E-skills UK, the employer-led Sector Skills Council for IT and Telecoms, has announced a development programme to fast-track the careers of new IT professionals.

The Masters’ level programme is being created by universities and employers. The content of the programme will reflect the industry-endorsed IT Professional Competency Model (PROCOM), which builds on the Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA) to provide a framework for IT professional learning and qualifications.

Karen Price, chief executive of e-skills UK, says: "Many traditional entry-level IT roles are disappearing from the UK due to offshoring and technological advances. At the same time, increasing numbers of IT professional roles in the UK are becoming focused on highly skilled, customer-focused areas such as project management, business analysis and solutions design.

"This means that new IT professionals must be able to progress rapidly to demanding roles without access to the kind of jobs that would help them to build their skills and experience: they have to climb a career ladder with the bottom rungs missing. Our new programme will help to bridge this gap, enabling graduate recruits to build a strong foundation of competence in the early years of their career. It will make a real difference to new IT professionals and their employers."