Edit: I imagine even more senior level personnel have retired since I wrote this. The itjungle link is no longer active. The link to subscribe to IBM Systems Magazine still works.
Originally posted December 23, 2008 on AIXchange
If you’ve been into a computer room lately (and most likely you have if you read this blog) let me ask you something: How old are the senior-level personnel? Are they approaching retirement age?
How you answer these questions probably depends on where in the world you’re located. In the United States, between the retirements and the lack of entry-level, on-the-job training, skill shortages in IT is an issue. I previously wrote a bit on this, discussing how you don’t see junior-level admins joining the help desk or operations and working their way up as much as you once did. Today it seems businesses will only hire people who already have the necessary skills.
I’ve also noted that some organizations are reluctant to train their current employees, for fear that they will take their new-found knowledge to a new employer.
With this in mind, I was happy to see that IBM and DeVry University are launching an enterprise computing track for students to gain experience with AIX, IBM i and z/OS. (Read the press release.)
This article offers details:
“‘Within the next five to seven years, baby boomers will begin retiring and DeVry University can help fill the pipeline with a pool of qualified applicants for IBM, its customers, and business partners. Our students will be educated on IBM’s technology that currently runs the world’s top 50 banks and 22 of the 25 top U.S. retailers. Through this practical education in enterprise computing, DeVry University’s graduates will be set apart from other computer science graduates. …
“DeVry will be plugged into a large Power Systems hub that is specifically managed for the university. The hub will be the direct connection used for teaching IBM Power Systems and mainframe environments. It allows DeVry access to high-end enterprise hardware without the overhead of buying and maintaining systems.”
I like the fact that students will be able to work on live systems remotely, but I have to hope that they will also be able to get hands-on experience. Maybe local businesses or business partners–entities that need to grow new talent–would benefit by providing internships for these students. Maybe bring them in to see what goes on with firmware updates and backups and system migrations.
Then perhaps, through this exposure to the strengths of Power Systems and the robustness of IBM operating systems, these students will be less interested in working with toy operating systems and more inclined to use real operating systems.
Also a note to readers: The magazine is launching a digital version in January. The digital version is free worldwide. To subscribe, click here.