The past two years have been a challenging time for businesses across the globe, and the tech world is no different. The only advantage tech has is the ability to work remotely if needed. Despite this advantage, there have been major challenges these past couple of years for Silicon Valley and beyond.
As global working practices have changed, we’ve also witnessed a shift in demand for certain jobs. A rise in demand for remote/home working and a drop in office-based roles, especially management. We took a deeper look at the changing trends of tech jobs. Which tech jobs are in demand, and how you can hire the right talent for those jobs.
To compile this list, we used an aggregate of Glass Door and Indeed to give us an overview of the current state of jobs in the tech industry. Average salary is based on London, England, and growth rates are estimated over 5 years.
Let’s dive in.
10: Enterprise Architect
The enterprise architect helps businesses achieve their goals through implementing efficient practices and technologies. With a base salary of £93,187, this is a highly paid profession in the tech world. The only downside is the 5% predicted growth, but this is more to do with the burgeoning state of the role and companies’ unwillingness to shift from old practices to best practices.
As time goes by, it will become harder for those businesses to exist without doing so and we will see the enterprise architect as being central to that change.
At the time of writing this, Starbucks in Seattle has an opening for a Senior Enterprise Architect paying $210,000 excluding benefits. Clearly this is one of the most in-demand tech jobs right now.
9: Data Engineer
Data engineers collect, manage, and transform large amounts of data into usable information for business analysts and data scientists to use. The base salary is £52,281 and roughly 8% growth. As companies grow, they produce more data. This increases their data warehouse exponentially and the role of data engineers will become vital to the success of the business.
By writing complex queries on the data within the business, they can make it accessible to the rest of the organization. The overarching goal here is to optimize the big data ecosphere within the company. Building big data warehouses that can be used for reporting or analysis is an absolute must moving forward.
8: UX Designer
With a median salary of £49,603, the UX designer sits comfortably on this list. Their job is part science, part art. By making products and technology nice to look at, user friendly, and enjoyable to use, growth is at a healthy 13%.
The UX designer has two responsibilities. Their first responsibility is always to meet expectations of the end user and create a slick product. The second responsibility is to meet the needs of the business. You must be a great communicator and understand the fine line between what the business wants and what the user demands.
7: Data Scientist
Data scientists are one of the most sought after roles on this list as organizations accrue massive amounts of data. Data scientists are required to interpret, extract and analyze that data to make the most of it. Basic salary of £36,150 a year and 13% growth rate means this role is going to an in-demand tech job in the coming decade.
Some of the basic skills required for this role are understanding statistical analysis, programming, data storytelling, and machine learning.
6 - Back End Engineer
Sitting behind the fancy bright lights, applications need a back end. And that back end needs an engineer. This role has a base salary of £61,981 with around 22% growth. Which means it’s one of the most in demand roles right now. The role involves planning, building and maintaining server-side applications. They create server scripts, APIs and business logic for organizations to keep everything user-side looking flawless.
5 - Java Developer
Java developers are a specialized slice of the software developer pie. Since Java is one of the most popular software languages, it’s no surprise that this appears on the list of most in-demand jobs. The Java developer develops, manages and obviously designs Java based applications.
They also work with web developers and other software engineers to integrate JavaScript into websites and other software applications. Java developers are in high demand with a roughly 22% increase over the next decade. The role doesn’t pay as highly as other software developer roles, but it’s still very sought after. Average starting salary is £55,728.
4 - Information Security Engineer
With the exponential increase in cyber fraud and hacking, the role of information security engineer has become vital in a brief space of time. With job growth of 33% in the next decade, companies are clamouring to plug holes in their IT systems.
This job role is part analysis, part network forensic investigation. This role also puts a heavy emphasis on research and investigating new and future potential threats. Since hackers are constantly looking for weaknesses in IT systems, this could be a brilliant career for those looking to work at a government level. Average salary is now £65,118.
3 - Machine Learning Engineer
The role of a machine learning engineer is to build and design AI systems. They create scripts, programmes and algorithms that enable artificial intelligence to act without being directed. Machine learning is still very much an emerging field but is in high-demand. Average salary for a starting MLE is £55,025. Creating these robotic processes can save companies thousands, if not millions of pounds.
Building a system requires an engineer to analyze data, arrange data and assess systems to develop good machine learning models. They tend to work within a larger data science team and growth is around 22% over the next few years.
2 - Cloud Engineer
Everything is cloud based these days, from consumer products like Netflix to high end data governance software. The days of downloading software to a computer are pretty much over. It’s definitely the most important change in computing in the past 20 years other than the increase in broadband speeds.
The cloud engineer is responsible for designing, monitoring, managing, and planning cloud systems. They can be experts in cloud database administration, cloud security administration, cloud systems, or cloud software. The overarching goal is to keep the cloud exactly where it should be... up.
Given the importance of cloud engineering and the prevalence of cloud computing in both B2B and B2C scenarios, it’s no surprise that job growth is around 22%. With salaries starting at a whopping £60,258.
1 - Software Engineer
Software developer or software engineer was obviously going to be in first position on this list. Everything on the list above is completely moot unless there is software behind it. Software engineers are well versed in multiple coding languages and tools. As well as building software, they must have great analytical abilities to test, interpret, and maintain software built by other people.
It’s a great job for people who love solving problems and have great analytical skills. It’s also one of the few jobs on this list that applies to multiple industries since every industry now uses software. Growth is around 22% and isn’t slowing down. Salary starts at £53,392 but because this field is mature, the higher end of the pay scale is astronomical.
As you can see from this list, demand in tech jobs has increased so much that demand has beaten supply. The tech world is so varied and fast-paced that a previously unknown role can pop up and be in high-demand in just a few short years.
In 2023, this list could look very different, and we’re excited to find out what changes happen over the next year or so.
