04 October 2023

George Barnes, CEO, Hamilton Barnes

You can’t really escape it; the media is shouting about tech redundancies, but we’re also hearing of skills shortages – surely there can’t be both?

It really isn’t all doom and gloom. In fact, redundancies hitting headlines isn’t relevant for 95% of the market. When FAANG (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google) and similar companies make mass layoffs, it is going to hit the news, but the truth is that these companies are hugely overstaffed in the first place. You’d be surprised to hear of the inefficiencies at these businesses, where redundancies are often for roles that weren’t needed in the first place, or because there’s five people doing a job that one person would do elsewhere.

“So there aren’t really tech shortages, then?” I hear you ask. Well, it might seem like a good thing to have these candidates available to the wider market, but they present a couple of problems.

A lot of candidates, once they break into FAANG, stay within that realm. It’s like a badge of honour, and joining a network vendor, a bank, or an insurer, would be a step down the career ladder for them. When in actual fact, many FAANG positions are so specialised – because there are so many people doing siloed roles – that these candidates don’t have the skills and expertise to thrive in the broader market.

Hence the skills shortages. Though, rather than a skills shortage, I’d say there’s a shortage of people who are good. There are also a lot of magpies out there, interested in the new ‘shiny’ thing – take cloud technology. It has its place, no doubt about it, but it hasn’t necessarily been the holy grail that people thought it might be and many candidates are opting to return to on-premises software and technologies.

Nor does the development of networking help matters, since it was historically very linear, moving in one direction like a train. From the Catalyst 6509-E Switch to the Nexus Series, networking didn’t really change for a long, long time, meaning that even ten years ago, there was a very limited range of skills required from network engineers. It was pretty easy to upgrade your skillset every couple of years when Cisco released a new product. But the advent of software defined networking, network automation, network observability, and other innovations has forced engineers to think and learn differently.

If the take-up of certifications in recent years is anything to go by, we need a shift in mindset to drive the industry’s continued progression. In short, fewer engineers are doing fewer certifications, all the way up to CCIE, which is considered the pinnacle of networking qualifications. Why? I think there are several reasons.

Firstly, I don’t think Cisco has done enough to ensure longevity for their certifications; they’re still quite traditional. Even if 80% is still highly relevant, many engineers are questioning the remaining 20% and wondering why they can’t do a certification in 5G, for example. The launch of DevNet was big news at the time, giving developers the means to implement basic network applications using Cisco platforms, but that was almost ten years ago. Put simply, the certifications aren’t progressing as quickly as the tech is.

Secondly, certifications aren’t cheap so many are simply opting not to do them. It’s not like being a lawyer, where you have to qualify in order to practise – there’s no requirement to have a certification to prove you have the necessary networking skills. Indeed, some of the best network engineers I’ve ever placed haven’t had any certifications, but they have excellent hands-on experience. Interestingly, though, it can make the recruitment process a bit stickier when companies begrudge paying for someone that isn’t certified, but in a candidates’ market, such as we’re seeing now, they inevitably will pay.

And I think the shift in mindset will come as a result. Businesses are desperate to hire the best talent and are wising up to the need to offer candidates attractive propositions aside from merely salaries – which are grossly inflated now, but that’s an article for another time. Sustainability is another area of focus, but if I’m honest, it’s one that worries me. Since it’s a must-have – not just a nice-to-have – for the younger generations to work for businesses that are demonstrating how they’re minimising their impact on the environment, I think we’ll see a lot of lip service from potential employers. They’ll build out sustainability programmes, but it’ll largely be greenwashing.

In the meantime, the positive is that businesses are investing more and more time, money, and resources in their staff, to get around the buoyancy of the market. They’re paying for certifications, supporting graduates with training, and bending over backwards to ensure they attract – and retain – talent. And rightly so. Businesses that show this willing are likely to get a high return as grads have a sense of loyalty to the first company they work for and are less likely to hop around from job to job. With the right coaching and training, and progression, they can be developed to be proficient managers further down the line. They are, after all, the future of the industry.