The cloud and oversees India workers?

itdaddy

hello guys,

I am very nervous about our career in network engineering. I work for a company that highers out Indian to do many of the network services. And I was going to apply for a new job but found out they do the same thing higher out over sees engineers to take care of things.

Where is our job if oversees India is doing our work and the company is going to manage voice and the CLOUD?

where are we. Are we going to work are self out of a job? My god dudes what are we going to do?

These companies are pushing hard for overseas people to do the job where are we going to be in 10 years? or even 5 years?

DatabaseHead

Privately owned companies want to keep the money for themselves if they can get IT service at a discounted rate they will. Same goes with publicly traded companies share holders want share prices to increase along with the overall valuation of the company. Lowering SG&A drives down cost, maximizes revenues which reflect as profits.

networker050184

This is why I work for technology companies not in the IT department of companies in another industry. You don't outsource your entire business model.

At the end of the day stay on top of technologies and keep your skills in demand.

MeanDrunkR2D2

I'm not worried at all. Why? Because they mess up quite often. I deal with another company that outsources all of their IT help to TaTa and they are hands down the most inept people I have ever dealt with. I'm also sure that we are not the only clients of theirs that is annoyed by how horrid these people are. I ask them to do the needful, yet none of them ever figure out how to do so.

If you want to really make sure you cannot be replaced, get your education and BS. Learn and become a master at what you do. And find an employer that understands technology and not just the bottom line. If you have a company that understand tech and knows that you cannot afford stupid outages by inept cheap workers they will cost the company far more than paying for higher skilled workers. Are their good IT guys from India? Absolutely. But they can be hard to find amongst the dumpers and those who are fast tracked to a fake education/cert to get jobs that they cannot handle because they have never worked with the tech in the real world.

Also, not going to rag on ya, but it's "Hire" not "higher". "Overseas", not "over sees". I could go further, but I'll stop. And even if things are "cloud" based, that doesn't mean that it will all be outsourced, it just won't. They will still need people physically in these locations as there is still hardware that will have issues. And many employers do respect highly skilled workers over "cheap" ones.

Lexluethar

The way to avoid being outsourced is to keep your skills current and stay on top of technology trends and what the market demands. You can't help if a company outsources your job but you can ensure YOU are in demand.

We outsource a few things like SharePoint development and packaging and let me tell you, the quality of work is poor with the companies we have dealt with from India. I've personally worked with three vendors, all different companies all based in India and if it weren't for current contracts we would have fired them. My experience has been very poor. Where it lacks is customer service.

That's not all companies out of India, just the ones I've dealt with.

gespenstern

First, look for govt contract jobs that require security clearance and get one yourself. These jobs will never be outsourced because of national security concerns.

Second, as it was already mentioned above, outsourcing to India leads to sloppy IT. The farther you are from the people you serve the less you care about providing good services to them.

That's what happened to Target Corp. They laid off tons of their IT personnel in the US in order to hire Indians in their Bangalore IT hub. I'm talking thousands of IT jobs here. Then Russian hackers planted their malware onto Target's PoS equipment and harvested CC data FOR MONTHS. So it leads to thinking that businesses may start thinking that critical stuff shouldn't be outsourced that far.

$bvb379

E-Trade Financial just returned all of their IT team to the United States. Help desk, Networking, and SOC.

itdaddy

I do not mind being corrected MeanDrunk, I write things fast and just fly with my typing and sometimes I do not read it and correct my crap.
But you guys get my meaning. I am a good network engineer and to be honest our company sees the same crap coming from these big IT firms.
Sloppy work. They do not know how to some to me basic ASA firewall configurations. And yet they have a few guys that I feel are very sharp engineers. But most are not sharp at all. It just makes me sad that so many people out of college and they are hiring overseas workers and not USA folk.

MeanDrunkR2D2

I will agree that there are SOME really good and sharp people out of India, and many of them are just waiting for their win in the H1B lottery to get state side. I'm perfectly fine with the good ones coming over here and competing for jobs that they are skilled enough for (and willing to not take a major paycut and therefore dropping our wages because they are willing to take a 20k+ cut in pay just to get a job) and being high quality employees.

But, many that are outsourced are just not good at what they do. When you work in certain industries those who don't realize how important IT is to making sure you aren't breaking laws and end up getting fined heavily for mistakes will quickly find out when those errors happens. In the financial sector that I work in now, a mistake can cost a company millions in a blink of an eye should an auditor find out. Those are mistakes that I see daily with our vendors and am able to catch and preventing those fines.

thomas_

I remember reading something a famous economist said about IT jobs being fungible. Sometimes I wonder if executive leadership of companies read/hear economists say similar things and conclude, without consulting anyone with IT expertise, that since all IT jobs are the same it doesn't matter if it's done from the US or a country half-way around the world. Perhaps the CIO/CTO object, but their objections fall on deaf ears because surely they don't know more than an economist knows.

chmod

The reason i work for a company that serves isp's and enterprise.

Been the it guy of a hugh school or xyz office involves more risk.

UnixGuy

If businesses can find a way to cut costs and increase profit, they will. Focus on what you can control (i.e. your skills).

anhtran35

Get a clearance and work in the government sector.

OctalDump

One way around this is to focus on things that are harder to outsource. Personal service, local service, local knowledge, being under the same legal jurisdiction, benefits of citizenship (eg security clearances). Perhaps even being the bridge between the company and the outsourced organisation.

Perhaps another area to extend your skills into is business/systems analysis and design.

The other point is at the very pointy end, eg multi-CCIE, you are playing in an international market anyway because there are fewer people with your skills.

