Service Management Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Service Management
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Service Management skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 82 58 56
Rank change year-on-year -24 -2 +10
Contract jobs citing Service Management 663 494 669
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.67% 3.89% 3.27%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.28% 4.29% 3.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 433 288 483
10th Percentile £210 £215 £259
25th Percentile £381 £363 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £521 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.08% -0.71% +10.53%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £600
90th Percentile £688 £688 £700
UK median daily rate £520 £504 £525
% change year-on-year +3.12% -3.95% +4.63%
Number of hourly rates quoted 58 37 17
10th Percentile £16.09 - £12.53
25th Percentile £16.17 £12.62 £15.17
Median hourly rate £60.00 £21.28 £17.72
Median % change year-on-year +181.95% +20.09% -63.46%
75th Percentile £83.94 £28.00 £19.00
90th Percentile £129.23 £33.75 £26.70
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £22.14 £17.72
% change year-on-year +159.71% +24.94% -65.76%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Service Management falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 20,214 11,509 17,140
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 81.29% 90.67% 83.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,094 7,218 10,220
10th Percentile £300 £234 £250
25th Percentile £401 £375 £376
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £575 £600
90th Percentile £676 £650 £688
UK median daily rate £512 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -0.14% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,144 820 2,102
10th Percentile £14.25 £14.19 £12.38
25th Percentile £18.87 £16.95 £15.29
Median hourly rate £42.69 £25.15 £37.75
Median % change year-on-year +69.72% -33.38% +7.86%
75th Percentile £67.84 £62.24 £61.30
90th Percentile £80.04 £75.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £41.94 £27.45 £36.02
% change year-on-year +52.79% -23.80% -2.64%

Service Management
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Service Management relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Service Management job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Service Management
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Management.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Management

Service Management
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Service Management in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Service Management in the UK excluding London

Service Management
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Management.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Management

Service Management
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Service Management in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Service Management in the UK excluding London

Service Management
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Service Management within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 27 May 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
