Demand for IT Professionals Remains Strong Across the UK, CompTIA Analysis Reveals
Employers across the United Kingdom posted job openings for more than 162,000 core information technology (IT) positions in Q1 2019, according to an analysis by CompTIA, the leading trade association for the global technology industry.
IT positions accounted for 9 percent of all UK job postings in Q1, CompTIA’s examination of data from Burning Glass Technologies Labour Insights reveals.
“Software programmers and developers were far and away the most in-demand job employers sought to fill, with nearly 58,000 job postings,” said Amy Carrado, senior director, research and market intelligence at CompTIA. “But there also was robust hiring demand for technology professionals with skills in infrastructure and networking.”
Occupations that were in high demand included IT business analysts, architects and systems designers (24,595 job ads); IT user support technicians (18,949); IT and telecommunications professionals (15,554); web designers and developers (14,852); and IT operations technicians (14,824).
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“This strong demand aligns with the ongoing move to digital transformation, as organization modernize their IT infrastructure,” said Graham Hunter, CompTIA’s vice president for skills certification in Europe and the Middle East. “Additionally, many have an eye on the future, anticipating the rollout of 5G wireless networks, edge computing and related emerging technologies.”
UK employers with the most IT job postings in Q1 included the National Health Service, Fresh Group Limited, Amazon, KPMG and Barclays.
More than 200,000 of the core IT job postings for the quarter were in the London metropolitan area, but the demand for tech talent was also present in Manchester (29,931 job postings), Birmingham (23,460) and Cambridge (17,270).
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“Not every job posting results in a new hire, and some companies may have multiple postings for the same position but the help-wanted ads are an indicator of the areas where organisations are making their technology investments,” Carrado noted.
The number of core IT job postings in Q1 was down 21 percent from Q4 2018. But the size of the IT workforce continues to grow, to an estimated 1,284,052 workers at the end of 2018. Projections for future tech employment are also bullish. The UK tech workforce is expected to grow by more than 14,000 jobs in 2019; and by an estimated 48,000 positions by 2023.
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