Smart buyers make 2009 the year of the project manager
~ 68 per cent of training buyers cite project management as key investment, despite impending recession ~
November 2008
Research from Parity, the IT and business solutions provider, has revealed project management has topped training ‘wish lists’ in face of uncertain economic climes.
Demand for training in project management remains strong, and is up 5 per cent on 2007, with over two thirds of respondents looking to invest in the skill in the next two years.
This is amid a weaker demand for training in:
- Technical skills - down 53 per cent
- End user skills - down 39 per cent, and
- Service management skills - down 9 per cent
"With belts being tightened across the business, training investors are reviewing critical projects and asking themselves what will deliver the biggest return, and what skills are needed to do this," said Alwyn Welch, CEO at Parity. "It’s key that training delivers real business value in the current climate. Ultimately, training has to provide value - now more than ever - and project management skills are deemed to deliver."
"This time around the recession will be different for IT, and we need to communicate that: far from being the cause of the recession, IT has the potential to deliver a way out of it. It’s at the heart of the way businesses will pull through the recession, and needs a skilled, UK-based workforce of IT specialists and project managers to make it a success."
About Parity
Parity is a business and IT solutions company. With over 40 years' industry experience, it delivers a range of recruitment, learning and business and IT solutions that contribute to the growth and organisational performance of private and public sector clients.
Parity has deep industry knowledge and expertise across a variety of sectors including commercial, central and local government, defence and commercial. It delivers people, skills and concepts for IT projects and programmes and has provided these services to a range of blue-chip clients, including BT, Ofgem, HBOS, The Cabinet Office, BAT and The Charity Commission.
The company operates as three divisions, Solutions, Resources and Training, all of which use people to solve business and IT issues. Parity designed and runs the largest graduate recruitment programme in the UK for The Cabinet Office, is responsible for creating the UK’s award winning eGovernment portal, eFire, ranks as the top supplier of IT and Programme and Project Management specialist contractors to the public sector through the Catalist framework and throughout its history, has delivered training to over 1 million people - more people than any other UK IT training provider.
Listed on the London Stock Exchange, Parity recorded a turnover of over £150m in 2007.
For further information, please contact:
Louise Waller or Suzy Ferguson at LEWIS
louisew@lewispr.com / suzyf@lewispr.com
+44 (0) 20 7802 2626/7
Internet: http://www.lewispr.com
