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 2 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 61 72 57
Rank change year-on-year +11 -15 +3
Contract jobs citing Service Management 695 442 653
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 3.79% 3.07% 3.35%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.44% 3.51% 3.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 473 274 491
10th Percentile £185 £202 £248
25th Percentile £313 £373 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% +10.53%
75th Percentile £576 £600 £600
90th Percentile £725 £675 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £528
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.47% +5.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 76 20 10
10th Percentile £12.94 £20.16 £15.17
25th Percentile £16.64 £24.18 £15.73
Median hourly rate £20.79 £30.43 £17.72
Median % change year-on-year -31.67% +71.70% -31.34%
75th Percentile £60.00 £39.94 £21.50
90th Percentile £77.13 £67.63 £49.38
UK median hourly rate £22.14 £30.20 £21.00
% change year-on-year -26.69% +43.81% -13.40%

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 15,665 12,597 17,087
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 85.53% 87.51% 87.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,623 7,372 10,985
10th Percentile £220 £239 £250
25th Percentile £375 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £685 £690
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,712 721 1,248
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.50 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.30 £20.00 £17.72
Median hourly rate £23.79 £30.78 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -22.72% -31.60% +43.91%
75th Percentile £52.52 £63.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £68.75 £73.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £43.79
% change year-on-year -22.62% -25.79% +25.12%

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 2 January 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 2 January 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 2 January 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 +38 192 £500 - 63
North of England +4 160 £475 +18.75% 48
South West +4 145 £575 +4.55% 19
Midlands +18 123 £488 -11.44% 36
West Midlands +2 95 £510 -7.44% 23
North West -8 90 £550 +37.50% 28
Yorkshire -17 57 £453 +95.46% 15
East of England -10 39 £452 -14.80% 17
Scotland -3 35 £463 +0.27% 15
East Midlands +3 28 £419 -16.25% 13
North East -2 16 £280 -53.04% 5
Northern Ireland - 4 £325 - 5
Wales -4 3 £170 -46.44% 15
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 62 (8.92%) Confluence
2 51 (7.34%) Microsoft Exchange
3 44 (6.33%) SharePoint
4 15 (2.16%) Apache
5 14 (2.01%) WebLogic
6 10 (1.44%) Skype for Business
7 5 (0.72%) SharePoint Server
8 2 (0.29%) JBoss
9 1 (0.14%) CMS
9 1 (0.14%) HCL Notes
9 1 (0.14%) IIS
9 1 (0.14%) WebSphere
Applications
1 84 (12.09%) Microsoft Office
2 35 (5.04%) Microsoft Project
3 21 (3.02%) Microsoft Excel
4 10 (1.44%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (1.01%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 16 (2.30%) Remedy ITSM
2 13 (1.87%) Oracle EBS
3 3 (0.43%) assyst
4 2 (0.29%) Dynamics CRM
4 2 (0.29%) Salesforce CRM
5 1 (0.14%) Maximo
5 1 (0.14%) SAP ERP
5 1 (0.14%) SAP HR
5 1 (0.14%) SAP PM
5 1 (0.14%) SAP S/4HANA
5 1 (0.14%) SystmOne
Cloud Services
1 106 (15.25%) Azure
2 80 (11.51%) AWS
3 63 (9.06%) Microsoft 365
4 37 (5.32%) GCP
