Transferring talents: Harnessing IT skills in the financial sector

There are many high-skilled individuals in the world of work who look to branch out and transfer their talents into various different areas and expand their career horizons.

Some skills are more versatile than others and allow for more flexibility. One such trade is IT, a skill that is valuable in pretty much every sector and industry and can allow an individual with the correct talents – be it programming or Linux abilities – to venture into new territories.

IT is able to merge with many areas and one sector it mates with perfectly is finance. Finance in itself is more than expansive and IT features heavily across all fronts of the sector; money simply wouldn’t be made without IT in place within the finance sector as it is required to set up the many applications that work out risk as well as enabling customers to access their money.

There are so many different areas of IT that are required in IT, including programming, Linux, software development, .NET and C# developers; here are just a couple.

Programmer jobs

Programming jobs are among the most common in IT and those working in finance would be expected to build applications and modules such as secure logins for personal banking websites, but also applications that allow accountants and private bankers to maximise income for their clients.

A programmer would need to understand complex algorithms for trading, transactions or scientific modelling. Skills with the likes of Java, C++/# and .NET are also imperative and it is important to know which firms use which programming code before you look to apply for a job with them; you may look pretty silly applying for a job IT skills on your C.V that the company doesn’t even use.

Understanding the business is a key feature as you will need to know how your work will benefit the company and explaining this in an interview will certainly put you in good light. Wages can start at just over £20,000 a year and then rise to £80,000 for the most senior positions; click here for more information.

Linux jobs

Linux has been with us for over 20 years now and is still a very strong fixture of the IT community and even has healthy history will the financial sector. Finance benefits from using Linux –based systems as it is capable of high performance, speed and offers a flexible usability.

Linux is also very secure and so fits in well with the needs of the financial sector. Linux jobs require skills in VMware, Enterprise Linux, Solaris and others, with responsibilities spanning over the whole infrastructure of a company, including capacity planning, handling application issues and support.

If you want your role to be more specific and not so generalised, then look for such jobs as systems administrator or systems engineer roles. Wages in Linux jobs can be similar to programming jobs and range from £25,000 to the reaches of six figures.

About the author: Sam writes for Cititec.com who offer a whole range of jobs in IT within the financial and pharmaceutical sectors, including programming jobs, Linux jobs and software development jobs.