The local IT industry is still the domain of white males and workaholics, while Johannesburg and Pretoria remain the areas of choice.
Sample size
[CHART]With 2 897 valid responses, this year`s sample is considerably smaller than last year`s (3 788). However, the data captured provided increased depth due to a more complex questionnaire, particularly in the section concerning the details of remuneration package structures.
Gender and race: Largely white, male
[CHART]Nevertheless, just as in the previous years, the survey sample is heavily biased toward the white male IT population, with only 21% of the respondents being non-white, and only 19% being female - statistics which exactly match last year`s survey demographics.
Rookies and veterans
[CHART]IT remains a young industry, with over 50% of our sample under the age of 30, and a further 20% between 30 and 35.
[CHART]Most respondents (68%) have spent between two and six years in IT. However, the industry`s veterans are also well represented, with 28% having worked between 10 and 20 years in IT.
Education level: Highly degreed
[CHART]While the overall level of education is fairly high, with over 60% of respondents holding a tertiary diploma or degree, nearly a quarter of the respondents only have a matric certificate. These respondents mostly belong to the older age group, a finding which reflects the fact that it is increasingly difficult for candidates with only a matric to enter the industry.
Position and involvement: Permanent workaholics
The majority of the respondents (38%) belong to general IT staff, followed by 29% in management. Only 7% are in executive staff positions - director, managing director or CEO. The rest of the sample is distributed between consultants (15%) and sales (11%).
[CHART]The sample is strongly biased towards permanent employees, with 92% of the respondents holding permanent positions and only 3.2% doing contracting work. However, commentators agree that the actual industry ratio between permanent staff and contractors is more balanced than our survey suggests, despite the shift by many contractors to seek permanent employment due to uncertain market conditions over the past 12 months.
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[CHART]IT is regarded as an industry of workaholics, a fact which is confirmed by 67% of the sample who report working between 8 and 10 hours a day, with a fairly significant number (15%) putting in over 10 hours.
Industry, location, company: Gauteng is the hub
[CHART]Just under half of the respondents said they work in the IT industry, with the next most represented industry being banking and finance at 11%, followed by telecommunications at 8%.
[CHART]There is no doubt that the local IT industry is concentrated in Johannesburg and Pretoria, with 72% of the sample living and working in Gauteng. Western Cape comes second with 18% of the sample.
[CHART]Respondents are distributed across companies of all sizes. The two single biggest groups come from companies wide apart in terms of size - 18% work for companies of between 10 and 50 staff, while over 15% work in large corporates of over 5 000 employees.
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