The buzz around the Australian IT sector is that tighter times are encouraging job hunters to take different approaches to finding work. Associate Professor Jenny Edwards, from the faculty of information technology at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) said she had noticed an increasing number of people trying to find work through people they knew. "Things are undoubtedly tighter than they were six months ago," Edwards said. She said she had noticed a lot more people using contacts, and also some people who had been retrenched using the opportunity to look at doing post-graduate studies they had previously delayed, or reassessing the work they were doing. Philip McCrea, chief executive at high-performance computing center ac3, has also noticed a growing number of IT professionals getting in contact looking for work. While he admires their initiative, he admits it can get annoying receiving unsolicited emails, which are also sent to a number of other organisations as well. It has also received a number of emails for IT workers overseas wanting to move to Australia. McCrea said it had also found that there were a greater number of applications for positions the computing centre advertised. Ac3 has sometimes found that it gets 50-100 applicants for a position, which McCrea said can sometimes be a lot to read through. "Almost everyone knows someone looking for work," McCrea said. "I'd much prefer someone recommended by someone I know." Michel Hedley, national education policy manager at the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA) believes the way IT professionals approach finding work differs depending upon their level of experience, whether or not they've worked in the industry before, career aspirations, and what industry sectors the person wants to work in. "It's important to realise there's probably getting close to 400,000 people that can be regarded as IT managers, IT professionals or IT para-professionals," Hedley said. According to Hedley, about a third of this number are employed by IT companies, vendors. About two-thirds are employed in other sectors, such as banking, utilities, and government. "Increasingly, if you're going to be an IT manager or an IT professional you need uni qualifications," Hedley said. For all job and work-related news, or to search for a job and get information on training, go to ZDNet Jobs. If you have something to say about work and employment issues say it here at the Jobs Forum