Three quarters of UK tech pros are ready to leave their jobs
- Reference: 1681228930
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/04/11/three_quarters_of_uk_tech/
- Source link:
A [1]four-day work week would suit 83 percent of tech talent, one in five are ready to leave their jobs as soon as possible, and only 11 percent are happy to stay in their current role, the survey found.
The research from technology talent hub hackajob is in keeping with research from Gartner earlier this year that [2]found that despite widespread tech sector layoffs, there was still a dire shortage of skills and employers were being forced to compete to secure the right people in their teams.
[3]
In a statement, hackajob CEO Mark Chaffey said: "The gap between what companies are offering and what tech workers want is causing unrest at a time when there's no shortage of alternative job openings out there.
[4]
[5]
"There are still plenty of organizations hiring, and now many more people are searching for new roles. Whilst salary will always be key to any tech job seeker, it is crucial that companies look outside of just remuneration in order to retain the tech talent they already have."
[6]ChatGPT is coming for your jobs – the terrible ones, at least
[7]Rackspace racks up job cuts amid market downturn and talk of offshoring
[8]WFH? Google Cloud's offices like a 'ghost town' before new policy
[9]Results are in for biggest 4-day work week trial ever: 92% sticking with it
The report also found that after pay (29 percent), tech workers were most attracted to a role and organization by its overall culture (15 percent) and mission (13 percent).
Last month the analyst found demand for technology talent still significantly exceeds supply. According to a Gartner survey of around 18,000 employees conducted in November and December 2022, 86 percent of CIOs reported more competition for qualified candidates and 73 percent were worried about IT talent attrition.
During the time of the survey, [10]Meta , [11]Google , and [12]Salesforce had already started laying off staff. Since the beginning of 2023, 570 tech companies have chopped around 168,000 employees, according to tracker website [13]Layoffs.fyi.
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However, tech skills in application development, AI and machine learning, software engineering (Python specifically), and enterprise cloud architecture remained hard to find, Mbula Schoen, Gartner senior director and analyst, told The Register . ®
Get our [15]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/21/4_day_work_week/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2023/03/22/skills_shortage_shadows_it_departments/
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZDXYhUgr2Q3p6INlN09k3wAAAE4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZDXYhUgr2Q3p6INlN09k3wAAAE4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZDXYhUgr2Q3p6INlN09k3wAAAE4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/03/chatgpt_boring_turk_jobs/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2023/03/28/rackspace_racks_up_the_redundancies/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/03/07/wfh_google_clouds_offices_empty/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/02/21/4_day_work_week/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/09/meta_redundancies_mark_zuckerberg/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2022/09/21/meta_google_layoffs/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/09/salesforce_trims_workforce_as_growth/
[13] https://layoffs.fyi/
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZDXYhUgr2Q3p6INlN09k3wAAAE4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Hybrid working
In my experience I think much of this is due to work mode arrangements.
One case of "3 in, 2 out" I know of is literally just hotdesking done on a rota because they don't have enough desks to begin with. Your "3 in" are fixed, you will be in on those days, you have very little say and choice in which days those are.
In another case it's a four day week - except Monday. Monday is mandatory unless it's a BH or you have approved leave.
And simply closing down your offices and burping your entire staff onto WFH contracts without warning or consultation? That's not "flexible working", nor is it "progressive" or "the future" either. Forcing everyone WFH is just the opposite extreme of five days in the office and it's not really any better.
Give people a proper choice.
Re: Hybrid working
Pay people enough so they can rent their own office if they need one.
Before IR35 changes, when you ran a consulting business you could expense your own office. Now that is gone, the work has become generally less pleasant as renting after tax is too expensive when clients insist on in-scope contract because they fear HMRC could have a bad day and unload their vendetta on them.
WFH can be a horror if you can't afford place large enough to have dedicated office, but still better than open plan overhearing that Jake kids have diarrhoea, Anne's worries about her aunt not coming and that her partner may find out about her fling while enjoying the aroma of someone re-heating their two day's old tuna sandwich, only realising after the fact that it was spoiled and then for two hours each day worry whether your laptop will be crushed on the train.
Re: Hybrid working
>Before IR35 changes, when you ran a consulting business you could expense your own office
IR35 has destroyed the freelance market
Enough said
So?
My last permanent post lasted 19 years. If you'd asked me at any time during those 19 years whether I was looking to leave I would have answered "yes" - and so would most of my colleagues. Like them I bought the Telegraph on a Thursday (it was a long time ago) and turned first to the jobs pages when freebie papers that landed on my desk. In those 19 years, in spite of "always looking" for another job, I only ever applied for three; I got offers for all of them and turned them down simply cos they wouldn't pay as much. Most people will say they're ready to leave, but when it comes down to actually doing it then there are a lot more things than more money and a shorter working week that come into play.
Re: So?
The 9% who replied saying they were happy to stay thought it was a trap
Yup, I'm one. Partly it's because at age 56 I have a big enough pension not to need to work. But mainly it's because the tools I use are annoying and piss me off. The biggest offender is Microsoft Visual Studio. I wasted two hours today trying to get it to build a perfectly valid solution. Finally after three restarts it managed to actually build.
If VS wasn't such a pile of crap or if I felt the team responsible for it gave a damn then I'd be happy to continue. I'd treat programming as a hobby that I get paid for. But I'm not going to spend my remaining days f-ing and blinding at the computer. My other hobby is golf and that provides all the confusion and mystery that I need in my life.
Thankfully my current employer has allowed me to move to a four day week so I no longer work Wednesdays. But I doubt I'll make it much into the new year. What's left of my life is too short to have to deal with the ass-hattery inflicted on me by Microsoft.
Same boat, reached 50 have enough in the bank.
I asked to work 4days/week in exchange for 80% salary (never mind that we were more productive doing 4days/week during Covid with fewer meetings)
Denied = we're too busy, there is a big end-of-year deadline (like every year)
So I'm leaving in 6weeks - they just don't know that yet
Skills shortage
There is a skills shortage in the same way there is a shortage of professional footballers
Plenty crap, plenty good, but the good ones you have to pay more.
Don’t like that? Stay in the lower leagues with the rest of the cheapskates then
The old saying
you get what you pay for
And if you're worried about your tech talent leaving and impacting your business , pay them more (or agree to hybrid working or whatever) because at the end of everything, your employees ARE your business as anyone can rent a office space and fill it with various computers/servers and the like.... but no people.. no business
I wonder what is taught at business manglement skewl....
Re: The old saying
pay them more
This is such an insensitive thing to say. Have you thought about shareholders and their feelings? Imagine not getting your dividend when you have your pool about to be completed and the last instalment is due and you don't currently have enough liquid assets as everything is tied in the investments. It's a nightmare. What would you tell your companion? Sorry babe, we have to postpone our trip to Maldives by a month because I am bit short? Or would you call your mate and say sorry Dave can you send me back that 100 grand I wired you last week? People will be talking! Such a conundrum!
Who
Would not like a four day week, three days off a week!. Should help greatly with life/work balance. No one should live for work but should work to live!.
Without listing the confidence in the data the quoted percentages are kind of worthless and with the sample size of only 1000 (yes it says 1000 plus and if it was significantly more they would have quoted that) the error bars are going to be significant.