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How Many Jobs Have Shifted Offshore?


A reality check…plus advice on keeping yours when all else fails

By Jennifer deJong
June 15, 2007 — 
It isn’t always said out loud, yet every software developer has gotten the message: If all you do is write code, your job is in danger of moving offshore.

But when it comes to how many programming jobs have actually shifted to India and other countries, where labor costs remain lower than those in the Unites States, the perception doesn’t always match the reality.

The Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) commissioned a task force of computer scientists, social scientists and labor economists from around the world to review existing reports and data pertaining to the globalization and offshoring of software development.

The task force found that definitive numbers are hard to come by, but based on the data reviewed, ACM estimated that the annual job loss attributable to offshoring is approximately 2 percent to 3 percent of the IT workforce. This number is smaller compared with the much higher level of job loss and creation that occurs every year in the United States, according to the 2006 ACM report “Globalization and Offshoring of Software,” which published the task force’s findings.

Economic and financial forecasting firm Global Insight concurred that analyzing how many software developer jobs have migrated offshore is difficult. It’s next to impossible, said company spokesperson Mike Montgomery. “There are jobs here that left. There are others that were never here, but could have been. And then there are new jobs located there, instead of here,” he said.

MAKE YOURSELF INDISPENSABLE
Whatever the reality, it’s a myth that everything is being outsourced, said John Estes, a vice president for IT staffing firm Robert Half Technology. It is also incorrect to assume that developers have no choice but to move out of the programming role if they want to remain employed by the companies they work for, he said. One alternative is to ask yourself, “What can I do to make myself indispensable as a programmer?”

Step one to accomplishing that goal is broadening your expertise in multiple skill areas, Estes said. “Our clients want Java skills. They want database skills. Some even want Java and .NET skills.” During the dot-com era, employers wanted niche-specific expertise, but today is very different, he said. “Nowadays they say, ‘OK, this person has five years of Java. What else does he have? Database experience? Enterprise [experience] from C++ days?’”

For developers that do have management aspirations, the ability to interact effectively with line-of-business executives is essential, Estes said. “You don’t necessarily need an MBA. But you must be able to [articulate] how what you do contributes to the business.”

The ACM report concluded that offshoring will increase, but it was unable to determine by how much, and when.

“Skepticism is warranted regarding claims about the number of jobs to be offshored and the projected growth of software industries in developing countries” the report found.


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