Tech jobs increase in June

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Basically agree

You sound like what I've been saying for the past two years, for the most part, though I haven't been talking about how companies are killing off their own potential labor pool, but I think you're right--and the media has done a real number on tech aspirants as well. I used to talk about how companies were shooting themselves in the foot by laying off their most knowledgable people, which are generally more expensive.

There was some truth to what the media was saying. Starting in 2003 a lot of companies were offshoring work in order to lower costs. And tech work was extremely hard to come by from about 2001 through just recently. So yes, tech jobs didn't look too appetizing, and I wouldn't blame people for seeing it that way. The difference that I saw, comparing to past tech recessions, is there didn't seem to be any positive vision of the tech future being expressed. Whenever the media talked about what was happening in the job market it was in the darkest terms.

The reason companies looked to offshoring was somewhat understandable. They were doing it because demand dropped off so they had to do something to generate sales (lower costs so they could lower prices). I have no doubt there are companies who have been using offshoring smartly and are gaining benefits from it, but I think they are the minority. Just my hunch. My experience with corporate management, looking from the bottom, up--I haven't been to board meetings, but I saw the effects of their decisions--has taught me that just like I used to hear 12 years ago, management and engineering exist in two separate worlds. This issue still hasn't been resolved.

Years ago, Lester Thurow, an MIT economist, said that during the Industrial Age a company's capital investment was in its machinery. Labor was expendable. In the Information Age (which Sun's Schwartz now says is "dead") a company's capital investment is in its people, and the technology is expendable (it's more of an enabler or amplifier of people's work effort). He pondered the dynamic that would develop if people, the company's capital investment, decide to walk out the door and not come back. From what I've read, and people I've talked to, most companies still don't understand the way things work in the Information Age. They're still operating as though they were in the Industrial Age. They've replaced mechanical machinery for electronic machinery, but they haven't changed their concept of where the capital investment is.

Re: "By the time they come home looking to rebuild that here in the US it will be too late, and the price will be paid."

Well I guess I'll wait and see if the ITAA starts sounding the alarm again about a "tech labor shortage" . It may be more severe this time, but I remember when I was in college in the late 80s/early 90s I was told that computer science enrollment had been dropping off for years. We apparently got along alright anyway. Once the demand increased, salaries increased (dramatically). This prompted people to enter computer science/engineering and get those degrees. It seems to work out fairly well, even though it looks awfully messy from the inside. Only problem is tech aspirants can end up fooling themselves. I remember reading in the NYT a year or two ago of a case where a student saw a promising career in software development, so he went for an undergraduate comp. sci. degree in 1996, thereabouts. He got his undergraduate degree 'round about 2000, and figured he could make more money if he had a graduate degree. So he goes to get his graduate degree in comp. sci. (think about how time has passed here). By the time he got his graduate degree (2002), the tech job market was in the sewer. What do you think he did? Went back to school, this time in a different field. He missed the tech boom altogether while he was in school!

Re: "I say fire all the business people and lets place techies on the top of the management pile and when our world is swimming in data and IT services 50 years from now, lets compare those companies and their technology leaders with the pencil pushers of today..."

That's a little too optimistic, I think. A large reason a tech company succeeds is because of salesmanship, since a lot of customers don't understand technology that well. Some techies have the business acumen to pull off a success (I'd use Bill Gates as an example), but most do not. I've said this before. Perhaps what's necessary is for those who go to business school to get some background in technology, and/or for those who train in comp. sci./engineering to get some background in business. They're both essential skills to make a business successful. The problem is they don't each other.

Posted by: Mark Miller   Posted on: 07/09/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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