Information Technology Careers Research Articles

The Impact of Blockchain Technology Effectiveness in Indonesia's Learning System

This research investigates the integration of blockchain technology in vocational education in Indonesia, evaluating its impact on database system learning outcomes. Involving 86 Indonesian students, this study aims to assess the effectiveness of blockchain in improving students’ understanding, skills, and academic performance. Using a quasi-experimental design, the findings of this study showed a significant improvement in learning outcomes, as evidenced by the analysis of pre-test and post-test scores. The measure of the effectiveness of the improvement in learning outcomes, with a substantial increase of approximately 46.50%, emphasizes the positive influence of blockchain technology on student achievement in the database systems course. The findings of this study will contribute valuable information to educational institutions, policy makers, and educators who wish to incorporate new technologies such as blockchain into their learning systems. The implication of this research is to provide recommendations in optimizing the integration of blockchain technology, which significantly affects learning outcomes in database systems. This is realized through facilitating fast and efficient access to learning materials, fostering a more interactive and engaging learning environment, and enhancing students’ understanding of industry practices. The integration of blockchain into database systems learning not only improves the quality of learning but also equips students for a successful career in information technology.

Academic Factors Influencing Students Career Choices in the IT Field: Insights from South African IT Students

Effective career decision-making is pivotal for students, influencing their prospects and employability. This study delves into the nuanced relationship between academic factors and career choices among Information Technology (IT) students. While existing literature acknowledges the broad impact of academic performance on career decisions, limited research explores this dynamic within the context of South African universities. This research employs a comprehensive mixed-methods approach, examining the influence of educational experience, mentorship, access to resources, and institutional support on students' academic performance and subsequent career choices. Through statistical analysis and qualitative interviews, the study unveils unique insights into the interconnected effects of these factors on IT career pursuits. The findings bear significance for educators, career counselors, policymakers, and industry stakeholders. By understanding the multifaceted elements shaping academic performance and career decisions, institutions can tailor support programs, refine curricula, and nurture holistic student development. Employers stand to gain insights into the attributes of high-performing individuals, aiding talent management and recruitment. For IT students, this research provides a profound exploration of the intricate links between academic performance, career choices, and outcomes, contributing to the broader discourse on workforce development and the future of the IT sector.

Breaking the Glass Code : Mentorship-Driven Empowerment in Malaysia’s ICT Sector

This study explores the role of mentoring in advancing women’s careers in Malaysia's ICT sector, where women are underrepresented in leadership roles. This conceptual study is primarily centered on examining the role of mentorship in advancing women's careers in Malaysia's Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector. It examines societal, organizational, work-life balance, and individual factors influencing the career paths of women in the ICT sector in Malaysia. This study is significant in providing the importance of promoting diversity in the workforce, in line with the Sustainable Development Goal SDG 5 i.e. Gender Equality.

A Study on Gender Roles in the Information Technology Profession and its Impact on Human Resources

Information Technology (IT) is one of the fields that has an important role in the economic and social development of the world today. One important issue that continues to be of concern is the gender gap in the IT industry. This research aims to examine the role of gender in the IT profession and its influence on human resources. This research uses a qualitative methodology in the form of a literature review, which implies that the research will examine and explain data by utilising information and textual content from various sources. The study results show that gender roles in the Information Technology profession is an issue that is gaining increasing attention in the IT industry. Despite the increasing participation of women in IT careers, gender imbalance remains a significant problem. Factors such as gender stereotypes, inequality in opportunities, and differences in education contribute to this imbalance. As a result, unequal gender roles in the IT industry create inequalities in compensation and career opportunities, and also result in underrepresentation of women in leadership positions.

Afrofemtrism: a critical examination of the relationship between gender, technology, and society

Abstract Existing theories in technology and society studies do not comprehensively address the realities of people of African descent, including factors such as their histories, evolving cultures, and power dynamics. The article addresses this gap by constructing afrofemtrism, a gender justice theory which interrogates gender realities in the context of a society’s peculiar interaction with technological advancements. A salient feature of afrofemtrism’s development is the iterative interaction with empirical data from the Ghana blockchain community wherein participants in this study encountered conflicts and congruity between their information and communications technology (ICT) careers and their deeply traditional but cosmopolitan Global South setting. Ultimately, the study critically investigates digital technologies which present inequitable experiences for women in Ghana.

