Trying to maintain systems built using old programming languages can be costly for banks and rewarding for programming specialists. But what happens when the specialists retire? By Chris Skinner.
As banks realise their mature technologies are becoming increasingly difficult to maintain, a new breed of technology millionaires is arising. For example, COBOL programmers are now getting paid six-figure salaries, with average salaries up 27% on last year. Here is the story of one of them.
In 1966, Corner Bank promoted one of its young trainees in the data processing (DP) department, Pascal Fortran. Pascal had been enjoying a variety of punch card programming roles at the bank and had recently specialised in COBOL. He was promoted to assistant programmer, COBOL Deposit systems.
In 1976, Pascal became the lead COBOL programmer on the bank’s deposit account systems. Many other trainees had moved on to the hot new technologies, such as the DEC VAX, but Pascal had married and purchased his first house, and was not interested in managing or becoming head of information technology (as his company has started to call the DP department). He just wanted to program.
In 1986, Pascal was one of the few IT people who ignored the PC revolution and the lure of UNIX. He liked COBOL and decided it would be his specialisation long-term. He focused on the COBOL systems that managed Corner Bank’s deposit account systems and his reward was seeing them run without a fault. In his early 40s, Pascal enjoyed a round of golf on the weekend to escape his two young children.
In 1996, Pascal was in a mid-life crisis. People told him he was wrong to ignore PCs and that, with the internet revolution, he should make his fortune by getting into Visual Basic and Java. But he ignored them; he was still wrapped up with COBOL programming. He liked the fact that no-one bothered him and that he could take days off to enjoy golf or see the kids at college whenever he wanted.
In 2006, Pascal has the world at his feet. Many of his peers are specialising in service-oriented architecture, component-based development, J2EE and other things that he found interesting only in passing.
Now, Pascal is ready to retire. But Corner Bank is not ready to let him go; he is the only employee left who understands the COBOL system for its deposit accounts. He is also the only employee to whom the bank has given an annual remuneration package that rewards him with more earnings than most of its executive board. After all, they could not let the system go down could they?
The challenge for the bank now is who is going to take over the system when Pascal retires?
Chris Skinner is an independent financial commentator.(www.balatroltd.com)
