The CV is an indispensable part of any job hunter’s toolkit, especially in the ultra-competitive IT job market of today. These CV writing tips for IT professionals will help you make your profile stand out from the pile and open the doors to the best jobs and companies in the industry.
A good resume is a clear and concise showcase of your experiences, personality and aspirations. Since it is the first impression that the recruiter or employer will have of you, you better make it count. Here is how to do it.
Need advice on how to start or develop your freelance consulting business in tech or IT? Need to start a new permanent or freelance assignment? Join Mindquest and get support from our team of experts.
CV writing tips: Choose a positioning strategy for your profile
Due to the constant evolution of work culture and business processes; more and more IT experts are more and more looking for a job that is part of a well-defined project. To do so, you need to be strategic. You can use the header or the first part of your CV to describe your professional profile and aspirations using the keywords that your target employer is more likely to be searching for.
This ‘seduction’ phase, if you will, requires a solid business and marketing strategy. Adapt your speech as much as possible by offering services that are in line with what expected of the position and industry. If you are a developer, look for a cv profile example for software engineers; the Internet is teeming with good ones. You can also ask a colleague or mentor for theirs.
Make your CV clear and enjoyable to read
Content over looks, but do not neglect the visual aspect. Without falling into an excess of originality, make sure that all the elements are easily readable and prioritize the information. Remember that your resume is like your advertising booklet. It should invite reading and also contain all the necessary information.
Describe in a few lines or preferably bullet points what your duties and accomplishments were during previous projects. Indicate the type of companies you have worked for and the specific sectors you are familiar with. You can also specify the technical context and team configuration for different positions. As this will help attract employers who are looking for a specific level of expertise or experience.
Highlight key information for maximum impact
Single-page resumes are for people at the start of their careers. Opt for a multi-page CV that highlights your past experiences in relation to the type of mission you are aiming for.
In order to make your CV more impactful and attract the attention of the recruiter, you should highlight certain elements of your CV based on your strengths and the target position. If you have already done several similar gigs in the past and have some big wins to display, put the emphasis there.
You should also bring up some of your soft skills and passions to help you stand out among other candidates. Perhaps you have a rock band on the side or are a great climber – figure out a way to squeeze that in there. It will make you more relatable and help recruiters remember you more easily when weighing on their various choices.
Complement your CV with a portfolio
Chances are you already have a great deal of experience under your wing. You’ve worked for interesting companies, played a key role in noteworthy projects, helped bring to light successful products.
Beyond including all that experience in your CV, putting together a short portfolio can help potential employers get a better picture of your skills and strengths. It doesn’t need to be a portfolio as polished as, let’s say, that of a designer or a graphic artist – a simple explanation of every one of your best projects will suffice. If you’re after a programming job, put together some of your best code.
Make sure your CV is aligned with your online presence
Last but not least, keep in mind that one of the key CV writing tips for IT professionals does not have much to do with the CV itself, but rather with presenting a coherent online presence when compared to your CV.
After a company or recruiter first identifies a candidate who might be a good fit for the position, they will conduct a thorough review of their digital footprint. Any inconsistencies and red flags found will be taken into account before moving onto the next stage of the process. On the other hand, an insufficient online presence might prevent a candidate from being found in the first place.
Make sure that you are presenting a cohesive profile across all platforms and services. Is the image you are projecting in your CV consistent with your LinkedIn or Twitter profile? Are your past job titles the same on the different job boards you are present in? Do the start and end dates of previous projects match?
Tech education is a force for social transformation. We interview Karen Boers, co-founder & CEO of BeCode, a Belgian coding school bridging social divides.
Tech education is a force for social transformation. We interview Karen Boers, co-founder & CEO of BeCode, a Belgian coding school bridging social divides through tech education. A social entrepreneur at heart, Karen has kick-started various successful digital transformation projects over the years – including the European Startup Network, the EU’s first network of national startup associations.
How did your professional career begin? How did you enter the tech space?
Well, after some time in HR, I joined what at that point was a brand-new research institution focusing on software innovation. I joined as a management assistant, so absolutely nothing to do with the tech part of the company. But it was a burgeoning institution, and we grew quite rapidly. I evolved into marketing and communications and took on HR as well for a research staff of one thousand people across multiple universities in our country.
