Indian CIOs have to offshore work

Now that's interesting news:

Network World in Indian CIOs have to offshore work, says Gartner - Network World:
Indian CIOs will have to consider outsourcing offshore, because of the shortage of IT skills in the country, and inadequate services standards of local service providers, according to research firm Gartner Inc.

People who really know what they are doing are rare to find. In the IT industry good skills are not easy to obtain. A good developer or SysAdmin needs to live the job and not just do the job, because he needs money to feed himself and his family. The ever evolving technology demands that one is passionate about the topic and willing to learn constantly. Just performing a certain set of tasks over and over again will cause falling behind and in the end become useless.

Fostering good skills in its people is as well a responsibility of the company. For example in my own company I follow a bit the ancient pattern of apprentice, journeyman and master. The education kids receive in the local Universities here in Panama is not bad, but they lack guidance and practice. So I give them a chance and over the course of a few weeks I decide whether they are made of the right stuff or not. Once I found one who is, I put the new apprentice to work on real tasks that contribute to a real project and after a year he should have gained enough knowledge to solve some tasks on his own. Currently I have Fidel, who has been doing Java development since 1.5 years, and Enrique who is about to graduate from UTP. Currently Fidel, my "journeyman", helps me teaching Enrique and I expect Enrique to do the same in one or two years. It takes time, but I feel it's the only way for a company to grow in a sane way and have skilled people who can actually satisfy clients. Of course sometimes one can find a guy who has learned everything on his own, but I consider counting on that or hoping for the rare find a bad idea.

This article has been posted to social media sites. There might be comments. Just follow the links: