DIGITAL MEDIA

Sally Mills started LaVolta from her bedroom after closing the doors of the successful Mills Harding recruitment company when the dotcom boom crashed and left her with clients who could not pay. Mills Harding was the first online media recruitment specialist in Australia. Describing the present scenario where demand for digital expertise is outstripping supply, as “the same dog but with a different haircut”, Mills says the chief difference is that now online companies are making money.

So the industry is back on track but there is a massive shortage of people who understand the technology and its capabilities. “Everyone is hiring and often looking for very similar skill sets. There are not enough digital skilled people to meet the continual demand and if we don’t address this situation we will create a bottleneck in our industry which is already happening,” she warns.

“There is an obvious skills shortage, salaries are being driven up, encouraging job hopping and ultimately people are feeling bewildered and burnt out. However, someone who has moved three times in two years will not be lookedon favourably.”

Recruitment

Kate Carruthers works for a large global, retail and property conglomerate and is responsible for its web presence globally. With an impressive history working for other large corporates, Carruthers has been on the leading edge of technology throughout her online career. She embraces new technology, has an obvious passion for it and through her online network gets to try out new sites and technology in beta.

When Carruthers is recruiting for the team she looks everywhere including agencies but questions whether agencies can qualify the people she needs. There is no set test to find these people. She uses LinkedIn, personal networks, recruitment agencies and online advertising. Initially she will talk to someone on the phone to get a feel for the level of communications skills a person has. “Communications skills are crucial,” she states.

She will then interview the person and depending on the role will set tasks based on real scenarios that people have to work through. For example, a web designer will have to demonstrate on a whiteboard what they can do, or an information architect (IA) will be given a problem to solve. An IA can make or break a website so you need to be sure you get someone who understands. A developer might get to write some code while a web designer will be asked to bring in a portfolio of work.

“If we have a big project we might bring in an agency to provide a specialist IA because having a good IA can be the difference between success and failure. With a smaller project we might usea web designer with IA experience,”says Carruthers.

Stan Relihan is so passionate about the online networking space it almost oozes out of his every pore; his enthusiasm is blinding. He is an avid member of LinkedIn and one of his many achievements was appearing in the same podcast with the co-father of the internet, Vince Cerf, who helped to create the endless possibilities that digital media provides. Relihan, president and CEO of eXpert, an executive search company specialising in the technology sector has been a member of LinkedIn for two years and in the past six months can really see the benefit of it.

“It is a good place to identify people with skills and to meet clients. I can directly attribute eight to 10 placements directly through using LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a manifestation of the tools I have always used like my rolodex, database and Outlook for contacts. It is like the domino principal, one contact leads to another,” he says. “It has also helped in being able to identify and contact skilled people before they even arrive in the country.” LaVolta is also plugged into LinkedIn and Facebook. “We tap into the network to do research for example where IAs are and by working behind the scenes we have placed two IAs from the UK recently,” says LaVolta director Steven Granger.

Gen Y can have it all if they can take the time to learn from experience and listen from older people. Relihan strongly recommends becoming good at public speaking so you can be recognised as a spokesperson and a representative for the industry. In doing this you become a representative for yourself as well. “This is very important advice,” says Relihan.

Steven Noble, director, digital, Hill & Knowlton Australia believes that corporate clients recognise the need to embrace the digital medium and actively use it. Certainly for H&K it has attracted new clients and is a point of differentiation. “Clients are not attracted to companies where there is confusion and unease as to how to operate in the digital world. These companies stand out for the wrong reason,” says Noble.

However, finding the appropriate skilled people is hard. Noble needs people with a personal passion for digital media and recruits through informal networks, social media teams, and in the marketplace using sites such as Facebook, where he participates in a number of relevant forums, has his own blog as well as using LinkedIn. “We have been most successful using Facebook and it’s free,” Noble adds.

Noble entreats those who are in their garage or bedroom and have joined Facebook, use IM or post video clips on YouTube to get in contact. The opportunity is waiting for you so knock on the door and ask for a job and life may never be the same again.

What are these skills worth?

“The age of digital media has thrown up its challenges, not the least is being able to find the skilled people necessary to make it all happen,” says Relihan. So what is the hottest skill needed in the digital media space? Information architects and the interrelated skill of user experience. These people when found can earn $80k to $140k. There has not been enough training in the past to deliver the people with the experience to handle the demand of the market. When the internet boom bubble burst in 2000 because it got too big too soon, there was no investment in training. Mills and her fellow director, Steven Granger, agreed with Relihan that information architects (IA) are in short supply globally with a mid-range earning between $80k-$90k and senior IAs getting $120k plus.

