The unprecedented challenge posed by the Covid19 pandemic has affected all sectors of the economy, and in particular the ICT industry which had to respond and adapt at a pace never experienced before.
And while the situation seems to be managed for the moment, the future remains uncertain, and ongoing adjustments are going to be critical.
In the backdrop of an uncertain economic situation, clients re-evaluate their IT spending and often put their plans on hold. To survive this, companies in the ICT industry will need to ensure that their core structure is solid and that they have the right talent to help them go through this period of uncertain revenue streams.
In what could be called a paradigm shift for IT companies, new skill sets and job roles will have to be created as the world changes the way it functions.
Below is a glimpse at some of the jobs that are expected to see a surge in demand in a post-Covid19 world.
1. Unified Communications Engineers
Even after the pandemic is over, the traditional office spaces will have to undergo radical adjustments both in how they are operated and what services are provided: no more desks sharing, no more cramped cubicles, no more passing of documents from one hand to another and no more overcrowded conference or break rooms.
Long daily commutes will be a thing of the past as employees continue to partially work from the (dis)comfort of their homes, aided by Cisco WebEx and other technology solutions that allow them to collaborate, communicate, update project status, share documents and hold virtual meetings from anywhere.
The development and use of technology solutions will be further accelerated as companies realize the saving they achieve in terms of real estate costs, travel and accommodation expenses. Additionally, many employees will capitalise on the ability to work remotely to move from expensive urban centres to more affordable cities or areas across the country.
With such arrangements expected to be a part of company policies, Unified Communication Engineers will be in great demand to design, develop and roll out the services and to provide the required support to work-from-home employees.
2. Collaboration Specialist
While working remotely, some of the tasks earlier performed within the physical office would need to be carried out virtually. Employees would still need to collaborate with their colleagues to share their status, provide updates, follow up on the progress of the tasks at hand and so on. They would still need to meet each other virtually in order to work collectively and effectively. Collaboration specialists will play a vital role in providing a medium for these remote employees to collaborate with each other using audio/video conferencing, messaging platforms or telepresence terminals. Specialists with a good understanding of video/voice communication, messaging platforms, networking and security will see abundant opportunities in the coming days.
3. Mobile Application Developers
The pandemic occurred at a time where every service had already shrunk to the size of a mobile phone. With cities in lockdown, and shops and physical establishments shut, online mobile applications usage experienced a huge spike as it enabled us to perform all our transactions from the comfort of our home, thereby mitigating possible exposure in public places. A swipe of the phone enabled anything from stocking up groceries to making a bank transaction to availing government services.
As people continue to shun public places out of fear of exposure and opting for the safety of mobile apps for their day to day needs, the demand for Mobile Application Developers will skyrocket.
4. AI Engineers
The use of Big Data and facial recognition to combat the virus has been a hot topic of discussion across the world in the past months. Technology is being used to track infections, provide online consultations, monitor the virus and understand more about the disease. In a post-Covid19 world, this trend is only going to grow: governments across the world will increasingly use AI to handle real life scenarios like contact tracing and controlling the spread of infectious diseases. Demand for such technology will shoot through the roof. This means that AI engineers will be in demand like never before. They will have a major role to play in automating services across a wide range of applications from contactless payment in supermarkets to immigration control in airports.
5. Cloud Architect
With work from home becoming the norm, organizations will look at moving their data centre / applications to the Cloud – either public or private where remote employees can conveniently access their workloads and applications. This process would require the help of Cloud Architects to move, migrate and develop applications in the cloud environment. Cloud Architect need to understand programming languages and operating systems, as well as networking and security in order to be able to design the cloud infrastructure and optimize the use of cloud computing resources.
6. Developers/ DevOps engineer
While the cloud architect works on the cloud infrastructure this team will work closely with them to develop applications that function in a cloud environment. The team which currently supports applications could be reassigned to this role in a post-Covid19 world.
7. VDI System Engineers
Buzzwords like VDI and VPN have become household terms, with work from home becoming the norm. These are the two modes of access that companies have been using to provide their employees access their office systems. Among the two, VDI is the preferred mode as it enables users to access their office desktops from any terminal anywhere. With a large share of the workforce set to permanently be working remotely, VDI system engineers with a good understanding of virtualisation solutions, storage and network will be in high demand to provide the required support and assistance.
8. Cyber Security specialist
Accelerating the shift to the Cloud brings a substantial security risk in data integrity and privacy. To design necessary security at the cloud infrastructure and application levels, security specialists will be highly sought after. Those with good understanding of network, information, endpoint and application security will be in high demand. They will ensure that the access to organisational data is fully protected and is safeguarded against any kind of theft or compromise. The specialists will also be required to be aware of ethical hacking and mitigation techniques in case of detection of a compromising attempt. They will also need to excel at analysing the security logs to proactively provide remediation against any kind of threat. Aspiring security specialists are encouraged to have CISSP, CCISO, GCIH or CISM, which are widely recognized security certifications
9. Security Engineer / Architect
Many organisations will choose to keep their DC in their own premises, and their employees will then need remote VPN access to their data. In such instance, Security Engineers will provide secure remote access and make sure that the corporate end-point terminal / PCs used by the employees are hardened with the necessary security measures. Those who are good in network/infrastructure security (firewalls, VPN, load balancers, SIEM Solutions) and endpoint security will be in demand.
10. Systems / Support Engineers
Knowledgeable Systems and Support Engineers will be vital to remedy the technical hiccups that employees working in isolation will encounter. This is particularly the case of organisations with an on-campus DC which will need their own staff to support remote employees. These engineers will be good in troubleshooting problems and providing first level application support related to mails and file servers and endpoints.
11. NOC/SOC engineers
As organizations shift to cloud services, they need Network Operating Centres (NOC) or Security Operations Center (SOC) to monitor their infrastructure. A NOC/SOC Engineer is the first point of contact when identifying, investigating and resolving system issues that could potentially jeopardize availability and performance or hamper the security of essential data.
Their role is to manage incidents, meet service-level agreements and reduce system downtime while maintaining or improving performance and availability.