The reality is that IT is IT. If you are experienced in a bunch of things how long do you think it will take you to pick something up? Not long. There is a bigger problem today though, nobody wants to train anybody. So you have to do it on your own dime. So even if you do that it does not mean people will give you a job. I have been looking for the past few months and I can tell you for a fact that the employers are being incredibly picky now - must have a minimum of 10 years of pharma, 10 years of telecom, must have abcdefghijkmnopqrstuvw.... blah skills. Its incredible now. On top of this they get like 200 candidates for every single job.
Just to add fuel to your fire. I wanted to join a linkedin group and they required you to be a member of some other website so I went to check it out. I kid you not, the first topic had a guy saying to the effect of "we can find great statistics people but we can't find anyone who can write C and is great at statistics". So, a guy who masters statistics, and probably a decent bit of math along with it, has to also learn to program because, god forbid, the employer invest in the employee while they get up to speed on C.
Further, there is apparently a new trend along the lines of "don't apply if you don't already have a job".
And to add to the amusement, I decided to search for PHP at indeed.com, figuring it would provide the laundry lists, and you know what, it did not. The job descriptions were pretty reasonable even with the laundry lists. PHP is kind of fluid and it all kind of messes together. I even found an entry level job something I was certain only went to interns these days. And unless the "you aren't working brand" is too powerful, or, they have 200 resumes I'd have a legitimate shot at what I saw.
I really want to get out of development, and I spent so damn much time doing the BI/database piece, which I like and fits me, but the market is screaming "come to me and we'll PHP together".
