Posted on 02/23/2008 3:44:22 PM PST by Momaw Nadon
Many of America's top jobs are moving offshore. Which jobs are most likely to be hit by "offshoring" and what can you do to protect and safeguard your career?
The list below shows four categories of jobs:
I agree. In-sourcing has, at times, even exceeded outsourcing.
But, here’s the rub. There is a percentage of the population, for whatever reason, that will never be qualified for those types of jobs that are being in-sourced.
The jobs that are left are, for the most part, those that require more education than many are willing to obtain, or that don’t have the capacity to learn above certain levels; Or they are menial jobs, such as retail, fast food, unskilled labor, etc.
We do need to be creative, and find ways to keep jobs for all Americans, regardless of education levels, that will allow them to be productive, contributing citizens. By no means am I suggesting social programs that share in the costs, either.
Manufacturing is a good example. We need more manufacturing in this Country. I believe we have the ability to compete, heads up, with Countries like China and India. We simply need to be more creative and determined to do it.
If we don’t, the alternative is huge government social programs to support these folks and their children.
Any job combining IT skills with deep and specific knowledge of a given business area should not only survive, but thrive. Business intelligence is the best area, though it requires a broad skill-set and is hard for newcomers to get into.
But if you're pure IT, better pack your bags for Bangalore or Shanghai if you want to keep working.
It really depends on your income requirements and your ability to be flexible. Any position in IT, now, needs to have two or three main skill sets, and a smattering of three to five more.
What are your interests?
The IT jobs that are staying here are mostly H1B visa people - trained by those they replaced.
Lots of underemployed IT people around. I wouldn't want my kids in IT. Too bad, it's soon to be a lost ability.
You hit in on it. Any IT professional must have a solid “knowledge portfolio.”
Knowledge of Oracle, MySql, C++, Java and Microsoft .NET are the “blue-chip” skills. But you must also keep up with emerging technologies, like Ruby on Rails, or Functional languages like Erlang or Scala, that may or may not take off, but could provide a nice return. I always go to the Manning and OReilly web sites to see what are the upcoming titles for their books, that gives a good hint as to what is “hot” out there.
There's always a need for some in house tech support - desktop services for instance - where you have to actually do hands on support to install, set up and fix pc's and servers, etc. The drawback is that you don't need a lot of people to do that.
Another option would be a company who does installs and support for say, Wal-Mart or Target, supermarket chains, etc. - that would be a company like NCR or NETS.
Banking is a global business anyway. Most other project mgmt will stay local at many levels. The company I work for has hired 4 project mgrs in the last 2 years and is hiring 2 more this year in IT. They’ve added 3 construction project mgrs as well.
Not really. There are lots of jobs but problem is technology is changing and what is “in” is also.
I hate NCR. We used to use Agilysys but switched to NCR to ‘save a (few) bucks.’ Yes, NCR is always hiring. Just last week they fired 3 people on the team that deals with our company.
I’m a firefighter and run a photography business. I think I’d be tough to offshore. I still need people to use my services, though.
Yep, we have to kick, scream, crawl and practically baby sit NCR. During the Christmas season, which is our busiest time of the year like most retailers, we had several stores that had 2-3 weeks of a register being down without being fixed. Finally our corporate store support had to drive several new scales/register equipment to the stores ourselves even though NCR is contracted to have 4 hour response time and 2 day max if a part needs to be ordered. They have been awful since the first day we switched to them (about 3 1/2 years ago). Takes about 20 minutes for a store to reach them and frequently our seasoned Front End Managers are as or more knowledgeable than the level 1/2 techs.
NCR 'services' our hundreds of always a problem self scan registers.
This is very sound advice. Also, Oracle contractors can get $100+ an hour for their work.
“However, just because they passed the PMP doesn’t mean they have the dynamics and the ability to deal with people to be great project managers.”
For now, but as more of the work is done elsewhere it becomes less necessary for local project managers.
“Banking is a global business anyway. “
Not really, they have made it one out of greed.
Hi, 10th:
Fellow tech writer here! Based in Germany, working for co. recently removed from DJ30. Contact me!
About the article: What many readers perhaps don’t recognize is that, while the job title may not have changed, the actual nature of the job may have morphed almost beyond recognition. Q.v. an “auto mechanic” in the 1960’s vs. an “auto mechanic” in the 21st Century.
Regards,
Hi, HJR_fan:
Fellow technical editor, here!
>>I’m a writer (technical), but have seen how vulnerable my job is to fluctuations in the fortunes of high tech. Still, as long as English is such a bizarre language, a shotgun wedding of germanic skeleton and romance flesh, it will be hard to find non-native supplanters.<<
Care to guess how often I’m forced to convert four-page, text-heavy Installation Instructions into “language-neutral” picture books, or at least “telegram-style” texts (LOTS of bullets, no definite or indefinite articles, only infinitive verbs, etc.).
Once the conversion of all that literature is completed, ANYONE will be able to maintain it (and create new textless docs).
Write me!
Regards,
Consider changes in career. Certain seemingly negative developments can be a blessing in disguise. After the manufacturing automation company I worked for went belly-up in the Carolinas, due to our client base vastly shrinking due to offshoring - I took off elsewhere to get my job back.
However, I ended up playing music for a living doing classic rock gigs, a lifelong dream, for all the very well-paid engineers and execs from these previous clients - as well as from other companies, in this fast-growing region, where one can actually make a living being a musician. Full Disclosure: I live in Shanghai, and the above is said with a bit of sarcasm, but only just a bit. I do like what I do for a living.
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