So it is about having the skills the market needs, and then selling those to business. It also means IT needs to be more involved in business. IT needs to be able to talk the business language and not just the technical details: the so called bimodal IT, which can innovate for the strategic business ends and not just provide a commodity service. IT needs better representation in the C suite and on the board. I think this also means that IT needs at least a stream of professionals (with professional standards, bodies, organisation, regulation) who can raise the profile of IT.

We used to talk about a transition from industrial to service economies, I think now we are seeing a change to a knowledge economy and this economy rests on the manipulation of information which needs IT. IT will be a critical component for deciding success for business, so business needs to get IT right. You can't do that by treating it as just another commodity to buy from the lowest bidder.

muneebkalathil

From India here,
Google, Microsoft CEO's are from India Now.

Coming to the situation we have here. Many Indians work for very less salary. There are many many people who finishes degree in IT and jobless. Yes, There are skilled and unskilled people. People join whatever they get and try to get experience and go out of the country. Here, Companies make huge money and employees not get any benefits. Well most people love to go out of the country for making money. Here an average salary is around 200-300$ per month for a 0 to 2 years experienced professional. That's too less, Even cant pay loans with that amount.

So many try to go US,Canada, Middle East etc where we get paid better than here and increase the standard of life.
There is no overtime pay here. Standard time is 9 to 5 or 6. But need to work atleast 8 or 10pm in most days.
And because of all these things, most started hating IT. Initially I too had very bad days and still too struggling. There is no actual life. No Peace . Nothing. Just do work, get back to room, sleep. Again same routine. After a month, will get the salary. pay the bills. ok finished. again started from beginning.

fmitawaps

MeanDrunkR2D2 wrote: »

Also, not going to rag on ya, but it's "Hire" not "higher". "Overseas", not "over sees". I could go further, but I'll stop. And even if things are "cloud" based, that doesn't mean that it will all be outsourced, it just won't. They will still need people physically in these locations as there is still hardware that will have issues. And many employers do respect highly skilled workers over "cheap" ones.

You're not alone, his misspelling of simple words was annoying me too.

jeremywatts2005

I have had lengthy discussions about the hiring of foreign workers. There are several issues surrounding companies doing this. I have seen a lot of companies hiring on H1B and other work visa or foreign worker programs. What usually happens is they bring in a Lead or Middle management guy who is either a green card or has become a US citizen. They accept a lower salary to do the work and undercut other Americans. Usually they from India they then start hiring more Indians into the workplace. This is because of the cultural aspect they are not comfortable leading Americans and they have a cultural fit with Indians. So they also start going to body shops to get overseas foreign workers on H1B visa and other programs to fill the void of the American workers who will not work with him. Again I have seen this happen over and over American workers typically have trouble working with foreign workers due to the lack of communication skills and or the cultural aspects. So they continue the hiring and the wages continue to drop. Then salary budgets get set for the lower salary.

The department starts to go into a decline. So they discontinue the hiring of foreign workers. They try to hire American workers at the new salary levels set in their budgets. American workers say nope and they are forced back into hiring foreign workers. The cycle is almost unbreakable until the company decides to change the budget on the salary. They literally rewrite the salary scales to a lower level.

Which saves companies money for awhile till the realization hits that they have entire departments primarily comprised of inexperienced American staff who will take whatever for experience and or Foreign workers. This is similar to my last position where I had an Indian manager who was not a citizen. He was here on a visa program and had been for years and got into middle management. He helped to get other Indian managers hired who in turn started to hire every Indian that came across their desk from overseas body shops. It is a vicious cycle and American companies need to figure it out.

We do not have a shortage of talent or skills in the US. We have a lack of good high paying jobs due to the cycle thus people will not work for companies or do the work for that cost. They would rather sit out of the workforce then to do labor for half the value, which would set their salary history for years. Again every company ask you what you made at your last job. Would you rather take a low paying job and tell the next employer that you got 50K a yr or would you rather sit out and wait for a better job and tell the new potential employer your last salary was 75K a yr. It would be better to never take the 50K a year job and sit till you found one for 85K a yr.

jeremywatts2005

Deleted

scaredoftests

fmitawaps wrote: »

You're not alone, his misspelling of simple words was annoying me too.

Ditto. Pet peeve

itdaddy

muneebkalathil

dude I get it I am not against Indian people getting job. We all need to work. I have some friends from India but when you hire an entire team and take away many USA jobs it bothers me. You cant go to India as white person or any really overseas job and just get a job. Most of our jobs are located in USA where we live. So that is what bothers me. It is not the Indians peoples job it is the share holders and CEOs trying to look good but they are destroying jobs that could be held by qualified USA folk. I mean teams of Indian people not just a few that are hired to do all the work. I work with them every day.

jeremywatts2005 dude you are dead on that is what is happening at my work it is a huge corp enterprise. That is what they did just as you described wow do you have a crystal ball?

The department starts to go into a decline. So they discontinue the hiring of foreign workers. They try to hire American workers at the new salary levels set in their budgets. American workers say nope and they are forced back into hiring foreign workers. The cycle is almost unbreakable until the company decides to change the budget on the salary. They literally rewrite the salary scales to a lower level.

Below I hear all the time they want to bench mark you. And if your current job is a low ball pay an not market value they don't care. Even if the new job you have to killl yourself and your new peers are getting 20k more thank you noone talks pay what they get. hush hush kind of thing but you are doing the same work and your boss smiles at your for working so hard and getting 20 k less than your peers believe me i live it.

Again every company ask you what you made at your last job. Would you rather take a low paying job and tell the next employer that you got 50K a yr or would you rather sit out and wait for a better job and tell the new potential employer your last salary was 75K a yr. It would be better to never take the 50K a year job and sit till you found one for 85K a yr.