Overall IT job growth is relatively sluggish, but as demand for cloud-related positions soars, many technology professionals can segue their skills into the capabilities they need to land one of these high-paying posts. So if your New Year's resolution focused on getting a new job, earning more money, or landing a better position with more potential for advancement, read on.
Technologies such as cloud computing, virtualization, and data management will likely create 7 million jobs in the next three years, according to an IDC study
commissioned by Microsoft and released in December. Many reports say organizations plan to continue investing heavily in the cloud. This year, about half the midsized firms in Europe and North America will use this technology, Forrester predicted.
Jobs may include guiding organizations' overall cloud strategies, evaluating providers' offerings, dealing with contracts and service-level agreements, and selecting applications for the organization's use. Within the actual cloud provider space, professionals must know how to create cloud systems, keep them running at optimal capacity, evaluate new products and vendors, provide customer service and support, deliver technical support, and sell solutions to prospective clients. They'll need to know things like Ruby, Java, .NET, Chef, Python, and Puppet.
That's a lot of jobs, many of which pay well. But how can you, as an IT pro, translate your knowledge of servers, systems, application development, network support, LANs, and storage management into a career in the brave new world of cloud computing? And how can you learn new cloud tricks while maintaining the level of professionalism and standards that you enjoy at your current job?
If you're lucky, your employer may provide you the opportunity to learn on the job. Since so many businesses are finding it challenging to locate well-qualified people to take on new cloud responsibilities, many are educating motivated staff to learn these skills. Through certification by developers like IBM, Microsoft, and other vendors or industry groups like CompTIA and the Cloud Security Alliance, you can pick up the skills (and proof) you need. If your employer doesn't do this, it may be worthwhile to investigate the costs for your company to pick up the tab. It is cheaper to keep quality employees than to replace them.
Universities and online forums offer free initiatives called massive open online courses. (See: Sending IT Pros to MOOCs for New Skills.) You may or may not get college credit, but you certainly can get an education in fields such as health informatics in the cloud (from Coursera or Network Optimization) or distributed systems (from MIT).
Given the more collaborative environment of today's cloud-based world, it's equally important for IT professionals to demonstrate their ability to work with other technologists and with business peers.
If you're anxious to put your newly learned skills to the test, consider volunteering at an organization that could use your valuable insight, whether it's an animal shelter, a religious center, or another nonprofit. These organizations could save money by moving their IT operations to the cloud -- if only they had access to someone to handle the work at little or no cost. You'll be providing an invaluable service, gain practical experience, and walk away feeling great about yourself and what you were able to do for others.
It could also lead to that new or more exciting job and the start of a great 2013.
Yes, @nasimon, that's so true! I recall only one time when pay was the major cause of dissatisfaction and that was when I discovered I had a higher rank and more responsibilities but was being paid significantly (as in more than $13K) less than a guy who I managed. That got my ruff up! But one of my wonderful mentors, my boss at the time, stepped in and fixed things--and got my undying loyalty, too!
Great perspective Alison! In addition to all this..Don't forget the non-monetary funds, as they too play an enormous role in making employees stick to their respective jobs. You must have heard about the famous saying of Mother Teresa..."There is more hunger for love and appreciation in this world than for bread."
You're right, @nasimon, that many companies either can't - or say they can't - afford to give even their best employees raises or bonuses. Unfortunately, that may be true in some cases, given the economy we're in today.
If you're one of those great employees who feels they're not getting recognized, at least financially, for your hard work, you can of course seek employment elsewhere. it is, typically, easier to find a job while you're in a job vs. when you're unemployed, from what I've read. But if you like your job, your boss, and your colleagues, perhaps there are other things you can request that will improve your quality of life without affecting the company's fiscal status. Your company may be amenable to flexitime; full or partial telecommuting; reimbursement for college credits; giving you paid time off to pursue some training (such as additional certifications from a vendor or organization), or increase your paid vacation time.
They may be amenable to letting you spearhead a pilot program using skills you have but don't get to use in your day-to-day job: Perhaps designing a mobile app; designing a telecommuting program, including the required virtualization technology, or creating web-based training for new employees... Not only does this offer you the space to do things you enjoy, it gives you a platform to demonstrate another reason why you should get a raise or bonus once the money frees up -- or you decide to job-hunt.
"It is cheaper to keep quality employees than to replace them."
But unfortunately most of the employers don't understand this fact. They usually seem ungenerous in this regard and do not facilitate their employees with monetary funds and when they are asked about the reason they have a common reply "That's all we can provide and provision of funds doesn't match our budget".
While researching this piece, I found some pretty interesting training offered by an Irish university to unemployed people. It was focused on a variety of technologies, including cloud, and one prerequisite was that you had to have no job in order to take the training. Since I didn't want to get lost in a (deadline-eating) tangent, I resisted the urge to click deeper into the website, but this appeared to be government-funded. I don't know if the U.S. government offers this type of training? It's a really smart idea, helping people with basic IT skills become more advanced IT professionals -- and fill organizations' needs for well-qualified cloud employees.
This is yet another example of the paradox of the current economy -- while millions struggle to find work, companies struggle to fill key positions because skills are in short supply.
One way that IT managers can find jobs in the cloud is with the cloud providers.
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
Precor, which makes exercise equipment for gyms and homes, needed to transform itself into a cloud services provider in order to keep up with the changing demands of its customers.
Like other leading technology-using businesses, Walmart is starting to look like a vendor in its integration of the latest technologies to serve its customers. That's what led it to buy two Silicon Valley cloud startups this week.
IT executives are worried about business units that use social media, Dropbox, Skype, and other public clouds without working through IT. This "cloud sprawl" creates concerns about security, compliance, and other potential problems for the enterprise, according to a study.
Cloud computing helped Netflix score a big win this week, meeting a thousandfold increase in demand and driving the Internet video service provider back to profitability. It provided Netflix with "availability, scalability, and cost savings," chief executive officer Reed Hastings wrote in a letter to shareholders.
Cisco's rumored sale of Linksys suggests we may have problem with innovation and profit at the edge of our Internet, and that could be critical to the evolution of many Internet-delivered services.
Enterprises are discovering that using social networking within the secure setting of a SaaS provider's network gives them an unusual opportunity to freely collaborate with partners, suppliers, and even competitors.
The very low-tech "scrum" project technique introduces "crowd talking" to projects and also sets the entire crowd to problem solving. So far, these new social-media-style meetings appear to have supercharged project execution.
CIOs need to be developing their ROI metrics for cloud now. Why? Because there may be a number of "hidden" fees that need to be added to the vendor's user "per seat" cost.
Many CIOs are findng themselves in the midst of a "cloud honeymoon," with little empirical data available about how cloud should perform and with other C-level executives just happy to have cloud. But this is likely to end in the next 18 months, when the hard questions about cost savings, agility, and speed of deployment begin to emerge.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
Ushering in a new era of cognitive computing systems, IBM announced today the IBM Watson Engagement Advisor, a technology breakthrough that allows brands to crunch big data in record time to transform the way they engage clients in key functions such as customer service, marketing, and sales.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
Email This
