The Best Tech Jobs in America
Glassdoor recently released its list of the best jobs in America and 10 of the top 25 jobs listed are in the technology sector. When you combine that with the fact that technology-related careers continue to have unemployment rates lower than national average and, according to BLS statistics, tech jobs are expected to grow 21.5 percent between now and 2022, it's easy to see that the demand for highly skilled technology workers is exploding. It is one of the few areas in the job market that the BLS predicts double-digit growth. So whether you're just entering the tech market or you're looking to make a change, the jobs on this list highlight some of the best that this industry has to offer.
Methodology: The Glassdoor Best Jobs report identifies 25 jobs with the highest overall job score rating. They base this on a 5-point scale, where 5 equals the highest score. Glassdoor uses its data to determine the weight of the following three factors:
Earning potential (average annual base salary)
Career opportunities rating
Number of open job listings
The results in this list that follows represent job titles that rate highly among all three categories:
"For a job title to be considered, it must receive at least 75 salary reports and at least 75 career opportunity ratings shared by U.S.-based employees over the past year (from January 1, 2014 to January 9, 2015). The number of openings per job title represents the total number posted on Glassdoor over the past three months (October 21, 2014 to January 1, 2015): Note, this report takes into account job title normalization that groups similar job titles, according to Glassdoor representative, MaryJo Fitzgerald.
So here it is -- the list of best tech jobs in America.
10. Sales Engineer
"A sales engineer has a technological and scientific understanding of the product being sold, "says Fitzgerald. These salespeople specialize, selling complex scientific and technological products or services to businesses. They need to take these multifaceted products and be able to explain to potential clients/customers the business value. Sales engineers need to be able to adjust their level of tech jargon and complexity to suit their audience; know their products/services inside and out, as well as the underlying technologies that support them and know the problems facing organizations that use their product or service.
9. Mobile Developer
If you're a mobile developer, it's your time to shine. The proliferation of responsive design, the explosion of new mobile devices and the apps that power them have sent competition for mobile development skills skyrocketing.
8. IT Project Manager
The project manager is a special breed; these individuals need to be steeped in technology with great time-management and communication skills. They ensure the project stays within guidelines, that deadlines are met and that everything stays within budget. To do that they have to allocate resources, know who is good at what and be able to talk to people from all walks of the business, i.e., customer, developer, accountant, etc.
7. Network Engineer
If your network goes down, your business comes to a halt. Network engineers work to make sure that doesn't happen. These IT pros deal with all of the organization's hardware and the computer networks that live within. Unlike network admins, network engineers focus mainly on top level design and planning as opposed to the daily operations and support of the network. Responsibilities range depending on the company size. In smaller companies network engineers might work with a small team or alone, wearing many different hats, like sysadmins, for example. Larger organizations may have an entire staff of network engineers, installing new hardware and wiring, adding hubs and switches and more.
6. QA Engineer
Whether your company offers products, services or both, QA engineers are a necessary part of technology execution. QA engineers oversee the entire development process from concept to final product/service ensuring whatever it is your organization creates is built to a standard with customer experience in mind. That customer might be someone who buys a piece of software or a product or a worker using a tool supplied by IT.
5. Solutions Architect
These tech workers are accountable for designing and organizing computer systems and custom applications used by their organization. While similar to an IT consultant, this role is more focused on the development and implementation of an interface that any employee can use to make their job easier and more efficient, according to MaryJo Fitzgerald, a public relations representative from Glassdoor.
From a technology standpoint, these workers must define current problems along with future goals to build a roadmap to get the business from point A to point B. This role has evolved over the years to become more of a technical role than it was originally.
4. Data Scientist
These IT workers delve into some of businesses most complex issues. Using often-times disparate sources of data, data scientists work to find insight and actionable data. Math, communication, business and statistics skills are all part of the data scientists skillset.
Josh Willis, a data scientist for Cloudera said a data scientist is a, "person who is better at statistics than any software engineer and better at software engineering than any statistician."
3. Product Manager
Timing is everything in this role. These IT professionals work closely with engineering, sales and marketing teams to ensure a product meets the business' overall strategy and goals. They take a product from concept to reality. In between they take input from stakeholders and customers and ensure that the product aligns with business objectives and work on things like maximizing business value and user experience.
Although it's listed in the tech jobs category, the right person for this role needs a strategic mind and a strong understanding of the business needs.
2. Database Administrator
Organizations have lots of data and that isn't going to change anytime soon. In fact, IDC reports that in 2012 the amount of data stored globally reached 2.8 zettabytes and they now forecast that organizations will generate 40 zettabytes (ZB) by the year 2020. That's an astounding number.
Along with all that data comes job security for those skilled in the art of storing and organizing data. These individuals work to maintain the integrity of their respective data and make sure its deliverable to analysts when necessary. They maintain and create new database systems as well as make sure things like back-ups are performed, plan security and ensuring that data comes from reliable sources.
1. Software Engineer
Computer science, engineering and math skills are what it takes to rise to the top of the software engineer talent pool. These professionals design, develop, test, debug and evaluate the software and systems required to keep businesses both big and small moving forward.
These IT pros must be familiar with different OSes and middleware to make sure that when push comes to shove, the software "just works." The process begins by evaluating user needs, then developing software and algorithms to support business needs.
