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.
How the Covid-19 Pandemic is Accelerating the hybridisation of Careers in Tech & IT
The current health and economic crisis is generating profound changes in careers and recruitment within companies. And especially within tech & IT departments. Manuela Delfort-Garampon, co-founder of Mindquest and Club Freelance, sees both a rise in freelancing and a comeback of permanent contracts. Two trends which may seem contradictory but which in reality testify to a convergence of the two forms of employment. The pandemic is causing a hybridisation of tech.
Pandemic hybridisation tech – Crisis-proof agility: the confirmation of the freelancing model
The common denominator in all crises is urgency. With the Covid-19 pandemic, companies have had to reorganise under unprecedented pressure. In this context, many organisations called on freelancers and external experts; a phenomenon far from being new in the IT field. But which has intensified in certain industries essential to business continuity.
Specifically: the urgent deployment of tools that are essential to the implementation of teleworking has generated a wave of requests for network and support consultants, cloud, VPN, and cybersecurity experts of all kinds. Some IT departments have also resorted to freelancing to compensate for the recruitments that were already planned.
At the same time, some candidates and IT professionals have made a choice in this period of crisis to turn to freelancing opportunistically. Both to stay active and to position themselves on high added value missions that help companies quickly deploy critical solutions.
While the flexibility of the freelancing model has long appealed to companies and applicants alike. The agility it provides has made it an obvious solution to the current situation. But that’s not the only trend regarding careers transformation in the tech world.
Consolidation for tomorrow: the return of the permanent contract
Beyond the emergency, many companies see the current crisis as an opportunity to get ahead and differentiate themselves. Many paused their recruitment efforts during the first lockdown, but most have resumed – or even accelerated – their search since September.
Why? Quite simply because in times of crisis, the best talent is more essential than ever in an IT team. Hence the need to attract and retain top performers that sustain strong teams. The war for talent has intensified around these key profiles. Which companies are tearing off and now want to “secure” under permanent contracts.
At the same time, the permanent contract has made a comeback in the hearts of many candidates and tech & IT professionals; even among some who previously swore only by freelancing. A certain number of freelancers have chosen to go (or go back) to salaried employment, in order to (re) find greater stability in these times of crisis.
Resorting to the freelance model, although it has grown in importance with the crisis, does not however supplant the permanent contract model. In fact, the two statuses coexist now more than ever.
Pandemic hybridisation tech, towards the end of the silos between statuses?
In terms of professional careers, the last few decades have seen many silos gradually fall. For a long time, the norm was to do the same job in the same company throughout one’s life. Then careers began to be built across several companies. For the past twenty years or so, it has been common practice to have several different jobs during a professional career, and sometimes to retrain or reskill completely. Today, there is also the alternation and combination of statuses, with an increasingly porous border between permanent contracts and the self-employed status.
In fact, this trend of hybridising careers in the world of technology and IT did not originate from the pandemic. The motivations for moving from one status to another can be multiple and independent of the current crisis. Example: many freelancers decide to (re) switch to permanent contracts to access management positions. But the current pandemic is greatly accelerating the phenomenon.
Status doesn’t matter as much as it used to. For companies, the challenge now is to attract the best talent, whether they are on permanent or freelance contracts, to accelerate their IT projects. For professionals open to new opportunities, what matters is more the interest in the project and the technical stack, as well as the dynamics of the team. Status is no longer an end in itself.
Information security only keeps gaining importance. Here are 10 of the best cybersecurity experts in the Netherlands to follow on LinkedIn and Twitter.
Certainly, information security only keeps gaining importance as more and more business-critical processes move to the cloud and hackers get more sophisticated. For this reason, you should stay up-to-date with best practices, top threats and emerging trends. That is why we at Mindquest suggest you 10 of the best cybersecurity experts in the Netherlands to follow on LinkedIn and Twitter.
10 of the Best Cybersecurity Experts in the Netherlands to Follow Online
Cybersecurity has become crucial in recent times, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic. As more and more companies had to implement their own virtual work environment, the need for cybersecurity experts grew exponentially. At Mindquest, as IT talents experts, we know the importance of getting the right contact to stay up-to-date and always match the top candidate for the best IT positions.
Therefore, take note of the 10 best Cybersecurity experts in Netherland to follow online.
Also, Sanne has recently joined Mandiant, now a part of Google Cloud, as a Senior Analyst. In this role, Sanne brings her expertise in cybersecurity to the forefront, contributing to Mandiant’s mission of providing cutting-edge security solutions.
Astrid is currently serving as the Corporate Social Responsibility Officer at ESET Nederland. In this role, she focuses on measuring the impact of the organization’s activities on society and the environment, promoting transparency and ethical behavior to contribute to sustainable development.
Floor is a senior privacy advisor at data protection services Privacy Company He also specialises in high-impact projects combining technological and organisational solutions.
