What’s Happening in the IT Market (2024)

I see in different Social Media and work chats a lot of colleagues worried about the current state of the market.

July 2024… it looks like the Golden Era of IT finished.

But that doesn’t mean IT is death or anything close to dead; more of the contrary.

My lecture of the situation is that the market is simply going through some crossroads of uncertainty. I’ll explore this idea further but we can mention some soft facts in the latest IT history (my own selection of hits):

• 2000s: getting out of dot.com bubble
• 2010s: Google/SocialMedia Era (First Waves)
• 2015s: Everyone accepts the fact that IT is Serious and Mature Business
• 2020s: Global Pandemic and massive people that were ocasional users of technology become daily users (but not necessarily experts)
• 2021: Golden Era of IT; salaries go up but again; from some years before and during these years A LOT of people starts seeing IT as a “medium of salvation” and decide to get in; invest in learning, or at least, trying.
• 2022s: Crypto and BTC year (not only this one of course; but web3 becomes the main subject and onto:

(I can be wrong in all of this, feel free to correct me in the comments, I'm just thinking aloud here)

2023s/Today

• IT work force excess: suddenly a lot of Talents are around offering their services; prices go low because of offer excess
• But offer exccess doesn’t mean improved quality: on the contrary; Tech gets so diverse that “supposed know it all” services emerge; trying to cover all the things (with each day that goes by; more Knowledge is needed to Reach Quality Standards)
• which end up doing bad work
• People from outside IT that decided to go into the business; hired someone cheap (more downward prices directions) went through a bad experience and decided to move their money to other industries.
• IA, Automations and no-code tools also democratized IT and Tech reach to entrepreneurs that want (and do) try themselves
• Add to this all of the “MicroSaaS” style apps offering out there
• Communities become a big thing; knowledge and learning and sharing also add up to all this offer

Ok, so, wrong career? No! There’s hope for the future, IMHO

This is how I see next years for the industry:

• Tech Gap: there are still a lot of people offline (even if there are TONs of online) and web3 is failing in resolve the “Real Life Solved by Technology” Gap (I mean: there’s a reach problem for web3 if people lack the tech knowledge to handle)
• But more people will still be interested in Technology; new things will come and new challenges too
• Quality Focus: projects lacking quality will eventually die; these are usually abandoned; they lack focus; long-term quality goals and re-prioritization, lack of leadership.
• Quality is and Will Always Be, Expensive
• There will always be more room for quality and improvements
• Switch/Career Adaptation: long careers of focused study in a field will be reserved and less common than before: people today loss interest and move forward with their next big thing.
• Back to Rural: reaching economical growth and stability leads one (in some cases) to a re-evaluation of the simple tastes of life: some land were to grow in peace; some neighborhoods and good neighbors to trust; back to the old values that made Us Possible.

In other words; we are going through a lot of changes but there is space for opportunity and growth; always.

We, as IT people, need to close as much as possible the gap
Between The Street

And the Screen.

Mind the Gap.
Close the Gap.