Oakton suffers Plumbing exodus

A number of Oakton employees working within one of its customers, Victoria's Industry Plumbing Commission, resigned last week.

ZDNet.com.au understands that six employees working for Oakton on the project resigned. Oakton had not responded to requests for comment at the time of writing.

Oakton has been working at the commission on project management and systems development. Oakton was paid $242,575 in the 2008/2009 financial year, according to the commission's annual report for the year to 30 June 2009.

The company's CEO Neil Wilson put a brave face on the financial crisis last year in August. He said that the technology spend had stopped being a discretionary purchase and was now viewed as "an essential and vital investment".

However, only two months later, Wilson said that he didn't expect the company to grow at the same speed as it had been. He said that he'd be more careful around staffing. Another two months on, it was revealed that Oakton had let some of its employees go because of reduced demand for specific services.

In February, Oakton confirmed that chief operating officer Steve Parker left the IT services firm just a year after he joined it from the top ranks of Unisys. The day after, the company's results for the same six months to 31 December 2008 showed that the headcount had been reduced by 90 people over six months.

In August 2009, Oakton released its full year results to 30 June, displaying revenues and profits which had taken a hit, a circumstance Wilson attributed to the crisis.