In Search of the 21St Century Programmer Joe Sinnott Verizon Corporation

The United States is in grave danger of losing its economic advantages to fast-growing nations like China, unless the country restores its lead in education and other policies supporting growth. Bill Gates According to the National Science Foundation, half of America’s scientists and engineers are 40 years old or older, and the average age is steadily rising. NASA employees over 60 outnumber those under thirty by a ratio of about three to one. Only 4 percent of NASA workers are under 30. Two-thirds of the nation’s mathematics and science teaching force will retire by 2010. This quiet crisis involves the steady erosion of America’s scientific and engineering base. In the fiscal 2005 budget passed by the Republican Congress in November 2004, the budget for the National Science Foundation, which is the federal body most responsible for promoting research and funding more and better science education, was actually cut by 1.9 percent, or $105 million. History will show that when America should have been doubling the NSF funding, its Congress passed a pork-laden budget that actually cut assistance for science and engineering. •

Agenda Verizon and how it uses the zSeries platform. Landscape and Demographics. The Plan. Experiences.

Verizon Products POTS Plain Old Telephone Service Special Circuits T1, T3, OC3, OC12, SONET DSL Digital Subscriber Line FTTP Fiber To The Premises FIOS Fiber Optic Service Wireless

zSeries Hardware & Software used at Verizon z/OS 1.10 IMS DB2 CICS ADABAS MQseries LINUX Languages COBOL PL/I Assembler Hardware Z9 and Z10 Network TCP/IP VTAM Security RACF ACF2

The zSeries Skill Shortage. Addressing the issue. It is a truism, but the more educated you are, the more options you will have in the flat world. Thomas Friedman “The World is Flat”

The Issues Contrary to popular belief, the zSeries Platform is not going away. Wireless + VZB + Telecom = 170,000 MIPS. Future skill shortage.

z/OS Tech Services Years of Service

Options Stay the course. Outsourcing. Security concerns. Is the focus there? High Turnover Rate. Even with flexibility, there is still a critical need on-shore. Develop a Strategic Plan. Training. Decide on what your core functional groups are going to be and then allow people to move around.

The Plan Hire some new blood. Internships Establish a career path. Take advantage of the contacts at IBM and Universities. Use the IBM Academic Database with student resumes. Allow for an employment bubble. Internships Expose future IT professionals to the zSeries platform. Establish a career path. Current Employees. There are people in the organization taking these zSeries courses. Give them an opportunity. Start the new hires in Operations and establish a career path. Move them into tech support roles within six months to a year.

New Hire Experience New College Hired on 08/11/2008 and assigned to DB2 support. Training Plan established. Spent a number of weeks in other support groups. Internal Mentoring program established. Worked with a number of DB2 Support personnel. WEBEX, NET Meetings utilized. Responsibility continues to increase.

Summary There is a future. The logistics of the current environment points to opportunity. Need a plan which focuses on training. College Hires. Mentor program. Employment bubble.