Brussels, August 2nd 2018 – We need almost a million digital professionals in the EU by 2020. No wonder salaries in the tech industry are up. Hightech Partners, one of the leading executive search firms in Europe focused on digital transformation and ICT, has just released its list of the 10 most sought-after IT profiles – and their price tag.

The list is based upon over 300 assignments performed across Europe within the past 18 months.

Ranking (in ascending order)

10. Service Delivery Manager - € 90k to € 180k

Reports to: Head of Delivery

Certifications and Degrees: ITIL, COBIT, and Computer Science or similar.

Experience: 5 to 10 years in service delivery.

Hard Skills: Depending on the type of services to be delivered, proven experience should be demonstrable in Infrastructure (IaaS), application implementation and maintenance, operations management, project delivery, and P&L management.

Soft Skills: Communication, negotiation, conflict management, analytical and problem-solving attitude, self-motivated, strongly results-oriented, resilient, people management.

Responsibility: Contract management, service delivery according to the SLA (service level agreement) or OLA (operation level agreement), management of delivery team, negotiation of change requests, incident management, escalation process management, customer handling, services’ customer satisfaction.

9. Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) € 90k to € 250k

Reports to: CEO or Board of Directors

Certifications and Degrees: CISSP (Certified Information Systems Security Professional), CISA (Certified Information Systems Auditor), CISM (Certified Information Security Manager), or an equivalent certification recognized internationally (subject to acceptance as a valid credentials), ITILV3. Desirable: ITIL Service Manager Certification, CRISC (ISACA Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control), PMP or Prince 2. Computer Science or Law Degree.

Experience: Depends from the size and business of the company, 10-15 years of experience in IT and Network Security, 5of which should have been in a managerial role.

Hard Skills: Experience with service/program management, risk assessment methodologies: EBIOS, CRAMM, PILAR or equivalent, incident management, ethical hacking.

Soft Skills: Leadership, people management, communication, problem-solving attitude, consulting, risk management, ethical, loyal, consistent, stress resistant.

Responsibility: Definition of security framework and implementation activity overlooking rules and procedures to prevent attacks or mitigate the risks. Negotiation and monitoring of contracts with the different partners, business domains, suppliers, and customers. Ultimate decision maker of action to be taken in case of crisis.

8. Solution Architect - € 95k to over € 160k

Reports to: Depends on company structure

Certifications and Degrees: Certifications are optional and linked to the solutions concerned; related certifications available from sources like IBM, Microsoft. SAP, CIsco, etc. Degree in Computer Science or Engineering or similar better if Master degree.

Experience: 5-10 years of experience in design and implementation of solutions Hard Skills: Business Process Analysis and Design, Systems Integration, Deep Knowledge of the platforms to be implemented such us SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, etc.

Hard Skills: Business Process Analysis and Design, Systems Integration, Deep Knowledge of the platforms to be implemented such as SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, etc.

Soft Skills: Thought leadership and engagement ability, business transformation orientation, communication, influence, pre-sales, patience, determination, creativity, team player.

Responsibility: Gather customer requirement, engineer the solution analyzing the process identifying key components, elaborate related costing in terms of products, services and resources, manage the transition to the implementation phase. This role is mission critical has a bad/good design will imply success or failure in the production phase.

7. Data Privacy Officer (DPO) up to € 150k

Reports to: Depending on company structure reporting to the CFO,  Compliance Officer or Board of Directors 

Certifications and Degrees: Degree in Law and/or in Computer Science/Engineering with specialization in Security. Preferable: IAPP’s certification (International Association Privacy Practitioner) or similar.

Experience: business or legal experience in privacy matters.

Hard Skills: Full Knowledge of GDPR, European legal frameworks for data privacy.

Soft Skills: Influential, rigor, integrity, autonomy, loyalty, attention to details, perseverance, leadership.

Responsibility: define procedures and privacy policy, escalation process, contractual relationships with the different stakeholders, supervise the adoption and implementation of the policy on the systems and digital channels, is the point of reference for the claims, has to report to the authorities any breach of the regulation. It’s estimated that Europe is around 50.000 DPOs short and few candidates have on-the-job implementation experience.

6. Product Manager € 100 to € 175k

Reports to: CPO – Chief Product Officer, the Product Portfolio Lead, or CMO – Chief Marketing Officer,depending on the size and business of the company.

Certifications and Degrees: CPM (Certified Product Manager) by AIPMM is ideal, but very few people have this in Europe. MBA in Engineering and/or Economy with specialization Marketing.

Experience: depends from the size of the team and the company and relevance of the product(s) managed but minimum 5 years of business experience and in similar role are required. Depending from the industry a subject matter knowledge of the domain could be essential.

Hard Skills: Project management, product management, people management, understanding the customer and the market, product development, requirements analysis, pricing, planning, competitive analysis, sales planning, inventory control, financial planning and strategy.

Soft Skills: Leadership, influence, vision, creativity, communication, structured, pragmatism, results oriented, agile.

Responsibility: Product managers oversee the full product lifecycle from initial business concept to analysis, product development, go-to-market strategy and finally to end of life. Product managers with deep experience in the technology sector are rare in Europe and, as a result, are highly sought after.

5. Chief Data Science Officer (CDSO) € 100k to € 200k

Reports to: CIO or CFO, depending on the size of the company.