We worked closely with industry partners to understand their needs and design software solutions for real-life problems. Not just economic problems, but also societal problems like children that have been ill for a long time and have been isolated from the learning environment. It was the pre-Internet era. So, we started working on solutions for children to have a virtual playground and play and chat with their friends. It was really cool. That’s what got me interested in technology. Not the technology itself, but how it can offer answers to societal problems and bring human-centred solutions into the world.
Then you went on to create several business and career development projects, as well as Europe’s first unified startup network. And at what point did you decide to dive into education and create BeCode?
I saw there was a huge war for talent raging all over the tech world. Not just for startups, but also in bigger companies. During one of our international missions to Kenya, we visited a coding school that was taking people off the streets, providing them housing, and giving them the training to become programmers. They would then introduce them to European startups looking for new talents, offering them as remote employees. And I thought “cool idea, but maybe there are similar solutions to be found closer to home.”
If we cannot find the right talents to join these companies, then we’re going to be in trouble. And not only from an economic point of view. We also have a huge societal problem with lots of people that are being isolated, cornered, and that face a lack of prospects. And, if we don’t address that problem, then we have an even bigger issue coming up.
Being the mother and stepmother of five teenagers, that was kind of in my face. I thought “if I don’t help resolve these issues, my children are going to be in huge trouble five to 10 years from now.” So, for me, the sense of urgency was pretty high. That’s how BeCode emerged from my multiple professional experiences.
I had my love for education, my industry experience, my experience in marketing, and my first steps as an entrepreneur. It all came together into a bigger project where we basically go hunt for untapped talent. We go look for people who are low-educated, in long-term unemployment, of immigrant background, etc. People who, for whatever reason, are struggling in today’s job market today, but definitely not for lack of talent or motivation.
How do you reach these at-risk people and help them realise and unleash the potential of a career in tech?
We go search for them. We try to inspire them into considering ICT as a career. Often, the problem is not that they’re not talented, but rather that they don’t know that they’re talented. They’re not aware of the potential they have. So, there’s a lot of awareness and evangelisation to be done with these audiences, to get them excited about tech and consider such a career choice.
Then we help them through really hands-on training programs. Not through too much theory, not through listening to the big expert who will tell you what to do, but basically through trial and error. We give you a small exercise, a project, then something more complex, etc. You have a small group of peers and lots of resources that you can draw on. Basically, nobody reads a manual before they start solving a puzzle either, right? They just pick up the pieces. They try bits and pieces. And if it works, it works. And if it doesn’t, you search for another solution. That’s what they do.
What skills are you putting the focus on through your tech education programs?
The funny thing is that our tech education does not actually focus on the tech skills themselves. I mean, it’s a means, but not an end. What we focus on mostly is teaching them how to learn in a technical environment, because whatever competency or programming language teach them today, tomorrow the context and the technologies will have changed. So, they will have learned basically nothing, or at least not how to continue developing themselves as professionals.
That’s why we focus a lot on learning how to learn: understanding where the resources are; how you can apply them to a use case; what to do when you get stuck; how to build a network of peers where you can go and ask for advice; how you look at examples and copy-paste, but not exactly copy-paste, and debug, etc. So, it’s much more about the soft skills and the learning process around technology.
In the end, they come out with a basic set of technical skills, but mostly with the ability to continue learning once they leave this environment. Especially because in seven months you can’t learn everything. So, whatever they come across, they will have to keep learning for probably the rest of their careers.
And that’s what we hear from the companies that hire our graduates. It’s a combination of, “OK. It’s nice to have people with a different perspective around the table, but it’s also nice to see that eagerness to learn and that ability to learn and be a problem solver rather than a bringer of problems.” Also, the ability to resolve problems as a team and work towards goals together.
What’s usually your main piece of advice for those starting out with their tech education?
Always dare to fail. If you don’t try, if you don’t experiment, you’re not going to learn. When you learn how to walk as a kid or even how to ride a bike, which is already a bit more complex, you don’t go sit down and read the manuals first. You fall flat on your face at least a couple of times. But you get back up on your feet. You look at your parents to ask “what exactly did I do wrong?” And maybe they give you a little nudge left or right, and you try again. You do better. And that’s how we learn.
It’s our natural way of learning. We have to accept that, if we want to learn as adults, we also have to fall flat on our face a few times and hurt ourselves a little bit. We’ll look at other people for small tips and pieces of advice, then take those and try again. And that’s OK. It’s not shameful to try something and not succeed at the beginning, or even not to succeed at all. But if we don’t dare to venture out there and try, then we will get nowhere.
