Kazakhstan will train more IT specialists
Kazakh President Tokayev instructed the training of 100,000 IT specialists. By presidential decree, Astana Hub created the Tech Orda training program to fund private coding schools to train IT specialists. In 2021, 13 IT schools received funding to train 100 students, and in 2022, 3,000 Kazakhs received professional training.
At the end of 2022, global technology companies are laying off jobs on a massive scale. According to the report "Kazakhstan Labor Market - 2022: The Road to Digital Reality", only one-third of IT university graduates find the right major. Kursiv spoke to market participants about whether Kazakhstan needs 100,000 programmers.
Recently, it was reported that Israeli game development company Playtika will lay off 600 of its 4,000 employees. Similar news is coming from the IT sector – since mid-2022, massive layoffs and layoffs have affected almost the entire IT industry around the world, including Amazon, Netflix, Meta and Twitter. With 100,000 laid-off IT employees in the U.S. due to a slowing economy and recession, analysts expect total revenue from FAAMG (short for the five largest technology companies by U.S. stock market capitalization, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Google and Microsoft) to decline, growing 9% this year, but 28% in 2021 and 19% in 2020.
The main reason is that in 2020, merchants believe that after the epidemic, the pace of consumers moving online will not stop. However, in reality, after the relaxation of the control of the epidemic, the demand for digital services began to decline.
Kazakhstan's IT market has also accelerated during the pandemic. According to the Human Resources Development Center, the volume of IT services in Kazakhstan reached 646 billion tenge in 2021. According to the National Institute of Statistics, in 2020, computer programming services, including consulting and similar services, reached 467 billion tenge. The same indicator before the pandemic in 2019 was 361 billion tenge, and in terms of digital speed, the country ranks 20th out of 90 countries in the Digital Intelligence Index.
President Tokayev has instructed the training of at least 100,000 senior IT specialists within the framework of the national digitalization project. By presidential decree, the Astana Center created Tech Orda, a program that funds the education of IT specialists in private programming schools. By 2021, 13 IT schools had received funding to train 100 students. In 2022, 3,000 Kazakhs received specialized training in IT. The amount of financial aid per student amounted to 600,000 tenge, and the total amount of the project that year was 1.8 billion tenge. By 2025, Tech Orda plans to train 20,000 students.
Recruitment does not lay off employees
Kazakhstan is in this regard contrary to the global trend. The IT company explained that we do not expect large-scale layoffs. Because there is still a shortage of personnel, there are not enough specialists in the market.
IT company Kolesa Group employs about 150 specialists: back-end and front-end developers, ML engineers, mobile developers, QA engineers, system administrators. However, high-quality IT products also require product managers, designers, and analysts.
"We have not scaled back: both in terms of personnel composition and in terms of employee salaries. Instead, we're growing and strengthening our existing team. As the product continues to evolve and the team evolves, new positions are opened, including those in development. Asher Mukhtarova, head of human resources at Kolesa Group, said that the company is still hiring specialists above the intermediate level.
Kazakhstan's Beeline company will recruit 35 developer positions for the society in 2022, and there are no layoffs in other fields. Today, the company's IT department employs about 650 people, including 300 developers.
"IT teams have been thriving since adopting the digital operator's growth strategy. In 2017, there were 120 people in the IT department, and now [that number] is 5.5 times higher. Alexei Sarasavar, director of change and information technology at Beeline in Kazakhstan, said.
He noted that 20 to 30 percent of college graduates have little experience developing web and mobile apps, and it takes six months to a year for companies to move newcomers to the junior level.
Are there enough jobs?
According to HeadHunter, the number of job vacancies at IT companies in Kazakhstan increased by 67% year-on-year in July-August 2021 and 52% compared to 2019. According to HeadHunter's statistics for the third quarter of 2022, the demand for IT specialists is in fifth place - 9,000 people are needed.
The Human Resource Development Center's second national report on the labor market highlighted that 31 percent of IT university graduates are not working in their professional jobs and 10 percent are in blue-collar positions. The company boss added that the employment problems of college students are concentrated in two aspects: lack of experience and low level of knowledge.
"Every year, thousands of IT students are unable to work professionally. They lack expertise and desire for work. Only a few universities in Kazakhstan will provide excellent IT education. There is a high demand for beginners with a little bit of proficiency, not to mention people at an intermediate level. But for interns who are not yet junior players, everything is a bit difficult. So it's good if they can get a job. Akhter Studios head Admet Akjer said.
Milas Doraev, founder of the DSAcademy IT School, agrees. His school received a Tech Orda grant in 2022 and has been training programmers from zero since 2018, during which time 1,400 people have been certified. "We see a gap in the higher education market. Most universities don't produce highly qualified IT specialists, and companies hire people right away, and they don't train new people from scratch. Dolayev said.
He added that it was not clear whether society needed 100,000 IT people, but it would certainly not be wrong to train 100,000 doctors and teachers. And after the epidemic, what is needed is middle and senior IT personnel, who are in short supply.
Where else can 100,000 IT staff go?
If professional IT service outsourcing is developed for the global market, the number of jobs for domestic IT specialists will increase. But today there are no more than 10 outsourced IT companies in Kazakhstan with between 50 and 100 employees, most of which focus on the domestic market.
"If we don't have the conditions for outsourcing, then it's very likely that very few people will need 100,000 programmers. They will be forced to work in low-paid freelancing, as in other developing countries, without personal development. But it is necessary to implement laws on supporting the export of IT services. Akjer said.
Ascal Ettwolf, Central Asia coordinator at Google Developers Group and researcher at the TOC Center, focused on neighboring countries that have formed outsourcing teams.
"In Kyrgyzstan, there are far fewer IT companies than in Kazakhstan, but they soon began to develop IT outsourcing in various fields. On this basis, they have developed some large companies. Uzbekistan is the same, with a large number of IT companies providing services to freight companies, as many truck drivers from Uzbekistan work in the United States. Askar said.
In his opinion, it is also difficult for Kazakhs to find well-paying jobs in the IT outsourcing industry.
"Now Belarusians and Russians complain that Indians eat well in this field. In 2020-2021, when putting forward the demand for outsourcing services, I found that the worst quality were Kazakhs and Central Asian developers, because of the lack of experience. However, due to the low prices and exchange rate differences, the Kazakhs may be able to compete with the Indians here. Askar said.
Source: kz.kursiv.media
Compiled: Aniah
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