Author
Zigurat Global Institute of Technology
Blog / Leadership & Transformation
TOP 9 Most Demanded Digital Jobs
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In today’s post we’re going into detail about the digital jobs that have been, are and will be the rising stars of the job market. Take a look at this guide of the TOP 9 most demanded digital jobs. The digital market grows as fast as it changes. Is it possible that the profile that leads tomorrow's digital transformation does not exist today? Yes, it’s likely. The new business models demand new competencies and professionals who defend them. We could say that an era of changes in the job market is giving way to a change of an era. Something that Zigurat Innovation & Technology Business School has preached for since its foundation and an understanding that manifests itself in the multi-faceted program of the Global MBA in Digital Business.
In what follows, we will take a look at the job positions that point the way to where we’re headed, as well as the required knowledge and the know how of tools you’ll need to master in these professions.
A service design strategist translates business ideas of the organization into products/services that respond to a need or demand of the users/clients. A service design strategist will have to keep the benefit for the company in mind and make sure that the new product/service adjusts to the business model.
Therefore, this professional must have a deep knowledge of the target audience to know what and how to offer in order to achieve the differentiation of the company's product/service in comparison with others that offer similar products/services, that is, to bring the brand to the top of mind for the user to come back and recommend it.
Knowledge
A Service Design Strategist has to master design (Design Thinking, interfaces, etc.), manage concepts of user psychology/user experience, and take them into account for the usability of the design. Must also know the target and services/products of the organization, be at home in research processes and innovation focused on the user and persona method (generation of archetypes/profiles of people).
Tools
Prototyping and wireframe tools, such as Balsamiq; project management tools (Kanbanize, Trello, Slack, Jira, Redmine etc.); experience map generation tools (Smaply, Touchpoint, Canvanizer, Uxpressia, BlankCanvas etc.); and service design (empathy maps, Service Blueprint).
A UX (user experience) designer is an intermediary between the company and the user, who aims to optimize the user experience in the different applications and interfaces of the company, following the needs of users, seeking for the product to have usability, accessibility, ease of use and attraction. This professional has to know the users and their needs.
UX designer performs usability tests with both qualitative and quantitative methodology; evaluates the data found about the usability of the product/service and makes conclusions on these intending to improve future processes. He/she also optimizes the web page (UX designer) or the mobile web (UX mobile) to facilitate a good user experience, creating intuitive interfaces.
Knowledge
He/she has to know programming languages (HTML, CSS, Javascript) to model the design in code, user psychology and usability, methods and designs of both qualitative and quantitative research, as well as heat maps, wireframes and design (interaction, software, app, web design, visual designer, etc).
Tools
Tools to create a typographic scale (Modular Scale, Gridlover, Scale & Rhythm,Type Scale, Typecast, etc.); to check usability (What users do, User Testing); project management (Kanbanize, Trello, Slack, Jira, etc.); data analysis (SPSS, R, Google Analytics, Optimizely, etc.); heat maps (Heatmaps); to create questionnaires (Survey Monkey, Typeform, etc.); to prototype apps (Quartz Composer, Origami, proto.io, InVisionApp, framerjs.com, flinto, etc.); and for prototyping websites (Balsamiq, Axure RP, FlairBuilder, Gliffy, iPlotz, etc.).
These professionals are programmers specialized in apps or websites, so they are responsible for creating, developing, maintaining, testing and programming all that an organization may have.
Knowledge
He/she has to know everything related to web and mobile design; responsive design; he/she also has to know programming languages, software engineering. Must know about usability, slight knowledge in SEO and solid knowledge in testing.
Tools
A developer has to know programming languages to generate static pages (HTML/XHTML, CSS and JavaScript); as well as server-side programming languages, which allow generating dynamic pages (python, ruby, php, Java, ASP, ASP.NET). He/she must also use tools to prototype apps (Quartz Composer, Origami, proto.io, invision App, framerjs.com, flinto...) and to prototype Webs (Balsamiq, Axure RP, FlairBuilder, Gliffy, iPlotz...). Experience in SQL and Oracle databases is valued to connect them to projects and searches.
An information security analyst has the mission to protect the computer networks and the information of an organization. In a society in which information has become the engine of globalization, an information security analyst becomes more and more important for the companies. In this line, this professional makes it possible to reduce uncertainty, as well as threats, and to improve decision-making.
