Comms Dealer

With unemployment at its lowest level for 40 years and wages rising, employment prospects for skilled job seekers are bright. The big issue now is the quantity of active jobseekers, or rather the lack of them, writes Clive Jefferys of recruiter JMA Network.

Generally speaking, the staff supply implications of Brexit will pass the telecoms industry by. Ours is not an industry that particularly needs to employ foreign workers so the fracas about freedom of travel is largely immaterial. Instead, the emphasis is specifically focused on people with experience of UK systems for sales, support and billing. It's very much a home-grown industry.

People have become conservative about their career intentions. Typically, they are staying put in their jobs because it's better with 'the devil you know', and doubt whether the 'grass is greener' elsewhere.

Meanwhile, employers are desperate to recruit more staff across all job types to bring the business in and then service it once it's arrived.

We've seen a dramatic change in the nature of our work over the last year. Instead of companies giving us specific vacancies they are asking us to send whoever we have available. Never has our private network of contacts been more crucial to the growth of their businesses.

This is not to say our job has become easier. Far from it. But we are generating success with the companies that understand how recruitment works today.

These employers are glad of our help and ask us how they can assist the process to get what they need.

Our job offers are generating an average 10% uplift on current salaries, in return for bigger roles with more responsibility.

So, if you are wishing you had a better job or need to expand your business, now is the time to act.

Barracuda Networks is rebranding its acquired Intronis business as Barracuda MSP, tightening its focus on managed service provider partners.

The company's MSP business has increased billings and expanded its partner base by 25% over the past two years, it says, as well as moved into the European market.

The firm is also building two new education initiatives for channel partners - a website and an educational and networking programme for VARs and MSPs (Ready, Set, Managed!).

Vodafone is putting around €2bn in investment into ultrafast fibre connections in Germany, the UK company's biggest European market.

The investment will move Vodafone toward 13.7 million new connections to homes and businesses in Germany by the end of 2021.

Vodafone says the incremental spending will boost growth of service revenues in Germany by 1-2 percentage points in the medium term.

Veritas Technologies has named David Noy as VP of Product Management. He will oversee product management for the Veritas Software-Defined Storage (SDS) and Appliances portfolios as well as the appliances support, manufacturing and supply-chain functions.

Noy joins from Dell EMC Isilon where he was vice President of Product Management and Marketing, leading the product management team to develop and execute on product strategy and roadmaps.

Before joining Dell EMC, he was Director of Product Management at NetApp and was responsible for NetApp's big data strategy and competitive insights teams. Prior to that, he was Director of Product Management for the Veritas Storage Foundation product line at Symantec.

Leaders of European artificial intelligence and robotics firms are among over 100 signatories to a letter to the United Nations calling for action to prevent the development of 'killer robots'.

In the letter to the organisation, AI leaders, including billionaire Elon Musk, warn of 'a third revolution in warfare'. AI is already getting a bad press in some quarters as a result of predictions that large numbers of jobs will disappear as a result of robots taking people's jobs.

The UN letter claims the human race now faces a rather more serious threat: being wiped out by lethal autonomous robots used in warfare. The letter says the world is now facing a 'Pandora's Box'.

AI leaders state, 'As companies building the technologies in artificial intelligence and robotics that may be re-purposed to develop autonomous weapons, we feel especially responsible in raising this alarm.

'Lethal autonomous weapons threaten to become the third revolution in warfare. Once developed, they will permit armed conflict to be fought at a scale greater than ever, and at time-scales faster than humans can comprehend.

'These can be weapons of terror, weapons that despots and terrorists use against innocent populations, and weapons hacked to behave in undesirable ways. We do not have long to act'.

The many European technology leaders signing the letter include Mustafa Suleyman, co-founder of Google's AI company DeepMind, headquartered in the UK. In 2015, in another letter, over 1,000 technology experts warned about the dangers of autonomous weaponry, including scientist Stephen Hawking, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and, again, Elon Musk.

Mark McHale has been promoted as the new VP of Arrow's Enterprise Computing Solutions business in the UK and Ireland.

