State of the Market

[eek]

True - there used to be lots of well paid telecoms roles, then they disappeared. Then a phase when all the publishers went digital a few years ago - lots of work for BA's. This has mostly been achieved now, by the looks of it.

Then it was ecommerce/shopping sites and a bit of finance. Judging by the proliference of ecomm consultancy jobs it looks as though they are picking up a lot of this work. Still, it's very early days - have only been looking for a week.

Despite how specialised some of the ads are, it's unlikely that there are dozens of BA's sitting at home who just specialise in an area which generally has few vacancies - you'd starve - e.g. HR specialists, for example (like an ad I saw yesterday).

No point in taking any wooden nickels so need to wait for something decent to come up. This can be quite tangientally related. I've gone for contracts where the exact same thing is wanted and not got it, then landed one in an entirely different industry (last year - went to retail from telecoms), and also gone from banking to news media.

I don't cover investment baking but I normally have to wade through pages of investment banking jobs to find my sort of stuff - this seems to have stopped recently. Maybe the markets have the jitters because of Brexit.

You have to remember I'm (intentionally) techie not a BA / Tester.. So in my case you do need to specialize as the rates for a .net or javascript developer ain't what they used to be...

[LadyPenelope]

You have to remember I'm (intentionally) techie not a BA / Tester.. So in my case you do need to specialize as the rates for a .net or javascript developer ain't what they used to be...

Ah, yes, that makes sense. Quite a different market, I would guess. For BA's the rates are same as 10 years ago, less in some cases, so allowing for inflation quite a lot less in real terms. Certainly one of the retail banks I worked for (I know it's them because of location) advertise for people these days and the rate is less than I was getting 10 years ago. Seems to be quite widespread.

[Eirikur]

Seeing quite a lot of contracts in my area of expertise, but the rate seems to be £50 in average lower, especially in and around London it's more like £75-100 lower

[VillageContractor]

Got contacted by about 5 agents yesterday for various roles. Quite odd.

Would usually only get contacted every 1-2 weeks

[diseasex]

Got contacted by about 5 agents yesterday for various roles. Quite odd.

Would usually only get contacted every 1-2 weeks

On the market in northwest now. Some agents claim it's quiet, some calling with the roles, some just fishing. No interview yet after week of looking.

[Rabotnik]

Interesting. SQL BI dev here as well.

I'm on my way out of a contract so have just started looking. Seem to be enough jobs on jobserve but (is this a trend across the board?) far fewer in the 500+ range, with most in the 350-450 range.

Not sure what the deal is, maybe too many of us now? One agent reckoned he had 300 applications for BI role, and it's actually harder finding basic T-SQL devs now since everyone moved into BI due to it being a bit easier/sexier than performance tuning queries. I've got 11 years of experience with the full stack and have been put forward to a few companies but they aren't turning into interviews. Could be that my CV is just carp!

Keeping myself busy with a startup and learning Hadoop and MongoDB.

[theroyale]

Not sure what the deal is, maybe too many of us now? One agent reckoned he had 300 applications for BI role, and it's actually harder finding basic T-SQL devs now since everyone moved into BI due to it being a bit easier/sexier than performance tuning queries. I've got 11 years of experience with the full stack and have been put forward to a few companies but they aren't turning into interviews. Could be that my CV is just carp!

Keeping myself busy with a startup and learning Hadoop and MongoDB.

I was told the same by my current agent - the contract I eventually got through for had 300 applicants. "About half", he reckoned, were five-second dismissals, people just applying for everything without a thought. Still leaves 150..

Yes its a funny thing the T-SQL vs BI thing. As you say BI is sexier. But I can't imagine people being good BI devs without being good SQL devs.

Still seems a growing market though.

[uk contractor]

I can only talk about London because that is where I am based. Unless your very lucky the norm is to compete with around 300-400+ CV's & out of those only perhaps 50 are viable candidates but to even get noticed you need to have a superb CV & hassle the agent until he takes your call.
Some people on this forum make it sound as though the work is falling out of the sky landing on their laps well perhaps outside London that's true but in London the competition is intense so its much harder to land a decent contract now!

[ShandyDrinker]

I can only talk about London because that is where I am based. Unless your very lucky the norm is to compete with around 300-400+ CV's & out of those only perhaps 50 are viable candidates but to even get noticed you need to have a superb CV & hassle the agent until he takes your call.
Some people on this forum make it sound as though the work is falling out of the sky landing on their laps well perhaps outside London that's true but in London the competition is intense so its much harder to land a decent contract now!

That is of course because they are sooo good and ace every interview they go to or because they've got an extended network of ex clients with contract work available on tap. While said with tongue firmly in cheek I'm sure there are a few who very rarely have to go into the marketplace to get work.

For those of us unfortunate enough to go out into the market to get contract roles it's pot luck at the best of times. Where I do think you're wrong is that the competition is equally fierce outside of London as there are so few roles available, particularly in the South West.

[cablarnshowntone]

I've had a similar experience. Usually takes no time to get interviews and offers. I have had little to no feedback on a number of roles that match my skills and experience. I've been told some of them are now permie roles, some of them the hiring manager is not responding. I have had two phone interviews whic i've been informed both of which have been moved forward but the one that is already offering is taking a long time to confirm offer and answer negotiation questions etc. Very odd... there's a storm brewing and I think most people are caught in the headlights of propaganda.