We think you’ll agree: there has been little solace over the past couple of months for those among us with career ambitions. Fired, laid off, furloughed, unemployed or otherwise; uncertainty has plagued much of the professional world in the wake of Covid-19’s impact on our health and economy.
Yet, digital technology has been the great enabler in the crisis. Companies with the capability to communicate and operate effectively online have been able to maintain some level of continuity, although the nature of the pandemic means many sectors, digitally-enabled or not, have suffered disproportionately. For those maintaining some level of business, albeit unusual, we’ve seen the seismic shift in working culture with two-thirds reporting to be remote working and half of those using video conferencing tools to facilitate this.
Nevertheless, despite the surge in demand experienced by Zoom, Slack and Amazon, jobs in technology haven’t proved themselves exempt from the cost-cutting measures many businesses have been forced to make. In many instances, hiring flatlined altogether: the first month of lockdown saw a 31% drop in hiring activity among 100 of the UK’s top tech companies. By the beginning of May, the harsh reality of the pandemic had even swept through Silicon Valley, where Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb all announced large numbers of layoffs.
The immediate job market might not prove to be the most reassuring, but what the pandemic has offered us, as something of a silver lining, is time. The opportunity to pause, reflect and ask the questions many of us shrug off in our day-to-day lives, such as: am I happy in my job? Is this career my only option?
The cost and rigidity of higher education have left many of you pursuing a career which was once appealing, but for one reason or another, hasn’t stood the test of time. The fast-track of digital transformation among companies presents the opportunity for individuals to find renewed incentive to learn new skills and support future resilience through technology. This time, this forced pause, is your chance to future-proof your career for 2021 and beyond and retrain in tech.
We’re not the only ones who think now is the time to reassess the skills needed in the future. Becky Frankiewicz indicates in Harvard Business Review that this is the time for businesses to weigh in and “ready themselves for an even-more-digital future. More ambivalent and uncertain than ever, we are confident that a pretty strong bet on the future is to focus on reskilling and upskilling people so that they are better equipped to adjust to change.” In a survey by Econsultancy and Marketing Week, 19% of organisations in the marketing industry said that “they have increased spending, or invested new spending, in strategic initiatives such as digital transformation” for the first half of 2020, and 23% said they have “increased their spending, or invested new funds, into technology or infrastructure spending.”
What’s more, for professionals considering learning to code, it’s encouraging that even during the pandemic, engineering jobs have been the least impacted: hiring for C++, PHP, Ruby and Java developers dropped by only a fifth. Through our conversations with leaders about their tech recruitment strategies through the crisis, we’ve seen an increased appetite for infrastructure, IT and cybersecurity specialists too, and this is a trend we expect to continue as companies double down on their efforts to benefit from digitalisation post-pandemic. The shift to online working has been matched by the number of phishing scams and security concerns companies are experiencing: hacking or phishing attempts were reported to be up by 37% month-on-month as of March 2020. Before the crisis, the global deficit in cybersecurity professionals needed was calculated to hit 3.5 million in 2021. If cloud-based software and remote working are the ‘new normal’, the challenges of finding enough technical talent capable of supporting stronger systems and digital resilience will be weighing on the minds of business leaders across the country.
Throughout the pandemic, _nology has been successfully retraining talented individuals in coding and software development through remote learning. Like the course itself, it offers the same dynamic coaching, opportunities for team working and one-to-one support available whenever you need it. And, what many of our trainees have found to be the ultimate reassurance during this time: a job guarantee – supported by our partner relations and our confidence in the continued demand for professional software developers. Plus, it’s even given us the ability to open applications to talented trainees from all over the UK, eliminating the hassle of travelling or relocating to course locations.
If you want to seize the opportunity to change your career by learning to code, email our Admissions Manager, Jenna, on jenna@nology.io to learn more about how you can equip yourself with the skills to future-proof your career in a post-Covid world and benefit from a job guarantee.