Promoting young talent within the IT industry is a no-brainer. There are two reasons for this, as by 2030, we need 120,000 new ICT professionals in Switzerland, and a more diverse team make companies more innovative and successful.
Let’s take the example of Digio AG, winner of the ICT Education Excellence category, at the Digital Economy Award 2023. They prove that it does not matter how big an IT company is in order to invest in learners and young talent.
I personally want to motivate young women in particular to prove themselves in the IT industry. There is hardly a more varied, faster-changing industry and the detailed documentation of the various tasks per job profile on this website shows this optimally.
Kathrin Kölbl, Head of Account & Service Management, Member of Executive Board, Abraxas Informatik AG
Josef Widmer – SERI
Many paths lead to success! Are you facing a difficult decision regarding your education or career path? Are you still undecided about what kind of career you want to go into? A career in computer science is a more than valid option in this case! The rapid development of information technology and technology has meant that we can hardly do without computers, networks, etc. at work. This alone shows that the importance of information technology has grown enormously and will continue to grow in the future. In many companies, information technology has become a business-critical factor and the requirements for ICT specialists are also changing accordingly. Many ICT roles are in transition. Priorities continue to shift from the actual technology to the business process. Computer science can and must make business processes easier, more rational and better. The future of many companies will depend on how well business and ICT work together. In addition, integrating social media has become a key requirement for many companies, meaning that computer science will continue to face many challenges that require well-qualified ICT personnel. Switzerland is well equipped for this qualification task, as it has a diverse and sophisticated education system. The wide-ranging vocational training sector, which is closely linked to the economy, has become a key factor for success. This also applies to computer science. Interested young school-leavers can benefit from fascinating and challenging basic vocational training courses, such as to become a computer scientist, mediamatician or telematics specialist. Anyone who obtains a higher vocational qualification after several years of professional experience (e.g. ICT application developer with Federal Professional Examination, web project manager with Advanced Federal Professional Examination or business computer science with Advanced Federal Diploma of Higher Education) has many avenues open to them in the world of information technologies. Of course, you can enter into the field via a school-based basic education, such as a computer science high school or a baccalaureate followed by a (shortened) vocational apprenticeship. Graduates who acquire a vocational baccalaureate in addition to their basic vocational education can head to a university of applied sciences (degree: Bachelor or Master of Science) or – with an additional foundation year – to university.
The career prospects in computer science are excellent, as there is already a shortage of well-trained specialists in some areas. According to a 2010 study on the shortage of skilled workers in STEM, there will be a shortage of more than 30,000 of these kinds of skilled workers in computer science by 2018. This is not without problems for a country that wants to continue to compete internationally in the field of information and communications technologies. We therefore welcome you to play your part! Enter the fascinating field of computer science! However, the job market for ICT specialists is constantly evolving, new fields of activity are emerging and qualification requirements are changing. In addition to specialist qualifications, it is becoming increasingly important for young professionals to acquire key competencies for their individual career paths – including well-developed soft skills – and to plan their own educational and professional careers as early as possible. This is precisely why this publication is extremely useful. It contains all the essential information on training and continuing education opportunities in the field of computer science and helps you plan your individual career path. There is barely any professional field which offers such promising career prospects as computer science. Get involved and gain the knowledge and skills you need! Your innovative ideas and your workforce will be in demand in the future. I hope you really enjoy!
Josef Widmer, Deputy Director of the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation [SERI] since 2013
Dr. Thomas Flatt – swissICT
Do you want to become a railway worker or a pilot? Do you want to save the Amazon rainforest or understand what’s going on in the stock market? Or would you rather improve football match analysis skills? Or perhaps develop robots or save lives with cancer drugs? If these subjects excite you, then computer science may be, no, computer science is sure to be the thing for you. Neither financial service providers nor conservationists or drug manufacturers can do without computer science. You can combine personal interests with professional interests and also take a deep look into a company when involved in ICT. Meaningful ICT solutions are based on computer scientists properly analyzing and understanding their employers or customers, as well as their needs and processes.
Every sector needs computer scientists at all competency levels, and you don’t have to emigrate to Silicon Valley or India, as ICT experts are needed in Valais as well as in Zurich and Lugano. Around 250,000 people currently work in the Swiss ICT field and there is a shortage of thousands of qualified professionals. Studies show that this could unfortunately continue to be the case for a long time to come. This initial situation offers every ICT professional good opportunities with varied prospects, attractive working conditions and modern company cultures with flat hierarchies and plenty of freedom. This goes hand in hand with the fact that Swiss IT companies have been assessed to be excellent employers for years. This is evident in the studies conducted by the “Great Place to Work Institute” and on various employer evaluation platforms.
At the same time, we can be proud of the fact that the Swiss ICT field has a long history of outstanding achievements, as the computer mouse and the world wide web were invented here, and a third of the core of Android, the leading operating system for smartphones, was developed here. What’s more – and this will truly blow you away – Swiss software exports are economically more important than our exports of chocolate. This brief analysis shows that Swiss ICT field is innovative, successful and offers excellent prospects for application developers, network specialists, business analysts, project managers and many other professions that are described in detail in this book. But what really sets an ICT specialist apart? Analytical talent, communication skills and sound training and continuing education are at the heart of this, along with the will to achieve the highest Swiss quality standards
You should therefore study “ICT Professions” thoroughly, as the standard work describes and standardizes dozens of career opportunities in different industries and shows which technical and methodological competencies are required. It also becomes clear what business knowledge and which personality traits are key.
What do you get for your career choice of computer scientist? In addition to all the factual benefits, you also have the knowledge that you are working in a science fiction industry and that you are a major contributor to the prosperity, security and quality of life in Switzerland – which is worth a lot.
