ICT salaries under pressure in downturn, but Sydney, Adelaide fare best

Peter Dinham
Monday, 09 March 2009 18:42

IT Industry - Deals

However, according to Acheson, despite the short-term outlook, there are a number of major projects on the horizon that Peoplebank anticipates will boost demand for contractors later in 2009.

“Additionally, several of our enterprise clients – especially in Perth – are seeing the wealth of talent currently available as an opportunity to hire the skills that will equip them to explore new areas of competitive advantage.

“These are nascent trends, but they do point to the beginnings of a recovery in our sector in the medium to longer term,” Acheson adds.

In Sydney, Acheson says the market has been buoyed by relatively strong continued demand for contractors, especially for Java/J2EE developers, technical solution architects, project managers and business analysts, with demand continuing to be underpinned by a number of major projects in the NSW Government and telecommunications sectors.

Whereas, in Melbourne, Acheson observes that with a number of strong ICT candidates on the market at the moment, Victoria has slated what he calls its “pent-up demand for ICT skills, and is rapidly becoming a buyers’ market for enterprises.”

In Perth, in stark contrast to recent years, where employers have paid a premium for skills so that projects could proceed, there is now a surplus of skilled ICT workers, which is placing downward pressure on both salaries and contractor rates.

According to Peoplebank, it estimates that the salaries currently being offered for ICT roles in Perth are about 5 percent lower than those of 12 months ago.