Hot Career Opportunities in IT

Infrastructure, Manufacturing, Telecom or Pharma--speak of any industry and

you'll get to hear of their stupendous growth. IT is the backbone behind all

sectors and plays a pivotal role in the growth of the business. All these

sectors require the services of skilled IT people. Starting this month, we'll

feature a regular story on hot career opportunities in IT.

Today, there's a growing requirement for IT professionals in areas such as

programming, engineering, database, information warehousing, Internet and

E-Commerce, enterprise application deployment and management, SOA, and

networking. Each area requires professionals at all levels right from the

architects who'll define these solutions to managers who will implement and

manage them.

We'll start off with the developer segment, because that's one segment which

spans all others. For instance, although you need professionals with business

and implementation knowledge for deploying enterprise applications like ERP and

CRM, you'll still need somebody who can customize the code of these

applications. The same thing holds true for other areas as well, such as SOA,

Internet and e-Commerce, etc. Let's start with a broad overview of the career

opportunities in these areas.

Basically, there are two main platforms that most developer population works

upon, Java and .NET. SOA is another buzzword-virtually every enterprise is

trying to get on this bandwagon, and hence this field also has a high potential

for IT professionals. Similarly, another area where a lot of activity is

happening is embedded technologies and mobility and yes, not to forget the ERP

domain which have had always been a top priority for any enterprise. It is not

just IT companies, there are a plethora of new ways coming up for the IT

professionals to build their career in. One way is to gain expertise in one

specific domain such as SOA and ERP and then climb the career ladder. And the

interesting thing is that these domains are not restricted for hard core IT guys

even non-IT knowledge holders can enter this arena. In this article, we'll not

only discuss all the hidden opportunities that are there for IT as well as non

IT professionals, but we'll also guide them about how they can choose their

perfect career path.

Opportunities for Java Developers



Java is a key platform being used by software houses the world over for

developing applications. There's a lot of action happening in this domain, and

today, there's great demand for Java professionals. There are two possible

career paths that a Java professional can follow. One is Web development and the

other toward building enterprise class applications. For a developer who is

freshly venturing into the Web development field will have to learn JSP, Java

Servlets, and other Web 2.0 technologies besides having good knowledge of core

Java programming. For Web applications that are mainly built on Java server side

technologies, the scripting languages like JavaScript, JRuby etc. become a

natural bundle to learn for the client side programming for developers. Same

ways if the developer ventures into the enterprise class solution and

application development he would have to update his knowledge toward J2EE

technologies like EJBs and other variants like Spring framework, RMI and other

distributed computing components knowhow.

With Java being open sourced, there have been many technologies and

frameworks that have spawned in recent times to bolster the avenues to career

prospects. With the advent of Web 2.0 standards and RIA-based applications

taking on the enterprise world, technologies like JavaFX, AJAX, Google Web

Toolkit, and other frameworks have made it easier for a developer to develop and

even design intuitive interfaces for the applications. A developer with a good

in-depth knowledge of core Java can easily learn and become comfortable with

these new Java frameworks and technologies. A good developer is one who knows

how to get things worked, rather than just using a tool or technology. Sai

Satish, Staff Engineer at sun Microsystems also says that “No amount of

documentation reading or knowledge of a given framework or technology can be

utilized by a developer for a project, until he's well practiced with the coding

part involved to it to realize where and how to implement the things.”

Certifications are also beneficial along with the required academic

qualifications for a certain job requirement. Certification not only adds weight

and authenticity to a job seeker's profile but also cements his knowhow in that

area. According to a study, it was revealed that the professionals having

certifications were found to be more productive than non-certified professionals

in 85% of the cases. That's why even HR managers during recruitments give

additional advantage to professionals having certifications in specific area of

Java technologies. Having a certification, even with lesser experience, bends

favor toward the certified professional. Also the experienced Java professionals

can benefit by having specialized certifications to endorse their knowledge and

technology knowhow of specialized domains like Sun Mobile Application Developer

or IBM's certification for WebSphere specialists. For Java and components

related to that there are certification exams available from Sun Microsystems,

while the likes of IBM and Oracle have certifications available for

professionals using and working on their application servers and portal

technologies.