Certifications and Degrees: Master in Computer Science, Master in Mathematics or Statistics.

Experience: 5-10 years’ experience in information management (IM) and quantitative, skills–including working knowledge of IT infrastructure, various technologies/platforms, and aligned vendor solutions and the capabilities they bring–as well as experience leading major IM programs in key business areas.

Hard Skills: Domain experience, statistics, mathematics and predictive modelling, program leadership, communication, information management, people management, business perspective and strategy.

Soft Skills: Enthusiastic, visionary, disruptive, collaborative, communicative, agile, and analytical.

Responsibility: Data scientist is said to be the sexiest job of the 21st century. For the foreseeable future, skilled big data scientists will be in high demand and will be able to earn nice salaries. But to be successful, big data scientists need to have a wide range of skills, including knowledge of statistics, mathematics, and predictive modelling as well as business strategy. But it doesn’t end there - they should be able to understand product development and privacy concerns while also being able to clearly communicate their finding.

4. Chief Data Officer (CDO) € 100k to € 250k

Reports to: CIO, CTO, or the CFO depending on the size of the company.

Certifications and Degrees: Master in Computer Science, Master in Mathematics or Statistics, Master in Engineering.

Experience: 10+ years’ experience in data analytics and information management, but its’ not necessarily to be considered as a technical role.

Hard Skills: Domain experience and specific relevant tools, program management, communication, information management.

Soft Skills: Analytical, disruptive, leadership, collaborative, influencer, visionary.

Responsibility: A Chief Data Officer is responsible for the overall data strategy within an organization. If big data is implemented throughout the organization, Chief Data Officers are responsible for ensuring that the strategy is safely and correctly implemented. As data-driven decision-making becomes increasingly important in organizations, a Chief Data Officer is typically a member of the executive board and reports directly to the Chief Executive Office.

3. Project/Program Manager - € 100k to over € 250k

Reports to: Head of Delivery, Head of Operations, Head of Programs.

Certifications and Degrees: PMP, PMI, Prince 2, Agile/Scrum, etc. ITIL, COBIT is a plus. A Master in Business Engineering is useful.

Experience: Depending upon the size of the project could be 5-15+ years some of them manages projects worth billion of Euros over multiple years.

Hard Skills: Risk management, stakeholder management, P&L, planning, supplier management, change management, leading and motivating teams, application development, infrastructure.

Soft Skills: Attention to details, structured, pre-emptive of events likely to happen, results oriented, pragmatic, efficient, resilient, stress resistant, negotiation, decisiveness, communication.

Responsibility: This is one of the most sought-after profiles across Europe. Digital transformation projects are crucial to many organizations and can have budgets of several million or billion dollars. This means project managers have an enormous responsibility to deliver high quality deliverables in a timely way. For project managers, a knowledge of the functional domain like financial services, telco, energy, or utilities industries is a plus.

2. Big Data Competence Center BU Director € 150k to € 250k

Reports to: Depends on the size and type of business of the company.

Certifications and Degrees: Master in Computer Science or Engineering.

Experience: 10-15 years in management of Big Data and Analytics projects.

Hard Skills: Analytics design, data collection API’s, people management, P&L, customer relationship, communication.

Soft Skills: Passion, determination, results oriented, leadership, vision, analytical, agile, business perspective.

Responsibility: This is a revenue generating role responsible for managing the business intelligence offering of an IT Services a company. Business intelligence is all the data and applications that help optimize a business’ decision making process. The Big Data Competence Center BU Director is responsible for the strategic, operational, financial, and human management of the BU and provides all BI and BI-related services to the clients. He/she is normally a key members of the leadership team and is responsible for the BU  profit and loss.

1. Chief Digital Officer (CDO) up to € 250k

Reports to: CEO.

Certifications and Degrees: Master in Computer Science or Engineering.

Experience: 15-20 years lead experience of digital marketplace.

Hard Skills: P&L, people management, deep knowledge of digital technologies.

Soft Skills: Enthusiastic, visionary, disruptive, collaborative, agile, desire to share knowledge, creative, lateral thinking, leadership.

Responsibility: A lot of companies jump in the deep end and hire a CDO before they have completely defined the role. This is because it is seen as a necessary modern addition to any digital company. There are some key functions, though, that any CDO should be able to perform: map digital capabilities and strategic priorities, be an advocate for digital process innovation, develop digital projects and client offerings, measure efficiencies, develop and retain top digital talent, and shoulder the responsibility of rolling out new digital capabilities. Many people believe that within 5 years, once the digitalization has become the new normal, this title will disappear and the responsibilities will go to the CEO or CIO.

About Hightech Partners

Hightech Partners is a leading executive search and transformation consulting firm in Europe specialized in assisting companies in their digital transformations. The team at HTP leverages forward-looking methods such as big data analysis and artificial intelligence to inject the executive search process with smart and fast-paced techniques. This technology, combined with the seasoned leadership of the firm, helps HTP ensure accurate candidate matches that help companies embrace new ways of working.

Hightech Partners has offices in Brussels, Belgium, and Geneva, Switzerland with local partners situated across the major regions of Europe. Hightech Partners is founder of ITP Worldwide, an alliance of specialized search and consulting firms in the Technology industry in the US and Asia.

Hightech Partners is a proud member of AESC and commits to the AESC Code of Professional Practice and Standards of Excellence

Sarah De Wulf

FINN PR

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