What are some of the most incredible stories of personal transformation you have seen at BeCode over the years?
That’s a tough choice. We have seen over 1,500 stories pass in front of our eyes, and many of them are absolute tearjerkers. I think the one that touched me the most was that of a female refugee. She spent two years trying to come to Europe and had asked for asylum. It was a really rough journey where she saw a lot of hardship and people suffering around her. I don’t think she even dares to tell the people that she met here in Belgium.
She then spent another two years here going through the motions of becoming a refugee: doing the paperwork, learning the local language, etc. And then she came across BeCode. She was so eager to learn.
While she was with us, she was also trying to get her children, who she had had to leave behind, over to the country. And she succeeded not only in finishing the programming course and securing herself a job, but also in getting her children here. You could see it in her eyes that she was absolutely convinced that she was going to make this happen. No was not an option. And she persevered. She had a rough time during the training at certain points, but she always saw it through and found a way out, and she was always open to helping other people. When you see people like that graduate, secure a job, see them reunited with their children; those stories, they stick with you for life.
But I love helping the local people as well. It can be equally rewarding to see somebody who’s been a truck driver for twenty, twenty-five years and started struggling with their back and is not able to drive the truck anymore. That was basically their whole life. They spent their whole life in their truck and then, all of a sudden, they’re completely stuck. If you can somehow make them see that there might be an alternative career for them through tech education, an alternative future; that can be a life-changer.
What new tech education projects is the BeCode team working on these days?
We have seen that, for some, becoming a professional programmer is a good career choice. But for some, it’s a bridge too far, and that’s okay. Right now, we are developing a number of shorter training programs, so that they can just taste and try and then decide whether it’s something for them.
But we are also working on programs to teach people basic digital skills, how they can survive in a collaborative workspace so that we all had to become acquainted due to the global pandemic. Things like how to download your work schedule from the Internet as a factory worker, how to apply for your holidays through an app instead of by writing on paper.
If you look at recent studies, the digital divide is mostly on those digital skills. Yes, there’s clearly a shortage of programmers. But the biggest problem is on fairly basic digital skills that really hamper people from being proficient as professionals and in their personal lives. And that’s a disaster.
If you look just at Belgium – and we’re quite a developed country, aren’t we? – 40 per cent of all Belgians lack the digital skills to be proficient in what they do today. And, if you look at low-educated people or people in low-paid jobs, that number rises to seventy-five per cent. So there’s a lot of work still to be done and not just on the programming side. That’s our conclusion and our path forward, to include these people as well and not leave them side-lined.
Looking for career inspiration and development tips? Here are 10 of the best software developers in the UK you should be following online.
Looking for career inspiration and software development tips? If you are into software development and happen to be based somewhere in the UK, here are 10 of the best developers in the UK you should be following online (they are, of course, also worth a follow if you are based elsewhere).
10 of the Best Software Developers in the UK to Follow Online
As the IT environment is constantly evolving, it is crucial, if not necessary, to connect with the brightest minds to keep up with innovation. In other words, the more contacts you get, the more likely you are to solve IT challenges. Therefore, we at Mindquest are pleased to provide you with a list of the software developers in the uk to follow.
Let’s start with Marco, a Leeds-based senior software developer specialising in front-end development. He has also received the 2020 Awwwards Honors and the 2020 CSSDA UI Design Award, among others.
Secondly, Peter is a Gloucestershire-based MBCS freelance web developer and consultant at Websomatic. He also teaches programming and is the host of How to Code Well.
Lorna then, is a Huddersfield-based developer advocate for Aiven. She is has authored several books and is a regular conference speaker and also a writer for a number of specialised outlets.
Jennifer is a North West-based software engineer at BAE systems. She is a history graduate who turned to coding after a career with the National Trust.
Rob is a Worcester-based software consultant and developer concentrating on APIs. He runs Nineteen Feet and contributes to several open-source projects.
To go on there is Emma, a London-based software engineer at Twitter working with Javascript, React and Gatsby. She is also an instructor at Code First Girls.
Catalin is a London-based technical writer and a developer advocate at Hashnode. He has a YouTube channel, where he discusses tech-related hot topics and offers programming tutorials.
Last but not least, Jack is a Nottingham-based front-end developer at Mitrefinch. He works with Vue.js and TypeScript primarily, has authored a book about career advancement and writes a blog about tech.
Do you know of any other software developers in the UK who should also be featured? Shoot us an email.
