Market downturn

[lawnmower]

It's surely the worst IT contract market for a long time. What do others think? I haven't had a contract all last year (last one finished late 2015) so it's the worst period for me since 2012 certainly. It depends what you do, of course, but the market for testers is definitely saturated, you certainly need strong automation skills (Selenium/UFT etc.) I don't have much of that so I'm considering doing a course but self training never seem to do you much good. The market for developers of all kinds seems good, but won't these projects ever go into UAT or something (or are people not bothering with that anymore)?
What's happening?

[uk contractor]

http://forums.contractoruk.com/busin...te-market.html
Read backwards nothing much has changed since it was started!

[SlipTheJab]

More automation developers writing more tests = less traditional testers required. SETs (Software Engineers in Test) are in demand. Quite an interesting read here http://stringerstheory.net/cucumber-...s-from-cukeup/

[eek]

It's surely the worst IT contract market for a long time. What do others think? I haven't had a contract all last year (last one finished late 2015) so it's the worst period for me since 2012 certainly. It depends what you do, of course, but the market for testers is definitely saturated, you certainly need strong automation skills (Selenium/UFT etc.) I don't have much of that so I'm considering doing a course but self training never seem to do you much good. The market for developers of all kinds seems good, but won't these projects ever go into UAT or something (or are people not bothering with that anymore)?
What's happening?

Surely User Acceptance Testing implies that the end Users are going to do the testing.

[europetractor]

Cloud computing and economics are killing IT jobs slowly, with contractors being hit hard. IT Admin and Test work are turning into dev work. You can provision virtual machines in Visual Studio now, this required 2 -3 people to do 2 -3 years ago. It is just harder and harder to get a contract or perm job....

[SueEllen]

Cloud computing and economics are killing IT jobs slowly, with contractors being hit hard. IT Admin and Test work are turning into dev work. You can provision virtual machines in Visual Studio now, this required 2 -3 people to do 2 -3 years ago. It is just harder and harder to get a contract or perm job....

When the market looks like it is changing you need to get those skills.

There are some of us who are inundated with offers as we have managed to do that.

[terriwrist]

When the market looks like it is changing you need to get those skills.

There are some of us who are inundated with offers as we have managed to do that.

What is your specialisation? (if you don't mind me asking)

[lawnmower]

Surely User Acceptance Testing implies that the end Users are going to do the testing.

Yes, but usually some IT UAT specialists also get involved. Sometime IT business testers test on behalf of the users.

[lawnmower]

More automation developers writing more tests = less traditional testers required. SETs (Software Engineers in Test) are in demand. Quite an interesting read here Cucumber and Mobile, BDD or Automation? Thoughts from CukeUp!

But would it really do you any good if you put yourself through a 3 day course in e.g. Selenium or UFT?

[lawnmower]

It's surely the worst IT contract market for a long time. What do others think? I haven't had a contract all last year (last one finished late 2015) so it's the worst period for me since 2012 certainly. It depends what you do, of course, but the market for testers is definitely saturated, you certainly need strong automation skills (Selenium/UFT etc.) I don't have much of that so I'm considering doing a course but self training never seem to do you much good. The market for developers of all kinds seems good, but won't these projects ever go into UAT or something (or are people not bothering with that anymore)?
What's happening?

Anyway thanks for your replies, testing is more of a technical specialist's market at the moment, there's no doubt, and somehow you've got to get those new skills. Self training is a possibility. It's pretty tough being a generalist, non technical (or 'manual', shall we say) tester at the moment. Having said that, I've got quite a bit of experience of e.g. HP ALM etc. and some QTP (but not enough).

The SDLC will inevitably require testers to be involved at some point, though. There may also be a lot of offshoring going on as well, which could be affecting things.