Which IT jobs will survive automation?
A recent report by HfS, a US-based research firm, predicted that India's IT services industry will lose 6.4 lakh 'low-skilled' jobs to automation in the next five years. This is alarming, given that the $160 billion industry is one of the biggest employment generators in the service sector. Another report points to a bigger problem—the huge gap between new information technology jobs created and the number of engineering graduates produced every year. While more than 15 lakh new engineers enter the job market every year, the absorption capacity has shrunk to 2-2.5 lakh.
What does this mean for employees? Head hunters say fierce competition among freshers and skill over scale will now become the norm.
Though the jobs that will be lost are mostly bottom of the pyramid positions, mid-level employees are also at a risk of becoming unemployable, unless they upgrade themselves. Employers say this is not a new trend in this sector. "In the IT and ITeS industry, learning never stops and one has to keep updating themselves as per the latest industry skills. Those who are not able to do that have perished in the past and will continue to do so," says Praveen Dewan, Managing Partner, Antal International.
The HfS report points to a similar trend, anticipating that while process-based jobs will perish, the industry will see a 56 per cent increase in high-skilled jobs. Areas which will see high demand and lucrative paypackages are big data, analytics, machine learning, mobility, design, Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence.
Staying relevant in the future
Head hunters predict no dearth of opportunities with the right skills. "The government is pushing for automation in all its departments, and jobs will be created across levels. Then there is the strong startup community which is hungry for high-skill workers," Dewan says.
With the influx of a large amount of diverse information, skill-based positions like data scientist, designer and digital marketing expert are here to stay. Data scientists are expected to be in high demand.
"Not only in IT & ITeS, data scientists will be also sought after in the manufacturing, R&D, banking and financial sectors and in expanding e-commerce companies," says Sunil Goel, MD, GlobalHunt. Big data analysis calls for knowledge of com puter science, analytics and statistics skills, strong communication skills, and a working knowledge of business intelligence tools.
A number of jobs related to IoT, will also be generated. "As Internet speeds increase, the need for maintaining and managing internet infrastructure will also grow," says Dewan. Experienced people with profiles such as digital marketing expert, marketing technologist and solution architects, who have both business and technical know-how and are able to align the two, will be in high demand. Areas like mobile application, cloud computing and IT infrastructure risk analysis and security will stay relevant for a long time. "Developers with experience in user-interface (UI) and user-experience (UX) are in demand. Data visualisation experts with the skills to present data in easily intelligible ways will be in demand too," says Goel.
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A recent report by HfS, a US-based research firm, predicted that India's IT services industry will lose 6.4 lakh 'low-skilled' jobs to automation in the next five years. This is alarming, given that the $160 billion industry is one of the biggest employment generators in the service sector. Another report points to a bigger problem—the huge gap between new information technology jobs created and the number of engineering graduates produced every year. While more than 15 lakh new engineers enter the job market every year, the absorption capacity has shrunk to 2-2.5 lakh.
What does this mean for employees? Head hunters say fierce competition among freshers and skill over scale will now become the norm.
Though the jobs that will be lost are mostly bottom of the pyramid positions, mid-level employees are also at a risk of becoming unemployable, unless they upgrade themselves. Employers say this is not a new trend in this sector. "In the IT and ITeS industry, learning never stops and one has to keep updating themselves as per the latest industry skills. Those who are not able to do that have perished in the past and will continue to do so," says Praveen Dewan, Managing Partner, Antal International.
The HfS report points to a similar trend, anticipating that while process-based jobs will perish, the industry will see a 56 per cent increase in high-skilled jobs. Areas which will see high demand and lucrative paypackages are big data, analytics, machine learning, mobility, design, Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence.
Staying relevant in the future
Head hunters predict no dearth of opportunities with the right skills. "The government is pushing for automation in all its departments, and jobs will be created across levels. Then there is the strong startup community which is hungry for high-skill workers," Dewan says.
With the influx of a large amount of diverse information, skill-based positions like data scientist, designer and digital marketing expert are here to stay. Data scientists are expected to be in high demand.
"Not only in IT & ITeS, data scientists will be also sought after in the manufacturing, R&D, banking and financial sectors and in expanding e-commerce companies," says Sunil Goel, MD, GlobalHunt. Big data analysis calls for knowledge of com puter science, analytics and statistics skills, strong communication skills, and a working knowledge of business intelligence tools.
A number of jobs related to IoT, will also be generated. "As Internet speeds increase, the need for maintaining and managing internet infrastructure will also grow," says Dewan. Experienced people with profiles such as digital marketing expert, marketing technologist and solution architects, who have both business and technical know-how and are able to align the two, will be in high demand. Areas like mobile application, cloud computing and IT infrastructure risk analysis and security will stay relevant for a long time. "Developers with experience in user-interface (UI) and user-experience (UX) are in demand. Data visualisation experts with the skills to present data in easily intelligible ways will be in demand too," says Goel.
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