Conversation with friends
Last week, I had dinner with two best friends in Shanghai. One is a senior manager of a very large companies in India and the other is a professor of a well known university in China. I wanted to ask some questions about the current technology trends so I told them: “According to the research firm IDC, in the next five years most developed countries may grow about 3% to 5% but emerging countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) could achieve 8% to 15% growth and this will change the economic balance of global power. One of the fastest growing sectors is information technology but there is a critical shortage of skilled worker in this field globally and that is a major problem for these emerging countries. As the information technology industry continues to improve, companies that have a need for skilled people will have difficulty hiring for particular skills and eventually have to obtain the needed skills by bring in workers from oversea or by outsource to foreign countries. It is hard to imagine that countries like China and India do NOT have enough IT people to support their economy growth and have to outsource or bring in outside workers, so I want to know if this issue is real or not?
My Indian friend answered: “It is NOT that we need programmers, we have plenty of them but we do NOT have enough highly specialized skilled people such as architect, designers and information system managers. Even our education system is improving but it takes time to develop these people. I am sure we will have these needed skills someday but in the next three to five years, we will NOT have enough skilled people to support our economic growth. We do run out of highly skilled people because of our success in outsourcing where demand exceeds supply.
My friend in China agreed: “We maybe behind India in Information technology but we are catching up. In past years, we have put a lot of investments in infrastructures and hardwares but NOT pay attention to software and this is a mistake. Actually we did not realize that it is software that drives everything and changes everything. We are changing our direction now and focusing more on software. The problem is our education systems are NOT changing fast enough, Even our government has invested significant amount in education, we have brought in several top curricula from the U.S and European universities to replace our “Archaic systems” but to be the best, we need good professors and it will take many years to develop them. No matter what we do, it will probably take another five to ten years to get our education system to catch up with the U.S”.
I asked them: “What are the skills that you need most today? What surprise me is both of them told me that IT security is one of the areas that remained very high in demand. My friend in India said: “This is probably the best IT job, the most wanted with the highest salary of all IT jobs. With so many problems happening from cyber-attacks to hackers send virus to company's information systems, every company needs IT security skilled people. Even our government passes more laws and regulations on this subject but constant fear of increasing threats and customer demands make this skills the most needed today. Unfortunately, very few universities teach this skill, even in the U.S only few universities have security courses in their program.
My friend in China agreed: “I think beginning this year, many companies will have to focus more on recruiting, training on IT security, the industry can no longer afford to ignore this issue. What we need is hiring more IT security people immediately. Despite the financial crisis that challenges many companies, those who choose to ignore this issue do so at their own peril. The problem is today we have to send students to the U.S because there are very few places teaching this skills. Of course, your school - Carnegie Mellon is the most well known in this field so you should know about it”.
I told them that IT security is already part of our training program for Software Engineering and Information System Management with many courses in network security and risk management. Based on this conversation, I think the importance of this skill and the long-term career opportunities should motivate many students to look into this area. I asked them: “What else beside IT security skills that you think will be needed?
My Chinese friend answered: “Probably skills in mobile devices from chip design to software applications management. I think the use of mobile platform will surpass that of Personal Computer in the number of users, the number of devices accessing the Internet. For years, the personal computer (PC) is king but we believe the next big thing will be mobile devices such as the smart phones (i.e., I-phone, I-pad etc.) as these products continue to mature and find their way into consumers and corporations. There will be an explosion of applications which open more opportunities for people specialize in mobile platforms. We believe that in the next few years, these devices will replace the personal computer as the tool of choice. Today the market belongs to Apple but there will be more similar devices come to the market soon and the key issue will be how companies manage an increasingly diverse mobile platforms that meets security requirements. This is the issue of Information System management people as we will need more people who can manage information systems for the company, provide IT services to users, explain technical issues to non-technical people and ensure that information technology provides value to the business.
My Indian friend told me: “I think knowledge and skill in cloud computing would probably be more important. With the financial crisis, companies must reduce costs, especially IT costs such as infrastructure and storage so driven by these economic motivations and benefits of renting instead of buying, cloud computing management would be critical in the near future. As cloud computing evolves, industry will need more information systems managers to manage interoperability between cloud computing platforms. These people will monitoring and keeping pace with the trends in cloud computing development for their companies. Of course, due to the rise in cloud computing usage and the changing natures of these technologies, companies needs to have very strong IT management that can manage, implement and provide them as services because cloud computing is another aspect of Software as a Services.
Both of them told me that knowledge and skills will be key factors for their countries' economic growth and investment in education, especially in Information technology is the main focus that can change the balance of economic power in the near future. So I ask them: “What are the main factors in education reform?” They told me that to improve education system, there are three key factors: “Having the best and most up to date training program, having good professors, and having motivated students”.
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
