The future will be dictated by information technologies. That is a statement that Leonardo Loureiro, business manager of Quanam and president of the Uruguayan Chamber of Information Technology (Cuti) holds with conviction.
Cuti is an association that brings together more than 350 Uruguayan companies and aims to promote the development of the sector towards the future that Loureiro clearly sees. For this, Cuti articulates actions with universities, state entities and companies, carries out dissemination activities on information technologies and leads education programs for young people interested in developing their knowledge in this area. "The main role of Cuti is the articulation so that the industry grows and the more employment is generated, the better," says Loureiro.
In this industry, the raw material that makes it go and feeds its growth is knowledge and the talents behind it. Every year in Uruguay about 200 engineers graduate, and the figure rises to an estimated 350 to 400 when considering other university degrees. The goal is to keep that number growing. Therefore, the association's mission is to raise awareness and attract young people to this field, and show them that they can be protagonists of this technological future.
In the interview, Loureiro gives an inside look at how the industry is preparing for the coming years and emphasizes the paramount importance of education and training to sustain sustainable growth.
What is the current situation of the IT industry in Uruguay?
Fortunately, it's a fairly thriving industry that is exporting in the order of 300 million dollars and has a domestic business of about U$S 800 million. It is one of the few industries that could actually grow, as they would say in Toy Story: to infinity and beyond. It is also one of the few industries that does not require large investments to be able to export one or two million dollars more. This is an industry that is 100% knowledge-based. This is paramount when defining this type of industry and why it is so important. Today it employs about 14,000 people directly. Obviously, when we talk about jobs in information technology and telecommunications, there are many more because that is where state entities and private companies start to come in.
Is the growth of the industry conditioned by the entry of people into the sector?
What happens is that there is a direct relationship between the number of people and the amount of money one can access, or the amount of national or exportable sales. I always give the same example. Let's imagine that I am a phenomenon in the commercial area, I go to the United States and I get business for 100 million dollars. But in order to export that amount of money I need at least 1,000 more people to have entered the business. What does that mean? People don't come out of the ground, it takes time to train them. That is clearly an issue that we have to change. That young people understand that you can work and live in an industry like this. What does a person see when he enters? Definitely the future, because technologies are getting into all sectors of economic activity. The more you get into this sector, the more possibilities you have to do different things. This is one of the sectors that is changing the world and is going to change it.
"The young person who decides to get into this industry knows firstly that they are going to have a future and secondly that they are going to change the world."
Do you recommend students who have not yet finished their degree to start working?
That will always depend on the conditions in which each of us lives. But if you can postpone it and start working in the last years of your career, all the better. If you can't do it, at least try to work no more than 4 or 6 hours so that you can finish your degree.
What is most important to us as employers is that young people complete their studies. It is important for the company and it is more important for the person. This marks the soft skills that we look for: it is not the same for people who set themselves a goal and finish it, as it is for those who do not.
A survey conducted by the magazine in 2016 resulted in 69% of students considering emigrating and working abroad. Is this a factor for the industry? Are they trying to get people to stay?
When I saw the figure I was surprised, 69% seems too high to me. It seems to me that once you explore the opportunities you realize that it is an industry that pays very good salaries, and has to compete internationally. What is true is that today our competitors are powerful poles like the United States or Europe, which hire people directly without them leaving Uruguay. They telework. Our Uber is the telework of professionals. We have many Uruguayan professionals who leave their companies and go to work at home.
I believe that there is a very important future here at the national level. What we as a national industry are looking for is that the work is here, that people stay here.
However, if lots and lots of people decide to enter this industry and we are not able to give them work ourselves, it is certain that they will be able to work for anywhere in the world.
How do the companies here compete with this Uber?
Mainly with human groups. Because the person ends up working from home in isolation. Surely there are people who are prepared to work that way and others who are not. Others will value the group, the people. All companies work a lot with fraternization activities. There are many events between different companies, there are chamber events. There is a lot that is lost if you go to work for a company from home. And you also lose it if you leave the country.
Another question to ask yourself is why do companies set up in Uruguay? Because today we have no limits, one with an idea could settle in the United States if he wants to. It is because we like to live in Uruguay, to give work in Uruguay. Sometimes we earn less but we stay and live in Uruguay.
"Many of us want our children to live and be educated here. Maybe it's a Uruguayanism, but losing the barbecue with friends, the get-togethers and friends hurts".
What options do companies resort to in order to recruit more staff? Are immigrant workers a help in that sense?
We are working along many lines. Regarding the issue of immigrant workers, there was an initiative in the past to bring in about 500 professionals from other countries, which ended up being beneficial for several reasons. The main reason was not because there were no people, but because it serves the company for multicultural reasons. For example, companies working for Latin America face more than 16 mixed cultures. Sometimes you think that the language barrier is the main barrier, but in reality it is the cultural one. We can be speaking the same language and yet have different meanings for the same words. And maybe because of our different cultures we can have misinterpretations and not understand each other. That professional people from other places come and enrich our industry for me is positive.
"Having people come can be a solution, but it is not the solution. The solution is for more Uruguayans to understand that this industry is attractive, and that is what we are working on, to make the industry attractive to young people".
Where do you see the industry heading in the future?
It's a nice question, in fact several of us are working on it. Today we are living a very important technological convergence. If we were already living in an accelerated time, now we are going to be accelerated to the maximum power. We have a convergence of big data, artificial intelligence, internet of things, quantum computing, robotics, 3D, genetics, all of this is being enhanced. Each one of these aspects is already a relevant and impactful topic, and if we add it all together, it makes for a very challenging acceleration, because keeping up with these things is a challenge. And this is not an issue that will happen in 15 or 20 years, we are going to see flying cars soon.
"The better prepared and trained we are, the better it will be. Today we are training people for jobs that don't exist yet. In that future, an industry like ours is an active participant".
Source: PRO University
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