* Robert Half Technology’s 2004 Salary Guide
IT leaders expect to pay slightly lower starting salaries in 2004, according to the results of Robert Half Technology’s 2004 Salary Guide. The staffing firm projects starting salaries to decrease by an overall average of 1.6% due to continuing stabilization. However, salaries will likely increase for certain hot IT areas such as security.
“While average starting salaries for most positions will remain little changed in 2004, those occupations that experienced extensive growth in the late nineties continue to see a slight decline in compensation,” says Katherine Spencer Lee, executive director of Robert Half Technology. “Increases in base pay will be reserved for the most sought-after specialties where skill shortages still exist.”
For example, the survey shows that starting salaries for security pros will rise 2.1% next year, to a range of $67,000 to $90,750 in base pay.
Salaries for applications architects and Internet/intranet developers are expected to increase 1.9% in 2004. This brings the average pay for an application architect to between $73,250 and $104,250, while senior developers can command between $67,250 and $96,000.
Systems auditors will pick up an average 1.8% in pay, bringing their compensation to the $60,750 and $77,250 range. Quality assurance/testing managers and disaster recovery specialists will pick up 1.2% to boost pay to between $63,250 and $85,000, and $59,000 and $89,000, respectively.
So who will lose out? Starting salaries for LAN administrators will drop 4.5%, adjusting base compensation to between $43,750 and $62,500 per year. And salaries for desktop support analysts will decrease an average of 5.3%, moving salaries to the $47,000 to $65,000 range.
For more information, go to www.roberthalftechnology.com