South East +29 189 £525 +16.67% 110
North of England -19 182 £500 +5.26% 77
South West -27 124 £513 -6.90% 29
North West 0 100 £550 +6.40% 31
Yorkshire -26 76 £475 +11.76% 40
Midlands -51 75 £420 -23.64% 51
West Midlands -52 56 £420 -23.77% 42
East of England -18 44 £475 -13.64% 32
Scotland -28 38 £500 -2.44% 10
East Midlands -20 19 £418 -4.24% 9
Wales -13 7 £340 -4.56% 3
North East -21 6 £440 +125.64% 7
Northern Ireland - 4 - - 5
Service Management
UK

Service Management
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 30 (4.52%) Confluence
2 28 (4.22%) Microsoft Exchange
3 24 (3.62%) SharePoint
4 11 (1.66%) Skype for Business
5 6 (0.90%) Mattermost
6 2 (0.30%) IIS
7 1 (0.15%) Apache
7 1 (0.15%) CMS
7 1 (0.15%) JBoss
7 1 (0.15%) LiveCycle
7 1 (0.15%) OpenStack
Applications
1 59 (8.90%) Microsoft Office
2 15 (2.26%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (1.81%) Microsoft Project
4 8 (1.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (0.60%) Chatbot
5 4 (0.60%) PTC Creo
6 2 (0.30%) MS Visio
7 1 (0.15%) Camtasia
Business Applications
1 40 (6.03%) Remedy ITSM
2 10 (1.51%) SAP S/4HANA
3 8 (1.21%) Teamcenter
4 4 (0.60%) Oracle EBS
5 2 (0.30%) Oracle Applications
5 2 (0.30%) Primavera
6 1 (0.15%) NetSuite
6 1 (0.15%) SAP HR
6 1 (0.15%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 90 (13.57%) Azure
2 52 (7.84%) Microsoft 365
3 40 (6.03%) Power Platform
4 30 (4.52%) AWS
5 22 (3.32%) Entra ID
6 20 (3.02%) SaaS
7 19 (2.87%) GCP
8 15 (2.26%) Azure DevOps
9 13 (1.96%) OneDrive
10 9 (1.36%) PaaS
11 8 (1.21%) GitHub
12 7 (1.06%) OCI
13 6 (0.90%) Microsoft Copilot
14 5 (0.75%) Azure Machine Learning
14 5 (0.75%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 5 (0.75%) Google App Engine
14 5 (0.75%) IaaS
14 5 (0.75%) PowerApps
15 4 (0.60%) Azure AKS
16 3 (0.45%) Azure Cosmos DB
Communications & Networking
1 33 (4.98%) Firewall
2 29 (4.37%) DNS
3 24 (3.62%) LAN
4 21 (3.17%) WAN
5 19 (2.87%) Network Security
6 18 (2.71%) DHCP
7 15 (2.26%) VPN
8 14 (2.11%) BGP
9 13 (1.96%) OSPF
10 12 (1.81%) BIG-IP
11 11 (1.66%) Cisco ISE
11 11 (1.66%) Skype
11 11 (1.66%) VLAN
12 9 (1.36%) Wi-Fi
12 9 (1.36%) Wireless
13 8 (1.21%) Ethernet VPN
13 8 (1.21%) Junos
13 8 (1.21%) TCP/IP
13 8 (1.21%) VXLAN
14 4 (0.60%) ATM
Database & Business Intelligence
1 32 (4.83%) Power BI
2 13 (1.96%) SQL Server
3 6 (0.90%) PostgreSQL
4 5 (0.75%) Oracle Reports
4 5 (0.75%) Relational Database
5 3 (0.45%) Azure SQL Database
5 3 (0.45%) SQL Server Analysis Services
5 3 (0.45%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 3 (0.45%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 2 (0.30%) MariaDB
6 2 (0.30%) Microsoft Analysis Services
6 2 (0.30%) MySQL
6 2 (0.30%) Oracle Database
7 1 (0.15%) Amazon RDS
7 1 (0.15%) DTS
7 1 (0.15%) GIS
7 1 (0.15%) InfluxDB
7 1 (0.15%) MongoDB
7 1 (0.15%) OpenStack Swift
7 1 (0.15%) Oracle Database 11g
Development Applications
1 73 (11.01%) JIRA
2 14 (2.11%) Git
3 9 (1.36%) Bitbucket
3 9 (1.36%) GitLab
4 8 (1.21%) Jenkins
5 6 (0.90%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 5 (0.75%) Browser DevTools
7 4 (0.60%) MLflow
8 3 (0.45%) Fiddler
9 2 (0.30%) Firebug
9 2 (0.30%) IntelliJ
9 2 (0.30%) ScriptRunner
9 2 (0.30%) Visual Studio Code
10 1 (0.15%) Claude Code
10 1 (0.15%) Gemini Tracker
10 1 (0.15%) Hudson
10 1 (0.15%) IBM UrbanCode
10 1 (0.15%) MSI