In the world of IT, real news can easily get mixed with eye-catching headlines and promotional buzz. From a critical ransomware attack to tackling online abuse: filter out the noise with our selection of the top 3 tech news stories of the week.
Ransomware attack: the new oil disrupting the old one
One of the most echoed statements about data is that it is the new oil. Regardless of whether you agree or not with this comparison ; you will surely find it ironic to see how much the decryption of data, this “new” oil, can end up affecting the old one.
Last Friday, Colonial Pipeline, one of the largest oi pipeline operators in the United States, experienced a ransomware cyberattack that pushed it to shut down its IT systems. Linked to the DarkSide hacking group, the breach happened on the business side of the company’s IT infrastructure but affected its nationwide operations.
Although it is thought the motivations behind the attack were economic and not of sabotage, the incident reignites fears of the dangers hackers pose to a country’s critical infrastructure. Oil prices have gone up due to the supply disruption, with people all over the US piling up fuel reserves. The issue might not be fixed until the end of the week.
The idea of programming AI systems to teach themselves has been gaining major traction in recent years. Flexible software that is able to learn through experience makes a lot of sense. But our current capabilities in this regard might not be as far-reaching as we think.
A group of Amsterdam-based researchers built a simple robot and tried to make it learn how to move through trial and error. Made of independent units chained together into a train-like structure ; the robot used a series of inflating pumps to propel itself at a top speed of two millimetres per second.
Unfortunately, while the autonomous learning system managed to effectively move, maintain a stable pace and follow a circular track, the robot encountered a few real-world problems that threw all its calculations off. A good reminder of how easily a variable not accounted for can disrupt machine learning algorithms.
The tech boom caused by the pandemic has brought along some troubling side effects. An increase in online abuse is one of them. With the number of tech abuse cases requiring specialised assistance having grown by 97% over the last year.
All around the world, domestic abusers use both legitimate online tools and so-called stalkware to harass, control and monitor their partners. Suffice it to say, this kind of behaviour usually predates or accompanies other forms of abuse, from physical to psychological.
That’s why the Barclays-backed non-profit Refuge has launched a site to help abuse victims protect themselves from tech-enabled domestic abuse. RefugeTechSafety.org has been built with the help of survivors and provides educational and actionable resources in multiple languages.
What makes a successful web dev? We interview Berlin-based front-end expert Stefan Judis. Stefan works for the content management platform Contentful leading developer relations. Whether it is by tweeting, writing, or streaming, he loves sharing his web development expertise with the broader community. He also helps maintain Tiny helpers and Random MDN.
Let’s start from the beginning. How did you get started in technology?
I started working in a completely different field after school. I was working as a sound engineer, and I worked in German television. So, what I did for a couple of years was mixing stuff mainly for sports TV shows. But then I figured out that I didn’t want to do that my whole life, that that wasn’t going to fly going forward. So, I thought, well, you’ve been always good with computers.
Then I started studying here in Berlin, where I learned to program stuff. So, it all began with a little bit of C++ and Java and these kinds of things that you learn at university. Berlin is a very start-up-heavy city, so I landed an internship working with Magento and PHP – not real front-end stuff like we do these days; that was not really a thing yet back then. But yeah, I took my first internship and from then I just jump from company to company and learned that I love the web and love writing and creating content around web technologies.
What made
you fall in love with web development?
I’ve always liked the visual aspect of it. When I started, I was really into the Magento stack and I thought it was kind of cool, but I always liked the whole visual animation part of doing web development. And when I started, it was still the early days. Then, you know, slide up, slide down, fade in, fade out, all of these tiny functions. But II found these incredibly appealing. And then slowly but surely, front-end development became a real thing. Then more complexity got into that, and I was completely hooked by all this new technology that was coming out. Then I found out that building for the web is fun. And since then, I tried to build the best stuff possible.
What
was the hardest part of your transition into tech?
Well, especially in web development, learning is difficult. I have been doing web dev for 10 years, and when I started, I was incredibly impressed with what people were doing there. So, I remember I was sitting next to a colleague, and they opened their terminal, and they were doing some fancy stuff in this black window and I was like, “holy moly this is a completely different world.”
I think it was rather challenging to figure out what exactly I had to know. What should I know how to do? But also building a career around that. I think it’s also important to figure out what you actually like.
