February 11, 2014
The job market for information technology is steadily and consistently growing. Technology is constantly evolving with new skills developing fast and outdated skills getting pushed out. Because of those variations, here is a list of the top 5 IT skills that will be sure to benefit IT professionals in 2014.
Big Data
Big data is used to describe the exponential growth and availability of data. A recent IDG Enterprise survey of over 750 IT decision makers showed that nearly half will be implementing big data projects or are planning to in 2014. This is a 5% increase over last year; even though it might seem small, it is showing that big data is growing and will continue to grow
each year.
Big data is being implemented in all different types of businesses, from sports to retailers, companies are realizing the valuable business intelligence they can gather to improve decision making and gain a competitive advantage. Big data can analyze anything from how often a person visits a location and track their purchases which then can be used to discover
how businesses can personally tailor their next visit.
Below are specific skills that are needed this year in big data:
- ETL (Extract, Transfer, and Load) Developers
- Hadoop Developers
- Visualization Tool Developers
- Data Scientists
- OLAP Developer
- Data Warehouse Appliance Specialist
- Predictive Analytics Developer
Mobile
The need for mobile application developers is growing as much as the use of mobile technology is. About 20% of web traffic last year came from a mobile device. Yet, mobile app development is ranked as the third most difficult skill to find according to Computerworld. Most companies want someone who has experience with developing for Apple’s iOS . There are a lot of other skills needed in order to develop mobile apps. Training in Java, jQuery, and other scripting languages are just a few skills associated with mobile app development. The shortage of people with these skills and an increase demand for app developers has caused a shortage in this
area.
Cloud
In 2012, the adoption and acceptance of cloud technology grew so much that 1.7 million cloud-related jobs went unfilled. Companies are looking for individuals with knowledge in migrations, integration, and developer knowledge of different cloud providers’ application programming
interfaces. The future of data storage is going toward cloud meaning that the demand for IT professionals with these skills is only going to get higher.
Security
Due to the increase in software hacking and the uncovering of NSA activity, IT security skills are extremely in demand for 2014. Security is the top concern of every CIO’s mind, so the need for solid security architecture is always going to be around. Those who have experience in
security saw a 23% increase in value and demand over 2013 and that number will
continue to rise in 2014 with a quarter of businesses looking at growing their IT security staff.
Web Development
Web development is still a hot skill for IT professionals and as long as the internet is around it will be. More companies are especially interested in those who know open source languages and modern languages such as Ruby and Python because this de-emphasizes Microsoft language and shows initiative. Companies see web development as such an investment for their
business and will pay lots of money for them. It is vital that web developers have framework knowledge, widget development, CMS customization, plugin development, and flash knowledge because all of these components are what companies want for their websites.
Having any one of these five skills will make you attractive to prospective employers and due to the shortage of experienced professionals in these areas, they could possibly drive up your salary. So, if you are looking for a possible career change or just want to expand your knowledge, tech executives everywhere would highly recommend developing and perfecting
these skills.
Which would make your top 5 list? Answer below!
Posted By: Danielle Toste