In the recent years – as in other European Countries – there was a substantial upheaval in the IT sector from a blooming phase to a phase of consolidation. Parallel to this a new system of IT qualifications in the further education sector was introduced. This paper illustrates those developments on the individual and the systems level based on qualitative and quantitative investigations carried out in the framework of the German part EU 5th Framework research project PARTICIPA. This paper will especially focus on the gap between rhetoric and reality of learning and working in the IT sector. Some of the self assessments of the IT-industry and the intentions behind the reform of the CVET system do not match the evidence gathered in the research project.