The people I speak with about virtualization projects always list the same reasons for going virtual; they don’t have enough space in their data center to add more physical servers, they can’t afford power and cooling bills, they want to consolidate physical machines, and they want to consolidate physical people.

That’s right; the majority of people I speak with - employers and employees alike - say nonchalantly that they deploy virtual machines to avoid deploying more IT staff. While this is great for corporations, it doesn’t sound so good for IT job seekers.

A few examples; I went to a VMware Inc. User Group meeting in Boston on March 27, and one user gave a presentation about the virtualization project he oversaw at the paper manufacturing company called SAPPi in Maine.

“One reason we wanted to virtualize is we needed to lower our IT headcount. We needed to get rid of high end support and just keep desktop support,” the systems engineer/presenter said.

Similarly, at the growing law firm Owen Bird Law Corp. in Vancouver, British Columbia, Stephen Bakerman, the sole IT staffer, went with Virtual Iron virtualization to avoid adding more physical servers and having to hire more staff to help him manage it all.

“The cost savings is probably $100,000, and the time savings for me are incredible. Once everything is virtualized, I can run everything from my desktop remotely from my office or at home. I don’t have to hire someone else, and I would have if we kept adding servers,” Bakerman said.

Another company called QualComm Inc virtualized 60% of its data center environment and saw a similar side effect. At the VMware Virtualization Seminar Series in Providence, RI Feb 26, VMware presented a case study of the wireless technology company showing how it started with 1,200 servers and consolidated down to 100 (12:1 ratio) physical servers, increasing data center space and cutting back on power and cooling. That’s great. And the cherry on top? They have not had to increase their IT staff at all in 2.5 years.

Sure, I get how cool virtualization is, and the benefits it brings from a savings and management stand-point, but is anyone else concerned those IT college kids who dream of days spent engineering systems won’t be able to find a job? or is anyone worried about those system administrators who might get consolidated from many to few along with their servers?

I’m interested in hearing from IT folks; is virtualization leading to a virtual job market?