The State of The Contracting Market

[Steve Bennett]

Anyone got any news about contracts? Use this forum for any snippets of intelligence about whether-or-not companies are hiring, rate changes, project cancellations, etc.

[Steve Bennett]

From the Australian IT. Note the passing remark to contracted staff. I have had a few people from CBA contact me about contracts, but does anyone know for sure that BI/DWH projects are being cutback?

Core Banking Project On Track

Mahesh Sharma | October 28, 2008

COMMONWEALTH Bank's $580 million core banking replacement project is not in danger of being shelved, despite the bank embarking on a huge cost-cutting exercise that will see jobs slashed from across the business.

The Australian revealed earlier this week that CBA plans on slashing at least $370 million from its bottom line, after an executive committee, chaired by chief executive Ralph Norris, decided the bank had to reduce costs by 5 per cent.

The cost restructure will include job cuts, including technology staff, which could consist primarily of contracted staff, and the shelving of major information technology spending and projects.

However, a CBA spokesman said the bank’s four-year project to replace legacy transaction systems will not be affected by the cuts.

“In uncertain times, it is important to balance the needs of shareholders against investment and prioritise accordingly,” the spokesman said.

“It is a priority for the bank to ensure that it provides excellent customer service and, in this regard, we will continue to invest in systems and processes that enhance the customer experience.”

CBA is close to completing a roadmap for implementing the new systems.

The cost restructure could also result in further delays to the integration of its $2.1 billion acquisition of BankWest.

The CBA-BankWest IT integration project is expected to start once CBA's core banking program is in place.

its bad... I have been looking for a couple of months... in June July I was getting calls every week from agents... but now... I send out 10 resumes I am lucky to get a call back from one and I am quoting a figure 30% below my last contract rate

[zamir]

I'm Sydney/Newcastle based and I've just started a new contract with the NSW Government. It took longer to find a contract than 12 months ago when I last looked.

The rate is also a little lower and I worry about cutbacks in the Department cancelling my contract.

I can't measure it, but I feel a lot less certain about the future.

Sorry for the depressing news everyone!

[admin]

From Computerworld Australia:

Study: BI, programming skills in demand despite economy

Companies are slowing down IT hiring amid the weak economy but some jobs are still hot, according to a new study.

Chris Kanaracus (IDG News Service) 03/02/2009 08:07:00

Thirty-eight percent of U.S. companies are planning to trim IT staff this year, but certain skills remain hot, according to a new study by the IT staffing company Veritude.

The poll, taken in the fourth quarter of 2008, shows that companies' hiring plans plunged dramatically in recent months. In a study Veritude conducted during the second quarter of last year, just 4 percent of respondents planned to make cuts.

In addition, the new survey found that only 38 percent of companies intend to add staff, down from 52 percent in the previous study.

One silver lining is that the anticipated cuts are not especially deep; 22 percent of those who plan to reduce staff said they would eliminate between 1 percent and 5 percent, Veritude said.

But workers with business-intelligence skills and expertise in C, C++ and C# programming should fare especially well in the weakened job market, according to the study.

Also, 17 percent of companies are now looking for Mac developers, more than tripling the previous survey's finding of 5 percent.

But demand for enterprise architects has declined significantly, indicating that companies are both reluctant to shoulder the larger salaries such individuals receive, and also scaling back on long-term project planning.

Meanwhile, the percentage of respondents that intend to hire workers on a "temp-to-perm" basis shot up to 56 percent from 27 percent in the previous study, which suggests that companies planning to add jobs are doing so tentatively.