User Experience Design for Information Technology Career Preparation Platform Using the Design Thinking Method

Digital talent is crucial in the thriving Information Technology (IT) industry. Hence, numerous countries seek digital skills to stay competitive in the current era. In Indonesia, the challenge lies not in quantity but in the readiness of digital talents to enter the professional world. To address this issue, we observed the IT career readiness of fresh graduates and senior students from the Faculty of Computer Science, Universitas Brawijaya. The observation revealed that 82.9% of 70 respondents stated doubts about their career preparations in the IT domain. These doubts stemmed from perceived inadequacy in technical skills, lack of readiness in developing a curriculum vitae and facing job interviews. Given the need for career preparation in the IT domain, we address the development of a platform to assist aspiring IT talents. This study proposes a solution as an IT career preparation application designed using the Design Thinking method The proposed design was tested using the Usability Evaluation, yielding an effectiveness rate of 100% and an efficiency value of 0.08 goals/sec. Furthermore, a satisfaction test was conducted using the SUS questionnaire, resulting in a score of 94.75 (excellent).

Peer Influence and IT Career Choice

The productivity of the information technology (IT) industry depends on the supply of high-quality human capital, especially of managers who contribute to operational, finance, sales and marketing, and leadership roles. This study examines the influence of IT peers on the choice a management student makes to pursue a career in the IT industry. Analyzing student networks at a leading business school in India, we find that having peers who have worked in IT reduces the likelihood of receiving and accepting an offer in the IT industry. If a student has no IT experience, however, IT peers ameliorate this effect to a certain degree. Our study has important implications for the IT industry and for management schools. First, managers trying to exploit peer-to-peer learning as a way to train workers ought to be aware that negative messages could be transmitted along with positive ones, leading to productivity loss. Second, we highlight that peer influences are important when managers in emerging economies choose their occupations and industries. Managers seeking to attract more talent to the IT industry should keep this channel in mind while designing recruitment strategies.

IT Professionals' Turnaway Intention and the Role of Technostress

The supply of global information technology (IT) workers does not meet the demand of the industry. Therefore, researchers try to distill ways to increase and retain the IT talent pipeline. Ensuring that IT professionals remain in their IT careers is an essential element of such research. The influence of technostress on job turnover is evident. Yet, we know little about the impact of technostress on career turnaway and its interaction effects on the antecedents of turnaway intention. While job turnover may negatively impact a specific organization, career turnaway has negative implications for the industry. Losing IT professionals from the field means that additional efforts toward motivating, recruiting, educating, and preparing replacement talent are needed. By examining the dynamics of technostress on IT professionals' career turnaway intention (N=512), we reveal two critical findings. First, technostress reduces the IT professional's commitment to their IT career and increases exhaustion from their IT career experience. Second, technostress moderates IT professionals' commitment to their profession and career turnaway intentions. To remedy these concerns, we provide managerial advice and provide suggestions for future research.

What Motivates First-generation College Students to Consider an IT Career? An Integrative Perspective

A career in information technology (IT) presents a viable source of economic advancement for college graduates, yet ethnic minority students remain underrepresented in the IT workforce. Such underrepresentation is often exacerbated by their first-generation student (FGS) status. It, however, remains unclear what causes the discrepancy between FGSs and their counterparts in terms of their choice to enter into an IT career. To address this gap, this study aims to reveal the factors motivating FGSs to consider an IT career and examines the association of influencing factors with personal and demographic factors (gender, race, ethnicity). This qualitative research overlays capital theory and social cognitive career theory to develop an integrated sensitizing framework and draws on individual difference theory in interpreting the findings. Our analysis of the open-ended narrative responses of 193 surveys collected from a minority-serving university revealed 10 key factors influencing IT career choice. A theoretical model incorporating individual differences, generational status, and environmental influences is proposed to advance the discussion of influencing factors in IT career choice toward further theory building and empirical testing. The paper concludes with implications for motivating the IT career choice of the ethnic minority, first-generation student population.

El uso de software educativo en el desarrollo de las destrezas lógicas en la educación superior

In certain occasions we wonder why students fail to solve certain types of logic problems and not in others, one of the causes of this fact is due to the lack of knowledge of some learning technique or because they have poor logical reasoning, which is reflected in the low academic performance of students. The population considered is the Information Technology Career of the Peninsula Santa Elena State University and as a sample two parallels are taken from the population that are linked to this study. The investigated topic is of vital importance in subjects where analysis and logical reasoning of problems are required, in addition, it directly influences the practice of basic thought processes.

