Developers' jobs pick up at expense of project management

IT sector waits for government spending review

Developers looking to jump to the private sector

When the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) publishes its monthly report tomorrow, it will show that while the number of IT-related vacancies remains well down on the boom years, there is a growing demand for onshore .Net, Java and C# developers.

And that is at the expense of business analyst and project management jobs, which were previously favoured over developers' jobs.

"If you’re further up the food chain, things just got tighter," REC Technology chairman Jeff Brooks said.

Brooks said businesses "seem to be holding their collective breath" while they wait for the outcome of the coalition's comprehensive spending review on 20 October.

He predicted that long-term public sector IT staff with relevant developer skills would find it easier to make the jump to the private sector than those with public-only project management experience.

"Developer skills are easier to transfer," Brook added.

The union Unite claims that HP is about to make 1,300 workers redundant from its professional services division, previously EDS, which held numerous public sector outsourcing contracts.