February 22, 2022

Which IT skills will be in demand for 2022?

6 min read

As specialists in IT recruitment, our team has an in-depth understanding of the tech industry in New Zealand. We talk to our clients every day and through their demand for talent in certain areas across the country, we know which skills are most sought after at any given time.

By knowing which skills are in demand, job seekers can craft any corresponding expertise into their CV, cover letter and of course the job interview itself. For many tech professionals, skill sets will be far reaching with exposure to a number of disciplines, coding languages or methodologies. It might also be an idea to either get upskilling in your current role, or seek out good quality training to strengthen your CV in areas in demand.

By fulfilling a market demand, job seekers can often demand a better pay. And in a landscape where overseas IT talent is unable to be tapped into, NZ-based IT professionals have a massive opportunity.

We spoke with our consultants across the country to uncover the roles they’re talking about as most in demand with our clients. We think the following are going to be hot and in demand for 2022.

Data and Analytics Skills

COVID-19’s tracking through Ministry of Health is just one example of how data and analysis is the driving force behind big important government initiatives. With the growing expectation of this data helping to manage complex challenges, being harnessed to create a better end user experience, or support an organisation’s function, the requirement for people that understand data and analysis grows too.

The challenge in the market now is finding expertise, particularly Data Analyst, Data Engineer and Data Architect experience – employers are finding it extremely hard to source due to skill availability.

We don’t think there’s any way this field is going to shrink, rather it will explode over the coming decade. For anyone looking to position themselves in a lucrative in demand area of IT, it’s hard not to suggest upskilling, training and qualification in data science.

Cyber Security Skills

As more businesses (and our lives) rely upon technology, the need for excellent cyber security is growing. This is no longer a peripheral field that only some organisations prioritise. Security of platforms, infrastructure and processes is fundamental for protection against breaches or external attacks on systems. With some recent highly-publicised cyber security stories in New Zealand like the attack experienced by the Waikato DHB and news media about the shortage of resources to combat cyber crime, there are constant reminders for organisations around the need for experienced security talent.

Because security is high stakes, the demand for personnel is caveated with high levels of experience too. For this reason, those in this field can demand considerable remuneration.

DevOps Skills

Ensuring a tech stack is working and utilised by the team still plays a critical role in many of our clients’ workflow. Whether it’s a need for more system administration to accommodate a growing team, or supporting the upkeep of platforms, we’re having plenty of conversations with employers who are asking for DevOps specialists.

Cloud Skills

This year will see more businesses shift their infrastructure into the cloud. Amazon Web Services (AWS) still holds strong as a popular Cloud environment employers need skills in, but Azure – Microsoft’s Cloud platform – is the priority for most of our clients at present. In fact, Microsoft suite skills are a hot topic at the moment with MS Dynamics 365 being adopted into a number of organisations’ workflow, thus needing consultants and experience around it.

Project Management Skills

The business world is continually needing good project management expertise to help deliver on tech projects. This demand is far reaching for organisations across many industries including:

Finance
Banking
Digital Transformation
Change Management
Public Sector

It’s encouraging to see growing numbers of candidates for these roles, but anyone within a desire to continue or grow their project management career should keep a close eye on roles as the demand doesn’t look to be slowing down – anywhere in the main business centres across NZ.

Project management roles typically require leadership, people skills, methodology expertise, organisation and problem solving.

Business Analyst (BA) Skills

BAs have long been in demand by organisations in order to better understand and solve business challenges. Demand for these roles is unlikely to slow down in 2022. The ability to provide analysis on ‘current state’ and ‘future state’ systems and processes – then use this to empower leadership to make the right decisions, is highly valuable. A business analyst with good experience should definitely look at the market if they’re keen on a new challenge – there’s potential for bigger earnings at the moment.

Learn more about what a business analyst does in our dedicated Project Services area of our expertise page.

React Native Skills

If you’ve been a reader of Absolute IT’s news for a while, you may remember our feature piece on React Native skills being in high demand back in March 2020. Our clients are still requiring React Native experience for a range of mobile and web app projects. In fact, React Native is so challenging to source for businesses at the moment that some projects are pivoting to find React.js and angular.js skill sets. These skills are difficult to find in their own right.

