Director pawns car to pay debt and worries about IT industry laying off 90% of employees

The above is the sharing of Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Duc, senior expert of Trapets Vietnam Company, Scandinavian Software Park, at "Career Orientation Day 2023", organized by the University of Natural Sciences (Vietnam National University, Hanoi) on October 22.

Mr. Duc and many experts gave a panoramic picture of the current situation of many technology businesses after the Covid-19 pandemic, the challenge for IT personnel in the face of a massive wave of layoffs.

Students learn about job opportunities at businesses (Photo: My Ha).

Before upgrading to a new car... now pawning the car

According to Mr. Duc, in the period of 2020-2021, when the Covid-19 pandemic first appeared, many technology companies recruited massively, and salaries for employees also increased dramatically, one and a half times higher than in previous years.

This makes final year students see this industry as "hot" and choose it a lot, but currently, human resources in this industry are falling into a wave of layoffs.

This expert cited figures that from the end of 2022 until now, about 380,000 layoffs have taken place, accounting for about 1.9% of the nearly 20 million technology employees worldwide.

Mr. Duc commented that the number of layoffs in the technology industry, although not too large, has revealed many instabilities. In the Vietnamese market, the wave of layoffs has come because our country mainly processes products.

"When foreign companies no longer hire, there is no work, leading to cuts. There are companies with 100 employees now only have 10, some have to close. There are even directors who upgraded their cars in 2020-2021, but this year they have to pawn their cars to pay off debt and maintain operations," said Mr. Duc.

This reality means that there are not as many jobs in the technology sector as before. For example, on the IT recruitment information page, there are usually 1,500 job postings, but now there are only over 700.

In previous years, many units recruited inexperienced personnel or recruited interns, but now most of them require experienced personnel.

"Students are facing a huge challenge when the market is at its lowest point. They are facing competition with experienced laid-off workers from other companies. The IT recruitment situation in Vietnam is currently quite "gloomy", Mr. Duc commented.

Associate Professor Pho Duc Tai, Head of the Faculty of Mathematics - Mechanics - Informatics, University of Science (Photo: H. Huong).

Students cannot "sit still"

According to Mr. Duc, the reason for the massive layoffs in the IT industry is that Vietnam mainly does outsourcing, and when the market goes down, it means employees lose their jobs. Meanwhile, small companies often prioritize short-term goals and do not have funds to deal with crises.

Layoffs due to the end of the Covid-19 pandemic, the trend of working remotely to cope with the epidemic is no longer there. Companies are under pressure to tighten spending, small companies are closing or having to cut staff, operating in maintenance mode.

Mr. Duc commented that the situation of staff cuts may gradually improve in 2024. This difficulty is only temporary, but students cannot "sit still". He advised third and fourth year students to work hard to gain more experience.

The assessment is "gray", but according to Mr. Duc, that does not mean it is too difficult for students to find jobs. Currently, large companies are still very thirsty for truly talented human resources and are willing to spend money to recruit.

For now, students need to determine their priorities when choosing a job. In fact, many new graduates have chosen to put salary requirements below other criteria to increase their chances of being hired in the IT industry.

In response to the question of student Hoang Anh Tuan, Computer Science class, when he said what students need to do to fill the gap of lack of experience, increase opportunities in the face of the wave of staff cuts?

Mr. Tran Luong, CEO of Financial Software Solutions Joint Stock Company (FSS), advised students to first equip themselves with good expertise; have a working style and enthusiasm, this is the key to success in the face of the wave of personnel cuts in the IT industry.

Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Duc, senior expert of Trapets Vietnam Company, Scandinavian Software Park (Photo: H. Huong).

Sharing with Dan Tri reporter, Le Quang Dat, a third-year student majoring in Data Science, said he was quite worried after participating in interviews with 3 companies at "Career Orientation Day". Dat realized that he did not have enough experience to apply to any company at this time.

"I don't have any English certificates, no experience in doing real projects, and I still lack many soft skills. I will look for a suitable job to both study and work, to accumulate more experience to cope with the wave of unemployment that is coming," Dat added.

Associate Professor Pho Duc Tai, Head of the Faculty of Mathematics - Mechanics - Informatics, University of Science, also frankly admitted that communication and soft skills are what many IT students lack.

Therefore, organizing career orientation day is an opportunity for schools to listen to sharing from businesses, thereby having better orientations in training, helping students in their work.

In addition, he also advised IT students not to be subjective, thinking that this industry is hot and neglecting their studies, leading to an unstable knowledge foundation.

Associate Professor Tai said that job opportunities for new graduates this year will be very difficult. It is predicted that this year, the rate of students majoring in Information Technology at the university having jobs after 3 months of graduation will no longer be at 95% like previous courses.

Source link: https://dantri.com.vn/lao-dong-viec-lam/giam-doc-cam-o-to-gan-no-va-noi-lo-nganh-it-sa-thai-90-nhan-su-20231022184408434.htm