some friends were pondering their future career paths. One young fellow has a strong interest in computers and asked me about the IT field. I would really be interested in how others would respond.
My response was:
As to your career question, I would be very emphatic about the positive possibilities in the field. I'd probably take a bit different approach, as I think we are entering a bit different era than the one you reminisce about (referring to the 'glory days' where you could just sit around and write code...).
In particular, computing has truly moved from being a purpose in and of itself - other than in a small subset of the research community. This is not all bad, it just means computing is now, even more so, a means to an end rather than an end in and of itself. This may seem blasphemous to some or maybe even trite, but I really think it has changed.
It does seem harder to find the 'sit in a closet and code' jobs. I would suggest that people with other skills in combination with computing are the hot commodity in the future. And that other skill can be in a whole variety of areas -- business, project, management, etc. But even that is missing what I think is the big push.
I would (and have) recommended that people entering the field take a look at not only computing but combining computing with another passion (unless that is your only passion and you are a guru, and not a self-described guru, but a true genius). For example, take somebody who loves dealing with the environment -- combine that with computing and do environmental modeling, or sensor networks to monitor environments. Somebody who loves photography can marry computing and photography via the digital media and communications networks to create and extend the capabilities. etc.
Computing is so embedded in what we do and is doing so much to enable other fields to go beyond their present state that not knowing computing (and that's not HTML), algorithms, programming, data structures, etc. is going to be a deficit in the future, at least for the advancing jobs and careers.
Would I tell somebody to go into computer science to become a programmer? No, but then that's never been me since I'm not that good at pure programming. But would I tell somebody to go into computer science? Absolutely and I hope my daughters heed at least some of my advice (of course things may change in the next 10 years that I don't anticipate).
Lastly, I think there are many opportunities with companies that do respect and build on experience of people, I don't think that's a lost art, just precious when you find it. I'd hate to paint the world with such a broad brush. The world is a very large place -- which brings me to my last point. I would very much impress on young people (and old people like me) the value of an international, global view. I would highly recommend anybody looking into the future and planning their career to consider the international aspects of their chosen career. Not only from the perspective that can be gained, but also from the flexibility that it can create for future opportunities, cause even though the world is large, ICT (Information and Communication Technology) is making it much smaller and so very interdependent.
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