Most IT professionals planning for pastures new

gallery

The latest IT recruitment survey has found a whopping nine out of every ten IT professionals are planning to look for new work in 2009.

Online recruiter, The IT Job Board surveyed 362 UK employees in the sector and found only 11 per cent of respondents were not planning to look for new work this year.

Of those not job hunting, 46 per cent said that this was because they were happy with their current job. And 36 per cent cited the volatile economic climate as the reason preventing them from looking for new pastures.

Given the heavy influence of the UK’s recession on those IT staff deciding to stay put, Alex Farrell, The IT Job Board managing director said he was surprised so many were still planning to look for new work in the year ahead.

“It’s positive to see that the sector’s employees do not believe the economic downturn will have a major impact on career opportunities,” he said.

And almost half of those surveyed believed that the economic downturn would have some negative impact on the IT sector, but that it would not be as hard hit as other industries.

Of those surveyed that were planning on job hunting this year, over 50 per cent of respondents stated that they wanted to find better career opportunities, and 45 per cent wanted to look for a new job in order to earn more money.

Nearly two thirds planned to further develop their technical skills through a new job and more than half believed that a career change would help to improve their work/life balance.

“It will be paramount for employees to attract and retain quality staff, and help them to improve their technical skills,” said Farrell.

“And, it will be down to job boards and recruitment consultants to work with prospective employers to ensure that the right candidates are being effectively targeted,” he added.

Email to a friend

Print this page