This post’s title was inspired by an article in TechCrunch.
Go read “Silicon Valley’s Dark Secret: It’s All About Age“, including the comments, and then come back here.

I’ll wait

The author’s focus is on tech talent (particularly software programmers) in Silicon Valley but I think the lessons apply to almost anyone in an IT tech role and based in the developed world.

Note the advice he offers within points 1, 2 and 3.
I imagine these are well-known by IT Pros in their 30s and 40s, but I often wonder how many are actively planning to do anything about it before events force their hand?

By events, I mean: economic black swans such as the “Lehman shock” (as the global 2008 financial pandemonium is called here in Japan), corporate outsourcing to developing countries, and technology changes.

For me, the wake up call was reading Ashutosh Sheshabalaya’s book, “Rising Elephant”, around 2005/6. He was very clear that big changes were coming for both the US and Europe as India’s offshoring juggernaut built global momentum.

With the perspective of hindsight, here’s a very prescient interview of the author in 2004 – and remember that the debt-fueled boom of many Western nations was in full swing at that time, and minds were not alert as to what would happen when the ‘inevitable’ bust arrived.

“Author Says Offshoring ‘Real WMD’ for US”

And now that many countries are still in the economic doldrums, 2 years beyond the 2008 debacle, you can imagine the pressures to cut costs, “do more with less” mantras that are fueling corporations’ planning and decisions.

Excepting a major and ‘unexpected’ geopolitical event (e.g. resource wars…) that might derail the ‘global playing field’, the outsourcing trend (in my opinion) is likely to accelerate in the years ahead. Driven not just by skills and wage arbitrage but by technologies such as ‘telepresence’, it will be easier and cheaper to create, monitor and manage virtual office environments. (Although time differences will always suck…!)

A small ripple in this economic pool are the changes to the ex-pat population in Japan (mainly Tokyo). A lot of people have apparently ‘disappeared’, as this article in Japan-based entrepreneur Terrie Lloyd’s ezine of 24th August reveals:

“… many of those missing 4,700 people are in fact foreigners.
We are hearing repeated stories of luxury apartments going
for 50% or less of their pre-Lehman shock rentals…”

You can probably guess what’s happened to the missing – sacked, repatriated or relocated (in many cases to Singapore).

This can happen to anyone, at virtually any time.

Be prepared..

- Mark McClure

…but more like a class F5 tornado just swept through Manhattan.

Similar carnage occurring in London’s Square Mile.

Smart and able IT professionals are having to rapidly rethink careers, lives and even country of residence.

Take a look at this Mar 24 Bloomberg article by Lisa Kassenaar and Stephanie Baker. The title certainly grabs eyeballs: “Fired Doctor of Derivatives Waits To Cry As Finance Job Evaporate”

It’s a well written piece – with the subheadings from page one alone telling a particularly torrid and alarming story (e.g. Quarter-million jobs, Self-worth, No Callbacks, Transaction bubble, Nobu’s Retreat).

Tokyo Hit Hard Too

According to my Tokyo headhunter contacts, most all the Foreign Banks are in lock down mode for IT hiring. Good people are being let go, sent overseas (Singapore is popular) or outsourced.

Interestingly, Lehman Japan seems to be a special case – as this Reuters article explains: “Tension Simmers at Nomura As Lehman Bonuses Loom”

Future Prognosis?

Here’s where I leave the professional pundits to do their thing – the end of the FIRE economy? Global Depression? The demise of over-leveraged, debt-based economies?

In all honesty, I don’t know. (And based on their track records so far, I doubt if most pundits and forecasters know either!) But things are changing, for sure.

Read on ONLY If You’re an IT Professional In Financial Services

My best guesstimate is…

12 months from now some of you will be doing just fine (bonus might be minuscule, though…).

Others will have unfortunately been fired despite endless hard work and “building the franchise” dedication.

And a minority will probably bite the bullet and leave Financial Services IT altogether – however, getting a remuneration haircut in the process. (I know how that feels.)

What can you constructively do in the meantime?

Take advantage of whatever training and courses are available via your employer and brush up your soft skills – as well as core technical skills, if you can.

And yes, do your job – to the best of your ability.

