Thinking of changing career to IT

[the average man]

I currently work as a contractor in civil engineering and have done so for 4 out of the last 6 years the other 2 was in building services. I'm only(!) 25 and am thinking of a career change. I won't make no bones about it, the freelance rates in IT look pretty enticing compared to my own industries. The other impression I got was there are a lot of specialisms and its not really one size fits all. Obviously I'm not willing to jump in with both feet after just seeing "£450 per day" quoted somewhere and I have a lot more research to do still. I feel the best people to ask are the people on the ground doing the job i.e. you lot. I don't have a lot of time for "recruitment" agencies so thought better to ask here.

My question is, bearing in mind that I am working full time, and would like to continue to do so, what would be the best route in to a contract IT career qualification wise? Are degrees still relevent/sought after? In Civil Engineering you rarely see a contract job for someone with zero experience, when they do some up its usually at somewhere like a Local Authority. How does this compare with the IT industry? I'm assuming you've got to have some bits of paper to work freelance...

what kind of impact do you think the "new" new world order: China/India will have/has had on the industry in terms of future employment etc?

I do have a couple of other Q's but will have a proper look around on the articles on this site first and see what replies I get back: most likely!

cheers
And

[vetran]

Leverage your expertise and move across profession, find something that requires both your current skill & computers then morph seemlessly across. I started out fixing phones & voice mails, I turned that into Call logging & thence IT. So look for something high value that uses computers and manouver in that direction.

£450 a day isn't available for everyone I only got paid that occasionally, I had specialist knowledge in a specialist area. Most of the rest of the time it was £200 - £300 a day which isn't a bad screw. Make sure you have plenty of money behind you, its a high risk venture becoming a contractor I went back to mainly permiedom to pay the mortgage.

Offshoring / Visa workers have reduced opportuinities & wages there is a reason the number of students taking Computer science degrees has fallen dramatically. However currently our imported / exported workforce have weaknesses in vision & communication skills so you can use that to your advantage.

[thunderlizard]

In IT, there's no silver-bullet qualification like CEng. A degree in IT might help a bit, but probably not enough to be worth 3 years graft especially if you're already a qualified engineer. But you could get a vendor cert or two: they're cheap and easy to get, but would at least show people you're serious.

You can break into IT pretty quickly, because the hot languages and skills change every 3-4 years anyway. It's possible to get contracts with purely bedroom experience - they're the sub-£10/hr ones in godforesaken industrial estates. Maybe start off with some of those: with luck and judgement, a 6-monther and two 3-monthers could see you well on the way towards proper contracting within a year.

& Chinese/Indian New World Order? Don't fret about it: act local. As a contractor, companies can outsource, insource, upsize, downsize until the (sacred) cows come home for all I care. It's when they stop restructuring that we've got to worry.

[Old Greg]

I'm with vetran on this one. I started my career in the NHS barely able to use a PC. I now contract in IT in the health sector - I wouldn't know how to write a line of code but I understand my clients' (and their clients') business inside out and can express it in a way that techies can understand (and vice versa). It may be worth thinking about contracting roles in specialisms where your engineering expertise will count for something with engineering clients: project management, business analyst. If at all possible, try to get involved in project activities (process re-engineering, implementing new systems/ways of working) where you are now, and then talk them up when you start contracting. If you do decide to go down that route, it may be worth looking at a PRINCE2 or ITIL qualification, but these are generally not that useful if not combined with experience (or talked-up experience which you can pull off in a role).

Good luck.