Rates Tipped To Rise For IT And Creatives

Rates Tipped To Rise For IT And Creatives

IT and creative professional’s pay expectations have increased over the past six months, according to new research in New Zealand’s contracting market.

This Rate Guide, released from contracting specialist Crackerjacks.co.nz, analysed rate expectations from 8,000 records, which they retrieved from their contractor database in March

This revealed that IT contractors have increased their rate expectations by five per cent over the past six months to an average of $72 p/h. Marketing/PR and Advertising/Media contractors also increased their rates by seven per cent to averages of $66 p/h and $61 p/h respectively.

Looking at specific IT roles, key increases were recorded amongst contracting Business Analysts, Network Administrators and Service Delivery Consultants.

Media Direction, Creative Direction and Journalists recorded the highest increases in pay expectations in the Advertising/Media industry, and in Marketing/PR the key increases were found in PR, Marketing Management and Direct Marketing.

Crackerjacks managing director, Tony Wai, says these rates are simply reflecting the market. “With more cash to play with, organisations are upgrading systems, resulting in more work for IT professionals in both consulting and in-house teams. Consequently, these contractors are charging more; it comes down to supply and demand - if there are limited professionals available who can get the job done, rates will increase.

“In terms of the creative industries, it seems more budget is being allocated for marketing and advertising purposes. We’ve also found the use of PR consultants has been a popular and cost effective tactic to engage with customers.”

On the flipside, Accounting, Banking/Finance and Sales contractors did not share this optimism, with expected rates in these professions decreasing between four to seven per cent on average over the past six months.

Wai explains that “IT is the current boom area in the contracting market – it has the highest volume of contracts coming through. Unfortunately, for other sectors like Accounting and Banking/Finance, it may be another six to nine months before more jobs free up; we should see an increase in these rate expectations then.”

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