You might even freshen up your resume or hire a mid-career coach to review your options in a 100% private and confidential environment.

A Very Special Offer For Financial Services IT Professionals

I’ll be combining my career coaching skills and my recently launched resume writing service for a very special offer next week.

As with previous offers, it’ll be limited to only a few people and available for just 48 hours. (That’s partly to prompt you into making a decision BUT also to help keep my schedule manageable. I can’t coach 50 people 1-to-1 in a month!)

Next Tuesday’s post (31 Mar) will have all the details.

(NOTE: It will be a password-protected post. Sign up for my email announcement list before Midnight Monday 30 March, New York time; and you’ll receive the password via email. The sign up box is on the right of this blog, below my photo.)

- Mark McClure

Even though Iceland’s economy is in dire straits and the outlook remains uncertain, CCP games is one company that continues to do well.

Jon Mayes is IT Director of CCP Games – the Icelandic Developer & Publisher of EVE Online, a massively multiplayer online roleplaying game.

Jon moved to Reykjavik from Tokyo in September, 2007. (He and I were IT colleagues in Japan.)

I emailed Jon some questions about life and work in Iceland a few weeks ago, and here’s what he had to say:

Q1 Jon, tell us a little of your background in IT and what brought you to move from Japan to Reykjavik, Iceland.

I have been involved in the IT industry since 1988 – starting out as a mainframe operator and moving my way up throughout the IT Field. Moving to Iceland was not really too difficult of a decision as the position and the industry was well suited for me. I believe that one must enjoy the work they do and really believe in the product or service that their firm produces to truly give their best.

Q2 What have been the biggest challenges as an IT Director since the Icelandic banking problems became major news?

There are really two major challenges with the fall of the Icelandic banking system. First, we have many employees, both Icelandic and Expats, that have a lot of hardships with finances and having to suddenly make sometimes very hard decisions that may affect them the rest of their life.

Secondly, the Icelandic economic problems have not been really noticed by us as a gaming company as we are constantly growing and improving the systems with the latest hardware.

What has made the problem stand out is that funds are very difficult to get out of Iceland and we have had to get very creative with our vendors to get any equipment at all.

Q3 What’s a typical business day for you look like?

My typical day involves coming into the office and and checking the run of the game cluster over the night.

Then usually the bulk of the day involves meeting after meeting to talk about the current and future development cycles for the company and evaluating how we can and should grow to meet those needs. This can be very interesting, especially working in a company that adheres to “agile” development practices.

I am in charge of the Global Infrastructure teams as well, and thus much of the day is spent working with the team on the current infrastructure performance and the projects in progress and in the queue.

Other than that, just the typical jobs such as vendor relationships, contract negotiations, budgeting, staff management and much more.

Q4 Is employee morale holding up OK?

In many firms in Iceland, I would say that the morale is not too good. At CCP, I am seeing that the morale is still quite high as the company is very stable and from the fact that we are not reliant on the Icelandic krona, but from subscriptions from overseas.

Q5 Is Reykjavik’s famed night life fizzling out or still very much alive?

I think that nothing can bring down the Reykjavik Nightlife. It is great for forgetting about the problems of the day and also foreigners are loving the exchange rate. ;-D

Q6 What are your top 3 likes about living and working in Iceland (so far)?

Living and working in Iceland is a complete 180 from working in Tokyo. The work days are normal and people are definitely less stressed from the job itself.

Iceland is also very beautiful with clean air and ultra clean water straight from the tap. The pace is also very much slower in Iceland than almost anywhere I have lived prior.

Q7 Are foreign (IT) staff leaving Iceland or sticking around?

This is very dependent on the (working) sector you are talking about. Many people from Eastern Europe were coming to Iceland to work, as the money and exchange rates for the Krona made it very much worth it.

After the fall of the economy, many have returned home as they could make much better money in their home countries. But, this is more focused on the less skilled positions than on the professional world.

In CCP, we hire mostly high sought after employees (world-class artists, designers, and game industry leaders) and those are always in demand. Some people have had to leave due to not being able to afford to work here, but I would say that that is a minority though.

Thanks very much for your time, Jon!

- Mark McClure