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| Stefan Magdalinski, Upmystreet |
Experienced IT people have been in notoriously scarce supply over the last ten years or so. A couple of years ago the American IT industry was lobbying the government to allow more immigrant visas for IT staff from Britain, since British equipment had suddenly become very popular and had used up Britain's quota of visas, leaving America short. And unfortunately, scarce supply usually leads to rising salaries, which has definitely applied to the IT sector.
Things have eased somewhat since the burst of the dot com bubble last year, and seem set to ease further. A number of larger consulting firms, who traditionally take on thousands of graduates for IT work, have reduced their intake significantly this year, and some are also laying off IT staff.
"The situation has certainly changed a lot. The contract market always reacts faster than the permanent recruitment market, and the indicators are that supply is outstripping demand, to the extent that two of the major players in the banking sector have reduced their business rates by 10%. However, businesses will still see what budget they have for the best candidate," says Simon Crockett, of Michael Page Technology and Consultancy recruitment.
Paul Szczepanski, director of recruitment agency Cogent-IT says some areas are experiencing supply changes, most notably in web-based areas. "A Java developer who would would have been looking for £50,000 would now have dropped to about £40,000-45,000. In specialist areas, such as client server people, there hasn't been any change because skilled staff are still scarce, but that's effectively the same as a salary drop in this industry."
In London and the south east, you should expect to pay between £25,000 and £35,000 for a qualified network engineer. Experience and any special knowledge will usually determine whether someone is at the upper or lower end of the scale. For a more junior, unqualified support technician, you should expect to pay between £15,000 and £25,000 per year. In the North of England, the equivalent range for a qualified engineer is £20,000 to £30,000, and for a technician is £10,000 to £20,000.
Depending on the size of your business and IT needs, you may need an IT manager or even a director; both would earn more than the figures quoted here. Stefan Magdalinski is IT director at on-line information provider Upmystreet: "Once you've got more than 10 people sitting down in front of computers you need someone to make sure that everything's running smoothly. This person can be quite junior but it's hard to survive without their help."
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