Is your job at risk (IT)?

[Orrin_73]

If it's the type of work that can be done over a wire, then probably yes. Now Indian software companies are offering consultancy too. That means more jobs that will be outsourced. Im about to graduate in IT, nice to know that I will be unemployed.
Indian outsourcers follow a megatrend

"Infosys is India's second-largest outsourcer. After achieving success in software engineering and back-office service, it has now begun to compete with companies like IBM for more lucrative consulting work. This week, Infosys reported that its second-quarter earnings rose 36 percent. It raised its earnings forecast for the full year on stronger demand and a weaker rupee."

[dretceterini]

1. ALL jobs are at risk

when corporations and lunatics rule the world.

[MADem]

2. You can work, so long as you do it for LOW WAGES

If you can make it worth a company's while by accepting miserable low pay, they would prefer you, especially if the job requires customer interface. But they don't want to pay for corn fed American accents and cultural interface. They do not see any value-added there.

I think they are wrong--'mirroring' the customer increases sales, IMO.

[unblock]

3. i have moved on to my second career. programming ain't what it used to be

it's fast becoming too assembly-line, too boring, too offshoreable. the creativity and fun is now in designing and using the software for other purposes, not in actually implementing and delivering the design.

personally, i now do wall street analytics. i use computers (mostly excel and ms-sql server) heavily, but i am now fundamentally a business person using computers as opposed to a computer person doing business.

what i do is highly specialized and not readily offshoreable.


on edit: i should add that i have a bachelor's and master's in computer science and about 13 years of tech career, from qa all the way up to cto.

[Robert Oak]

5. not so sure

I hope it's not offshored for economics, back end analysts using statistics and other economics is being offshored to India extensively.

So is the back end legal research (beyond paralegal, extensive patent law, copyright law, international tax law, US tax law and so forth legal research).

[Coastie for Truth]

4. What I am seeing is IT folks going into "health related" jobs

There are several graduate level software developers at the local med schools, ran into a Rescue-Medic (that's the new job title for fire fighters who are licensed paramedics) with an MS in IT, and a friend of mine is a former Technical Writer who is now an X-Ray Tech.

[MazeRat7]

6. India, Brazil, and Russia....

Have lower worker compensation rates and higher education/experience rates - generally speaking. Not that I agree with this trend, being a 25yr IT veteran, but I do deal with this reality daily. Bottom line, why would a company pay a new grad from the US with no experience 60-80k/yr when they can get an MS or PHD with multiple years of experience overseas for the same price ?

MZr7

[glasalle]

7. It's hitting the law field now

I have been watching this trend at my co. since 2000. Management keeps telling us what a great job the offshore firms are doing, but the workers know better. The offshore teams do a terrible job for the year or two and then their quality sometimes improves to mediocre. Its all about cost. Unfortunately, IT workers are a bunch of sheep and won't make a political fuss about this.

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal posted an article (Sept 28) titled "More US Legal Work Moves to India's Low-Cost Lawyers".
Lawyers over there are at the bottom of the professional ladder.
The pecking order goes engineering, medicine, MBA, CPA ,law.
I wonder how long it will be before American attorneys try to put the kibosh on this trend.

[Orrin_73]

8. Unbelievable!!!!!!!

legal work too, where will this eventually lead too. Someone should stop this madness.