Angry techies hit back at 'ignorant' bosses

Predictions that the techie will soon be rendered obsolete have been met with a furious response from silicon.com readers. They say that business people need to learn more about IT, not the other way around.

According to analyst house Gartner Group, good technical skills won't be enough for workers who want to hold onto their jobs in IT, as many of the basic jobs will be offshored or automated.

Workers will have to prove they have business skills if they don't want to end up on the scrapheap - but silicon.com readers have hit back, saying that business execs also need to boost their understanding of technology.

IT consultant John Woods argued: "As a 'techie' who is keenly aware of the business, commercial and customer issues, I am increasingly aware that the failure of many IT projects is largely due to the fact that the 'bizzies' (it's about time they had a derogatory label) know almost nothing about the technology they try to sell, deploy and manage - and more importantly, they seldom appear to think this lack of knowledge is any problem."

He added: "I'm sure Gartner is right that we need a new breed of techie. But we need a new breed of bizzie, as well."

Ted Howl agreed: "If business managers consulted their techies before deciding on a software system instead of after, there'd be substantially fewer disasters. For years business managers have seen techies as an unnecessary cost. They don't understand exactly what they do so conclude that it isn't necessary."

IT is constantly evolving, according to another reader who pointed out "the same cannot be said for the so-called person with business skills. It is time [for] the business person to develop their skills and knowledge and not to push all responsibility [on] to the person working with IT."

But IT manager Bernard Peek predicted that as the next generation of tech-savvy teens enters the world of work this may change. "IT will no longer be something that managers need to have done for them (or worse, to them)," he said. "A lot of the current techie roles will merge with the 'bizzie' jobs. So in one sense the pure techie roles will mostly disappear, at least in the USA and UK."

Still - Bill Gates may come to the rescue of the home-grown IT worker, as 'IT couch potato' wisecracked: "As long as Microsoft continues to 'improve' [its] software, there'll always be a job for a techie. So, it doesn't matter if it's outsource, off-shored or right-sized, some poor tech has to try and work out how to do it."