Demand for IT staff with mobile skills up by 39%, but salaries hold firm

Demand for permanent IT staff with mobile skills has increased by 39 per cent in the past year (from Q3 2016 to Q3 2017), according to the latest Tech Cities Job Watch report from Experis.

Combined with a 26 per cent rise in the number of contractor roles in the same discipline, Experis says that mobile technology skills “are now the industry’s most wanted”, with mobile roles for IT professionals making up the highest proportion (28 per cent) of all those advertised in the UK in Q3 2017 and supplanting web development roles, which had previously held the top spot.

The number of web development roles advertised on both a permanent and contract basis, fell by eight per cent and 22 per cent respectively year-on-year.

However, permanent salaries for IT professionals in roles that use mobile skills only grew by one per cent over the same period, with day rates growing by two per cent – failing to keep pace with inflation. There were only modest salary rises in permanent big data (one per cent) and cloud (one per cent) roles. Despite the demand drop for web development, permanent salaries had a modest rise of two per cent, while IT Security saw remuneration drop by three per cent, despite a 39 per cent rise in demand for permanent positions.