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Considering an IT career but not sure where to start in tech’s ever-evolving landscape? It’s understandable to feel overwhelmed by buzzwords like cloud, automation, blockchain and Web3. How do you know which fields have substance versus hype or staying power versus obsolescence?
5 Hot IT Fields with Staying Power:
By examining key tech growth drivers over the next decade, a few IT specialties rise to the top for career resilience and trajectory. If you’re exploring IT paths or just want to future-proof your role, here are the 5 best IT fields to get into with tremendous upside through 2030 and beyond.
Cybersecurity
With companies residing increasingly online, cyber crime damages already surpass $6 trillion annually. High profile attacks on pipelines, government agencies and healthcare networks keep security front page news. This brutal combination of exponentially growing external threats and persistent internal talent gaps fuels over 15% Cybersecurity job growth annually.
Multiple cyber niches from ethical hacking to risk analysis to incident response offer dynamic roles where skilled professionals can dictate their salary and career path across industries.
Cloud Computing
Cloud’s dominance only expands as companies migrate from private data centers to public cloud infrastructure for storage, networking, platforms, software and machine learning capabilities. AWS Certified and Microsoft Azure experts remain perpetually in demand to architect, migrate, optimize and manage complex cloud environments as on-prem IT fades.
Salaries for top certified architects can exceed $250K.
Data Science & AI
Data is dubbed “the new oil”, but extracting business insights requires data science skills to ingest, process, analyze and apply cutting edge AI for optimization, prediction and personalization. Seven in 10 companies now compete on data analytics, fueling over 25% job growth here. Combined with the fact most organizations are under 20% mature in data-driven decision making, expect voracious demand for analytics and machine learning talent through 2030.
Automation & DevOps
Reducing manual tasks via scripting, low/no code platforms and infrastructure-as-code practices provides competitive advantage and enables companies to scale. Demand is voracious for DevOps engineers along with automation across cloud, security policy, testing and more. The IFS predicts that 57% of repeatable manual tasks will be automated by 2025, signaling tremendous career upside.
Blockchain Development
Underpinning Bitcoin/cryptocurrencies, blockchain provides decentralized authentication, transaction ledgers and “smart contracts” applicable across industries from supply chain to medical records and beyond. Though early stage, IDC forecasts over 50% global GDP stored on blockchain ledgers by 2030. This requires a new breed of blockchain developers and architects familiar with emerging platforms.
Leading organizations already launch innovation labs, offering lucrative salaries for specialty skillsets.
The Bottom Line
Outside of the 5 best IT fields to get into listed above, legacy IT mainstays like networking, software development, database management and technical project/program management remain essential. But the areas above promise particular resilience and reward for those looking to future-proof careers or enter IT fields with exponential growth ahead.
If you have an analytical and technical mindset, there has never been a better time to skill up in any of these disciplines. Many offer flexible remote work options too. The critical infrastructure supporting our increasingly digitized world urgently requires this talent. Think you’ve got what it takes?