One of my friend recently asked my opinion, if all programming jobs will move to India in next 10-20 years. It did made me think of current situation and stipulate how future might look like. In my opinion:
Future depends on past, if we look back 10 years; computer were sluggish, and networks slow. Communication around the world was bad. Fast forward to today’s world, we are connected to everyone, all the time. The way technology is emerging, lets imagine 20 years down the line. Where people will have high computing and well connected devices in everyones pocket. Business will happen at speed of light. Other scenario is economic advantage, as salaries rise in east and match with west. Monetary saving might not remain as main criteria of outsourcing.
(Book: ‘Business at Speed of Thought’ by Bill Gates)
What would that mean for programming jobs? Until now, we were following traditional model of software development, with legacy tools and application. They are quite labour intensive. For example, building website 10 years back was arduous, which drastically different now. Why? Plain reason, because earlier computing models were based on slow networks and slow computers, Industry was rather immature. So it was easy and cheaper to ship the redundant programming/customization jobs to India, for example, but it won’t be the case for long. Software Engineering is evolving as profession, it will gradually eliminate repetitive tasks. (Book: ‘The World is flat’)
What’s the future?: Future is in cloud computing, where Software and solutions will be delivered as a service not as product. Now that changes the economics a bit for companies, where few high quality programmers can produce product for mass markets. And as Software Engineering matures, it will be less labour intensive. (Which until now remains a labour intensive industry). Cloud computing will eventually bypass traditional IT systems and Software development.
Will all jobs to go India? I doubt it, because: First: The price gap, on labour between west and east in 10-20 years will disappear or will be marginal, and secondly they will have their own market to cater for. Example: In United states, companies have stopped outsourcing few of their jobs, because its no longer giving them cost benefit.
Read: About Growth of Indian middle class, American becoming frugal and Salaries in China: Winning the talent war in China and Future of Global Economic System
What it might mean for us, as Software developers? We might have to compete globally for jobs, and it will be survival of the fittest. You might know that already, with current global economic crisis, things are changing fast.
To summarize: It will be quite different economic model in 20 years, and as programmer we might need to specialize very specifically in our business domain and programming skills. High quality jobs will find the best people and vice versa, without physical boundaries.
It’s a debatable topic, please let me know your opinion.