Joost is a tech editor at Dutch news organisation NOS. He writes about security and privacy issues and also reports on the country’s latest cybersecurity news.
Marjolijn is deputy director at ECP, a public-private platform for the development of the information society. She is also the winner of Women in Cyber Security (WiCS)’s 2016 Woman of the Year Award.
So, Lodewijk is a senior public prosecutor at the Dutch Public Prosecution Service specialising in combating cybercrime. He is also part of the supervisory board at the DIVD.
Then, Anna is a privacy law expert at firm Allen & Overy, where she focuses on European Union regulations around ICT & Telecom, data protection and cybersecurity.
Last but not least, Rickey works as Incident Responder at Responders.NU. Founded with the mission to elevate Incident Response to new heights, the company breaks away from traditional approaches to deliver unparalleled expertise and service.
What is the role of the AngularJs developer? Discover in this job description his missions, his skills, his training or his salary.
Use our template to create a compelling and comprehensive AngularJS Developer job description to attract top talent.
With the appearance of new frameworks, the professions around web development are more and more specific and a large number of professionals specialize in a particular technology. Among the different possible specializations is the front-end developer AngularJS.
AngularJJ is one of the JavaScript frameworks. It is a free and open-source framework created by Google in 2009 and is used for the development and creation of web applications. It is a complete, solid and homogeneous framework that is one of the most popular JavaScript frameworks, being used all over the world by many companies.
But what is the role of the AngularJS developer? Discover in this job description their missions, skills, training and salary.
Interested in exploring more roles within tech? Take a look at the role of the C/C++ Developer
The profession of the AngularJS developer
Professionals choosing to become web developers have the possibility of focusing on Front-End Back-End or Full-stack development; in a particular programming language or in the use of a specific framework in order to become an expert.
The profession of AngularJS developer is part of front-end development. That is everything related to the design of the user experience of a web page or application.
The AngularJS developer is a specialist in the JavaScript “event programming” language and in particular its AngularJS framework. This is one of the rarest professionals in the field of front-end development.
The AngularJS developer works with JavaScript, but their work doesn’t end with just playing around with this programming language. They are in charge of all types of front-end web development. With their main role being the creation of a Single Page Application (SPA) linked to a RESTful API. They also bring their mastery in the validation of communications between the Front AngularJS application and the RESTful API.
Required Skills
Expertise in the ecosystem
The AngularJS developer is an expert in the AngularJS framework, so they must, of course, know and fully understand all of the specific components of the framework. But that’s not all. This professional must master front-end development and have a perfect knowledge of the JavaScript event programming language. But also mastery of the HTML and CSS languages.
In order to carry out their missions, it is important that these developers have knowledge of Bootstrap and know how to manage interactions with third-party systems via APIs (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google Maps, etc.).
In addition, if they have in-depth knowledge of Agile best practices and are able to offer an effective development methodology, their market value will only be greater.
Curiosity and passion
Because of their job, the AngularJS Developer must be passionate about new technologies. They must enjoy logic and have a sense of design. It is important that they are curious and enjoys learning and discovering new things continuously., as technologies such as front-end frameworks, tools and best practices evolve very quickly and constantly. It is therefore essential to be curious, to constantly be on the lookout for information and stay informed about the latest releases and updates so as not to fall behind or be overwhelmed.
Salary
The salary varies greatly depending on the company, region and level of experience. The salary of a junior AngularJS Developer typically starts around €35,000 annually. However, based on experience, this salary can very quickly increase up to €75,000 per year. On the freelance side, the average daily rates vary between 300 and 600 euros.
AngularJS Developer in training
There are several ways to become an AngularJS developer. This professional can pursue a university degree specializing in computer science and then complete a master’s degree in IT. They can also go to engineering school, specialising in computer science and in this framework via online training.
The first part of our interview with Olena Drugalya, a Berlin-based, self-taught front-end developer who just recently managed to go from being a stay-at-home mom to a full-time dev. Born in Ukraine and having lived and worked across Europe, Olena discusses her transition into tech, the barriers she encountered along the way and how other women can overcome them.
Interview with Olena Drugalya: Congrats on your new job! You made it. How did you go from stay-at-home mom to full-time developer?
Thank you! My transition into tech was a long and winding road of failure, hard work and, eventually, success. So, let’s start from the beginning.
I graduated in linguistics and law, but I never worked as a lawyer. Fresh out of university, I found a job at a trading company as a translator, as there was a huge demand for speakers of foreign languages at that time in Ukraine. I worked in the company for 10 years and was promoted a couple of times, ultimately becoming an executive manager.
What happened then?
Then I met my husband and we got married. We moved to another town, and I worked remotely for some time, but it didn’t go too well because my daughter was born, and I didn’t take maternity leave. Not long after that, I was already burned out from the job, from having a baby, from the move. So, I quit my job.
