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The IT market remains resilient, according to Alexandra Akhmetova, head of staffing and development at Norbit, part of the Lanit group. This resilience makes it hard to find technical skills that would be rejected in every situation, yet patterns still emerge in how employers evaluate talent.
They say there is less demand for Delphi, Python, and C# programmers. Akhmetova notes that the required knowledge, expertise, training, and other inputs depend on the client or the position being assessed. Even as C# declines in some areas, it remains a sought‑after language for Norbit.
Anastasia Nazarova, vice president of the Skillbox Career Center, shared that Perl is falling out of favor, largely replaced by a simpler and more versatile Python. She also observed that Haskell, still used by global giants like IBM, and Objective-C have lost some of their former popularity.
Nevertheless, Nazarova emphasized that there is no one‑size‑fits‑all approach to landing a job that requires knowledge of these languages.
Popularity does not equal money
Alexander Kiselev, founder and CEO of Rebotica, believes there is no single stranger among programming languages in IT. A recent Stack Overflow survey highlighted seven languages with notably lower usage: Fortran, Erlang, APL, COBOL, SAS, OCaml, and Crystal.
The study also revealed which programmers earn higher median salaries. Worldwide, Dart developers earn about $43.7k annually, PHP developers about $50.5k, and MATLAB developers about $57.5k. These figures illustrate that popularity is not a direct predictor of pay in the IT field.
Pay rates for the top‑earning languages show a different trend. Clojure developers can earn well over $106k per year. In the mid‑range, Delphi, Python, and C# professionals typically earn around $65k to $70k annually. Stack Overflow data place Delphi on about $64k, Python on roughly $71k, and C# on about $69.5k per year.
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Angelina Kapitonova, director of personnel development at the Digital Economy League, cautioned that online courses alone won’t secure a job in a large organization when retraining as an IT specialist from scratch. She advised seeking unpaid internships in IT companies to gain practical experience and worthwhile opportunities for a job offer after the internship.
Norbit’s Alexandra Akhmetova pointed out that soft skills are often a more decisive factor than technical training. A lack of motivation, poor critical thinking, difficulty working in a team, or a reluctance to learn can raise red flags even if courses or degrees are completed.
Similarly, Alexander Kiselev noted that many Russian IT firms still operate with a flexible pipeline, placing almost any programmable specialist into various roles. He mentioned that in some cases developer functions are duplicated across departments, which can be mitigated by streamlined business processes.
Public sector – more conditions
Akhmetova also highlighted that new IT specialists sometimes overlook additional conditions when considering work with government‑linked projects. For high‑security public sector work, foreign nationals or people living outside the country may be excluded, and higher technical education can be a prerequisite.
Kapitonova added that internships do not guarantee employment, even when they are completed. She stressed the importance for newcomers to be proactive and independent, arguing that no company will teach a profession if the candidate shows little effort.
Kapitonova recommended young people build relationships with future colleagues during education and internships to improve job prospects. She advised aspiring IT professionals to engage with developers skilled in Java, Kotlin, Go, and Hadoop since these areas drive demand in Business Intelligence, Big Data, and web and mobile app development.