Someone who has both usability and IA skills will get about $180k or more. LaVolta is not only supplying the Australian market but have been asked to meet the growing demand in Dubai and China. Their search for talent is so broad they are tapping people in the UK, US and South Africa whose skills are highly sought after. Australians are also in demand especially when coupled with multicultural skills.

LaVolta gave the following indication of salaries for other roles – junior designer with one year experience gets $35k to $40k; a mid-range designer with three to seven years experience would get $70k-$80k, while seniors with seven years plus experience start at $100k and could take the role of art director. A creative director with 10 years plus experience will start at $140k and also be the head of digital. Online content providers and editorial people earn between $150k and $250k, copywriters range from $70k-$100k.

Mills adds that production is a very key area so producers are highly sought after because without a good producer there are bottlenecks and it holds up the whole industry. Juniors get $40k, mid-range $60k-$70k, seniors $80k-$100k and executive producers for large organisations command $150k-plus.

Agency directors are just as important as producers with a group agency director (GAD) earning from $150k to $200k. Agency directors act as the conduit between the client and the agency and have excellent communications skills. Mills says: “They could come from a marketing, communication or advertising background.”

There are also requirements for search engine managers and search engine optimisation managers.

Online media agencies that plan the strategy and execution of an online campaign for clients need media planners and buyers. “There is a huge shortage of these people and as soon as they hit the streets they get soaked up by the industry,” says Granger.

Relihan says other skills in demand are search engine marketing and search engine optimisation and depending on seniority these people earn $60k to $120k. Account directors who are the chief liaison person between the client and the agency earn between $150k and $170k and can earn more depending on the skill to extend the relationship with the client by suggesting extra features that will assist the client, a win-win situation. Producers are project managers who have timelines to meet and if they are not going to be met need to warn the client in a timely manner. They earn $120k to $150k.

An Australian Information Industry Association salary survey published in August saw average total remuneration packages as: MM (multimedia) content author $69k, MM graphic designer $66k, MM project manager $92k and web/MM programmer $74k.

Training

Sheryle Moon, chief executive of the AIIA claims that while everyone recognises the need for more skills in this area, they do not recognise the diversity of skills needed to work in digital media.

“IT managers are still going back to the traditional roles in IT when looking for digital media people,” she says

She notes that Intel’s employment of an anthropologist works as a great model for the industry. “It shows IT people that they need more than IT people. The industry needs people who can think outside the square and this might help managers to recognise the skills they actually need.”

IBM is also lobbying the AIIA in Australia to try and influence universities and TAFEs to provide education in this area. It takes a university about three years to change curriculum and provide new degrees. The industry claims this is too long, people are needed now. The AIIA is trying to break down the old thinking of IT people that only graduates with a computer science degree are worthy employees and urges employers to recognise that the TAFE system can provide skilled candidates in a faster time.

The Australian Interactive Media Industry Association (AIMIA) has responded to the demand for skills and experience in a rapidly growing digital market, by launching an internship program offering students practice and insight into the mobile content industry before they enter the workforce. The program brings together Australian tertiary education organisations and companies operating in the mobile content industry to give students a formal, structured internship opportunity while still studying or after recently graduating.

AIMIA CEO John Butterworth says: “while tertiary education is an integral part of the skilling process in the industry, practical experience is invaluable for upcoming employees and their employers ”

Chris Flintoft, director, wireless and broadcast, Hyro says: “The pilot has proved a great success ... Our first intern has now become a full time member of the team at Hyro.”

Carruthers adds: “There are now courses available to learn how to write for the web and it is worthwhile from an organisation’s perspective to invest in this training for content providers and if you are outside the industry and want a foot in the door invest in this training yourself. ”

Brendon Cropper, who runs Digital Cadet, knows what skills are needed in the industry. He has set up a course that covers theory and practical and includes interactive presentations from leading digital marketers who are the potential employers of graduates of the course. Graduates who successfully complete the three-week course will be interviewed by digital media companies for permanent employment at full salary.

The course costs $3000 including GST. Other training companies such as Hiser provide a series of usability training covering designing with users, effective layout and design, information architecture, usability evaluation and writing for the web.

Course fees range from $825 to $1512 and are either one to two days.

Carruthers questions where the good IAs will come from, given there are no university courses yet and it takes about three years to develop the curriculum for degree courses. There is no specific body of specialist knowledge on digital media.

“Universities offer e-commerce degrees but these are not really satisfactory. Because for a start by the time a course is put it on the technology has moved on, the lecturers may understand the technology but they have never been hands-on practitioners or if they were they were no good at communicating,” says Carruthers.

She suggests a solution is to define a framework as you can’t define a body of knowledge because it is changing so rapidly. The framework would be based on generally agreed categories.

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