Skills

Qualifications held

IT specialists are more highly qualified than other UK workers, and in 2023, three-quarters were thought to hold some form of higher-level qualification, compared with around one half of workers as a whole (51%).

Overall, disabled IT specialists were also found to be more highly qualified than other workers with disabilities, and in 2023 approximately 69% of IT specialists with disabilities held a degree/HE level qualification compared 45% of workers with disabilities as a whole.

Level of educational attainment amongst IT specialists (2023)

Source: Analysis of ONS Quarterly Labour Force Survey by BCS

In 2023, IT specialists with disabilities were less likely to hold a degree in an IT-related discipline than those without disabilities working in such occupations with comparison figures of 11% and 13% respectively.

IT specialists holding computing degrees (2023)

Source: Analysis of ONS Quarterly Labour Force Survey by BCS

Skills development

Despite the arguably high skill/knowledge requirements associated with their work, IT specialists as a whole in the UK are no more likely than other workers to receive job-related education/training and throughout 2023, on average 26% of IT specialists/all workers stated that they had received some form of job-related education/training in the previous 13 weeks compared with 27% of the workforce as a whole.

For disabled IT specialists, however, the proportion receiving education/ training was higher (33%) – both when compared with disabled workers in other occupations (30%) and with other IT specialists without disabilities (25%).

Job-related education / training in the past 13 weeks (2023)

Source: Analysis of ONS Quarterly Labour Force Survey by BCS

Skills sourcing

As with other UK employees, the most common identifiable means of IT specialists^[4] securing a job (where stated) was ‘replying to an advertisement’ with 33% of those that had been with their employer for less than one year over the 2019-23 period stating they had secured work in this manner.

The next most common way for IT specialists to secure a job was via direct application (17%), followed by private recruitment agencies (16%) and in-work contacts (15%).

The likelihood of IT specialists finding work by these means appeared to be much the same for IT specialists with/without disabilities, with the exception of direct applications where those with disabilities were less likely to have secured work via this route (comparison figures of 14% and 17% respectively for those with/without disabilities).

Means of finding work amongst IT specialists (2019-2023)

Source: Analysis of ONS Quarterly Labour Force Survey by BCS

^[4] Employees / people on government schemes who have been with their current employer for less than one year/12 months prior to being interviewed for the LFS.