State of the market

[BlasterBates]

The tricky part with multi-threading (as with a lot of things) is that there is so much that they can ask you about that it is hard to have all of the answers in your head.

I had the same problem years ago when being phone interviewed. Was asked what happened inside 'new'. I told him, he asked what happened inside 'malloc'. I told him what happened but he kept pressing for lower and lower details until I explained that I had never needed to delve inside malloc, I knew how to use it and that was all I had ever needed to know.

He failed me for not being able to answer 'basic C++ questions'. It turns out that before he got at job at that bank he had worked on writing compilers so what was basic in his knowledge base was unknown in mine.

Having done quite a few banking interviews I find it´s only "straightforward" in superboom times, and that is because you can have so many interviews in a short space of time that you can become "good enough" after some practice. In the current market, an out of work contractor ex-colleague of mine has had two interviews in 5 months.

The problem is there is an awful lot of people competing, you have contractors, lower paid contractors trying to get higher paid work, permies and out of work permies.

You can also see this in their list of demands in the skill profile, in good times it reduces to C++, Unix or Windows and a database, that´s it.

[twocontract]

I see the site homepage has an article about current demand for contractors:

Rise in confidence reduces IT contractor demand :: Contractor UK

I left the contract market at the end of last year to concentrate on 'Plan B'. Nonetheless I've been keeping an eye on things in case 'Plan B' doesn't work out. Having contracted in the .NET and then SharePoint arena since 1999 my perception is that things currently are almost as bad as they were in 2003. In the London / Home Counties area there seems to be a moderate level of activity at best, and rates are down on what they were even a couple of years ago.

Will things improve again? I have no idea. Logic says they should do, but if we're in for a prolonged period of low economic growth (in the west not just the UK) there is likely to be a surplus of labour globally. The permie market may be healthier, but even there the salaries on offer in IT dev / architecture don't look too exciting with many jobs paying £30k to £40k whereas before they were closer to £50k to £60k.

[BolshieBastard]

I see the site homepage has an article about current demand for contractors:

Rise in confidence reduces IT contractor demand :: Contractor UK

I left the contract market at the end of last year to concentrate on 'Plan B'. Nonetheless I've been keeping an eye on things in case 'Plan B' doesn't work out. Having contracted in the .NET and then SharePoint arena since 1999 my perception is that things currently are almost as bad as they were in 2003. In the London / Home Counties area there seems to be a moderate level of activity at best, and rates are down on what they were even a couple of years ago.

Will things improve again? I have no idea. Logic says they should do, but if we're in for a prolonged period of low economic growth (in the west not just the UK) there is likely to be a surplus of labour globally. The permie market may be healthier, but even there the salaries on offer in IT dev / architecture don't look too exciting with many jobs paying £30k to £40k whereas before they were closer to £50k to £60k.

I take all these website pronouncements of an increase in the market with a pinch of salt. Outside of London and the SE, I just dont see it.

Im getting bombarded with mails from agents asking me if Im still looking as they are doing mailshots of companies with cv's and could I let them know where i have interviewed or applied for so as not to create 'problems'!

Yeah, ok.

Wednesday, I thought there were signs of the market finally starting to move as I had contact from 4 agents regarding different roles (for a change!). However, Thursday was back to normal with no one suitable role on jobswerve, jobsh*te, mongster et al.

For the first time in over 15 years, I've applied for a permie role, the market for me is that bad.