Couchbase, a cloud database platform company, has announced the findings from its research, revealing the trends, challenges and opportunities developers are experiencing in their roles. The survey of 533 US-based software developers found that nine out of 10 developers are at or over their work capacity and are calling for automation and SQL-based database query tools to help them boost productivity. Additionally, a majority of respondents (86%) indicated they are currently facing challenges in hiring developers with the right skill set.
As developers’ overall workload increases, more are taking on tasks outside of their normal purview – with only 5% saying they had the ability for more projects. Specifically, when developers were asked if their responsibilities have been affected in the past 12 months, three out of four admitted they consistently shoulder responsibilities outside of their job description.
Of the developers whose roles have seen an increase in workload, more than half (54.1%) experienced increased stress, 43.8% were overwhelmed, 40.2% felt burned out and 31.3% expressed a lack of work-life balance. To address these challenges, the survey revealed many are pointing to automation, along with SQL-based database tools, as the top ways to increase their productivity.
“As the digital innovation continues to accelerate, it’s no surprise that developers want more automation and familiar, easy-to-learn tools to help them keep up with their day-to-day workflows,” said Perry Krug, Head of Developer Experience at Couchbase. “Automating repetitive, lower-value tasks frees up a developer’s availability to redirect their time and talent to higher-value projects, like creating business-critical applications.”
Additional key findings from the survey include:
- A majority of respondents (87.2%) still use legacy relational databases as their primary database to build applications when they are actively looking for more flexibility and agility. Factors that would influence developers to explore non-relational databases include speed, flexibility, security, scalability and cost savings.
- Over the next 12 months, developers aim to increase scalability, reduce costs and maintain data governance compliance for their database infrastructure.
- The top internal challenges faced by developer teams include talent shortages, the need to ask for access to data or other systems and meeting compliance requirements.
- Hiring managers say the top three technical skills required to build modern applications are cloud-based technologies, SQL and experience working with teammates throughout the data life cycle. However, as the employment landscape continues to evolve, 86% of managers reported that hiring developers with the right skill set remains a significant challenge.
