Reply to: The trend: commoditisation of I.T. and falling rates

[bobspud]

I tend to agree that public sector rates never seem to go down but as it seems to be a cosy little club (especially SC stuff) they are going after a limited pool of talent.

Trust me when I say, that pool of talent are the best for the job. I am jumping the SC ship to a commercial contract this month and I am already piled into the books because I spent the last 3 years chewing up my technical background while waisting my time on RMADS and other non-consequencial BS that these clowns think up while the commercial sector screw them silly, and they take one year to do what I could achieve outside in 12 weeks. If you want to spend your life on ageing tech and death by non-functional requirements go ahead but the interesting stuff is outside SC roles.

One interesting question I keep asking.... are tech leads & business analysts becoming commodities as well? Or will these become more valuable alongside the continuing offshoring trend?

And how does a hands-on coder become a hands-off technical analyst? Any suggestions....


(btw. those talking about chaff and inferior quality, what I've been seeing is that clients no longer give a rats about the quality of people they hire. they may say so in the ad and the interview , but actually it ranks lower on the list than actual rate and availability, chemistry et al)

Yeah the big names are all racking down rates for lead architects to the levels that I used to get as a unix engineer. But it really is a temporary thing. As more and more people retire or Plan - B their way out of the industry the pool gets smaller and they will have to start poaching from each other.

It's far tougher in the hands off world than the engineering sector, so think twice before you jump for money reasons, there are several guys on here pulling more than I do just for fecking about with hardware in a banking environment. and most developers are only an iPhone app away from being boomed in the current markets...

[jonathanOnshore2010]

One interesting question I keep asking.... are tech leads & business analysts becoming commodities as well? Or will these become more valuable alongside the continuing offshoring trend?

And how does a hands-on coder become a hands-off technical analyst? Any suggestions....


(btw. those talking about chaff and inferior quality, what I've been seeing is that clients no longer give a rats about the quality of people they hire. they may say so in the ad and the interview , but actually it ranks lower on the list than actual rate and availability, chemistry et al)

[yasockie]

I think it it not mentioned enough that contracting in IT has very few downsides, compared to contracts in other industries (say drilling on a remote oil rig etc).
The one downiside is that skills do become obsolete rather quickly and you need to keep up. I'm still pretty sharp with nuance of ISDN and Novell Netware, but I am rather happy to have moved on.
I'm sure there is still someone, somewhere out hter using those legacy technologies and they can pay a bit or pay a bit to migrate to sth more modern - invetabily the rate will be as low/high as the ease of migration.
On the side of the wave are the surfers riding the hot new tech, I've read an ad for an Iphone app tester paying up to 400 pd and from the description it shouldent that anyone who's downloaded Angry Birds from the app store and 'tested' them, qualifies.
You find you niche and a place in the wave. if you're niche is good, like COBOL or AS/400 then you'll be able to find work at good or even excellent rates many years after the tech's heyday.

And as other have said - even with all IT commoditised, at the intersection with business, there always needs to be a BA or PM with decent communication skills to mediate between the CEOs and the coders.

[SussexSeagull]

Naff all. Their rates seemed to go up. The home office was paying 550 for. TA role recently and the guys at the fco were offering 650. So as you can see there is plenty of room at the trough.

As for the downward spiral:
I think we are playing a long game at the moment. The more junior jobs go off shore then the less people will be available to take the senior roles tomorrow, while every year more and more old people are drummed out of the industry through age discrimination . sooner or later businesses will start to realise that they really have no choice but to compete for the skills that are left in the country.

Bob is already too expensive and they too have skills shortages. The co that I am working for is really flummoxed because all their bobs want to be moved up the food chain managing other bobs, instead of being well paid coders. So the pressure is on to make anyone with a few good years on projects man managers. So they are left sifting dross and trying to train new talent. So they haven't solved any issues that sent the work away in the first place. They just moved the problems to a remote and culturally different place.

I tend to agree that public sector rates never seem to go down but as it seems to be a cosy little club (especially SC stuff) they are going after a limited pool of talent.

It was always going to be he case that Indian IT people would wanted a bigger piece of the pile. Good for us!

[bobspud]

I think the million dollar question is what effects the government spending cuts have next year on contracting.

Naff all. Their rates seemed to go up. The home office was paying 550 for. TA role recently and the guys at the fco were offering 650. So as you can see there is plenty of room at the trough.

As for the downward spiral:
I think we are playing a long game at the moment. The more junior jobs go off shore then the less people will be available to take the senior roles tomorrow, while every year more and more old people are drummed out of the industry through age discrimination . sooner or later businesses will start to realise that they really have no choice but to compete for the skills that are left in the country.