So, even though now I say that I specialise in front-end technologies, that took me quite a while. Then, I would say that it took me two or three years to figure it out and get a clearer picture of what is actually out there. And it’s only getting worse, especially in the front-end sphere, because there’s just so much technology out there. A lot of people keep asking me: “Hey Stefan, what should I learn?” And I’m like, “well, good luck figuring that one out.” So, I think that is definitely a challenge that we have at the individual level, but also at the industry level, because there’s just so much stuff happening these days.
Given
how many open fronts there are these days, what would you recommend to those who
don’t know what to focus on?
For people
who are just entering the industry: do whatever is fun and useful, really,
because there’s so much stuff to learn and it feels very, very overwhelming.
Build your website, get it off the ground and do whatever is fun and useful.
But what I usually recommend to people is: don’t forget to be curious about the
technology when doing so.
What we see
right now is that there are a lot of people just learning a framework when they
enter the industry. And, while that is great to get a product off the ground, I
think it’s very important to understand what is actually going on. I’m a big
fan of the pillars of the web, HTML, CSS and JavaScript, and I think it’s still
important to have a very good fundamental knowledge of these technologies. And
these are huge areas by themselves. You cannot be an expert in all three areas,
especially when you have frameworks on top and that and maybe something on top
of the frameworks. But I think curiosity and having this drive to say: “Ok, I’m
using that. But how does it actually work?” — I think that’s very important to
become a good web developer.
In your experience, what separates a good web dev from a great one? Is it soft skills, or is it more about hard skills? What make a successful web dev?
I think
there are two areas. Soft skills are usually a very underrated thing when we
speak about software developers. Being a team player in general, I think this
is definitely a crucial part of a solid career. Being humble, being helpful,
all the kinds of things that make you a good team player. That’s something, for
example, that probably should have been taught at university when I studied. Good
or great teams or developers really depend on soft skills. And I would love to
have the industry focus a little bit more around that.
And speaking from the technology side of things, I think a great web developer is someone who always puts the user first. What happens in web development right now is that we have a lot of technology fatigue. We’re using the latest and greatest just because it is the latest and greatest or just because everybody is doing it. So, what I see very often are overengineered sites and products where something simpler would have done the job.
There’s nothing wrong with building something with the latest and greatest when you’re playing around and you’re building your own blog. But when you’re building a commercial product, I think it’s very important to take a step back and think: “Hey, did that make the whole thing slower, or is it now more inaccessible or is it less robust just because we wanted to use the latest and greatest technology?” I think great developers keep the bigger picture in mind and think about the user to build the best possible product. Because at the end of the day, that’s what we’re paid for. We’re not paid for playing with tech. We are paid for building something great.
What would you say are the top three soft skills a successful web dev should have?
I would say
it’s the usual things, from being helpful to being humble. Putting yourself
into the shoes of your colleagues and customers, I think that is a very
underrated skill. Very often it always feels like everything is on fire and
everybody wants something. But very often, and I’m guilty of that myself, it’s
necessary to take a deep breath and think about where the other person is
coming from. I think this is very valuable when it comes to building a career
or working together in teams.
One piece
of advice that I received a few years ago and that I now keep close to my heart
is that when you’re working it can get quite stressful, always under pressure.
And very often, what happened to me is that I had this kind of “anti-” mode. I
was like, “everything is too much.” And I just ranted a lot to other people.
And I once ranted in a situation where the person was in front of me. They went
like: “Stefan, I feel you, I empathise with you, but what’s the solution?” And
I didn’t have one. I just wanted to rant.
Since then,
when I really had the feeling that something had to change or something was really
going on with my nerves. Try to think about the solution first and then propose
that to colleagues, your bosses, your mates or whoever is around you, because
very often ranting doesn’t solve the problem. And it’s very easy to rant
instead of changing something. And that’s something that I learned and that I
have kept with me for a couple of years now. And it’s definitely helpful.
In the ultra-competitive IT job market of today, finding the right job is not as straightforward as one would wish. Understanding how it works is a must.
In the ultra-competitive IT jobs market, finding the right IT job is not as straightforward as one would wish. Things move fast, with top skills and technologies changing every few months and a constant stream of qualified IT candidates making it difficult to secure the best jobs out there.
But today’s complex environment is also one ripe with opportunities. Understanding how it works will help you achieve both your professional and personal goals.
Also, need advice on how to start or develop your freelance consulting business in tech or IT? Need to start a new permanent or freelance assignment? Join Mindquest and get support from our team of experts.
