IT jobs market plunges in July: report

by Stan Beer

Thursday, 07 August 2008

Page 1 of 2 ! The overall IT job market in Australia has decreased by 5.06% in July, according to the latest monthly jobs survey released by recruiter Best International. According to the Best IT Talent Index, which compiled from jobs board statistics, permanent positions on offer were down a significant 6.99%, while this was offset by a 0.76% increase in contract roles. Most popular skills tags .NET Active Directory C# Cisco Development HTML Infrastructure Management Network Oracle Project Management SAP SDLC SQL Server Support Sybase TCP/IP Unix VB.NET Web Services/SOAP XML According to the report, with the new financial year now in swing, this could mean worrying signs for the IT market in Australia. However it could also point to differing methods of recruitment and less reliance by organisations on traditional internet job boards for finding people. "More and more companies are utilising multiple hiring methods for their recruitment including an increased willingness to look overseas," the report states. However, the news was not all bad, according to the Best report. "New projects have certainly kicked in as some of the sectors have returned strong increases but it appears the general feeling could be one of caution and companies not prepared to take unnecessary risks with their hiring intentions this close to the beginning of a new Financial Year," the report states. What appears to be the most solid indicator of a downturn in employer sentiment is the poor performance of the permanent jobs market. Recruiters have been telling iTWire for the past few weeks that the permanent jobs sector is not a good place to be right now. This is echoed in the Best report: "The Permanent market seems to have suffered more than the Contract market with only a few sectors showing growth. These sectors are Architects, Consultants, Management and System Admin with Business Analysts and Team Leaders remaining static. "This could be attributed to the lifecycle of projects but is more likely to be down to organisations exercising caution around their hiring intentions preferring to gamble on contractors rather than permanent employees. "This reticence to hire permanent employees could be attributed to uncertainty in where the market is heading. Most companies would not wish to over recruit in the permanent arena should the market take a further downturn. This in turn will have a knock on effect on the market and could artificially drive down demand." So what about the contract space? CONTINUED << First page <   1 2 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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