Hi Wooba,
First of all, the demand for IT skills over here outstrips supply to an extent you wouldn’t believe. Friend of mine works at Hewlett Packard, and a couple of years ago they did some sort of official survey. They predicted that by year 2000, the demand for net-related IT skills (e.g. Java) here in London alone would outstrip supply by about 5000 vacancies. My experience within the industry certainly bears this out. I used to work for an established, successful e-commerce outfit that had a good name. At times, we had TWO people working full-time, x agencies and 1 headhunter on a retainer, solely to try and fill 1 week Java training engagements which were VERY well paid.
Regarding lack of experience, to some extent it’s like anything else, you’re in a vicious circle (no work without experience and vice-versa) so you just have to knock on enough doors until someone gives you that first break. But it is far easier to get that break in IT than in just about anything else in the private sector.
If you go the route I suggested, as a contractor for hire, then I doubt you will have major problems. When you start, your lack of experience means you can’t pick and choose the juiciest contracts - you have to take whatever crumbs come along that other, more experienced contractors have turned down. So you pinch your nose and sup it up, and it’s a great learning experience anyway. After that, your chances get a little better, because now you have 1 contract on your CV. But to some extent you still have to settle for second best. The magic number is THREE. Once you have three contracts under your belt (which will take less than 1 year) you will look, on paper, just as experienced as anyone else because many of the agencies only include details of the preceding 3 contracts anyway. Once you get to this stage, you will have work offered to you all the time, and you can pick and choose whatever YOU want to do, and more or less write your own hourly rate (just keep it somewhere more than ‘generous’ but less than ‘insane’ and you will find takers willing to pay).
Another option is to look for a full-time job over here, but I don’t recommend this. All IT companies in England these days are in and out like accordions. They go through a phase of rapidly hiring, then a few months later some bean counter says shareholder profits are down 1 percent so everyone gets laid off again. You can give 1000 percent loyalty to the firm, late nights and weekends etc., but the firm will show no loyalty to you whatsoever.
Another option is to stay put where you are, and start to work for yourself. It’s easier than you think and it means you don’t have to come and live over here. Ireland may be OK, but England is basically very hard to view patriotically since nothing works and nobody gives a damn. The advantage is that if you’re even slightly entrepreneurial, you can do very well because 99% of the rest of the population are most definitely NOT.
Incidentally, you can test the water, so to speak, free and at no risk. There is nothing to stop you getting your CV on Jobserve (URL is what you would think it is), and for now fibbing slightly about your availability, just to see what offers come down the pipe.
Good luck.