An information security analyst develops and manages strategies to keep the organization's files and networks safe. He/she keeps up to date with viruses and their protection systems and defines policies for access and control of files, among other functions.
Knowledge
An information security analyst must know about engineering and technology (strong knowledge of computers and electronic equipment, as well as how to develop products and services); communications (telecommunications); data protection, data analysis, and statistics, data mining, big data. He/she also has to pilot cybersecurity (search and retrieval of information and software of this nature); prediction, prevention and treatment of crime and public policies of security and prevention.
Tools
Obviously, he/she needs to know and handle transaction security and antivirus protection software (McAfee and Symantec), monitoring software networks (Nagios and Wireshark), and software development environment (Ruby and Microsoft PowerShell).
The mission of a blockchain specialist is to understand the structure of the blockchain and interact with it. He/she has to distinguish in which applications blockchain can be useful (e.g., digital university degrees provided by an official entity) and in which not, (e.g., company that wants to have its blockchain without being a global business). The blockchain specialist has to understand and apply the technology taking into account the objective (e.g., when to use centralized or decentralized networks, or in which contexts to use a public or private blockchain network). We recommend you to read up on the career opportunities in blockchain.
Knowledge
Centralized and decentralized networks; use of technology as a trust platform between two entities that have no previous history and as an immutable record of the information uploaded to it; consensus algorithms in blockchain (proof of work and proof of stake); smart contracts in the different blockchain platforms different types of blockchain (public: bitcoin, Ethereum,etc.; or private: Hyperledger, Quorum, Alastria network, etc.). And, also, he/she must know the programming languages of the specific tools used.
Tools
Private blockchain (Hyperledger, Quorum); public blockchain (Ripple); Wallet software (Bitcoin core); second layer blockchain applications (Dapps); programming languages such as Solidity (Ethereum), Geth (ethereum go), Java, C, or Python.
According to experts, virtual reality comes into contact with more and more areas. In this way, it has ceased to be a leisure technology to enter areas such as architecture, engineering, art, design, tourism, computer graphics, or even video conferencing. Therefore, Virtual Reality Developer/Specialist is a profession with very good prospects. His/her functions are diverse: to develop experiences of virtual and augmented reality of different types, to generate immersive narratives in digital environments or to design UX projects in virtual and augmented reality, among others.
Knowledge
It is a demanding profession: a virtual reality specialist has to handle programming languages of the specific tools used, as well as 3D and polygonal modeling, video game engines, RV/RA/RX ecosystems, situational psychology, user experience and user interface. He/she should also be familiar with materials, textures and lighting, IT and software engineering.
Tools
They will depend on the specific field in which the virtual reality developer/specialist is working. For example, tools for creating and visualizing prototypes (e.g., Storyboard VR), designing video games (e.g., Fuzor), painting in virtual reality (e.g. Tilt Brush, Quill), 3D modelling (e.g., Arkit, Gravity Sketch, Blocks, 3D studio, Blender; and A-Frame), character creation and animation (e.g., Oculus Medium, Animvr), game development (e.g,. Unreal Engine, Unity3D), and 4D development (e.g., 4D Cinema).
An IoT professional needs to know the technology involved in the process and be able to interact with it to fulfill its mission, which is to interconnect objects in a digital way facilitating data collection and storage in the cloud. Among other functions it applies technologies of passive sensors (RDIF tag, NFC...) and active sensors (GPS positioning sensors, temperature, presence...); he/she knows when to apply the different protocols and communication methods in wireless sensor networks (M2M, MQTT, 3G, 4G, UWB...), analyzes the end to end (E2E) of the processes and fits the applicability of the IoT in some of the steps of the general process.
Knowledge
Ideally, the candidate should have a university degree in Telecommunications Engineering. He/she must also know passive (ASTER, LANDSAT, AVHRR, TOMS, MODIS, MISR, OMI, CERES) and active (LIDAR (CALIPSO, LITE), RADAR (SAR, PR, CPR), SONAR) sensor technologies; as well as wireless sensor networks, cyber security; notions of computing in the cloud and in the fog (edge computing), and has knowledge of data science (databases, knowledge of statistics, scripts, machine learning, big data)...). Hardware control is valued according to the IoT device (8-bit or SYstem-On-Chip (SOC); 32-bit; 32/64-bit or Single-Board-Computer (SBC); Industrial Microcontrollers or PLCs). and IoT applications in smart cities.
