Australian Government - SkillsInfo

ICT skills


Australia’s Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector is one of the most highly developed and cost competitive in the Asia-Pacific region. There is a strong local industry and many international ICT corporations have significant global operations based in Australia.

On this page you can use the following bookmarks to find links to information on skills in the ICT sector – or you can scroll down to the Employment Overview section.

 

 

A slideshow presentation in PowerPoint format on current indicators of supply and demand in the Australian ICT labour market can be viewed by clicking the link below. Users who would like to read the notes to the slides should choose the 'Save' option and open the copy saved to their local drive. Alternatively, a copy can be requested from the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) by e-mailing Bob Bunnett. The labour force data in this presentation are current as at November 2008.

ICT labour market PowerPoint presentation

There are eighteen significant occupations at Unit Group level (that is, at four digit occupation code level) in the broad view of ICT occupations taken by Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO).  These are set out in ANZSCO's 'ICT Alternative View'.  Many other occupations also include elements of ICT related skills and tasks. The following table shows the number employed and the share of employment for each of these ICT occupations in May 2009.

ANZSCO Code Occupation Employed '000 Share of ICT employment (%)
2613 Software and Applications Programmers 66.9 16.7
3131 ICT Support Technicians 49.4 12.4
3423 Electronics Trades Workers 44.4 11.1
1351 ICT Managers 40.5 10.1
2621 Database & Systems Administrators & ICT Security 36.1 9.0
2611 ICT Business and Systems Analysts 24.8 6.2
2631 Computer Network Professionals 23.7 5.9
6212 ICT Sales Assistants 22.0 5.5
3424 Telecommunications Trades Workers 15.1 3.8
2252 ICT Sales Professionals 14.3 3.6
2632 ICT Support and Test Engineers 12.0 3.0
2612 Multimedia Specialists and Web Developers 10.5 2.6
2324 Web and Multimedia Designers* 10.5 2.6
3124 Electronic Engineering Draftspersons, Technicians 7.4 1.9
2334 Electronics Engineers 7.4 1.8
2633 Telecommunications Engineering Professionals 5.7 1.4
3132 Telecommunications Technical Specialists 4.8 1.2
2232 ICT Trainers 4.1 1.0
Total Employment in ICT Occupations 399.5 100.0

Source: DEEWR Trend Data based on ABS Labour Force, Australia, Cat no: 6291.0.55.003 – May 2009

* ANZSCO Unit Group 2324 is called 'Graphic and Web Designeers, and Illustrators' and includes the specific (6 digit level) occupations of Graphic Designer and Illustrator, both of which fall outside of the scope of the ANZSCO ICT Alternative View.  Census 2006 data indicate that these 'non-ICT' occupations account for approximately 75% of this Unit Group and the above numbers for the ICT component of this group are adjusted accordingly.

Computing Professionals and IT Managers - together comprise 'ICT Professionals'. In November 2008 there were 179 800 Computing Professionals and 43 900 IT Managers, or 223 700 ICT Professionals. (Source: ABS Labour Force Survey, November 2008; DEEWR trend data). The following shows key labour market statistics for the 'ICT Professionals' group.

 

 

The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy

  • DBCDE - Publications and reports will take you to a list of recent DBCDE reports that relate to ICT skills including:
    • General Purpose Technologies and the Information Economy: an evolutionary approach to macroeconomic modelling
    • ICT and Productivity: Summary of the Department's publications
    • Economic aspects of computer-aided automation


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