But, after some time, my daughter had grown older, and I started to think about what I would like to do next in my life, my career possibilities, etc.
My husband is a software developer, so he suggested that maybe I could find a development job in our city. There was a coding academy that offered a course on software development on the weekends, so that worked for me as my husband could watch my daughter during the weekends. I learned there for two years and graduated as a .NET developer. After that I graduated, I participated in several projects. I even built an online game and actually got some money for it. So, I was like, OK, I can do it.
And
then…
Then I decided to try to get a job at a company, not just freelancing. But at that time, in Ukraine, it was very difficult for a woman to enter the tech world if she didn’t have a computer science degree. So, I had a couple of interviews, and that was a failure. A total disaster.
So, after a range of failed interviews that got me discouraged, I decided that tech was not for me. I always thought that, for being a developer, you needed a special mindset, and that I just didn’t have it. And everyone around me seemed to think the same, except, of course, for my husband. But I was too unmotivated and frustrated. So, I stopped. I decided it was not for me, that I would try something else.
Women in tech
We moved to Denmark, where I got a job as an office manager. I was quite happy with the job, since we had just moved in, and I could learn Danish and do something useful instead just sitting at home. But while working there, I realised that, in western Europe, the situation with women in tech is totally different. In fact, tech companies encourage and offer women enormous possibilities in the tech industry. That made me think about tech again, and I decided to give it another shot. This time I started with web development and that’s what I’m doing right now. We moved to Berlin, and I recently got a job as a junior software developer at IT services provider Novatec. And I love it.
You
mentioned how hard the interview process was at times. What would you say to
people who are going through failed interview after failed interview? How can
they keep their spirits up?
Above all, that you just must keep going no matter what. If you really want this job, if you really want to work in tech or in any other industry, you just need to learn from your failures and just move on and try again. Failing at an interview doesn’t mean that you are not good in what you are doing. Sometimes there is just a better candidate, or the company has a different profile in mind. It often just means it’s not the right time or the right company for you because they are looking for something else.
Do
you think your background in humanities has helped you in tech?
Absolutely.
Knowing a lot of languages, for example, has helped me a lot. Speaking English
is a big plus in this industry, and I can speak German too. There are a lot of
wonderful developers out there who are missing out on great opportunities
because they don’t know languages. All technology now is made in English. Plus,
if you know how to learn a language, you know how to quickly learn new
structures and words. You can directly apply that to learning a programming language.
You learn the grammar, the syntax. The same goes for fluency. In order to get
fluent, you just need to write code often. You just need to treat programming
just like any other language.
How
do you combine your job, learning and raising kids, especially during lockdown?
You need to have a daily routine. Otherwise, you will always feel like you don’t have enough time. I was lucky to have the help of my husband. When my son was little, I usually studied for two hours after he went to bed.
That was, of course, tiresome, because usually you don’t feel fresh anymore in the evenings. But I had no other choice. But the first lockdown actually helped me a lot with goals, as my husband started to work from home, and we shared the time with the kids. From morning until noon, he was with the kids, and I was with the kids from noon until the evening. I had my two or three hours to myself every day, and that was fantastic. Then I jumped right away into the 100 days of code challenge. I made a habit of coding every day for at least one hour. And I have been doing it every single day since. So, yes, the daily routine is very important.
You
are very active in the dev community, sharing development tips and your journey
into tech. Why do you enjoy blogging, how has it helped you?
I started my blog when I started my studies as a web developer. First, I wanted people just to know my story about being a stay-at-home mom and learning web development. I was hopeful it could encourage other women like me who were afraid of transitioning into tech. But as I proceeded with the study, I started to write posts about topics I was learning at the time.
I thought that many blog posts or YouTube videos out there were not really that beginner-friendly, often being written in a rather complicated language. So, I decided to try to write down these difficult concepts just in a simple language, just for myself. If you manage to understand something by writing about it, you actually learn it more deeply. Then I saw others were struggling with the same problems and decided to share these materials with the broader community.
I encourage everyone to start writing the blog. It’s one of the best ways to learn by yourself because you need to research something and then you have to explain what it is and what it does, and how you can use it. It’s also a great way of holding yourself accountable and make sure you keep progressing towards your goals.
Mindquest is now a member of APSCo, a British association which promotes the values of innovation and excellence in the field of recruitment.
We are pleased to announce that Mindquest is a member of APSCo, a British association which promotes the values of innovation and excellence in the field of recruitment. This membership, subject to numerous eligibility criteria, highlights the professionalism and quality of our services and is fully in line with our internationalisation goals.
APSCo (Association of Professional Staffing Companies) is a British association that brings together the most successful players in the professional recruitment industry and defends the values of excellence of our profession.