Tools
The professional must handle ORBCOMM tools, which allow tracking and monitoring satellite modems (ORBCOMMconnect to manage subscribers; DeviceCloud to manage devices. He/she must operate IOTGO platforms, which allow to collect, process, integrate and analyze data collected by different sensors and devices and company information; software platforms to manage and communicate IoT devices with each other (Azure Iot Hub (Microsoft), AWS IoT, Google Cloud IoT). As far as programming languages are concerned today, they would be Java, C, JavaScript, Python, C++, SWIFT, Ruby, Lua; as well as databases (NoSQL, SQL, MySQL).
This professional is in charge, as the name says, of developing video games (both on the web and in mobile applications or consoles), from the beginning of the process (idea generation) to its revision (testing), going through its design and programming phases. He/she will have to create rigs and animations, design the interfaces, program the video game (scenarios, characters, animated behaviors...), test it, model it, integrate the graphics with the sound, generate low-poly models, as well as generate scripts and storyboards.
Knowledge
Making a video game is complicated. Thus, a video game developer should be able to know object-oriented programming, visual and graphic programming, video game technology, artistic drawing and concept art, know the psychology of perception. He/she should also know about digital image processing, networks and multiplayer environments, mathematics and physics, video game design (scripts and storyboarding), 3D modeling and animation (organic and inorganic), animations and scripting, operating environments and platforms and knowledge engineering (AI).
Tools
Video game developer will have to handle mobile operating systems (IOS, Android...), consoles (PS4, xBOX, Nintendo, etc.), image editing/creation programs (Photoshop, Gimp, 3D Pixel Art, Flash c55, Adobe Animate CC, Adobe Illustrator, xNormal, nVida Texture Tools, Lazy Nezumi), animation tools (Unreal Engine, Flixel...),, and so on.org, Arcade Game Studio, Character Studio, Unity, Autodesk Maya, Mode, Mixamo); for creating the narrative (artify:draft, Scrivener, Chat Mapper, Celtx) and for creating audio (Audacity, AudioBlocks, Reaper, Pro Tools, Soundation).
Service Design Strategist
A service design strategist translates business ideas of the organization into products/services that respond to a need or demand of the users/clients. A service design strategist will have to keep the benefit for the company in mind and make sure that the new product/service adjusts to the business model.
Therefore, this professional must have a deep knowledge of the target audience to know what and how to offer in order to achieve the differentiation of the company's product/service in comparison with others that offer similar products/services, that is, to bring the brand to the top of mind for the user to come back and recommend it.
Knowledge
A Service Design Strategist has to master design (Design Thinking, interfaces, etc.), manage concepts of user psychology/user experience, and take them into account for the usability of the design. Must also know the target and services/products of the organization, be at home in research processes and innovation focused on the user and persona method (generation of archetypes/profiles of people).
Tools
Prototyping and wireframe tools, such as Balsamiq; project management tools (Kanbanize, Trello, Slack, Jira, Redmine etc.); experience map generation tools (Smaply, Touchpoint, Canvanizer, Uxpressia, BlankCanvas etc.); and service design (empathy maps, Service Blueprint).
UX Designer
A UX (user experience) designer is an intermediary between the company and the user, who aims to optimize the user experience in the different applications and interfaces of the company, following the needs of users, seeking for the product to have usability, accessibility, ease of use and attraction. This professional has to know the users and their needs.
UX designer performs usability tests with both qualitative and quantitative methodology; evaluates the data found about the usability of the product/service and makes conclusions on these intending to improve future processes. He/she also optimizes the web page (UX designer) or the mobile web (UX mobile) to facilitate a good user experience, creating intuitive interfaces.
Knowledge
He/she has to know programming languages (HTML, CSS, Javascript) to model the design in code, user psychology and usability, methods and designs of both qualitative and quantitative research, as well as heat maps, wireframes and design (interaction, software, app, web design, visual designer, etc).
