Exciting new career opportunities for students

With almost daily, rapid advances in technology, the opportunities provided in the IT sector continue to expand and evolve at a similarly fast pace.

This means that prospective students – regardless of their major field of interest – should do careful research to determine whether there might be a match between their aspirations and strengths, and a career opportunity in this burgeoning industry, an education expert says.

Nola Payne, Head of Faculty: Information Technology at The Independent Institute of Education, says often prospective students will only be exposed to more traditional options, but that there is a world of new choices where skilled graduates are highly sought-after.

Careers now exist which were non-existent five, even two years ago,” says Payne.

“With this shift, forward-looking education providers are incorporating new technology and new careers into their curricula, and future students would do well to investigate new growth industries within their field of interest,” she says.

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“Furthermore, even working adults are now more than ever required to commit to lifelong learning. And adding an IT strength to one’s repertoire within a field could help future-proof your career.”

Payne says that it is also worth noting that even within the field of IT, rapid tech advances have demanded swift adaptation from workers.

“Enterprise technology has shifted to include mobile devices, access to some data and software to the cloud, and social networking. IT employees have had to make this shift and learn how to incorporate these technologies into their careers.

“Education providers have had to review their IT qualifications to develop their students into these emerging careers.

If you are in a career in IT, or intend to pursue one, it is imperative that you constantly upskill and adapt yourself to ensure longevity in your career. It is impossible to predict the future of IT, but the one certainty is that it will change and that change will happen quickly.”

Likewise, someone considering a career in sales or marketing may not be aware that they could actually specialise in the fast-growing field of social media marketing, which is no longer just a sub-function of being a marketer.

The current technologies and trends to be taken into consideration are:

• Social media
• Mobile technology and the various platforms (smart phones, tablets)
• Cloud services and virtualisation
• Big Data and real-time data analytics
• Gamification of business
• The Internet of Things
• Networking for these technologies
• New hardware (3D printers, drones, robotics)

And some of the hottest new careers include:

• Business Architects, strategists and analysts
• Data scientists who are proficient in big data
• Security strategists and architects
• Social media architects and user experience gurus
• Mobile Technology experts in mobile application development
• Cloud integration specialists
• Game developers

As tech takes over even traditional fields of study and specialisation, it is especially important that future students carefully investigate all their options, because there may be many more than they, their parents or teachers imagined.

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