McHale was previously MD for Arrow's Data Centre Solutions division.

McHale succeeds Jesper Trolle who has been promoted to president Americas of Arrow's Enterprise Computing Solutions business.

McHale joined Arrow just over 30 years ago and became a member of the UK and Ireland management team over a decade ago.

Snom's new C520-WiMi conferencing solution is targeted at companies of all sizes requiring flexibility and independence as a key benefits when conferencing.

DECT and Bluetooth technology aids teamwork and three microphones ensure voice quality. One microphone is integrated into the base unit together with the full-duplex speaker, while two other cordless DECT microphones can be set up anywhere in the room and/or passed on to whoever is speaking.

The C520-WiMi features a Bluetooth interface which enables mobile or DECT telephones, such as smartphones, to be connected and used.

The C520-WiMi conference system can be extended to facilitate telephone conferences with large teams. The additional C52 speaker units are paired with the base unit in this case, thereby increasing the range of the speakers and microphones.

Nimans cooked up a charity treat by hosting a staff BBQ which raised almost £300 for Cash4Kids - a project which supports children aged 0-18 who are disabled, disadvantaged or suffering from abuse or neglect. The lunchtime event, spearheaded by the company's very own 'MasterChef' and Head of Sales Operations Mat Weall, was held at the company's Manchester headquarters and saw staff enjoy burgers, hot dogs and ice creams plus some rare north west sunshine.

DISTRIBUTORS are evolving to address the shift towards Managed Services and Cloud-based applications which are driving much of the growth across the UK ICT sector.

According to the latest research from IT Europa and Gartner respectively, Europe's leading distributors increased their share of the supply chain, growing their revenues by an average of 5.4% while overall the ICT industry grew by just 0.3%. The UK overall experienced growth of 6% - higher than the European average of 5.4%.

IT Europa's latest database report 'Distributors in Europe', describes an industry that is changing fast. While consolidation and organic growth are making for economies of scale, and portfolios are expanding, the costs of doing business in the world of complex services and emerging technologies is increasing. The larger distributors, who have been advancing into cloud, analytics, IoT and other areas, have invested in staff and training, with numbers employed in the top 500 in Europe rising to over 103,000 from just over 100,000 in the last study.

The twenty-plus publicly quoted distributors in Europe managed to lift their sales in 2016 by just 2.58%, while smaller independents did over 10% better.

The total revenues for all companies in 2015 was $142.84bn (€132.38bn) with a total staff figure of 103,034. Overall, total revenues of all companies increased 5.42% in 2016 (based on 2016 revenues) compared to the previous year.

The 'Distributors in Europe' report provides in-depth profiles of Europe's leading distributors including: 20 parent companies, 144 subsidiaries, 314 independents, and 22 publicly-listed companies. Priced from £2,350, The report is available from IT Europa (www.iteuropa.com).

Of various client and prospect meetings over the last few weeks two have stood out in my mind. You might well call it a Tale of Two Employers. Why? When it comes to employing staff today - it seems that this is the best of times and the worst times, writes Clive Jefferys of Telecoms recruitment agency JMA Network.

Both companies called us in to advise on recruiting for key positions. One needed to replace lost staff, the other wanted people for expansion. Both organisations are outwardly successful and profitable, but two very different mentalities rule within.

On one hand, the conversation was dominated by why people resign from their job. The other was all about how to attract them. One laboured on about recrimination, the other spoke of desire and ambition for the company and the people that make it. It's hard to confront issues sometimes and I don't sit in judgement - but above all else, one company simply refused to accept that this is a candidate-led market. The other embraced this fact wholeheartedly.

Its leaders enthuse about offering more holidays, shorter working hours, flexi-time, home working, better pay, employment incentives. Yes, you've heard it all before from the HR handbook. But you cannot deny that happier employees make for more productive and creative ones too.

So, when it comes to recruitment, in-house or using agencies, it's so much easier if you have a market-leading employment package on offer. It's not rocket science, it may feel costly on day one, but the long-term rewards for your business and its bottom line are much greater.