Personnel officers and consultants who trust salary surveys that base average remuneration on the number of years` experience a particular candidate has, misunderstand the unique nature of the information technology industry as well as those who work in it.
So said director, Ivor Rimmer, who is responsible for locating and securing highly skilled IT contractors for his blue chip client base.
The problem with a methodology which results in a recommendation that a `BSc Computer Science graduate with five years` experience should earn RXXX a month` is that it fails to take account of the quality of the experience, he said.
After all, five years` experience could mean one year of worthwhile experience plus four years of `baggage` or even one year`s worthwhile experience five times over. Then, given the fast pace with which this industry changes, a legacy systems programmer with 20 years` experience is certainly not as valuable to an organisation as is a programmer with 10 years` of experience of legacy systems as well as new age programming. In this industry more than any other, you get over-paid youngsters and under-paid oldies, said Rimmer.
In addition, there are great discrepancies between the remuneration packages being paid to IT personnel. Salary surveys tend to average these out.
This makes it very difficult for human resources managers and personnel consultants without exposure to the IT industry to gauge what a candidate is worth. It makes it even more difficult to propose a remuneration package that will appeal to him or her and result in a new employee.
So, how should the industry measure its employees` worth? The answer may be to say to use the time with the candidate to seriously evaluate his or her skills and attitude as well as conducting thorough reference checks, suggested Rimmer.
Then, if the candidate volunteers disclosure of his or her payslip, the human resource manager or consultant should take the opportunity to see on which side of the `remuneration` bell curve the applicant falls. And, if it`s on the positive side, there is a very good chance that the applicant has the skills to deserve favourable remuneration. Discrete enquiries and validation of references will soon confirm or refute the information gleaned from that simple piece of paper.
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