IBM predicts the state of IT jobs by 2015

According to the latest Tech Trend survey from IBM, over the next five years, jobs in mobile application development and cloud computing will be the focus in IT recruitment.

For this survey, some 2,000 IT professionals participated. An overwhelming majority of those believe the trend cloud computing will be shaping the world of IT jobs over the future years. A staggering 91% said they thought cloud would overtake on-premise computing as the primary IT delivery model by 2015. As cloud computing automates many processes carried out by data centre staff, the necessity for IT workers to develop new skills to stay relevant in the jobs market is inevitable.

During an interview held by PC World with Bob Getchell, worldwide channel sales manager for cloud at IBM, Bob Getchell said "The need for skills relating to installing technology and applications or bolting together hardware and software will decline with cloud"

He also added that workers in traditional data centre need to think about getting the skills that will enable them to act as cloud solution advisors and cloud application managers, specialising in the assembly and life cycle management of cloud services.

"Others will also specialise as cloud deployment professionals - skilled in designing, deploying and maintaining the new technology and software necessary to manage the cloud."
Some 55% surveyed also said they think mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers will replace traditional PCs and servers as a market for developing applications.

IBM's vice president of independent software vendors Mark Hanny spoke to CIO.com and said that this will change software development jobs in different ways. As well as in-depth knowledge of HTML5, software development specialists will need to accommodate the user-driven systems of mobile devices and build an understanding of how programmes run on different mobile platforms. Other types of IT specialist markets showing opportunities in career growth and job security over the next five years include roles within the telecommunications, financial services, healthcare and energy sectors. 90% of the participants surveyed said that industry-focussed knowledge was quintessential even in technical roles. However only 63% of them believed they themselves had enough industry knowledge to be competitive.