The growing IT talent gap
Technological advancement has its adverse consequences – skill obsolescence is a well-known side effect of progress. However, with new technologies emerging at a growing pace and changing the way businesses operate, the IT talent skills gap is rapidly widening.
Not surprisingly, most recruiters cite skills shortage as their top challenge. The lack of qualified candidates drives salaries up and empowers those professionals who possess the most desired skills. These candidates become increasingly hard to attract and retain, which, in turn, perpetuates the vicious cycle. That’s good news for tech experts.
Ironically, the same evolutionary speed that often makes IT professionals so valuable and sought-after can be their downfall if nothing is done in response. More so than in other professions, technology experts have the implicit duty to constantly renew themselves in order to remain competitive and grow their careers.
Emerging skills and niches
New technological and business breakthroughs are constantly updating the list of most desired skills and capabilities. While softer skills like communication and time management are life-long partners of success; technical knowledge needs to be periodically revisited and updated to keep up with enterprise trends. The rise of data science, the AI boom and the strong momentum of cloud computing are all setting the agenda for the most in-demand IT skills.
In addition, the pandemic has put the focus on business-related skills. With companies increasingly looking to hire IT professionals who also understand the business side of things and can coordinate better with the rest of the organisation.
The change of focus makes sense. As higher-level business and management skills can help a great deal in navigating change and identifying new opportunities. For IT professionals and technical profiles, making a lateral career move to become more business-savvy can prove very beneficial.
In the world of IT, real news can easily get mixed with eye-catching headlines and promotional buzz. From AI and chips to cloud security: filter out the noise with our selection of the top 3 tech news stories of the week.
The AI hype is so strong we often forget that
artificial intelligence is already an integral part of our everyday
lives.
Firstly, AI played a key role in the development of Covid-19 vaccines. But there are many other, less conspicuous ways we benefit from it directly.
For example, from anti-spam email filters to fraud detection for your banking account, silent, tiny AI helpers accompany us throughout the day without us necessarily being aware. Whether it is by dimming our phone’s screen brightness or suggesting sentences we tend to use, low-level AI tools do exactly what the best kind of technology does: help out without being noticed.
But not everything’s about the little things, other common applications have positive effects on our society, like smart city traffic management or energy grid optimisation.
For all its innovation potential, the
technology industry still has an over-reliance on the diminishing effects of
the long/established Moore’s Law, by which the number of transistors in
computer chips tends to double in number and halve in size every two years.
Unfortunately,
recent years have seen this rule of thumb falter, with chip manufacturers
struggling to keep the good ratio going.
Enter IBM. The company announced this week a significant breakthrough in the way computer processors can be effectively made. IBM created a 2nm chip it claims can boost performance by 45% over 7nm chips while cutting down energy consumption by 75%.
Making sure that evolving cloud environments remain protected against malware is becoming increasingly difficult in a world where multi-cloud is the new norm and a single weakness can compromise an entire network
As if
human fallibility and the cloud’s sheer size were not enough, attackers are
using increasingly sophisticated methods of bypassing traditional security
measures and protocols.
Malware is often only valuable until its detected, as its signature can then be easily identified by the system. Yet, scanning an entire cloud ecosystem for irregularities still involves too much complexity and resources due to its sheer size.
A research initiative by Microsoft’s, Projet Freta, proposes a novel approach: a cloud-centric in-memory scanning system that focuses on virtual machine instances to deliver scalable protection.
Use our template to create a compelling and comprehensive IT Business Analyst job description to attract top talent.
The role of the IT Business Analyst aims to bridge the gap between the various operational departments and the IT department. Their main mission? To ensure the alignment of a company’s IT systems and its strategic business objectives. They are in charge of analysing business needs and translating them into technical objectives.
The main difference between a classic Business Analyst and an IT Business Analyst is that the latter does not delegate the operational part of the project.
Interested in exploring more roles within tech? Take a look at the role of the Salesforce Consultant
IT Business Analyst: the job
Identify IT issues
Firstly, the IT Business Analyst will identify all sources of wasted time, energy or money within the company’s IT systems. They will therefore start by analysing all processes, tools and uses to identify areas for improvement.
Develop a strategy
After carrying out their analysis, the IT analyst expert will then define an action plan and lay the foundations for the project. The goal of the project may be, for example, to improve production, sales, customer relationship management, information flow or even logistics. Their field of action is therefore extremely wide.
Implement the strategy
Unlike the classic Business Analyst, they will be in charge of the project through its operational part. That is to say, after having defined the strategy, they will be in contact with the development teams to directly manage the implementation of new IT systems or the optimisation of existing ones.
