Navigating a successful career in the technology industry is harder than it looks. At face value the tremendous job opportunities and competitive wages make it seem simple: go to a good engineering college, get a degree, and land a series of promotions with branded companies. Seasoned professionals who have lived through several economic cycles, however, know better. In that sense, history can be a good teacher. Let’s explore this further.

Over the past two decades, the dynamics in the technology industry has changed in many ways. From a business perspective, there has been a significant shift from the large conglomerates to large focused businesses through consolidation. Big companies are also concentrating more on integration, acquisition and distribution channels. And small companies are now leveraging India – once the exclusive domain of companies with large infrastructures. Technology advances have also changed the way business is conducted. The Internet, VoIP, and new business models such as Software as a Service are challenging traditional assumptions.

From a career standpoint, the premise of job security in large companies is no longer a given. Furthermore, most new jobs – at least in the U.S. - are in small companies.

What does all this mean? In at nutshell, what worked yesterday may not work tomorrow.

In the last ten years of the IT industry, the business focus and the job scene has changed significantly. In the early to mid 90’s, offshore projects were in vogue and the job scene revolved around joining multinational companies, job-hopping and focusing on the technology and title. While there were plenty of jobs to go around, many people favored large companies because of job security and benefits.