Steve,
I can answer that last part. I encouraged my daughter (Kristine Harper)
to go into mainframe software development. She majored in Computer
Science at University of Arizona and graduated this last summer with
twelve job offers.
She heads up the z/Next Gen project at SHARE, and they had over fifty
attendees at their sessions (all new to z/OS platform).
The interesting thing is that out of her major graduating class of over
two hundred, only a few have jobs in the computer business (all in the
game software development area). One here in Sugar Land is working as a
restaurant manager. Jobs in the JAVA C++ area are hard to come by at
this time. I'm no expert, but I believe most of the corporate
infrastructure development was done in the 1995-2002 time- frame, and
demand has dropped off precipitously in that area. Also, many conversion
projects have been cancelled.
I think when you do career selection, you need to look towards the
future. I do not see non z/OS platforms doing what z/OS is doing in the
future. Our customer's data processing business is experiencing a
healthy growth rate, and has been for some time. As some baby boomers in
the main frame business retire, more and more positions will open up. I
think the future looks bright in this area. But that's just my personal
experience and opinions. I'm sure there are others out there that have
different experiences and thoughts.
Tom Harper
2. Tell me if you had young kids you would actively encourage
them to look at z/OS for a career.
Kind regards,
-Steve Comstock
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