There are so many IT function tracks in the IT sector. The proliferation of technology, IT products coupled with standards, frameworks and ways of working are leading to a spurt in the number of job tracks.
Please refer to the below websites to have an understanding of different IT roles and responsibilities:
60+ of the Most Common IT Job Titles and Roles | Aha! software
List of all Job Roles, Job Titles in Software and IT Companies - DevOpsSchool.com
IT Jobs: Career Options, Job Titles, and Descriptions (liveabout.com)
Together, with the roles, titles like “Principle”, “Senior”,” Associate”, and “Enterprise”, enable rapid proliferation of roles with no control. It is no wonder that the job responsibilities are majorly overlapping in different IT roles with no standards to follow. Because of this, the career path progression is also, at the best, hap hazard! This leads to obfuscation of role clarity and hence, job assignment is also becoming very inefficient. This further leads to problems in proper resource allocation and time management.
I take inspiration from the way Italian names are arranged to suggest creation of meaningful role names. Certain naming styles are common in India too – for example in Kerala, a certain style of name consisting of given name, surname and house name.
The common parts of an Italian name are:
First Name – To identify individual within a family,
Clan Name- To identify the clan’s name,
Family Name- To identify the family and
Nick Name – To indicate any special feats.
If we use this concept in naming IT related roles, then a single IT role can be expected to have 4 parts:
Title Name– examples: Senior, Junior, Principle, Associate, Enterprise, Business and catch-all titles like IC (Individual Contributor), Professional, Trained or Expert
Specialization Hints – Certification titles/Professional memberships etc., examples: AWS Certified, CompTIA Security + Certified etc., or IT Functional Specializations like Network, Infrastructure, Storage, Middleware, Backend, Integration, Full stack etc.,
Role Name – examples: Developer, Analyst, Programmer, Engineer, Architect, Project Manager, Program Manager, Service Manager, Consultant etc.,
Optional Technology/Function Name – examples: .NET, Java, AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, RedHat, Mainframes, Service Delivery, Service Management etc.,
PARTS OF AN ITALIAN NAME: | First Name (Praenomen) | Clan Name (Nomen) | Family Name (Cognomen) | Nick Name (Agnomen) |
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PARTS OF AN IT ROLE: | Title Name (Mandatory) | Specialization Hints ( 1.Optional 2, Can be one or more-separated by * ) | Role Name (Mandatory) | Technology Name ( 1.Optional 2, Can be one or more ) |
** Let us separate the parts by “- “. Empty part may be represented by “/”
Thus, some sample names of IT roles as derived from the above 4-part standards can be:
· Senior-Full Stack-Developer-Java
· Business-/-Analyst-Service Delivery
· Junior-/-Developer-Python
· Expert-CompTIA Sec+ certified*Security-Engineer-Azure
There can be below career paths that may exist in any given organization. If there is none, then the relevant HR executives should chalk out one or more career paths and publicize.
· Technical Career Path
· Functional Career Path
· Managers Career Path
· BU Career Path
Some of the suggestions from my end on appropriate role design/management includes the following:
Map the roles to different career paths and stages.
Enable cross-linking of different career paths at appropriate nodes
Create roles that are generic and not too specific as much as possible.
Link certification/training regimes to appropriate roles.
Perform annual role review and if necessary, create new roles, modify existing roles and retire old roles.
Check the industry salary norms of different roles and match it if possible.
Ensure certification/training mandates.
Make sure the job responsibilities are aligned to roles and are not over lapping. If over lapping don’t hesitate to assign 2 or more roles to a single person. Allocate appropriate salary and optimize.
Industry can study the standard role definitions (for time and effort) and design appropriate professional standards by specifying knowledge areas to be acquired, % time for executions/operations, % time for professional development etc., This should serve as guidance for project allocations and scheduling.
When mergers/acquisitions happen, perform a concerted effort to consolidate and optimize the different roles.