Bob is already too expensive and they too have skills shortages. The co that I am working for is really flummoxed because all their bobs want to be moved up the food chain managing other bobs, instead of being well paid coders. So the pressure is on to make anyone with a few good years on projects man managers. So they are left sifting dross and trying to train new talent. So they haven't solved any issues that sent the work away in the first place. They just moved the problems to a remote and culturally different place.

[Sockpuppet]

Just work in a technology that can't be out sourced. Not all IT projects can be done from abroad.

[SussexSeagull]

I think the million dollar question is what effects the government spending cuts have next year on contracting.

[DS23]

Taking a lead from the theads "WebSphere, what's happened?" and the "At what point do I consider... Perm?", as well as the numerous ‘rate-cut’ threads, I wanted to throw down some thoughts I was having on the subject of contracts and rates in general..

great post chimp master.

perhaps to elicit some reasoned discussion between us all.

as bobspongepants would say "good luck with that".

rate drain is due to:
the offshore model become standard
recession causing project freeze
recession causing job cuts and flooded markets
recession driving greater use of offshore model
technical and architectural changes creating obsolete skills
other stuff i'm too hungover to think of

determining what percentage of rate-drain and contract loss is purely due to the offshore model is difficult to tell. the recession must have accelerated the process and it will continue to do so. tasks that can be accomplished offshore for a fraction of the price that we used to command will become the norm.

there are plenty of failures inherent in the offshore model but these service providers are not going to become worse at what they do - they are going to get better. much, much better. i am not convinced that becoming technically specialised or adept at riding the latest wave will provide security or stall the erosion of rates.

having said that i don't think it is all doom and gloom. the downturn is creating a huge backlog of work. there are an awful lot of customers with kit and process that is getting older and older. the tipping point of waiting and saving versus spending and gaining is getting closer. there will be plenty of work out there soon enough - the trick is to be in a space that means you are getting the contracts.

one thing has been apparent this year has been the increase in offshore integrators trying to find resources willing to head their projects in europe. the indian firms have the technical resources at super slim cost but they need to have local skills to manage and set expectations with the end clients. customer facing skills are key. communicate and manage.

[contractor75]

Mod Post.

Hi Contractor75,

Please see the post 'Behaviour in Professional Forums' post.

If you want to discuss a position, please do so in General.

[Wanderer]

Won't take three years to re-skill as a professional ukulele aficionado will it? This guys started quite recently but now has Ukelele Aquisition Syndrom

Maybe he would like to join these guys?

[stek]

Wow - Just makes me more depressed - what rate are you on?!!

Did a quick calc, about 650 a day. For five years, no breaks!

[northernladuk]

There, fixed that for you.

[nomadd]

What gets me riled is when other posters come on here.

There, fixed that for you.

[Kelstar]

Would you advise a young whippersnapper (late 20's / early 30's) thinking of contracting to jump now? In all honsetly, don't think I would if (s)he wasn't pushed from their comfortable permie role.

N.B. speaking from a WAS/J2EE skillset point of view.

I am that young whippersnapper. 6 years working for a Big4 in Management Consultancy. Got cheesed off with the flogging at consultant rates with no reward. Decided to stop moaning, and work for myself. Same clients, no middleman (I work direct so cut out agents) and do a job I am good at and enjoy.

Someone made a good point earlier - I trebled my permie salary (taking into account tax and NI savings) and feel lighter and less stressed as Big4 protected consultant. I do exactly the same job...

Banking over £100k a year at 29 - happy with that (apologies I do understand this makes me sound like a total but you get my point)

I do agree that there is an unnerving trend in the industry so I have already invoked my Plan B - methodology development. Often I am asked to produce literature, putting down on paper management techniques, evaluation tools etc... for the client. I have set about working with my current client and producing this business plan. Putting down on paper how I conduct my activities so perm staff can use this when I'm no longer around - cheap knowledge transfer for them. High return for little effort for me. I am hoping this plan will see me through when I want to have children and can't be in the office. Sell 2 x £50,000 TOM Design methodologies a year that take me approx 6 weeks to write - LOVELY!

However its all pie in the sky and may not materialise, so I may have to come up with a Plan C.

My point (I'm getting to it) is given this trend I gave myself the challenge of coming up with a variety of client delivery models should my bum on seat services not be required. I need to have a back up plan which is realistic and viable (hence working with current client to build the proposition). Its a lot of work but hopefully it will pay off.

Lastly I 100% agree with the comment made regarding chaff contractors. There were just as many in consultancy and one of the reasons I left was these k***end who never delivered, leaned on my technical knowledge to see them through a day, but talked a good game getting on further than me. I couldn't care less now as an independent. So long as the client pays my invoice when I'm in work, on you go taking on tulip contractors. They get found out eventually....

[NervousRexx]

posters come on here without a clue and make no effort to become a contractor

Agreed, the wheat needs sorting from the chaff in this thread.