21st-Century Skillset Perceptions of Students in an Information Technology Career Academy Compared to those at a Comprehensive School

In this study, we compared the perspectives of students’ 21st-Century competencies (critical thinking and communication, applied learning, and intrapersonal and interpersonal skills) based on participating in an urban magnet information technology (IT) career academy compared to a traditional, comprehensive high school. We utilized propensity score matching to match academy and comprehensive high school learners on various demographic variables. The propensity score matching resulted in 299 matched pairs (n = 598). Using the matched groups, we ran linear regression models to investigate the relationship between school participation and students’ perceptions of their 21st-Century skill attainment. We found that when compared with their comprehensive school peers, academy students believed their schools significantly contributed more to their abilities to apply knowledge from their coursework to a real-world context. We found no significant differences in critical thinking and communication skills as well as intrapersonal and interpersonal skills. Our findings indicate that the nature of the curriculum and instructional strategies within a career academy are beneficial. These strategies include the use of curriculum integration, work-based learning, and project-based learning to increase the meaningfulness and relevancy of content.

Societal Barriers that Hinder Maldivian Women from Succeeding in Information Technology Sector Jobs

The under-representation of women in Information Technology (IT) sector in the Maldives reflects in the overall under-representation of women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and in paid employment in general. Despite the challenges, a significant number of Maldivian women complete higher education in IT, but very few succeed to make a life-long career in IT. Hence, the purpose of the research presented in this paper was to analyze the societal barriers that impact Maldivian women pursuing IT-related careers. The findings of this correlational study revealed that antiquated thinking, gender discrimination, and marital status were perceived to have a higher significant negative impact on Maldivian women pursuing IT-related careers, while work-home conflict or the double burden of domestic work and work demands, and age discrimination had a lesser perceived correlation. The findings have implications for policy on promoting gender equality in the workforce in the Maldives.

Relational sensibilities and women's participation in computer science and information technology degrees: A cultural-historical approach

There is extensive literature concerning women's low participation in the technology industry. However, little is known about the relational aspect of women's participation in information technology–related degrees. This study focused mainly on relational sensibility and women's experience of the situation as it is, and how they imagine it could be and should be, as potential life projects are formulated in relation to, and with, others as they engage in 4-year undergraduate degrees in computer science (CS) or information technology (IT). Data were generated from five semi-structured interviews and a focus group discussion with seven women ( n = 12 participants). The women in this study enrolled in an undergraduate degree as they were able to solve complex IT problems by themselves and then help others. Further, the self-positioning and the positioning by others created emotional tension and effected the women's relational sensibilities. Most of the women were undecided about their future career in IT because of the lack of transparency and information about what is involved in employment in the field. We argue that moral imagination provides a different perspective to understand women's underrepresentation in the CS and IT fields.

Programming: From abstraction to practice

This article presents a study based on the experience acquired in 18 years working as a teacher in the Information Technology career in the area of software development. Where it has been seen that when students enter the career the range of knowledge is very varied, since there are students who come from technical high schools in which they have already had experience in the programming area and on the other hand we have students who come from a non-technical high school in which they have no experience in the area. Hence the problem of teaching a programming class in which we can achieve the goal that all students develop their logic. This is why a survey is applied to find out if the student has the basic concepts of the programming area since most students learn to program mechanically, not developing their critical thinking to solve problems other than those solved in class. The contribution of the study shows us that to a certain degree, most of the students have the theoretical concept, but they do not know how to apply it in practice.

Comparing Three Theories of the Gender Gap in Information Technology Careers: The Role of Salience Differences

The information technology (IT) field faces a skills shortage. Only 17% of a projected 3.5 million computing job openings are expected to be filled by 2026 (National Association for Women & Information Technology, 2018). Yet the number of women pursuing IT careers continues to decrease—only 19% of IT bachelor’s degrees in 2016 were awarded to women compared to 57% of bachelor’s degrees overall. We compared three theories that could explain this gender gap in the pursuit of IT careers: expectancy-value theory, role congruity theory, and field-specific ability beliefs theory. We find that women and men are similar in their levels of important factors related to career interest, but that two of these factors—technical learning self-efficacy and agentic goals—have increased salience for women. This suggests that some of the gender gap in the IT field could be addressed by placing more focus on developing technical learning self-efficacy in both men and women. While this could help both women and men, it would likely have an outsized effect on the IT career pursuit of women.

