Project and Excel in program roll outs.
Interesting times.
Prior to passage of the bill obligating collection and remittance in such circumstances, prominent online retailers including Amazon.com and Overstock.com had threatened to terminate relationships with affiliates, if the legislation became law. Now that it has, and affiliate relationships are being severed, something critics of the legislation say was entirely foreseeable is occurring: Online businesses and entrepreneurs are leaving the state, thus risking an actual reduction, as opposed to marginal increase, in California’s tax revenue.Last month, news broke of one California-based online entrepreneur who had decided to ditch California and move to Nevada in the aftermath of Gov. Jerry Brown signing the law. ”I always figured that in California, home to Silicon Valley and a million tech startups, they’d never pass a law like this,” said Nick Loper, who formerly operated ShoesRUs and has now opened a new venture, ShoeSniper.
Per the piece in which Loper is quoted, more than 70 affiliates had at that stage already left California, according to online businesses.
Then, last Thursday, another online entrepreneur, Erica Douglass, posted a mock “It’s Over” letter to California on her blog. Douglass, who sold an internet company she had built for $1.1 million in 2007 when she was just 26, cited multiple reasons for moving to Austin. Among them were unnecessary paperwork requirements mandated by the state, and high taxes as well as business fees. However, the straw that broke the camel’s back, was according to Portfolio, Brown signing the Amazon Tax into law.
This is one of those, `I see the wall, I see the wall, Oooh where did that wall come from?` events. When will politicians learn that everything they do has an equally troubling reaction?
I’m not trying to make the fur fly (at least not to begin with) , but this is the first study on the subject I’ve seen that seems to be relatively on the level. Here’s a quick snapshot of the results:
- Indian developers outscore U.S. developers on analytical skills like math and logic by 11 percent.
- U.S. programmers slightly outperform Indian programmers on mainstream programming languages including C (8 percent higher), Java (9 percent higher) and SQL (9 percent higher).
- U.S. professionals score significantly higher on Web programming languages: 53 percent higher on advanced PHP; 27 percent higher on advanced HTML.
- U.S. tech professionals are 33 percent better than their Indian counterparts at English communication skills. (IT Business Edge)
I’ll add a few observations:
First off, I do not think either society holds an intellectual advantage over the other. Both produce a roughly equal share of very smart people. I think it’s safe to say that Indian secondary schools probably do provide a better basic math and science curriculum. Beyond that, sheer numbers could account for the difference. The number of new US born developers entering the workforce is flat, which could mean those with more marginal skills are choosing other trades. At the same time, the numbers in India are still exploding. In India, working as a developer is still a path prosperity for worker with average skills. In the US. many other professions provide greater rewards. (more…)
We have covered this topic a couple of times before. But it bears repeating. There are various individuals looking at different approaches to common problems, mostly based on differences in scale and whether the process is additive or subtractive. The Israelis are looking at a machine that can ‘print’ with concrete. The idea being that they can knock out an entire 2 story house in days. Printing an entire apartment block in a manner of weeks with little labor. Others are looking at producing an entire drive away car via 3D print.
What’s got people excited is that up until the last year or so, most 3D systems were of the subtractive process. You carved out a larger block of substrate to produce a smaller finished product. It was just easier using current machining technology. Well the additive process has caught up. whole classes of product can now be used — paper, pulp, glue, plastic, metal, hardening gels, etc. The excitement comes when you realize just how little material is required if you are only printing to finished design tolerances. That’s a massive reduction in inventories, shipping and warehousing.
Right now 3D print is just breaking out of the R&D proto design shops into the more common production floor. But that is not where it will stop –
How 3D printing will transform society over the next 15 years
Legerwood consultants predict that production times for most 3D printers will fall by up to 80% in the next five years alone. Prices are falling dramatically each year, and a typical 3D printer now costs less than a laser printer did in 1985.
(more…)
It appears that GeekSquad is not as attractive in some markets as management had projected. –
A source first told NewsChannel5 on Friday that Best Buy is shutting down its operation in Solon, along with seven other Geek Squad operations nationwide. The source, who wishes to remain anonymous, said Best Buy has a total of 16 Geek Squad service centers.
According to the source, company officials told workers on a conference call Friday morning the layoffs have nothing to do with money, but everything to do with consolidation and better work efficiency.
Friday evening, Best Buy’s public relations department released the following statement:
“Today we notified the 45 employees at our small service center in the Cleveland area of our plans to consolidate service centers and repairs operations. The changes in the volume and types of products handled through these facilities has forced us to consider ways to better streamline our operations and be more relevant to the needs our customers have today.
This is the usual vagaries of the market. But I think we will start seeing more of this. As intelligent consumer devices keep dropping in price which includes the OS, more and more when the device ‘bricks up’ it will be toss and buy. It makes no sense to take a $300 netbook to Geeks and run up a $150 service charge! Not only that but Geeks does not do Linux last time I checked. So you may not even be able to get a Samsung Galaxy Tab serviced by them.
As in no more Border’s bookstores — soon. When downline middle management is recommending ‘other careers beckon’ well….
This is rumor, since I can’t get anyone to go on record, but multiple sources (all of whom are employed by Borders) are telling me that employees of several different Borders stores were told during conference calls this week that “things are bad” and “if they have an opportunity for employment elsewhere, they should take it.” This comes on the heels of last Friday’s stock slide after news that Borders was missing payments to creditors. Personally, I hope they are wrong. I like Borders. They’ve always been very supportive of me.
I repeat it is rumor. But hey sometimes the grapevine is more accurate than the corporate press release.
Borders is a bookstore chain that did not keep up with the times. Their online presence is old school. The B&M component is killing them. Rent pricing reflecting times before the crash and have not been realigned or closed down if need be. In a sense its BlockBuster all over again. Only difference is the product.
Frankly retail has morphed. There is no space for the specialty store as a niche. At least not as Borders represents it. Even cache designer labels all have a foot in the mass market now just to survive. There are really only two retail venues. Big Box retailing — BestBuy, Loews, et. al. Or online with maybe a single B&M outlet to clear out the warehouse from time to time. The list of national specialty chains that closed are as long as my arm.
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