When you walk into Wal-Mart and buy a shirt, you do so because of
the price...first and foremost. That the shirt is made somewhere besides the
U.S. is of little or no  consequence.  You are also secure in your
understanding that quality is not an issue, since when the button falls off,
providing it is within 90 days, Wal-Mart will cheerfully refund your money
or exchange the shirt.

        With that in mind, it should be painfully obvious to all why our IT
jobs are meeting with the same fate as the Garment Workers jobs did...money,
money. and last, but not least, money.

        Another issue concerning the future of IT jobs is that of marketing
for both the outsourcing of code development, and the purchase of third
party software.

        There are two fundamental tricks to selling software and services
for IT to any company.  The first, and most important trick, is to sell to
top management (Senior VP's and the like) since they have the money, a
perceived understanding of what the company's IT needs are, and the desire
to control a very significant department within the company (IT).

        The second trick simply piggy-backs off the first, and it has two
phases.  The first phase is to fortify the concept that the company's IT
department is to slow to respond to the company's needs, and way to costly
when it does...this takes almost no effort for the sales staff, and can
really be enjoyable for them (the sales staff). One favorite trick is to
point out to management that the IT staff is going to say that 'it won't
work', and of course, this is exactly what IT does...the sales folks try not
to laugh.  The second phase is a tried and true concept for any product or
service marketing campaign: "Sell the Sizzle, not the Steak".  For software
sales, the 'sizzle' is GUI, and for services (offshore code development, or
at site-consulting, etc.), the 'sizzle' is being unshackled from their
internal IT department first, cost savings second, and turn-around-time
third.

        The last component to our dilemma is, of course, the same issue all
laborers face...we are long term, expensive liabilities...'nuff said.

        We in IT speak of things like quality and standards while those in
management speak of things like cost and time (which is what they are
trained/paid to do).  The hard reality for us in IT is that the issues of
cost and time have/are/will always win over quality and standards. If you
don't believe this is true, then look at your PC, and explain to yourself
why you are running an OS and applications riddled with errors.   :-)


        IMHO,

        Ray Shahan.

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