Report: cyber security specialist pay to grow by 7%

A new report on how well different professionals are paid in the UK has revealed that salaries for increasingly popular IT roles, such as cyber security, will grow in the next year.

According to the latest European Salary Survey conducted by recruitment firm Robert Walters, pay for cyber security bods will rise, on average, by 7 per cent, one of the highest rates of increase for IT-related roles.

The report’s authors suggest that the growing number of cyber attacks that have hit media headlines have prompted more industry demand for IT professionals, as corporates rush to prepare themselves against the next security breach.

Ahsan Iqbal, Robert Walters’ associate director, said that IT workers are also asking for higher wages when moving jobs, with employers increasingly competing for top talent by inflating wages.

“In this context, the increases for cyber security specialists are particularly noteworthy,” he added
The report also estimates some of the average earnings of certain professions. For a head of information security role at a London firm who has at least 10 years of experience, they might expect an annual paycheque work between £105,000 and £170,000. This is a significant increase on the figure recorded for the same role in 2017, which ranged between £95,000 and £155,000.

In general, pay for development and infrastructure specialists will rise by 3 per cent across the UK, Robert Walters suggests.

Elsewhere in IT, e-commerce, retail and digital specialists are in “high demand” as were mid-level roles, such as project managers with business intelligence or big data experience.

The report also finds that, overall, demand for IT candidates outstripped the supply, with “high potential professionals” offered training or other perks in a bid to retain them over the long-term.

Its authors write: “Employers will continue to actively hire in 2017,with predictive analytics specialists expected to be highly sought after by government agencies, financial services firms and large retailers.

“In addition, cyber security specialists can expect to be in demand from these sectors, while SMEs and start-up firms will be active in recruiting software developers.”