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Posted by Steffanie / Category: general
Last week we wrote about the study conducted by the university of Hagen dealing with similarities and differences between freelance and permanent employees. The scientists came to the conclusion that freelancers are not less content with their working life than permanent employees.
In the second part of the survey of the university of Hagen the reserchers analyzed where the differences between freelancers and permanent employees are. Therefore in the second part 103 freelancers and permanent employees working in IT, media,training and journalism were surveyed. In the following you will find the most significant points regarding the general level of satisfaction.
Freelancers are less satisfied when it comes to:
1. their work life balance
2. their general life situation
3. their order/booking situation
However freelancers seem to be more content about:
1. their choice of employment
2. their career
3. their salaries
Particularly striking is the difference in how the quality of their activities is viewed by freelancers and permanent employees: freelancers tend to be extraordinarily satisfied in this point.
What are the most important factors motivating freelancers as well as permanent employees?
“Varying tasks” are a motivational factor which is valued higher by permanent employees than by freelancers. Important motivational factors for both groups were “personal responsibility”, “independence” and “creative work”, the “autonomous time management” as well as the “task itself”. “Status”, “recognition “and “income” seem to be less important.
What is your experience – do you agree with the scientists main results? If you don’t agree what is your point of view?
Based on: elektronikpraxis.vogel.de
Posted by Steffanie / Category: general
In Germany, there are currently about two million people working in a freelance employment – the trend is rising. Is freelance work a higher requirement regarding professional and personal life? The study conducted by psychologists from the University of Hagen is dealing with motivational factors and the question how both handle uncertainty and strain. Among others the scientists also focused on IT freelancers. According to the study, freelancers in general and IT freelancers i.e. are mostly contented with their working situation.
Here are some further results of the study:
IT freelancers pursuit economic goals. They are satisfied with their income and see the flexibility that is required rather as a challenge than as a burden.
The acquisition of projects is not viewed as problematic. The concept of self-promotion is valued highly by the respondents.
None could identify with the stereotype of the lonely freelancer. They can quickly identify with the companies they are working for and see the permanent employees as colleagues. Therefore social skills are very important.
Also freelancers are those who are the ones who could distinguish best between private and professional life.
All in all the researchers came to the conclusion that freelancers are generally satisfied with their working life – still freelancers are confronted with different aspects/obstacles than permanent employees.
What are the differences you have encountered in your freelance working life? In your opinion are freelancers generally more or less content than permanent employees? We are looking forward to your comments.
Based on: elektronikpraxis.vogel.de
A survey of the Center for european economic research (ZEW) in cooperation with Creditreform came to find that e-commerce is used rather for buying purposes than for sales. The survey concentrated on the association for sourcing of payment in advance.
Usually the term e-commerce refers to the selling and buying processes that are conducted via the internet.
The imbalance of selling and buying processes is especially apparent in the software and IT sector:
Nearly 64% of the companies working in the IT- and software sector say that they have ordered products and services on the internet last year. In contrast to that just 29% of these companies sold their products or services online. Mirna Sarbu, scientist at the ZEW announces: “The companies of the software- and IT-service branch are with 81% leading in buying via the internet.”
Considering the usage of e-commerce for selling products, providers of telecommunication services are leading. Nearly 58% of these corporations offer opportunities for their customers to buy their products online.
Generally the e-commerce processes peaked out in 2010. Market-leading companies like amazon, facebook, google or ebay as well as younger online-shops like zalando.de shape the online trading.
What experiences have you made regarding e-commerce? Feel free to leave a reply!
Based on: www.marktundmittelstand.de
Posted by Caroline / Category: market
Skills shortage has been in the news for quite some time now. The VDI (Verband Deutscher Ingenieure – association of german engineers) has recently conducted a survey questioning 450 experts from various fields in the IT sector and came to the conclusion that the skills shortage in the IT sector is viewed as a serious problem.
According to the annual survey the biggest lack of experts is found in the field of software development, followed by IT-project management, IT-security, Consulting and Support. The hardware sector is not facing serious shortages in human ressources.
So what is done to counteract these growing shortages, that are thought to increase even further until 2015: Development programmes for young talents are essential on the long run. By now companies are already finding ways to solve the problem e.g. by hiring specialised staff from abroad, by providing professional training and development for their employees or by outsourcing of services.
Eventhough the skills shortage is likely to exacerbate over the next years, 2/3 of the respondents view the location of Germany in terms of business and industry as good or very good.
The trend of skills shortage might be problematic for some, but especially for freelancing experts it might also bring full order books. Even better if those freelancers are specialised in the fields that are having a great potential for growth: cloud computing, IT-security, embedded systems and broadband infrastructure.
Based on VDI: http://www.vdi-nachrichten.com/vdi-nachrichten/aktuelle_ausgabe/akt_ausg_detail.asp?cat=1&id=52095&source=rubrik
Posted by Caroline / Category: events
The high tech world seems to be happy with the achievements of this years CeBIT:
4200 companies from 70 countries were exhibiting and a number of 339000 visitors from about 90 different countries came to see what news the high tech industry holds in store. Both figures have increased slightly compared to 2010.
Furthermore over 500 CIOs were present and more than 7 million contacts were made. 8000 visitors were interested in the speeches and talks held at the CeBIT global conferences.
One of the main topics “Work and Life with the Cloud” was published at the right time and had it’s fingers on the pulse of the time. Apart from Cloud Computing hot topics were evolving around tablets, smartphones, mobile business solutions, IT security and 3D.
A regional emphasis was put on this years partnering country Turkey – over 90 exhibitors were taking part and were meeting up with a growing number of international visitors.
