I.T. & Telecommunications

You might think that if you work in telecommunications, you’ll just have endless slogans buzzing round your head, like ‘it’s good to talk’, ‘stay in touch’, ‘the future’s bright, the future’s Orange’ and ‘life’s for sharing’, until you want to smash your phone to smithereens, “no, I don’t want to  stay in touch.” Or that I.T. careers are dominated by anti-social computer geeks, spending their lives playing Second Life (a racier version of Dungeons & Dragons).

I.T. is a booming industry. Computers are everywhere: they’re in our homes, in our offices and in our pockets. The same goes for mobiles: people are surgically attached to their mobile devices (not literally, of course).The I.T. and telecommunications sector is unspeakably important to the UK economy and we need a new generation of computer whizzes to lead the pack. There is a real demand for highly skilled, home-grown I.T. technicians.

One of the most exciting things about these careers is that they offer employees continuous opportunities for learning. I.T specialists can be really flexible in how they develop and where they work. Indeed, many I.T consultants work from home or get to go to different locations across the world.

To work in this sector you will need to acquire technical skills and knowledge. You need to be able to think logically, have solid mathematical skills and, naturally, be interested in computers or telecommunications. There is even a degree of creativity required in some I.T. jobs, such as web design and software development.

The big, burning question is: hardware or software? If you work in hardware engineering, you’ll be concerned with the physical parts of computers, networks and telecommunications apparatus. You could be, amongst other things, a technical support engineer, a network engineer or an infrastructure architect.

Software engineering is all about working with operating systems, programmes, applications, websites, databases and computer games. There are bucket loads of different jobs in this area of I.T and telecommunications, including web designers, software developers, and software testers. If you don’t fancy getting your hands dirty, there are less hands-on technical roles, such as I.T. consultancy. These guys analyse and assess the impact of other companies’ I.T. systems on their business requirements.

You don’t just have to work for giant and telecoms and I.T. companies such as Apple, Microsoft and Logica. You could work for smaller specialist I.T. solutions companies, or spread your I.T. and telecommunications, Yoda-like wisdom (we had to get a reference to Star Wars in there somewhere) at non-technological companies, such as public sector departments, investment banks and energy companies.

If you are a computer geek, it’s time to be loud and proud. Go, geek pride!