I Can Haz Job?

According to RTE there should be plenty of work for me and my classmates when we graduate. Good to hear. (As Forrest Gump would say, “One less thing, you know?”.) Unfortunately, from my experience so far this year I don’t think it’s going to be quite as easy to get a good job in ICT as RTE suggests.

The dramatic reduction in the number of people studying computer sciences courses since the dot-com bust has been no more obvious than in my own course. At the start of this decade, GY350 Information Technology was very much in demand, with hundreds of students and Round 1 CAO points regularly over 400.

Today, there’s nine of us in final year.

What caused the continuous slump in applicants? According to a report published last year by Forfás, the national policy advisory body for enterprise and science, the mammies and guidance councilors of Ireland share a large part of the blame.

When the numbers of ICT jobs started to fall sharply and graduates found themselves competing to find work the mammies of Ireland took heed. The word was out that the “computhers game” was a lame duck.

Nay not so. While fewer positions were available, the revenue generated by the ICT industry continued to grow and after 2004 the number of people employed in ICT began to steadily grow again. However, the stigma of the bust was not forgotten.

Personally, I know a number of people who wanted to study IT but were told “sure there’s no jobs in that” and “wouldn’t you study civil engineering and make a fortune like young Gombeen down the road?”.

Now we’re told Ireland doesn’t have enough IT graduates to meet demand. RTE reports that “50% of software hires in Dublin are from abroad” at a time when 4000 people (including many college graduates) are applying for 280 jobs in Ikea.

Aside from worries about job security, I also think that people have a poor understanding of the type of work that an IT student will do once they graduate. When I’m asked what I’m studying in college, I generally have to brace myself for the inevitable “Oh, you’re doing IT? Is there much work fixing computers?”. (Usually followed by a request to fix a broken printer or laptop. o_0 )

One of the main recommendations of the Forfás report is “better communication of career opportunities and skills needs of the ICT sector “. I think a good effort is now being made by the government and 3rd level institutions to change people’s perceptions of ICT. Hopefully, this will lead to more applications over the coming years.

An unexpected side affect of the drop in demand for ICT courses was an increase in the drop out rate. The points for my course bombed from 385 in 2001 to 225 in 2002. The points began to steadily climb again, but in the proceeding years I know that some people applied for the course purely based on the low points requirement. They struggled with the course material and work load. Many failed and either repeated or dropped out.

Other similar courses such as Electronic Engineering experienced the same problems.

All this should be good news to me, right? Less competition and all that? Unfortunately, my pending departure from 3rd level education is coinciding with probably the most dramatic hic-up in the Irish and global economy.

Already, a number of companies well-known for hiring IT graduates have suspended hiring for the rest of the year due to “the current macro-economic environment”. I didn’t hear that mentioned in the RTE report.

I also think some companies are continuing to advertise for jobs not knowing if they will be able to actually take on new hires, probably because they don’t want to seem weak in the current climate.

I’m not expecting to fall out of my degree onto a smorgous board of opportunity waiting to snap me up. (Prove me wrong, world. Prove me wrong.) In fact, I think I’m going to have to really sell myself to land a good job where I’ll be competing against people that are out of work and who have a few year’s experience under their belts.

Are there plenty of jobs out there? I’m sure there is, but definitely not to the extent reported by RTE last Thursday.