Tools
Tools to create a typographic scale (Modular Scale, Gridlover, Scale & Rhythm,Type Scale, Typecast, etc.); to check usability (What users do, User Testing); project management (Kanbanize, Trello, Slack, Jira, etc.); data analysis (SPSS, R, Google Analytics, Optimizely, etc.); heat maps (Heatmaps); to create questionnaires (Survey Monkey, Typeform, etc.); to prototype apps (Quartz Composer, Origami, proto.io, InVisionApp, framerjs.com, flinto, etc.); and for prototyping websites (Balsamiq, Axure RP, FlairBuilder, Gliffy, iPlotz, etc.).
Apps Developer & Web Developer
These professionals are programmers specialized in apps or websites, so they are responsible for creating, developing, maintaining, testing and programming all that an organization may have.
Knowledge
He/she has to know everything related to web and mobile design; responsive design; he/she also has to know programming languages, software engineering. Must know about usability, slight knowledge in SEO and solid knowledge in testing.
Tools
A developer has to know programming languages to generate static pages (HTML/XHTML, CSS and JavaScript); as well as server-side programming languages, which allow generating dynamic pages (python, ruby, php, Java, ASP, ASP.NET). He/she must also use tools to prototype apps (Quartz Composer, Origami, proto.io, invision App, framerjs.com, flinto...) and to prototype Webs (Balsamiq, Axure RP, FlairBuilder, Gliffy, iPlotz...). Experience in SQL and Oracle databases is valued to connect them to projects and searches.
Information Security Analyst
An information security analyst has the mission to protect the computer networks and the information of an organization. In a society in which information has become the engine of globalization, an information security analyst becomes more and more important for the companies. In this line, this professional makes it possible to reduce uncertainty, as well as threats, and to improve decision-making.
An information security analyst develops and manages strategies to keep the organization's files and networks safe. He/she keeps up to date with viruses and their protection systems and defines policies for access and control of files, among other functions.
Knowledge
An information security analyst must know about engineering and technology (strong knowledge of computers and electronic equipment, as well as how to develop products and services); communications (telecommunications); data protection, data analysis, and statistics, data mining, big data. He/she also has to pilot cybersecurity (search and retrieval of information and software of this nature); prediction, prevention and treatment of crime and public policies of security and prevention.
Tools
Obviously, he/she needs to know and handle transaction security and antivirus protection software (McAfee and Symantec), monitoring software networks (Nagios and Wireshark), and software development environment (Ruby and Microsoft PowerShell).
Blockchain Specialist
The mission of a blockchain specialist is to understand the structure of the blockchain and interact with it. He/she has to distinguish in which applications blockchain can be useful (e.g., digital university degrees provided by an official entity) and in which not, (e.g., company that wants to have its blockchain without being a global business). The blockchain specialist has to understand and apply the technology taking into account the objective (e.g., when to use centralized or decentralized networks, or in which contexts to use a public or private blockchain network). We recommend you to read up on the career opportunities in blockchain.
Knowledge
Centralized and decentralized networks; use of technology as a trust platform between two entities that have no previous history and as an immutable record of the information uploaded to it; consensus algorithms in blockchain (proof of work and proof of stake); smart contracts in the different blockchain platforms different types of blockchain (public: bitcoin, Ethereum,etc.; or private: Hyperledger, Quorum, Alastria network, etc.). And, also, he/she must know the programming languages of the specific tools used.
Tools
Private blockchain (Hyperledger, Quorum); public blockchain (Ripple); Wallet software (Bitcoin core); second layer blockchain applications (Dapps); programming languages such as Solidity (Ethereum), Geth (ethereum go), Java, C, or Python.
Virtual Reality Specialist
According to experts, virtual reality comes into contact with more and more areas. In this way, it has ceased to be a leisure technology to enter areas such as architecture, engineering, art, design, tourism, computer graphics, or even video conferencing. Therefore, Virtual Reality Developer/Specialist is a profession with very good prospects. His/her functions are diverse: to develop experiences of virtual and augmented reality of different types, to generate immersive narratives in digital environments or to design UX projects in virtual and augmented reality, among others.
Knowledge
It is a demanding profession: a virtual reality specialist has to handle programming languages of the specific tools used, as well as 3D and polygonal modeling, video game engines, RV/RA/RX ecosystems, situational psychology, user experience and user interface. He/she should also be familiar with materials, textures and lighting, IT and software engineering.
