Women help drive growth in IT contractor numbers

An accountant to contractors has totted up a record surge in the number of women working in IT on a temporary basis, not according to its own books -- but across the country.

In fact, National Statistics data show female IT contractors have increased from 16,568 in 2016 to 20,648 in 2017, representing a rise of almost 25%, says Nixon Williams.

As a result, the accountant calculates that the share of IT contractors who are women has risen to a record high of 16.5%, up from both 13.8% in 2016 and from 12.2% in 2012.

Derek Kelly, chief executive of Nixon Williams, suggested that the data were ‘remarkable,’ and not just because the proportion of female IT contractors in 2010 languished at 9.3%.

“The increasing proportion of contractors who are women is particularly significant as contractors tend to earn more than their permanent counterparts,” he said.

“[This] suggests that the pay gap between men and women in the IT sector is likely to be narrowing.”

Other official data obtained by Mr Kelly’s firm show that the number of self-employed IT professionals is continuing to rise at a faster rate than the number of IT employees.

By using the National Statistics’ definition of ‘self-employed’ (a person who ‘runs their business for themselves’), such as a PSC owner, Nixon Williams counts 125,012 to be in IT.

That represents a 4.5% jump on the previous year (119,568 self-employed in IT), dwarfing the 3.9% jump in IT employees over the same period (from 675,000 to 701,000).

“This continues a trend that began during the financial crisis,” Mr Kelly said. “The current economic uncertainty is making the use of contractors increasingly attractive to organisations.

“[And] with future demand so hard to predict, many organisations are deferring hiring decisions and turning to contractors to provide additional capacity.”