10 1 (0.15%) Rational DOORS
10 1 (0.15%) webpack
General
1 237 (35.75%) Social Skills
2 89 (13.42%) Finance
3 84 (12.67%) Analytical Skills
4 67 (10.11%) Public Sector
5 42 (6.33%) Legal
6 25 (3.77%) Military
7 19 (2.87%) Organisational Skills
8 16 (2.41%) Influencing Skills
8 16 (2.41%) Telecoms
9 15 (2.26%) Documentation Skills
10 12 (1.81%) Retail
11 11 (1.66%) Aerospace
11 11 (1.66%) Banking
12 8 (1.21%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 8 (1.21%) Presentation Skills
13 4 (0.60%) Financial Institution
14 3 (0.45%) Local Government
15 2 (0.30%) Pharmaceutical
15 2 (0.30%) Publishing
16 1 (0.15%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 86 (12.97%) Service Manager
2 74 (11.16%) Analyst
3 63 (9.50%) Lead
4 57 (8.60%) Architect
5 50 (7.54%) Senior
6 42 (6.33%) IT Manager
7 30 (4.52%) Service Analyst
8 29 (4.37%) Hardware Engineer
9 25 (3.77%) Service Architect
10 24 (3.62%) Consultant
10 24 (3.62%) Delivery Manager
10 24 (3.62%) Network Engineer
11 23 (3.47%) Project Manager
12 21 (3.17%) IT Services Manager
13 20 (3.02%) Support Engineer
14 19 (2.87%) IT Analyst
15 17 (2.56%) Designer
15 17 (2.56%) Infrastructure Engineer
15 17 (2.56%) Service Delivery Manager
16 16 (2.41%) Transition Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.92%) REST
2 14 (2.11%) SOAP
3 9 (1.36%) OAuth
4 8 (1.21%) 802.1X
5 5 (0.75%) OpenID
5 5 (0.75%) Oracle Fusion
5 5 (0.75%) SAML
6 4 (0.60%) .NET
6 4 (0.60%) CSS
6 4 (0.60%) HTML
6 4 (0.60%) OAuth2
6 4 (0.60%) Web Services
6 4 (0.60%) XML
6 4 (0.60%) XMPP
7 3 (0.45%) FIDO
7 3 (0.45%) Flash
7 3 (0.45%) Microsoft Graph
7 3 (0.45%) Middleware
8 2 (0.30%) ADO
8 2 (0.30%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 42 (6.33%) Product Ownership
2 37 (5.58%) Onboarding
3 35 (5.28%) CMDB
4 28 (4.22%) Data Centre
5 22 (3.32%) PKI
6 21 (3.17%) Clustering
6 21 (3.17%) Virtual Team
7 18 (2.71%) Management Information System
8 17 (2.56%) Enterprise Software
9 16 (2.41%) Driving Licence
10 11 (1.66%) Data Protection Act
10 11 (1.66%) Operational Technology
11 9 (1.36%) PMI
12 7 (1.06%) Replication
12 7 (1.06%) Self-Motivation
13 6 (0.90%) Analytical Mindset
13 6 (0.90%) Cloud Native
14 4 (0.60%) Legacy Systems
14 4 (0.60%) Security Posture
14 4 (0.60%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 139 (20.97%) Windows
2 36 (5.43%) Linux
3 34 (5.13%) Windows 10
3 34 (5.13%) Windows Server
4 13 (1.96%) Windows 7
5 10 (1.51%) Unix
6 5 (0.75%) Mac OS
6 5 (0.75%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (0.45%) Ubuntu
8 2 (0.30%) Solaris
8 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.15%) Android
9 1 (0.15%) Apple iOS
9 1 (0.15%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.15%) Rocky
9 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2008
9 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2012
9 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.15%) Windows XP
9 1 (0.15%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 374 (56.41%) ITIL
2 287 (43.29%) ITSM
3 157 (23.68%) Continuous Improvement
4 138 (20.81%) Agile
5 137 (20.66%) Stakeholder Management
6 123 (18.55%) Problem-Solving
7 112 (16.89%) Service Delivery
8 94 (14.18%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 86 (12.97%) Change Management
10 76 (11.46%) Customer Service
11 71 (10.71%) DevOps
