Greythorn survey: IT workers are uncomfortable with migrants in Australia

Except United States of America, multiculturalism has terribly failed in other parts of the world. Recent skirmishes in Malmo, Sweden confirmed that. Despite the sugarcoated belief that co-existence is part of 21^stcentury, human race is still discriminatory in many aspects. One of the aspects is the skilled migrant entering foreign countries, with me being one of them. As a matter of fact, we are said to cause local IT workforce feel threatened in their jobs. This belief has now been reconfirmed by a new survey of nearly 1800 IT professionals in Australia released by Greythorn, a recruitment firm. Nearly all professionals surveyed in the first quarter of this year, the study found that one feel threatened by increasing number of skilled workers entering Australia. Greythorn’s survey found 54% of IT workers surveyed were satisfied in their current jobs while candidates within the public sector are the most insecure. This was attributed to the upcoming election and budget cuts within the public sector expected in coming years.

Half of the government respondents claim that there were fewer jobs available within the technology sector this year than in 2012 compared with 46% for the overall group. According to the data availed by the firm, outsourcing is the main threat to technology industry with well above 25% of respondents having lost their jobs due to outsourcing. According to Greythorn managing director Richard Fischer said the IT industry need to promote bringing new skills into the country. He revealed that there are some projects that are new in Australia that have been completed in other countries and it’s much more effective to bring in experts than bring locals up to speed. Fischer doesn’t see any impediment to doing that other than the negative sentiment around. Fischer added that to be able to sponsor an IT worker there is need to be on a fairly significant salary and meet strict criteria, and organization needs to meet strict criteria on the reasons for doing it.

Personally, I think what IT workforce back home in Australia should do is to strengthen their focus on competencies that would make it hard for local companies to see the need for outsourcing. While at RMIT, I recall how the global Internet industry downturn discouraged many of schoolmates and some even dropped out and went on to pursue other courses. Fifteen years down the line, those of us who soldiered on are reaping hundreds of thousands per annum in the industry and multi nationals are spending sleepless nights hunting for our talent in programming. Therefore, I urge IT students or graduates in Australia not to be be dissuaded by outsourcing because there other areas offering “cream de la cream” from business analysis to cloud computing are offering attractive packages. As an IT worker, I have become less focused on remuneration and job security and nowadays, I mainly focus on job flexibility and my role in present and future value proposition. Take it or leave it, we programmers are a footloose community. Quality lifestyles are important part of our work same as the ability to work from home one day per week.