What's A Hot Job? Data Processing

Sydney Morning Herald

Friday May 25, 1990

By ELIZABETH JURMAN

Vic Hatfield's schoolmates may have laughed at his childhood ambition to become a clerk, but the joke has worn off slightly now that his career path has led him into the safe and well-paid data processing industry.

Data processing is the only industry to show a rise in job vacancies in April, according to a recent national study on the deterioration in the labour market by Mr Ray Block, chief economist at investment bank Dominguez Barry Samuel Montagu.

Data processing-related vacancies increased by 10.5 per cent in April compared with the average number of vacancies in the previous three months. All other employment categories showed a marked decline, apart from management and administration, which increased by 1.7 per cent, and the food and service trades, which remained static.

According to Mr Leon Lau, the general manager of Paxus People, a data processing employment agency: "There is a huge skill shortage in data processing. It is a relatively new industry, so people are still acquiring the appropriate skills."

Mr Hatfield, 33, is an operations manager at chartered accountants Price Waterhouse. He earns between $45,000 and $75,000 a year, and loves his job.

Why? "Because it is so varied. There are certain things I have to do all the time, but it's never dull or slow. Also, because I have been doing it for so long, I'm good at it and you tend to like doing things you're good at," he said.

"I get a lot of personal satisfaction out of the job."

A few years ago, he took a break from the endless spreadsheets and went into a wedding reception business.

But he was soon in front of the familiar screens once again. "It's just something that gets into your blood, I think," he said.

The data processing industry includes various job classifications, from data entry people, or keyboard operators, to computer programmers, analyst programmers and operations people, who "basically make sure the machines keep going", Mr Lau said.

Industries suffering the largest decline in job availability in April were the construction trades, with a decline of 16 per cent on the previous three-month average, and the woodworking trade, which fell by 14.4 per cent.

Ms Maggie Orum, a research officer for the NSW Branch of the Australian Timber Workers' Union, said about 500 people had been affected by closures and cutbacks in the timber industry in the past three months.

The study, using figures from October 1989, was based on a skilled vacancy survey from the Department of Employment, Education and Training. Mr Block said it was a more conservative indicator than the oft-quoted ANZ job advertisement index because the monthly change was compared with a three-month average, which tended to "suppress any unusual movement up or down on the preceding month".

The Herald scoured the operations department of Price Waterhouse for computer operator jokes, to no avail. Some people take their jobs very seriously.