12 59 (8.90%) Configuration Management
13 55 (8.30%) Service Design
14 53 (7.99%) Problem Management
15 45 (6.79%) Project Delivery
16 43 (6.49%) Roadmaps
17 42 (6.33%) Incident Management
18 38 (5.73%) Cybersecurity
19 37 (5.58%) Asset Management
19 37 (5.58%) CI/CD
Programming Languages
1 51 (7.69%) PowerShell
2 37 (5.58%) SQL
3 26 (3.92%) Python
4 23 (3.47%) JavaScript
5 11 (1.66%) VB
5 11 (1.66%) VBScript
6 9 (1.36%) Bash
7 5 (0.75%) C#
8 4 (0.60%) PL/SQL
9 3 (0.45%) Apex Code
9 3 (0.45%) Java
9 3 (0.45%) T-SQL
10 2 (0.30%) PHP
10 2 (0.30%) Search Processing Language
10 2 (0.30%) Shell Script
11 1 (0.15%) Bicep
11 1 (0.15%) Go
11 1 (0.15%) Perl
11 1 (0.15%) REXX
11 1 (0.15%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 324 (48.87%) Security Cleared
2 217 (32.73%) SC Cleared
3 109 (16.44%) DV Cleared
4 71 (10.71%) Degree
5 34 (5.13%) ITIL Certification
6 25 (3.77%) Cisco Certification
7 20 (3.02%) PMI Certification
8 18 (2.71%) Computer Science Degree
9 17 (2.56%) PMP
10 14 (2.11%) CCNA
11 13 (1.96%) BPSS Clearance
12 12 (1.81%) Microsoft Certification
13 10 (1.51%) A+ Certification
13 10 (1.51%) CCNP
14 9 (1.36%) JNCIA
14 9 (1.36%) JNCIP
14 9 (1.36%) JNCIS
14 9 (1.36%) Network+ Certification
14 9 (1.36%) TOGAF Certification
15 8 (1.21%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 37 (5.58%) SLA
2 24 (3.62%) Data Quality
3 17 (2.56%) PMO
4 15 (2.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 14 (2.11%) ISO/IEC 20000
6 13 (1.96%) QA
7 12 (1.81%) GDPR
8 10 (1.51%) Cyber Essentials
8 10 (1.51%) NCSC
9 9 (1.36%) GRC
10 7 (1.06%) COBIT
10 7 (1.06%) Government Security Classifications
11 6 (0.90%) Accessibility
11 6 (0.90%) ISO 31000
11 6 (0.90%) ISO/IEC 27005
12 4 (0.60%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 4 (0.60%) Disclosure Scotland
12 4 (0.60%) GMP
12 4 (0.60%) ISO 9001
13 3 (0.45%) JSP 440
System Software
1 70 (10.56%) Active Directory
2 34 (5.13%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (2.11%) VMware ESXi
4 11 (1.66%) BitLocker
5 9 (1.36%) Docker
6 6 (0.90%) VMware NSX
6 6 (0.90%) vSphere
7 5 (0.75%) vCloud
8 4 (0.60%) NFS
8 4 (0.60%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.30%) Firmware
9 2 (0.30%) GPFS
9 2 (0.30%) Hyper-V
9 2 (0.30%) KVM
10 1 (0.15%) iptables
10 1 (0.15%) Oracle RAC
10 1 (0.15%) Samba
10 1 (0.15%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.15%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 23 (3.47%) SCCM
2 21 (3.17%) Ansible
3 16 (2.41%) Microsoft Intune
4 12 (1.81%) Kubernetes
4 12 (1.81%) Terraform
5 9 (1.36%) OPNET
6 8 (1.21%) FortiGate
6 8 (1.21%) Single Sign-On
6 8 (1.21%) vCenter Server
7 6 (0.90%) SCOM
8 4 (0.60%) Grafana
8 4 (0.60%) Jamf Pro
8 4 (0.60%) PowerCLI
8 4 (0.60%) Progress Chef
8 4 (0.60%) Puppet
8 4 (0.60%) vMotion
9 3 (0.45%) Cisco Prime
9 3 (0.45%) Dell DRAC
9 3 (0.45%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
9 3 (0.45%) vRealize
Vendors
1 147 (22.17%) ServiceNow
2 113 (17.04%) Microsoft
3 53 (7.99%) Remedy
4 48 (7.24%) VMware
5 38 (5.73%) Cisco
6 28 (4.22%) HP
7 24 (3.62%) Oracle
8 23 (3.47%) Atlassian
9 19 (2.87%) BMC
10 18 (2.71%) Dell
11 16 (2.41%) SAP
11 16 (2.41%) Splunk
12 15 (2.26%) Canon
13 12 (1.81%) F5
14 11 (1.66%) SolarWinds
15 10 (1.51%) Juniper
16 9 (1.36%) IFS
16 9 (1.36%) Palo Alto
17 8 (1.21%) Extreme Networks
17 8 (1.21%) Red Hat