In order to develop the best possible strategy, the IT Business Analyst must analyse IT systems down to the smallest detail and determine how they can be improved. In some cases, they must consider if it’s worth it to replace the entire existing system.
Ability to adapt
Moreover, an IT Business Analysis consultant may be required to work in various industries. They must quickly become acquainted with the market, the operations of the company, and the computer systems it uses. They must have technical knowledge of these systems, but they must also understand how teams use them.
Technical and strategic monitoring
To develop the best possible strategies, they must also be constantly informed of new developments concerning IT systems, computing and business.
Mastery of programming language
In addition, As part of the development team, they often have to master programming languages like SQL, Java, NET, C ++, Python …
The analyst can work in any industry and within various companies as long as the information system and organisation are large enough.
Salary of the IT Business Analyst
The average daily rate is between €400 and €700, depending on experience and the type of profile.
Training and education
To access this profession, it is recommended to have a relevant university degree. A master’s degree in Economics / Business / Management or in Computer Sciences is a big plus.
Interview with Denise Nepraunig, a Berlin-based iOS developer who decided to pursue her passion for Apple after 13 years in the SAP ecosystem. She’s now a Swift and iOS dev at CARIAD, the Volkswagen Group’s automotive software development division. This is what she did, why she did it, and how you can do it too.
You worked with SAP for many years. Why the change in
career focus?
I started out within the SAP ecosystem about 13 years ago, working for an SAP customer, then I had a short stop at an SAP consultancy and, finally, I ended up at SAP itself. The thing was that SAP is really great to work with, and it also pays very well to have SAP skills. But they are really specialised, so it can be hard to transfer them to another company or environment. It’s also hard in terms of resources. Then. things like blog posts or stack overflow questions, they are hard to get by.
Plus, after doing SAP stuff for so long, I really wanted to break free from all of it and diversify my skillset so that I could work anywhere. The last two or three years at the company, I had the chance to get started with some iOS development, and I found it really exciting, I loved it.
So, I’m an Apple fangirl, and I thought writing your own apps for the platform was really cool. Swift makes it a lot easier than Objective-C, with which I had failed in the past. But at SAP we were still using our own frameworks within iOS and stuff like that, so I felt a bit stuck inside this ecosystem.
Then I had the opportunity to interview at Volkswagen, and I saw that they hadn’t created too much stuff for iOS yet. And It was a really good opportunity for me. I joined last December, so I’m a few months in. To be honest, it was quite scary to leave my extensive SAP experience and network behind, but so far I don’t regret it a single bit.
Now I am working on apps with which you can remotely control car features
like climatization. It’s also really fascinating to have hardware involved. At
SAP you just controlled software or business processes and now you can control a
car. It’s like being a kid with a remote-controlled car, but with a real car
instead.
So, you basically went from writing code for B2B
applications to doing it in the B2C space? What are the biggest differences you
have noticed?
For one thing, and in my case, you’re much more closely connected to the
customer, and your sprint and your tasks inside the sprint can change very
quickly depending on what problems arise or the feedback on the App Store.
Also, I feel more connected to my work. You directly know the end-users, everybody in your everyday life has experience with cars, but hardly anyone else has experience with ERP systems. Volkswagen also has a lot more customers. It has a whole different scale than SAP. Some projects I worked on, yeah – it’s really exciting. I was looking exactly for this.
What’s the best career advice you have ever been
given?
The best piece of advice has definitely been that I should network a lot.
And that was really important when joining a
big company like SAP. There are just so many different things which you are
dependent on, whether it is a cloud platform, or a web framework, or stuff
inside SAP itself… You need to know people, and it helps tremendously if you
know the right person. And that’s also true in terms of careers. For example, if
you know someone in another department, you can easily get a job there just
because you know the person.
There are also some cool events
that SAP had, where I got the chance to be a speaker at and so on. So this was
a tremendous experience inside the SAP family. My first manager at SAP actively
supported me in this process, encouraging me to travel to conferences and speak
there. I had the opportunity to travel to different countries and experience different
cultures.
What’s the
biggest challenge you have faced in your career?
Before I was in the IT
business, I was a secretary. I had no formal IT education and was coding as a
hobby. I used automation in Microsoft Excel a lot and very basic stuff like
that, and it made me decide I wanted to be a developer.
But trying to get the
right education and my first job without having any experience was very, very hard.
