But you cant say you fully understand how creepy the job is until you really work it. Especially the "able to work long hour and stay on call" part.

That doesn't necessarily mean it has a good future.  How far do you think you can go as a programmer without switching to management?  In Malaysia, the norm is programmers, even senior programmers have a salary cap which you wont be able to exceed unless you cross over to become a manager. 

What's the ratio of programmer to managers?  It is definitely not 1:1.  Lets pick a number, lets say it is 5:1.  So your probability of becoming a manager, assuming all the 5 programmers are equals, is 1/5.  If you dont make it, you salary is flat-lined and wont increase anymore and you have to wait for the next opportunity.

You say you are living comfortably now, so?  Do you have a wife and kids?  Do you have a household to maintain?  Even if you do, do you think the cost will not increase?  When your kids grow, cost for food, leisure, education increases.  You want your paycheck to grow.  But in Malaysia programmers salary are capped. 

In some MNCs (and countries), they dont cap technical positions by non-technical positions, but that is NOT the norm.

Do not confuse opportunity of employment with salary advancement limit.  Just because there's a big market for the job, does not mean the salary advancement limit is high (and dont confuse salary advancement limit to opportunity).  Salary advancement opportunity in the IT industry in Malaysia is high, but the limit/cap is low compared to other white collar professions based on hourly work to pay ratio.

When you talk about future, you want to take ALL of these into consideration.  A lot of ppl switch profession, not because they cannot find another job, in fact they get tons of offer.  Most of my friends that quit IT, is because they realize the amount of work they put in is not worth it, since the cap on the pay is just too low, and the chance to leap to management is not that easy. 

Some ppl are lucky, most are NOT.

rexis, i say creepy i was referring to the requirements. the rest are just to cite what usually is stated in a job opening requirement thing.

and i've work as such before, lost many holidays, sleep hours and weekend. and yes, on call part too.
which is why i say attitude lor. you definitely have to progress.

yes i have wife and household to maintain. only no kids yet. so busy, kids not a good idea atm.

the TS was asking whether "NO FUTURE" as programmer. programmer as you can see (even from your post) has future. decent, good, bad future - it's still there, just depends on the person and how they go about. definitely not no future. not so good in "salary advancement" doesn't mean bad or lousy future either.

my sentence mentioned demand alone. if you wish to bring in "salary advancement issue" then please do so, no need to post as if i'm not aware (or confused) of the difference between opportunity and salary advancement.

also my apologies if you think it's inappropriate for me not to bring in other white color profession into comparison. i did not bring them in as we were just talking about programmers - now that you brought that matter in, it's would be great if you could mention specifically which white collared profession you think is better (job scope + amount of work put in)

i've known people in advertising line that earn 5 - 10k range at their mid 20s. work stress also la.

Heh I see salary and career advancement to be more significant to the Future than job demand.  Job demands are ephemeral, they can be a million opportunities today and zero tomorrow.  You can hardly say a profession has bright future based on that.  That is why I tend to look at it from the perspective of salary and career advancement.

In Malaysia, it does not bode well.  As I said, a lot of companies practice capping technical positions with managerial ones.  So you can only progress so far in a technical position like IT.  This what I base my points on.  I've worked in a couple of companies in the US as a software developer, they do NOT cap their technical salary advancements with managerial ones.  In one project that I was in, my team lead earned more than my manager because he had a lot more years of experience.  Try finding that in Malaysia, it is not the norm.

Hi All,

Need your golden advice. 

Heard many people said there is no future work as programmer / technical field. Is there true?

People always said programmer is under paid, work long hours, no claim for OT... But due to that a lot of people do not like to work as programmer and cause there is high demand for programmer in the market ( especially C++ or C). Please correct me if I am wrong.

I see there is a lot of cases whereby my friend who studied IT end up choice work marketing, business, sales, project management.... because of they believed there is no future to be IT

How you guys think? Is that true? Anyone have a good example who work as programmer get extremely high pay?

hmm sorry for bumping but does anyone know which it company needs internship?
preferably around damansara area

You guys have to define first what is "have future".
After working 20 years as a secretary ,  i get 4k , is that "have future"?

For me "have future" means

1.) Having career advancement.
2.) High pay(and i don't mean 5k/month)
3.) In a growing industry. Growing doesn't mean just hiring more people , but an increase in average market salary.
4.) Career that have balanced work life.

For programmer , I would say that they have an "average" future which means it's neither too bright or too dull.

You guys have to define first what is "have future".
After working 20 years as a secretary ,  i get 4k , is that "have future"?

For me "have future" means

1.) Having career advancement.
2.) High pay(and i don't mean 5k/month)
3.) In a growing industry. Growing doesn't mean just hiring more people , but an increase in average market salary.
4.) Career that have balanced work life.

For programmer , I would say that they have an "average" future which means it's neither too bright or too dull.

In IT line such as programmer, the future is in your hand.....it's not like other industry with increment RM150-200.....I have seen people starting pay of RM2800 in INTEL (penang) but since he is good his pay jump to RM4000 in his second piece of job just after 1.5 years in INTEL in PJ at the age of 25.

Now already goes beyond that......

In IT line such as programmer, the future is in your hand.....it's not like other industry with increment RM150-200.....I have seen people starting pay of RM2800 in INTEL (penang) but since he is good his pay jump to RM4000 in his second piece of job just after 1.5 years in INTEL in PJ at the age of 25.

Now already goes beyond that......

That doesnt mean a thing.  If you plot the pay rise for most programmers over 30 years, it is not a straight upward line, rather it is curved and starts to slow down after you hit close to 10K. 

You have to Look at the salary cap to talk about FUTURE.  As the more you project your career to the Future, the closer it gets to the cap.  Like I said before, unless the person makes the jump to become a Manager, the salary cap for a programmer is not adequate to sustain a person when they get older and have grown up kids to provide for.

Ask yourself, what is the ratio of Manager to Programmer.  If every programmer sticks to being a programmer for 30 years, how many of those will become a Manager and get pass the salary cap of a programmer.  Do you think that number is good?  I would say it is not.

Of course when I mean good future is around that RM10000....unless you are talking about CEO or Director monthly pay which can easily hit RM50-60k than thats different story.....

We need to refer to society norm.....how many people can really become a CEO with that RM50k monthy pay cheque???? For a normal people can get a pay around RM10k is considered good enough already.

Regarding to your post (on bolded issues), they are very general. In most (i would use any if i could) profession, after certain years of experience (min 5 - 8 years in the same field), the salary is capped. Any significant salary advancement will be a transition to a managerial position.

On the other hand, ratio of Manager to xxxxxxx (be it in any profession) will depends on the graduates production line from time to time. If we were arguing on white collar profession, the ratio will depends on the company itself. On the bigger scale, it will depend on the global market. There are far too many factors that will affect the ratio. The 'IF' statement just doesnt quite fit itself here.