E-skills acts to tackle disruption caused by offshore trend

IT skills body is working on a development initiative to teach skills now lost to offshoring

IT skills body E-skills UK has revealed it is currently working on a development initiative designed to help IT graduates acquire the skills they would have traditionally gained in roles that are now commonly moved offshore.

Tilly Travers of E-skills UK said that employers were increasingly realising that the growing adoption of offshore outsourcing was disrupting the established career ladder for IT professionals.

"A new IT graduate used to have a career ladder of different roles that would lead to them becoming a project manager or CIO," Travers said. "But a lot of the middle rungs on that ladder have now been outsourced or moved to India and China – we need a new way to get entrants into higher-value roles quicker."

E-skills is keen to tackle this problem, Travers said, and has recently begun work on a new development programme aimed at speeding up the skills acquisition of IT professionals during the first two years of their careers. She added that this "first two years programme" was currently in the consultation phase, with E-skills seeking input from employers about what such an accelerated development initiative should include.

The programme is likely to particularly appeal to mid-market firms who have lost a "chunk of the IT career ladder" but lack the resources to run formal graduate development programmes, Travers predicted.

Separately, Travers insisted that E-skills is on track to meet all its targets for 2008, which were set out as part of its 2005 Sector Skills Agreement, and has already exceeded its target for adoption of the new IT Management for Business (ITMB) degree, with 15 universities expected to be offering the course by the end of the year.

Travers added that with a major new report on the UK's IT skills capability and requirements due later this year, E-skills is also now beginning work on its second action plan for post-2008.