Founded in 1999, the association has rapidly grown to become an authority for the professional recruitment industry, representing a wide range of organisations and trusted partners.
The APSCo accreditation is thus recognized by candidates and employers as a differentiating quality mark in the acquisition of professional talent.
Why did Mindquest join APSCo?
A pledge of seriousness and quality
Mindquest is now a member of APSCo. The APSCo membership gives Mindquest an internationally recognisable quality and reliability stamp; that acts as a real differentiator in the recruitment space.
This is recognition of the great added value that our services bring to both our clients and candidates. But also the high levels of satisfaction these have with our work.
Access to a wide range of resources
APSCo is also a large platform for discussions and exchanges; that brings together the best players in the sector around a common goal. To innovate in our job as recruiters and constantly improve our service.
The association also offers a whole range of quality services and gives our teams access to numerous resources and market studies. In order to better understand developments in the world of recruitment for the benefit of our clients and candidates.
One more step towards the international
Joining APSCo strengthens our presence in the UK market. Where Mindquest and its parent company Club Freelance have been established since inception.
This membership is fully in line with our international development ambitions. And gives us access to a multitude of resources to strengthen our European presence through the Mindquest brand.
The freelancisation of tech roles: how teleworking and the war for talent in IT are pushing for more flexible working conditions for employees.
The ‘freelancisation’ of tech roles. How the spectacular democratisation of teleworking and the war for talent that is raging in the technology sector are pushing companies to offer ever more flexible working conditions to their employees.
Freelancisation of Tech Roles: Teleworking and flexible working hours as the new standard
Long before the global pandemic, remote work and flexible working hours were already major trends in the creation of the world of work of tomorrow. But the Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of these ways of working. For a large majority of employees on permanent contracts, in all sectors. No more traditional working days at the office from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., with a break by the coffee machine, etc.
And this is obviously to accommodate their demands. According to a study conducted by Malakoff Humanis in June 2020, 84% of employees wanted to request telework after confinement.
On the business side, the flexibility of work also seems to convince. According to a recent study by Capgemini, employee productivity increased by 63% in the third quarter of 2020. Better still; 70% of companies seem convinced that the productivity gains generated by teleworking can be sustained once the pandemic over.
The employees of tomorrow will see their daily working lives marked by an increasingly flexible framework similar to that of freelancing.
The IT talent war and the “freelancisation” Tech Roles & of job vacancies
In the world of tech and IT, another phenomenon reinforces this tendency towards flexibility: the talent shortage.
Companies are struggling to recruit technical profiles and are engaged in a fierce battle to attract the best candidates. As a result, they are sometimes ready to bend over backwards to meet the requirements of the most popular professionals. And that includes offering more flexible conditions to candidates.
To recruit the best developers on a permanent contract; for example, some companies are ready to offer them full remote control and total flexibility in their working hours. This is attracting profiles who were already partial to freelancing.
“Freelancisation” or simple flexibilisation?
So yes, in the world of tech and IT, the trend is undoubtedly to make working conditions more flexible. But to speak of a “freelancisation” of tech roles would amount to reducing the status of freelance to remote work and flexible hours.
To work independently is to have an entrepreneurial mindset. It is to wear several hats including that of accountant and that of commercial, it is to alternate periods of mission and periods of inactivity… In short, a very different reality to that of a permanent position even with very flexible conditions.
It should be noted that the opposite phenomenon also occurs: freelance work sometimes takes some resemblance of a permanent gig. This is particularly the case of very long-term assignments under management. Working for example on large-scale SAP projects over several years.
Tech and IT: the classic permanent contract has not said its last word
But speaking of a widespread flexibilisation of jobs in the worlds of technology and IT would be wrong. The reality is in fact more nuanced.
Not all professions are suitable for teleworking, and flexibility generates many points of friction within organizations. The cohesion of the teams is weakened by the distance. Management methods are struggling to adapt.
Most IT departments are not ready to perpetuate the flexibility of working conditions across all workstations. And even less to abandon the traditional model of face-to-face work and fixed hours.
On the employee side, we find a bit of the same. Telework yes, but not too much. According to a survey conducted by Apec in mid-December, if the vast majority of private sector executives now want to telecommute. Nearly half want to use it only “two to three days a week”. In fact, not all employees enjoy teleworking, and some even dream of one thing: being able to return to the office.
Additionally, the freelancisation of tech roles is rather relative: salaried employment as we know it still has a bright future ahead, and the “traditional” permanent contract is not about to disappear. However, it is obvious that the worlds of classic salaried employment and the freelancing model are increasingly coming close to one another. Businesses and workers alike want the best of both worlds now more than ever.
In tech and IT more than in any other sector, we are now juggling the two statuses. The silos between freelance and permanent contract are gradually disappearing, offering ever greater flexibility and possibilities to both professionals and organisations.
