The year is ending and it’s time to re-evaluate one’s career and direction in the next five years.  Doing the nuts and bolts of systems administration may not be as relevant anymore.  An article in Computer World UK noted:

So what should today’s IT employee do to protect his or her career? “Look for the skills the company is going to need five years from now, not now, and start building them,” advises Forrester’s Schadler. “These include vendor contract management, integration with the cloud, analytics, rich lightweight Internet workforce applications, mobile applications — these are all skills for the next decade,” he says.

IT executives are considering cloud computing. That’s where the game is at.  It’s going to be a slow shift, but it will surely happen.  Better be prepared than sorry.