Tasmania Uni turns to the market to plug IT skills gap

The University of Tasmania has asked the private sector to help it fill a number of gaps in the skills it needs to help deliver its 10-year cloud-first IT transformation strategy.

The unversity's cloud overhaul is intended to move IT staff away from inefficient manual tasks and toward value-added services, while shifting IT spend from capex to opex.

However, it currently lacks the required amount of skilled employees it will need to complete the effort.

It has therefore asked the market to apply for a spot on a supplier panel covering program management, project managers, business analysts, consultants, contractors and technicians.

It specifically wants consultants with expertise in change management, the agile methodology, software testing, and enterprise architecture, among other things.

The university said it needs more technical and software development staff - particularly with .Net, C++, Tibco ESB, Oracle SQL and Java experience - as well as Microsoft experts, AV architects and designers, developers, pentesters and network admins.

“University of Tasmania recognises the importance of engaging industry to access a range of specialist skills for the effective delivery of projects and also specialist skills for the provision of support of systems and infrastructure,” it said in tender documents.

The university hopes the panel will allow it to be more “flexible and agile in engaging industry” for the skills it needs at any given time.

The University of Tasmania expects to appoint successful bidders to the panel in mid-October.