Date: 2010-05-19

New Skilled Occupation List causes confusion for IT professionals potentially wanting to Migrate to Australia


If you’re an IT specialist wishing to come to Australia you are probably wondering whether the Government understands the difference between a Cisco engineer and a telecommunications engineer, the internet and .NET, or the difference between a Systems tester, a web developer, applications developer and a systems administrator?

The Rudd Government introduced a set of reforms designed to move the focus to a more labour market demand-driven pull model (ie based on company sponsorship where a job is waiting). The number of slots available to people coming in without a job is likely to drop while the number of slots available for professionals with job offers is expected to rise accordingly.

The Government’s view that employer-sponsored migration and the matching of skilled IT professionals directly to jobs in Australia, is the best method to meet ensure the labour market requirements.

The Critical Skills List (CSL) lists the following IT specialists as “must haves” and gives their applications top priority:


2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in CISSP
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in C++/C#/C
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in Data Warehousing
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in Java
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in J2EE
2231-79 Computing Professional – Linux
2231-79 Computing Professional – .Net technologies
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in Network Security/Firewall/Internet Security
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in Oracle
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in PeopleSoft
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in SAP
2231-79 Computing Professional – specialising in SIEBEL (especially Siebel Analytic)
2231-79 Computing Professional – Solaris
2231-79 Computing Professional – Unix

The Skills Occupation List, which lists the “should haves and must haves” skills critical to Australia’s economic development for the medium to long term contains the following ANZSCO occupations:
ANZSCO Occupation Descriptor
261111 ICT business analyst
261112 Systems analyst
261311 Analyst programmer
261312 Developer programmer
261313 Software engineer
263311 Telecommunications engineer
263312 Telecommunications network engineer

The SOL is missing not only some of the “must haves” from the CSL, but it is also missing all of the following IT specialisations:

261211 Multimedia Specialist
261212 Web developer
261399 Software and Application Not Elsewhere Classified (Software Testers)
262111 Database Administrator
262112 ICT Security
262113 Systems Administrators
263111 Computer Network Professionals
263112 Network Administrator
263113 Network Analyst
2632 ICT Support, QA and Test Engineers

And where, you might ask, do those who work with hardware or systems architecture fit in? We will have to wait to see what the States and territories do with their lists and whether the DIAC updates the CSL.

Contact us today to discuss your options.