It was the biggest challenge, and overcoming it involved a bit of luck too. I heard
about a job from a former university professor of mine. It was SAP-related, but
not in development. I was first a project assistant and then kind of worked my
way up to developer. I knew I had to do other stuff to end up where I wanted. I
had also studied communications engineering, so I had all those skills in my CV
already. But work experience is so important in this field, and getting the
first job was super hard.
Is that
something you would recommend to newcomers who are struggling to get into the
field, starting with something related and moving up?
Yeah, I think so. You can
do this in a big company in particular, but also in small companies. There one
wears many hats, and it’s also easier to look over the shoulder of other people,
because it’s smaller. I think that, if you can’t directly get a developer job,
try to sneak in through somewhere and work your way up.
Hos was your particular
experience in larger companies?
Well, for me, my
developer career really took off in terms of knowledge when I joined SAP. Before,
I worked in teams that were rather small. There were one or two developers who
most of the time did a plethora of things. So, I was writing code, but I did
not feel that I was able to get better at it. I wrote the same things, again
and again.
But, when you join SAP, there are eight people working on the same problem all together. And a lot of people are smarter than you, obviously. It was the first time I ever heard about unit tests and other things I now take for granted. You don’t do this on your own if you’ve never been exposed to it. So that was tremendously helpful. And, also, in a big company, if something else interests you, it’s easier to move to another department instead of looking for a whole new job entirely. It was really a great experience. I mean, big companies sometimes move slowly and can be frustrating when it comes to some processes, but you learn a lot.
Mindquest welcomes Melchior du Boullay as its new General Manager to lead its fast-evolving organizational structure and propel its international expansion.
Mindquest and its parent company Club Freelance are welcoming Melchior du Boullay as the new group General Manager. This entrepreneur, IT specialist, and business development expert is now back in his native France after 14 years in the United States. His mission: to lead the group’s fast-evolving organisational structure and propel its international expansion.
A new
structure for new needs
Above all, the appointment of Melchior du Boullay comes as the recruitment group embarks on an acceleration phase, driven by the strong vision of its founders and materialized by the launch of Mindquest at the start of the year.
In recent years, IT skills have become much more complex and harder to secure. Consequently of talent shortages, demand has shifted towards a stronger hybridisation of tech roles and careers.
By providing both freelancer sourcing services and recruitment on permanent contracts, Mindquest offers an agile approach to IT recruitment that is unique in its sector. This approach meets both the needs of companies to build mixed teams (freelancers and permanent employees) and the desire of talent to break the linearity of their careers based on their evolving life plans.
Profitable since day one, the Mindquest / Club Freelance group hopes to
reach 70 million euros in turnover and 100 employees by 2025, compared to 21
million and 35 employees at present. The ambitious plans include the deployment
of the group’s services in several European countries: an expansion that will
now be supported and spearheaded by du Boullay as new General Manager.
A
hypergrowth management specialist at the helm
A graduate of the EPITA, the first Engineering and Computer Science school in France, and endowed with a strong entrepreneurial spirit, Melchior du Boullay has spent his entire career at oXya, a provider of technical services and cloud solutions for SAP customers, now part of the Hitachi group.
Du Boullay held various positions there: IT consultant deployed at customers, SMBs and large enterprises, then project manager and development manager. His international career took him to Congo, Canada and various other countries. He then settled in the United States, where he has led the American subsidiary of oXya for 14 years and achieved double-digit growth year after year. Nearly 20 years of continued challenges and successful conquest have enabled him to acquire very strong expertise in management, process optimization, and corporate governance.
The importance of inclusion and diversity
Close to the field, to his teams, and to his clients, du Boullay has made inclusion and diversity his guiding principles and will be keen to put his passion for people at the service of Mindquest. His transatlantic experience will also be an asset in the context of the group’s international ambitions.
Mindquest new General Manager Melchior du Boullay will work to take the excellent quality of service that characterises the company into a context of hypergrowth. A phase always difficult to manage.
“My role will be to structure the organisation in order to realise the
vision of its leaders. It’s about bringing together and engaging our entire
ecosystem. It is especially important for me to preserve the values of goodwill
and high standards that permeate the group and made me want to join this
adventure. Coming from the IT world myself and having already had to manage
complex phases of strong growth, I want to support Mindquest in its development
while keeping its values intact. My goal is to make it grow from a recognised
player to an undisputed leader both in its original French market and
internationally, “assures du Boullay.
