Oracle skills shortage in an economic downturn

One of our recruiters was asked by a customer why it was difficult to find the right skills for an Oracle E-Business Suite project. It felt like a strange question to hear in the current economic climate - especially while so many IT professionals are affected by unemployment - but he had a point, there will always be Oracle skills that are hard to find.

The Oracle skills market has changed more in the last two years than it has in the last two decades. The economic downturn has undoubtedly slowed a significant amount of project churn, which in turn has given a greater transparency of what skills really are in demand, together with a sudden and perhaps harsh view of what skills have been left on the shelf.

Oracle EBS Functional consultants have had a busy time since the new millennium. The demand for these skills led to more people entering these roles without the previously necessary academic credentials. Since the recent economic downturn, many Functional consultants would argue that they have never seen this level of uncertainty before. Functional Core Financials and Oracle CRM consultants have perhaps seen the slowest times of all Oracle consultants, I could name a dozen people in my own network who have thrown in the laptop and moved out of the Oracle world altogether.

Oracle EBS Technical consultants have seen their demand change over the years. While there is still demand for technical EBS skills, Oracle users are using less customisations in their solutions, and we have seen a lot of technical consultants move towards more functional duties.

Throughout the nineties the traditional Oracle consultant was more likely to be a SQL Forms or SQL Reports developer. In a keynote speech in 2000, Larry Ellison announced that “In the future there will be two types of technical Oracle Consultant: a Java Architect and a DBA”. Whilst the Oracle community at the time were sceptical about this statement, it has been heading in that direction ever since: the recent acquisition of Java has been described as “the most important software Oracle has ever acquired.”

Having asked our Consultancy team, our recruiters and our customers what technical skills they consider the most difficult to find, the most common answer is OA Framework and ADF. I have asked the same question for Oracle EBS Financials functional knowledge and the answer is FSAH and E-Biz Tax. Fusion Middleware and SOA/BPEL skills still continue to be in demand.

Whilst there is a distinct shortage in these skills, as well as specialist modules such as Oracle Contracts and Oracle Enterprise Asset Management, we could argue that the term “skills shortage” could appear a little insulting to those who have been benched in recent months (or even years), so perhaps we need to characterise the problem as a “skills transfer” issue.

George Gallant - March 2010