What does this mean if you’re an expert in this field? Potentially an increase in opportunities.

Developer Skills

One consistent feature of the IT market over the last 10 years has been the imbalance between supply and demand – and that’s good for devs. Chatting to clients in the past 6 months, we know they’re still needing experience in .net, Python, Javascript languages, among others. Front and Back End developers shouldn’t have trouble finding work, particularly in Auckland where there is an ever-growing tech sector requiring these roles at virtually all levels.

Android Developer Skills

Interestingly we’re seeing plenty of opportunities for Android-specific development. While iOS remains strong, it’s the Android side of mobile OS where employers are needing expertise. Catering for more smartphone types is important in both public and private sectors, and mobile developers are consequently finding more work in both a contract and permanent capacity.

Google Flutter Skills

Suddenly in 2021 we were fielding questions from clients wanting expertise in Google’s new software development kit Flutter. Touted as a solution for building mobile, web and desktop apps from one codebase, we’d expect this to join the list of desirable skills with React and iOS/Android experience. Mobile developers would be certainly helping bolster their CV’s attractiveness in today’s market by looking into Flutter!

Are your skills in high demand? Then we might have the perfect job for you! Chat with our team today.

Explore the benefits of contracting

7 min read

The rapid growth of technology’s core role in business has created a demand for skills in the space that’s hard to keep up with. New Zealand is experiencing a skills shortage across many roles in tech, making it an ideal time for experienced IT professionals to tap into the abundance of opportunities.

Along with full time, part time and fixed term roles, Absolute IT is a market leader in placing skilled contractors into organisations requiring specialist tech expertise. What’s interesting in talking with job seekers each day, is that many haven’t considered the benefits of contracting vs. a full time role. In this high-demand low-supply IT market, contracting presents a compelling alternative.

In this article, we’ll cover some of the benefits of contracting. If you identify with any of these points, a great next step is to get in touch with our team to discuss your options further.

There’s a big demand for specialist expertise

Many big tech-based initiatives in Kiwi organisations are project or programme-based, which inherently come with a finite lifespan, making a contractor resource the logical choice for many roles. Project managers, Business Analysts, Architects, developers and designers to name but a few, regularly have opportunities for work through contracting.

Furthermore, businesses know that to gain access to highly skilled experts in a particular field of tech, they may need to look to contractors, who have identified a more lucrative career through non-permanent ‘gigs’. In many cases, this makes sense for both parties – the contractor earns more and the organisation isn’t required to commit long term to an expensive resource potentially only needed for a specific project stage.

Many of our IT professionals enjoy 12 full months of work, for years at a time. This isn’t always the case, and as with any contractor you should expect the possibility of less or no work. Some contractors in IT may also have other ongoing freelance clients to help cushion the financial blow in between large contracts.

Variety in tech, projects, industries and businesses

Are you the type of tech professional who gets bored working in the same role, on the same platforms for the same business long term? If so, contracting might be the perfect antidote. By design you’ll be hopping from project to project, acquiring new experiences and skills along the way.

For our more technical contractors, they often get exposed to a wider range of technologies, quicker through a career in contracting. While you will be brought in for your strengths, the broader tech stacks will vary from contract to contract, giving you exposure to newer technologies, different products, builds and methodologies.

Contractors need to apply different parts of their brain as the business requirements and challenges vary between contracts. Being exposed to these varying challenges can help fast-track the development of a contractor’s skill set through exposure to different issues, helping them add value to the next project. While this approach may suit those who are comfortable with change, having a series of contracts will equip anyone with more confidence and new techniques to adapt and learn.

Variety is also rewarding thanks to the plethora of industries that require specialist IT talent to deliver on their business objectives; think financial, transport, tourism, government, health, ecommerce, retail – the list goes on. As a contractor, you’ll come into contact with these businesses, their people and their tech requirements. Aside from providing opportunities to apply skills and critical thinking across a variety of applications, switching up industries can be good to simply keep things interesting!