For specific vertical or domain, there is a dire need of Java professionals

who are experts in that domain like healthcare, telecom, etc. This demand for

domain expert Java professional is because these professionals would be

recognising the needs of their domain area and can put Java technologies to the

best use in their domain. They can also contribute with their experti se on that

domain toward the building of Java technology related solutions that can cater

to their industry domain.

According to Sai Satish, Staff Engineer at Sun Microsystems, developers can

look forward to new technologies like SOA, Web 2.0, RIAs and learn their

framework and supporting languages to make a steady career growth. He says that

the primary driver for Java enabled phones is the content--games, in mobile

devices, PDAs and even set-top boxes, have a huge demand in India.

Even the operators are demanding Java based applications and games that can

be used by subscribers. Thus developers with Java ME skills are in demand for

creating such applications.

Secondly there is a huge scope for Java developers with experience in mobile

operating platforms like Symbian and Windows as they can integrate the core OS

features like graphics engine or audio services into their Java applications

Opportunities for .NET developers



The Microsoft .NET Framework is the other widely used development platform

across the globe and in India also, there is a mammoth developer base working on

this platform.

With the .NET framework, Microsoft has tried to unify the diversified

functions of development and support life cycle of software development. Jimmy

P. Shaw, MD at ShawMan Software Pvt. Ltd. says how this framework has helped

developers to choose career path as “With .NET, a budding developer does not

have to make a decision early on in his career to choose his area of expertise

which he earlier was forced to do. A fresher can now spend time understanding

and mastering a single unified framework from where he can gradually move into

one of the more critical roles of managing systems architecture, DB design and

administration, security, etc.”

For a developer who has knowledge of his own programming environment like

VB.NET, ASP.NET or C# etc., there is an abundance of oppurtunites for them.

Since there is a lot hapenning in the Web 2.0, a developer can also build skills

on technologies that enable the next generation web such as Silverlight, AJAX,

Expression as well as those which enable rich user experiences such as WPF. Also

with mobile and embedded technology being one of the emerging trends in the

Indian software arena, the .NET developers have a good prospect here as many of

these area are based on .NET framework and developers having core .NET skills

can switch easily to mobile domain. These technologies are seeing large-scale

adoption in small as well as large IT companies in India and .NET developers are

uniquely positioned to leverage this opportunity without having to go through a

completely new learning curve.

Certifications are the best way to demonstrate one's skills and expertise on

Microsoft technologies and are a catalyst to recognition and growth in a

software career. There are several .NET certifications available depending on

career interests a developer can choose his certification course starting from

technology specialist stage to the software architects stage. Technology

Specialist certifications are now available for .NET 3.5 technologies such as

Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Communication Foundation and Windows

Workflow Foundation. Being certified in these technologies is an endorsement and

validation of one's skills in these technologies. All the top software companies

are adopting these technologies and building software applications and products

based on these technologies. These specialized skills also offer better career

opportunities currently and .NET developers should consider upgrading their

skills to leverage this opportunity. These technologies are being adopted at a

fast pace, which opens a lot of career opportunities for software developers.

Tarun Gulati, GM Marketing at Microsoft India says that aspiring and beginner

developers, should first build strong programming and computing fundamentals,

which remain applicable no matter which version of technology is introduced.

Once they are conversant with the fundamentals of .NET framework, they can start

building a breadth of skills around desktop development, web and RIA

development, mobile and embedded development as well as gaming development.

As they progress in their career, they should build their skills around

software design, architecture and project management. Microsoft offers learning

resources for each of these areas.

