South African ICT employers and practitioners appear to have adapted well to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns, with little to no negative impacts on working conditions or ICT skills demand and supply. However, significant digital skills gaps remain. This emerged in the 2021 ICT Skills Survey carried out by Wits University’s Joburg Centre for Software Engineering (JCSE) in partnership with the Institute of Information Technology Professionals South Africa (IITPSA). The survey, the 11th since 2008 and the first since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, assessed what impact the pandemic and lockdown have had on working conditions and skills supply and demand in South Africa.

Report co-authors Adrian Schofield, production consultant at the IITPSA, and Professor Barry Dwolatzky, director of the JCSE, said in releasing their findings: “The surprising finding is that there are no surprising findings! The survey shows that the ICT industry has coped well in these disruptive times without needing to change much or re-invent itself. ICT companies and ICT professionals have coped well with new working conditions. They have not needed to scurry around hunting for new technologies and skills sets. Everything required for the “new normal” was already in place.”

Read the full story in the October edition of EngineerIT.  Editor Hans van de Groenendaal had an interesting panel discussion with Adrian Schofield, Professor Barry Dwolatzky and Tony Parry, CEO & Executive Director of  the Institute of Information Technology Professionals South Africa (IITPSA)  about the survey and questions like are we moving into a Gig economy and what is digital transformation? Listen here