State of the Market

[hungry_hog]

My contracting experience is that I do 3% work 97% nothing in most gigs.

Often the company is too big and has no idea what it's doing, so you're in but then they haven't figured out what they want, so you're basically sat there just trying to hurry up and wait. Asking too many questions about when you're going to get work just makes people really stressed or they'll give you some nonsense like read some irrelevant documentation.

I've never done less work as a contractor. Unfortunately it affects your mental health a lot. A while back when I took a 1 month gig under market rate as a side-job and they gave me a spec and said build this, I was working all day programming it and it was the happiest I've been for years.

I hope to just get financially stable and then move into something completely different within a year or two.

Very true!
One of the large Banks I worked at about 10 years hired a whole testing team (test manager, 5 test analysts).

They didn't have a stable to system to test, so the testers wrote scripts, for about a year.
Amusingly they even claimed overtime to do this, as the PM was insisting the testers didn't "become a bottleneck".

[dsc]

40-45% in Poland. In the UK it's probably around 80%. So I don't agree that it can get any worse. So I stand by my original comment that we are now at rock bottom.

Less than a month ago I read that UK was similar, 45%-50% less IT vacancies. Has it dropped further? The other thing is seeing vacancies online and those actually existing (or not being filled internally), cause I have a feeling that's where the biggest problem is.

[avonleigh]

Less than a month ago I read that UK was similar, 45%-50% less IT vacancies. Has it dropped further? The other thing is seeing vacancies online and those actually existing (or not being filled internally), cause I have a feeling that's where the biggest problem is.

I am going on what I see on itjobswatch. Which is that we are at 10-20% of historic averages. So I think it's much worse than the media are saying.

[BlueSharp]

Very true!
One of the large Banks I worked at about 10 years hired a whole testing team (test manager, 5 test analysts).

They didn't have a stable to system to test, so the testers wrote scripts, for about a year.
Amusingly they even claimed overtime to do this, as the PM was insisting the testers didn't "become a bottleneck".

I've seen this exact scenario as well on a system that had not even been built yet!

[edison]

If you're only sticking around for a client a 6-12 months rather than until the end of the project, I suggest understanding office politics and what the organisation needs is something for you to work on.

This might help educate you more on the role of office politics, unless of course you know better than one of the most prestige business school publications.

https://hbr.org/2021/07/you-cant-sit...ffice-politics

Do you see the irony in making a statement such as politics being underhand and superficial is you playing politics to advance your viewpoint over others opinions?

Not everything Harvard Business School publish is good but traditionally they do a lot of research to back up their theories.

In this case, I think the article is fair, namely that politics shouldn't be seen as a negative thing. "At their core they are just the range of informal, unofficial and sometimes behind the scenes efforts that happen in all organizations as people position themselves, their interests, their teams, and their priorities to get things done."

The example given of seeking to influence stakeholders before a governance meeting to approve a project is very common in my experience, I use it all the time.

Unless you're literally going to sit in a corner and do exactly what you are told, 'politics' i.e. relationship building and influencing, has to be part of your role to some extent, surely? Even if you are there less than a year (like most of my gigs are.)

[edison]

Surely it cannot get any worse for IT? We have to be at rock bottom now. I cannot see how it can possibly get any worse from here.

I wasn't contracting around the time of the dot com bust around 2000-02 or the financial crisis around 07-09 but I think the UK market can definitely get significantly worse. Some key economic indicators are still relatively healthy e.g. employment and house prices.

When these likely start to fall in the wake of rising interest rates, I think consumer confidence will take a hit again and take business investment down with it.

I just don't see any significant catalysts on the horizon for companies to want to increase current investment in IT projects.

[GJABS]

All this talk about "politics" is confusing to me. I've never seen any politics at the many companies I've contracted at, as I think most people find it enough of an effort to do the actual work, to be involved in anything more. Who has time to do politics?

[hungry_hog]

I wasn't contracting around the time of the dot com bust around 2000-02 or the financial crisis around 07-09 but I think the UK market can definitely get significantly worse. Some key economic indicators are still relatively healthy e.g. employment and house prices.

When these likely start to fall in the wake of rising interest rates, I think consumer confidence will take a hit again and take business investment down with it.

I just don't see any significant catalysts on the horizon for companies to want to increase current investment in IT projects.

when you say worse - contractors working for free to get experience / foot in the door? Kind of like the internship model for graduates?

[Fraidycat]

Who has time to do politics?

The project managers i guess and all the other the layabouts who don't have any real work to do

[edison]

when you say worse - contractors working for free to get experience / foot in the door? Kind of like the internship model for graduates?

I don't think people will be working for free for typical contractor work where years of experience is required.

However, with supply and demand being what it is and what it may become, rates are only going to continue to fall in real terms outside of niche/hot skills.

IIRC some of the contractors who were around during those two periods have posted that rates halved in the worst cases.