Career Break, Not a Brake on Career: A Study of the Reasons and Enablers of Women’s Re-entry to Technology Careers in India

Career re-entry of women in the technology sector remains an unexplored area. With the increasing focus of information technology (IT) organisations to attract, retain and promote women at the workplace, career re-entry among women professionals’ merits attention. The purpose of this study is to investigate the reasons and enablers of career re-entry among women who plan a re-entry in the IT sector in India. This study employed a qualitative research method and used interviews as a tool for data collection. Data collected through the interviews of re-entry women ( n = 28) was analysed with the help of qualitative analysis software ATLAS.ti. Further, text analysis was also performed through Voyant tools. Findings suggest that a strong career identity, a high level of work centrality and an urge to regain financial independence motivated women to return to IT careers. Findings revealed seven distinct enablers of career re-entry. Based on this finding, a model of the support ecosystem is discussed that presents an intricate relationship between the enablers of career re-entry, support ecosystem and career resumption. Moreover, findings indicate that an active agency of women, a support ecosystem and favourable life events lead to career re-entry. Managerial and theoretical implications of findings are discussed. The article concludes with limitations and future research agenda.

Relational sensibilities and women's participation in computer science and information technology degrees: A cultural-historical approach

There is extensive literature concerning women's low participation in the technology industry. However, little is known about the relational aspect of women's participation in information technology–related degrees. This study focused mainly on relational sensibility and women's experience as they engage in 4-year undergraduate degrees in computer science (CS) or information technology (IT). Drawing on the theoretical concept of moral imagination the womens' situation is examined; as it is, and how they imagine it could be and should be, as potential life projects are formulated in relation to, and with, others. Data were generated from five semi-structured interviews and a focus group discussion with seven women ( n = 12 participants). The women in this study enrolled in an undergraduate degree as they were able to solve complex IT problems by themselves and then help others. Further, the self-positioning and the positioning by others created emotional tension and effected the women's relational sensibilities. Most of the women were undecided about their future career in IT because of the lack of transparency and information about what is involved in employment in the field. We argue that moral imagination provides a different perspective to understand women's underrepresentation in the CS and IT fields.

Computing, Girls and Education: What we need to know to change how girls think about information technology.

Despite significant efforts and many intervention programs over the years to encourage girls to study computing, we continue to see a declining interest. Girls’ lack of engagement with technology at school is resulting in fewer women entering the Information Technology (IT) workforce. Our research investigated whether a long-term intervention program with a specifically designed school-based curriculum could change girls’ minds about computing generally and increase their confidence and interest in an IT career. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected from girls and teachers before, during, and after this program was implemented. A conceptual model of the school-based influences on girls’ attitude was developed from the literature and used to explore the data. Findings from this four-year project added rich insights and resulted in a comprehensive model of ‘Factors that Influence Girls’ Attitude to IT.’ This research demonstrates that a carefully designed IT curriculum, delivered in single-sex classes, reinforced by opportunities to interact with role models, and timetabled in regular class time, can and does change girls’ attitudes to IT. We also found that the students reported improved confidence and increased interest in IT. We posit that our refined model of ‘Factors that Influence Girls’ Attitude to IT’ is a valuable reference tool. Teachers, academics and professionals who are implementing programs to promote IT to girls can use it.

Creating Inclusive Cultures for Women in Automation and Information Technology Careers and Occupations

Automation will be central to the next phase of business technology transformation, driving new levels of customer value such as faster delivery of products, higher quality and dependability, deeper personalization, and greater convenience. This business transformation phase will require workers with new skills at all levels. There are significant shortages of women in leadership job roles in information technology and automation. There are also significant disparities with pay and opportunities for women in those fields. As a result, it is critical to understand the organizational cultural change strategies that information technology (IT) and automation companies can make to employ more females in information technology and automation positions and address gender pay issues and gender exclusivity issues currently existing in today's workplace. This article intends to influence the world of practice through the execution of a literature review content analysis.

Improvement of Information Technology Career Path by using Apriori and Ontology on Mobile Application

In Thailand, the joblessness rate is continually expanding for new graduates. But information technology careers are nevertheless popular in business in this digital age. Finding a way to support students to know the career direction that is suitable for them and is ready before going out for a job is therefore very valuable. However, most students do not know which occupation is best for them and are concern about the need to educate themselves and build up information that is suitable for their current career. This paper presents the Thai mobile application for predicting a student's career based on subject results and guidance of training courses for information technology career path using the Apriori algorithm and ontology technique with the longest matching approach in the process of Thai word segmentation. The developed mobile application was tested in black box by experts and evaluated the satisfaction by users. The result shows that the developed mobile application was the highest effective with the high consensus for the evaluation of user satisfaction.