Making a career in SOA



Organizations are now vying to achieve seamless business environment, and

SOA is an answer to that. This field requires developers who can develop

standards based applications that can now or in future be compliant to the

services based architecture. Also the SOA architects and analysts who plan the

SOA path for an organization are the job prospect that is seeing an increased

requirement. Now for an IT professional, there are various roles available in

the SOA domain depending on the area of work. Some of these roles like Process

Analyst and Enterprise Architect is for those who have the business knowledge of

the organization. While the professionals who do not interact with the business

can opt for roles of Configuration management, Information architect etc.

While the developers at junior base can concentrate on assembling the

business rules and services, and making them available to the different

interfaces. They would be building the enterprise components and services for

the processes of the organization that will be interacting.

The professionals who want to be SOA experts, have to learn a lot about the

enabling technologies like XML, SOAP, UDDI, etc. and the framework analogies

like ESB, etc. along with the whole business understanding for enterprise

functions. It is known that SOA has the potential to change the way systems are

built today and how they can be made to function seamlessly in the future.

Therefore, learning effort in this area won't go waste and will just open new

avenues for professionals.

Mobile and Embedded Technology



Mobile and embedded software has become main-stream in India in recent times

with the advent of increasing usage of mobiles. This is not only attributed to

mobile devices but also devices like set-top boxes, DVD players and others where

there's an embedded chip to program the device to function intelligently. This

domain is wide open for developers of both platforms, namely Java and .NET. The

other stream is for the Operating System architects for the mobile phones. The

OSes for mobile devices are majorly on Symbian, Linux and Windows. Now Java

based operating system called Java FX Mobile too have been launched for mobile

devices. Developers of java can tone up their skill for mobile devices by

learning JavaFX and Java ME for development of applications. Similarly.NET

developers can opt for Windows Embedded CE technology for embedded programming.

There are vast scopes of opportunities for embedded programmers with devices

being programmed and also for the mobile environment.

Opportunities for Enterprise Applications Professionals



ERP, CRM and other business process based enterprise solutions have always been
in demand, now the organizations are trying to gain the maximum from these for

their businesses. Now with most organization implementing SOA or moving towards

Enterprise Implementation, these ERP professional who have domain expertise in

areas like HR, sales and distribution, supply chain management, etc. have become

highly sought after professionals. This is because they are the ones who will be

having core business knowledge of a domain and they can help, define and

identify the processes that need to be incorporated for the service

orchestration. Above that, since organizations are looking towards solutions

that provides them to extend their business opportunities and collaborate in

real time between different deparments and offices. People having domain

expertise are being involved in building such solutions for the enterprise, as

they have the proper knowledge of the functioning of different processes and can

identify and specify the changes that will be needed for achieving the

enterprises goals.

Thus, even a non-IT professional who has sufficient knowledge and experience

in specific area of organisational work can become ERP consultants and

enterprise application analysts by undergoing certification courses targeting

their domains like HR, SD, SCM, etc.

Opportunities in Networking



With telecom, Internet and media communication among other areas where

various network technologies like IP telephony and wireless are used; has opened

many paths for a networking professional to follow and pursue his career in

that. The networking professional can vie for systems analyst, network manager,

infrastructure manager and network consultants as career objectives. With basic

certifications like A+, CCNA for base networking knowledge to certifications

that are highly specific and are meant for specialization in a particular

network skill like network security are ones that a networking professional

should posses to demonstrate his skill and expertise in that area. There are

several certification courses available from Cisco, Microsoft, etc., but it's

highly advisable for a budding professional to check for the credentials of the

institutes that would be providing the training and certificate examination for

these courses.

User Experience Experts



Gone are the days when applications or websites just had to be content rich,

now along with content the focus has shifted towards providing rich experience

to the user. For this not only designers but also developers are being sought

who can create such applications using new RIA tools and technologies like AJAX,

Flex, AIR, Silverlight, Expression, etc. This user experience is not just

limited to websites or end-user based enterprise or desktop applications, but

also to the platforms like mobiles, hand-held devices etc. Thus, a professional

with creative ideas is needed who can design and make nice apps for the users.

Rahul Sah with help from Jasmine Desai