Flexibility around hours to fit your lifestyle

A contractor is essentially self employed, meaning that there’s often more flexibility around how to engage with the organisation they’re delivering services to. Full time employees are often obliged to meet more baseline requirements such as set start/finish times, company training obligations, and team building. Contractors aren’t so connected with the business (outside of the specific work they’re doing). This is by design, as contractors’ typical hourly rate means every minute they spend is ideally adding tangible benefit to that specific project.

While some projects may require contractors to be present for a full day, many projects can be negotiated as far as hours, days, and even location. Remote working with your own equipment can be attractive to an organisation who would otherwise need to supply a desk, power and potentially computer equipment.

So, if you’re an experienced IT professional who has other life commitments or hobbies, a contracting model could allow you to structure your week exactly how it suits you.

Significant earnings potential

There’s no big secret here; contractors usually earn more than full time employees and are typically paid on an hourly basis. The question will remain however, will this translate to a larger income, prorated over the course of the year? It’s an important consideration for a contractor as this answer may depend on how much downtime you have between projects. In today’s high-demand IT industry, any contractor with some good networking skills shouldn’t be without a gig for too long.

Organisations are willing to pay more for a contractor for a number of reasons:

Engaging a contractor ensures they are purely paying for technical resources that will be 100% productive on the task (or close to it).
Contractors don’t come with all the admin of a permanent employee, making onboarding or winding up engagement much easier (provided the terms of the contract are adhered to!).
Contractors are often brought into an IT-based project possessing some specific technical skills that may have been hard to find otherwise. Like salaried equivalents of these jobs, they demand a premium on the market.
The cost of a contractor can be built into the total project costs without great difficulty. When offset against the specific value they’re engaged to deliver, this makes the ROI model much easier for an organisation to account for.
Contactors may be needed immediately, and are able to hit the ground running.
They don’t need to pay the contractor holiday pay, sick leave or allocate training budget.

If you’re looking into contracting, make sure you put the time into determining the right charge out rate, based upon things like market demand, your experience, skills, covering costs like ACC and tax, plus the margin you want to make. It might also be worth connecting with others in contracting to get insights into how they calculate hourly rates.

There’s also nothing preventing you from adjusting your rates between contracts, either, so do make sure these are reviewed periodically to remain in step with the industry and your evolving value.

You’re totally in control of your business direction

Being self-employed puts the control – and responsibility – totally in your hands. That means you get to decide what work to take on, not an employer. If you’ve ever felt like you needed more say over how you use your workday, contracting is probably a good fit for you.

As the industry changes and evolves, a contractor can update and reframe their offering to market relatively quickly, ensuring that you stay current and in demand.

The one thing to note here – when we say it’s all up to you, it really is. This means any training, learning, sales, networking and marketing will fall on your shoulders alone.

Building a strong network of contacts quickly

Naturally, a contractor who strings together jobs will start to build up a sizable network of business relationships. Keeping connected with previous colleagues opens up the opportunity for repeat business.

As these contacts move to other organisations, there’s a chance they may tap into your expertise there as well. While permanent employees build strong relationships with their fellow staff, contractors build this list much quicker.

And beyond any business benefit, moving around regularly is simply a great way to meet lots of new friends, full stop!

Remove the perception around ‘job hopping’

We regularly talk with candidates who express concern around their CV and LinkedIn profiles showing multiple roles in a short space of time. While the stigma of this is much less in the modern IT era, it’s still a legitimate concern when trying to reassure a potential employer that you’re not a ‘flight risk’.

These aren’t concerns a contractor really needs to worry about; by design their careers are made up of lots of projects as opposed to permanent roles. Therefore it’s unlikely to cause any issues.

Furthermore, many IT-based roles on a contract basis will last for a significant period of time; some bigger projects could require you for over a year!

Keen to look for a contracting role or simply learn more about your options? Absolute IT connects skilled IT workers with fantastic contracting opportunities. Reach out to our team today to start on your contracting journey.