The ITWeb Salary Survey 2014 has revealed the top paying popular skills - with more than a hundred survey respondents - are SAP, Java, Cisco and C#, with average annual salaries between R620 000 and R520 000.
Closely behind are those who list MS SQL Server as the technology platform they specialise in, with just over R500 000 on average, while those focusing on Windows Server family platforms earn just over R440 000.
But those are not the highest paid skills overall - that spot is taken by less popular, "older" technologies, largely because those respondents are in senior, mission-critical positions, with long track records.
Adabas came in tops, with 12 respondents earning an average of R841 667. They are followed by IBM Lotus Domino specialists at R819 333, Sun server hardware at R793 333, and PowerBuilder at R792 000. Next came Assembler with R750 000, Sun Solaris at R736 000, and Avaya and Cobol at just over R730 000.
"High salaries for Adabas, Cobol, Assembler and other legacy platforms show the mainframe is far from dead," says Anton van Heerden, MD of Sage VIP Payroll & HR. "However, the sheer number of respondents working on more modern Web-based platforms and the salaries they command also show South African organisations are embracing digital transformation of their businesses."
Microsoft wins popularity
In terms of overall popularity of platform, Windows Desktop came out tops with 514 respondents, followed by Windows Server Family with 350 respondents and C# with 312.
Other popular platforms, over and above the top four, include Linux, PHP, Oracle database and Oracle applications, HTML and C++.
A breakdown of the most popular platforms by male and female respondents shows a slightly different picture than the overall average - see graph "Tech platform vs salary - female vs male".
Architecture rules
In terms of broader technical areas of expertise, it came as no surprise that enterprise architecture and service-oriented architecture came out tops, recording an average salary of R941 659. This was followed by IT strategy at R729 847 and systems architecture at R681 850. Other popular IT fields included sales, enterprise resource planning, project management, enterprise application integration and business intelligence.
At the bottom of the IT food chain are the support functions - the basic functions keeping the "lights on" - desktop support at R190 999, systems support or helpdesk at R225 136, and network administration at R272 740.
About the survey
ITWeb's 14th annual IT Salary Survey captured a total of 5 385 valid responses - more than double the 2013 sample.
A marginal positive change is seen in the male/female ratio - 79% of the respondents were male and 21% female, compared to 82% and 18% respectively in last year's survey.
The majority (82%) are permanent employees and include C-level executives, business managers, consultants, IT practitioners, developers from all around the country, ranging in age from under 20 to over 50, and from organisations with under 10 people, to enterprise giants with over 5 000 staff. Those aged 31 to 35 made up the bulk of the survey, followed by respondents in the 26 to 30 range, and 36 to 40 range.
This survey was conducted online in late 2013 and early 2014, and as such, it does not have a controlled sample. The results report is meant to serve as an indicator of local IT salary trends.
"The annual ITWeb IT Salary Survey offers a fascinating window into IT employment trends in South Africa and shows how the salary landscape is changing," says Anton van Heerden, MD of Sage VIP Payroll & HR.
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