Impressive numbers and facts – the CeBIT seems to be one of the main attractions and the place to be for everyone active or interested in high tech trends.
projektwerk CEO Dr. Christiane Strasse says “meeting freelancers and corporate representatives at the CeBIT is always interesting and very beneficial to our business.”
What is your opinion: As an IT freelancer is it crucial for you to be present at the CeBIT? Do you profit in terms of business or is it more about staying informed?
Based on: CeBIT Abschlussbericht
Posted by Sinah / Category: trends
At the trade fair CeBIT 2011 hardware producers will exhibit trend-setting innovations of the IT sector. The exposition takes place from 1st to 5th march in Hannover. Here are some gadgets that might impress at this years CeBIT:
The CeBIT (short for Centrum für Büroautomation, Informationstechnologie und Telekommunikation) is the worlds largest trade fair for communication technologies. And this year it’s going to be all about tablets: More than 80 implements will compete with the Apple iPad. Needless to say there are going to be numerous smartphones presented. So databased internet applications and social networking will be a great deal of the CeBIT as well as tridimensional displays on computer- and notebook-monitors. Flatscreen televisions and mini-displays of hand-held devices will imply tridimensional displays more often -but one will need 3-D-glasses still at all times.
Other novelties will be:
Do you have more information about CeBIT innovations that you would like to share? Feel free to add a reply!
Article based on:Â www.computerbild.de
Posted by Steffanie / Category: market
Fair wages and a decisive, unanimous project management are the main motivational factors for IT freelancers, so far the results of a survey of IT job boards among 99 IT professionals.
Additionally IT professionals tend to be more motivated at the end of a project than at the beginning. The reason for this is the prospect of the feeling of satisfaction, that occurs when completing a project. For 93% of the respondents, productivity means to produce as much as possible and not to finalize one thing that one can show off in front of the chef.
Another motivational factor is money (important for 46%). So is time pressures of colleagues who are waiting for results (57%). An early finishing time seems to be rather unimportant and was only mentioned by 16% of the respondents as a motivational support.
Many IT experts stated that writing to-do lists on a daily basis is very helpful to them. With those lists you would have a little success in every evening, you would have achieved something and feel more motivated..
The main motivational killers are ambiguous instructions according to 85 percent of the respondents.
However, loud noises or simply a bad mood can harm the motivation. Distractions such as reading e-mails or checking the latest posts in social networks slow down as well. Short breaks on the other hand should not be despised: Seventy-five percent of the respondents said that after a small break they would feel much more productive than before.
We are curious to hear your view on this study. What motivates you most?
Source: http://www.computerwoche.de/karriere/karriere-gehalt/2361421/index.html
According to the latest study of Lünendonk the freelance IT business is booming.
But instead of IT departments, IT-experts are booked by buying departments more often.
The crisis is over. The German economy grew by an average of 3.7 percent in 2010. Even for projects that were suspended during the crisis money seems to flow again.
Just good news for IT freelancers: Internal IT departments are overstrained and companies are increasingly reliant on external support. Compared to 2009, the demand for IT professionals increased by 11.5 percent in 2010.
The development over the last 3 years:
Due to Lünendonk there were a high number of project requests in 2008. The crisis in 2009, made the number of project requests drop. However, in 2010 the industry experienced a boom of project requests for IT professionals again.
Until 2015, experts for the IT freelance market expect an equally high, annual market growth of over 17 percent! For 2015 until 2020 an average growth of about 14 percent per year is expected.
Three ordering fields: the IT areas, the buying departments and other specific departments
The purchasing department is not only discussing charges. Increasingly they are the ones who are contacting the recruitment agencies of freelancers directly: 33.5 percent of the project requests are already made directly by the purchasing department.
Next to the IT and the buying department the individual departments already rank third when it comes to booking IT freelancers – with 19.2 percent.
Of course we would like to hear your experiences. What was the most interesting department you have worked for?
Posted by Caroline / Category: trends
So we have already started into the new year and haven’t been talking about IT trends? Good that others have been quick and precise: By the end of last year CIO published their list on the hottest topics in the IT world in the year 2011. Here is an overview of what is believed to change the ITÂ sector in the year that has already started:
1. Tablets
These devices will not only be used for business but even more in the private. The market for tablets will flourish this year, while the iPad will stay market leader.
2. Oracle will buy salesforce.com
Software vendor salesforce.com and its small and medium sized business customers will finally be bought by Oracle. This will open the field in small and medium sized businesses for Oracle and in turn salesforces CRM software will find its way to larger businesses.
3. IBM or HP will buy SAP
Being independent is getting more difficult…and it would would fit IBMs as well as HPs strategy to be building highly integrated systems.
4. Flash memory
The use of flash memory in enterprises will boom. Flash memory will become less expensive and the demand for data centers will grow over the next years.
5. Wikileaks
Wikileaks won’t be stopped and will go on in 2011.
6. Cyberwarfare
According to CIO Cyberwarefare will become reality. Cyber espionage and online sabotage will play an increasing role in warfare.
7. Clouds
More and more business applications will be moved to the cloud. Especially start-ups will play an important role in the process of migrating data to the cloud. The topic of connectivity will also be driven by the cloud.
8. Social media
Social Media will reach a maturation stage in 2011, which leads to a different use: not only non-profit organizations will use social media channels to spread their word, also profit enterprises will find their way to make use of social media. The challenge of misused data will remain.
9. U.S. congress takes tech break
There will be no important tech-related legislation passed this year by the U.S. congress.
10. Steve Ballmer believed to leave Microsoft
The CIOs prediction concerning CEOs is that Microsofts Steve Ballmer won’t stay CEO.
What are your predicitions for this year? Anything to add or any points here you wouldn’t share? We are looking forward to your opinions on this.
