Clicks-and-mortars lure back IT staff

Salaries for IT professionals with ebusiness skills are rising as bricks-and-mortar companies lure disillusioned staff back from the dotcom world.

A survey published last week by global recruitment consultancy Robert Walters shows that ebusiness salaries have increased by 20 per cent in the last year. IT directors with ebusiness experience can now expect to earn up to £120,000 a year.

The exodus of skilled IT professionals into the dotcom world is also over.

"Last year we took a lot of people out of bricks-and-mortar companies into dotcoms, but people have realised it's not the Klondike gold rush they thought it was," said Robert Lloyd, director of Robert Walters' technology division.

"There is now a shift back to candidates looking for more structure and stability and going back to the institutions. It's almost gone full circle."

The failure of some UK dotcoms to float on the stock market has caused many to have second thoughts about the future.

"We didn't see people going into dotcoms at higher salaries. Some highly-paid people came out of institutions, often taking as much as a £30,000 wage drop in return for share options. A lot of these guys are now coming back," said Lloyd.

He argues that employers will need to be more flexible to retain and recruit staff.

"If an employer is prepared to invest in developing new skills such as Java, that's always going to be attractive to staff," he added.

Another survey, by recruitment company Computer Futures, also shows an increased demand for ecommerce skills, with 15 per cent of placements made in the second quarter of this year being directly related to internet skills, compared with just seven per cent in the same period last year.

The average salary for an IT professional today stands at £28,279, compared with £26,922 last year, an overall increase of five per cent.

First published in Computing