Tools
They will depend on the specific field in which the virtual reality developer/specialist is working. For example, tools for creating and visualizing prototypes (e.g., Storyboard VR), designing video games (e.g., Fuzor), painting in virtual reality (e.g. Tilt Brush, Quill), 3D modelling (e.g., Arkit, Gravity Sketch, Blocks, 3D studio, Blender; and A-Frame), character creation and animation (e.g., Oculus Medium, Animvr), game development (e.g,. Unreal Engine, Unity3D), and 4D development (e.g., 4D Cinema).
IoT Specialist
An IoT professional needs to know the technology involved in the process and be able to interact with it to fulfill its mission, which is to interconnect objects in a digital way facilitating data collection and storage in the cloud. Among other functions it applies technologies of passive sensors (RDIF tag, NFC...) and active sensors (GPS positioning sensors, temperature, presence...); he/she knows when to apply the different protocols and communication methods in wireless sensor networks (M2M, MQTT, 3G, 4G, UWB...), analyzes the end to end (E2E) of the processes and fits the applicability of the IoT in some of the steps of the general process.
Knowledge
Ideally, the candidate should have a university degree in Telecommunications Engineering. He/she must also know passive (ASTER, LANDSAT, AVHRR, TOMS, MODIS, MISR, OMI, CERES) and active (LIDAR (CALIPSO, LITE), RADAR (SAR, PR, CPR), SONAR) sensor technologies; as well as wireless sensor networks, cyber security; notions of computing in the cloud and in the fog (edge computing), and has knowledge of data science (databases, knowledge of statistics, scripts, machine learning, big data)...). Hardware control is valued according to the IoT device (8-bit or SYstem-On-Chip (SOC); 32-bit; 32/64-bit or Single-Board-Computer (SBC); Industrial Microcontrollers or PLCs). and IoT applications in smart cities.
Tools
The professional must handle ORBCOMM tools, which allow tracking and monitoring satellite modems (ORBCOMMconnect to manage subscribers; DeviceCloud to manage devices. He/she must operate IOTGO platforms, which allow to collect, process, integrate and analyze data collected by different sensors and devices and company information; software platforms to manage and communicate IoT devices with each other (Azure Iot Hub (Microsoft), AWS IoT, Google Cloud IoT). As far as programming languages are concerned today, they would be Java, C, JavaScript, Python, C++, SWIFT, Ruby, Lua; as well as databases (NoSQL, SQL, MySQL).
Video Game Developer
This professional is in charge, as the name says, of developing video games (both on the web and in mobile applications or consoles), from the beginning of the process (idea generation) to its revision (testing), going through its design and programming phases. He/she will have to create rigs and animations, design the interfaces, program the video game (scenarios, characters, animated behaviors...), test it, model it, integrate the graphics with the sound, generate low-poly models, as well as generate scripts and storyboards.
Knowledge
Making a video game is complicated. Thus, a video game developer should be able to know object-oriented programming, visual and graphic programming, video game technology, artistic drawing and concept art, know the psychology of perception. He/she should also know about digital image processing, networks and multiplayer environments, mathematics and physics, video game design (scripts and storyboarding), 3D modeling and animation (organic and inorganic), animations and scripting, operating environments and platforms and knowledge engineering (AI).
Tools
Video game developer will have to handle mobile operating systems (IOS, Android...), consoles (PS4, xBOX, Nintendo, etc.), image editing/creation programs (Photoshop, Gimp, 3D Pixel Art, Flash c55, Adobe Animate CC, Adobe Illustrator, xNormal, nVida Texture Tools, Lazy Nezumi), animation tools (Unreal Engine, Flixel...),, and so on.org, Arcade Game Studio, Character Studio, Unity, Autodesk Maya, Mode, Mixamo); for creating the narrative (artify:draft, Scrivener, Chat Mapper, Celtx) and for creating audio (Audacity, AudioBlocks, Reaper, Pro Tools, Soundation).
To sum up, training in digital skills has become the Holy Grail to access the most requested positions and the new market niches. To learn where the digital market is headed and form part of the new generation of professionals, enroll in the Global MBA in Digital Business.
