Information technology (IT) professionals are not always the most admired lot at work. Co-workers and employees grumble about how all tech-related problems emanate from the IT room.
Even though these professionals may not be the most adorable people in the office and may even be tagged ‘the IT nerds’, they have reason to cheer. Salaries for IT professionals in the country are on the rise and the sector is expected to do well in the coming year.
According to experts, there will be more job openings for IT professionals as demand is growing in the sector.
“IT has been growing well, the market was relatively active,” said Konstantina Sakellariou, Partner, Marketing & Operations Director at Stanton Chase, indicating at a promising year ahead.
“Technology professionals continue to be in strong demand within the Middle East as organisations win projects and need the requisite talent to manage rising workload and business demands.
"E-commerce has emerged as an area of strong growth across the GCC, with estimates as high as 300 per cent annual growth, driving the need for Java and .NET developers and security professionals,” Gareth El Mettouri, Associate Director at Robert Half UAE told Emirates 24|7.
“More companies are moving towards cloud technologies as they enhance their IT security and compliance processes, increasing demand for security managers, architects and engineers. This is especially important for financial services firms as they face enhanced security concerns due to the sensitivity of their offerings.
"Meanwhile, retail banks will focus on multi-channel customer engagement and enhanced experience, with integrated and more functional web and mobile offerings prompting the need for mobile applications developers,” he added while commenting on the specific roles that will be in demand.
Lama Ataya, CMO at Bayt.com believes that “[there has been] a healthy rebound in employment in the IT sector. According to [our] Job Index surveys from October 2011 and October 2012, the number of jobs for IT professionals in the Middle East has increased in the past year.
"When employers in the IT industry were asked about the approximate number of jobs they would be hiring for in the next three months, 15 per cent said 6 to 10 jobs in 2011 as compared to 21 per cent in 2012; 3 per cent said 21 to 50 jobs in 2011 as compared to 6 per cent in 2012; and 2 per cent said 51 to 100 jobs in 2011 as compared to 5 per cent in 2012.”
The starting salary should be 5 per cent higher than the previous year with certain roles, which is very close to the overall (6 per cent) expected pay rise for UAE employees in the coming year.
“It is anticipated that starting salaries for IT professionals will increase 5 per cent over 2012 levels. Certain roles, including security engineers, enterprise architects, solutions architects and business systems analysts will see higher-than-average increases,” said Mettouri.
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