That it's (now) uncommon technology is only a small part of the hiring problem. Anyway, what's the alternative here? It is almost certainly not worth the effort to rewrite everything in today's common environment 30 years into the service life of the jet; whatever you do now is going to be uncommon again.
A bigger part of the hiring problem is aerospace software, specifically military aerospace software is a difficult field to hire for. Clearance requirements limits your pool. Building weapons of war limits your pool. Low salary compared to other software job limits your pool. Very high level of process / low velocity of shipping limits your pool. If you require experience in the environment, rather than training otherwise appropriate candidates, that's going to be a limit too, but if you work in a specialized environment, you really have to accept that you will need to train people.
The current hiring model of "hit-the-ground-sprinting day 1" I suspect is largely the problem here and stems across many industries complaining about hiring difficulties.
Since this "best existing skillset match" hiring model businesses have widely chosen to adopt provide little-to-no on the job training, people will inherently focus on learning the most widely adopted skills of their target market(s) to increase their odds of finding a position in the labor market. Even niche skills will typically target larger proven successful niches and not target risky niches.
As a result, your business better follow industry and technology trends as they shift or you better start investing in your employees and maintain a positive relationship so you don't lose your knowledge assets that are likely undervalued by your business.
Even if Lockheed pays me double, even triple, my current rate, it's likely not worth it for me me wasting my time investing months to years in their specific architecture and fairly non-transferable skills acquired doing so since employer/employee relationships and loyalty are dead. That's a hefty investment on my side with little investment on theirs.
No thanks. It can sit empty and their project can fail for all I care.
I was recently considering learning the SAS data stack and decided against it for exactly this reason. However, I’m not completely convinced it was the right choice. Does anyone else have experience that could shed light on this situation?
A bigger part of the hiring problem is aerospace software, specifically military aerospace software is a difficult field to hire for. Clearance requirements limits your pool. Building weapons of war limits your pool. Low salary compared to other software job limits your pool. Very high level of process / low velocity of shipping limits your pool. If you require experience in the environment, rather than training otherwise appropriate candidates, that's going to be a limit too, but if you work in a specialized environment, you really have to accept that you will need to train people.