5 22 (3.17%) Entra ID
6 21 (3.02%) Power Platform
7 16 (2.30%) OneDrive
8 14 (2.01%) Azure Monitor
9 12 (1.73%) SaaS
10 10 (1.44%) Azure DevOps
11 9 (1.29%) PowerApps
12 7 (1.01%) Salesforce Service Cloud
13 5 (0.72%) IaaS
13 5 (0.72%) OpenShift
13 5 (0.72%) Power Automate
14 4 (0.58%) Amazon EC2
14 4 (0.58%) Amazon S3
14 4 (0.58%) AWS Lambda
14 4 (0.58%) GitHub
14 4 (0.58%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 44 (6.33%) DNS
2 29 (4.17%) DHCP
2 29 (4.17%) Firewall
3 22 (3.17%) VLAN
4 21 (3.02%) TCP/IP
4 21 (3.02%) VPN
5 20 (2.88%) Skype
6 18 (2.59%) LAN
7 17 (2.45%) Cisco Firepower
7 17 (2.45%) Cisco IOS
7 17 (2.45%) Cisco ISE
7 17 (2.45%) Junos
7 17 (2.45%) WAN
8 15 (2.16%) Network Security
9 8 (1.15%) WebEx
9 8 (1.15%) Wi-Fi
10 6 (0.86%) SSH
10 6 (0.86%) Wireless
11 5 (0.72%) BGP
11 5 (0.72%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 16 (2.30%) Relational Database
2 14 (2.01%) Power BI
3 8 (1.15%) SQL Server
4 6 (0.86%) Amazon RDS
5 4 (0.58%) Data Mining
5 4 (0.58%) InfluxDB
5 4 (0.58%) Metadata
6 3 (0.43%) PostgreSQL
7 2 (0.29%) Azure SQL Database
7 2 (0.29%) Big Data
7 2 (0.29%) MongoDB
8 1 (0.14%) BusinessObjects
8 1 (0.14%) DB2
8 1 (0.14%) GIS
8 1 (0.14%) MariaDB
8 1 (0.14%) Oracle Discoverer
8 1 (0.14%) Oracle Reports
8 1 (0.14%) RDBMS
8 1 (0.14%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 1 (0.14%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 98 (14.10%) JIRA
2 17 (2.45%) Jenkins
3 7 (1.01%) Bitbucket
4 6 (0.86%) Git
5 5 (0.72%) webpack
6 4 (0.58%) GitLab
7 2 (0.29%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 1 (0.14%) MLflow
8 1 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 289 (41.58%) Social Skills
2 140 (20.14%) Analytical Skills
3 91 (13.09%) Public Sector
4 79 (11.37%) Finance
5 44 (6.33%) Military
6 34 (4.89%) Legal
7 31 (4.46%) Organisational Skills
8 28 (4.03%) Manufacturing
9 22 (3.17%) Telecoms
10 18 (2.59%) Documentation Skills
11 17 (2.45%) Banking
12 14 (2.01%) Influencing Skills
13 12 (1.73%) Electronics
13 12 (1.73%) Marketing
13 12 (1.73%) Retail
14 11 (1.58%) Presentation Skills
15 9 (1.29%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 6 (0.86%) Investment Banking
17 5 (0.72%) Billing
17 5 (0.72%) Police
Job Titles
1 93 (13.38%) Architect
2 89 (12.81%) Analyst
3 67 (9.64%) Lead
4 66 (9.50%) Service Architect
5 56 (8.06%) Support Engineer
6 48 (6.91%) Service Manager
7 39 (5.61%) IT Support
8 31 (4.46%) Support Analyst
9 30 (4.32%) 2nd Line Support
10 25 (3.60%) Network Engineer
11 24 (3.45%) Desktop Support
12 23 (3.31%) Platform Engineer
13 22 (3.17%) Consultant
14 21 (3.02%) IT Analyst
15 20 (2.88%) 3rd Line Engineer
15 20 (2.88%) Hardware Engineer
15 20 (2.88%) Infrastructure Engineer
15 20 (2.88%) Senior
16 19 (2.73%) Delivery Manager
16 19 (2.73%) Service Delivery Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (3.02%) REST
2 8 (1.15%) CSS
2 8 (1.15%) XMPP
3 7 (1.01%) HTML
3 7 (1.01%) RFC 2544
3 7 (1.01%) SOAP
4 5 (0.72%) .NET
4 5 (0.72%) CSS3
4 5 (0.72%) HTML5
4 5 (0.72%) Node.js
4 5 (0.72%) React
4 5 (0.72%) Redux
4 5 (0.72%) RESTful
5 4 (0.58%) Elastic Stack
5 4 (0.58%) RabbitMQ
5 4 (0.58%) Web Services
6 3 (0.43%) Lightning Web Components
7 2 (0.29%) GraphQL
7 2 (0.29%) ModSecurity
7 2 (0.29%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 53 (7.63%) Product Ownership
2 33 (4.75%) Data Centre
3 26 (3.74%) Management Information System
4 22 (3.17%) CMDB
5 20 (2.88%) Onboarding
6 19 (2.73%) Driving Licence
6 19 (2.73%) PKI
7 17 (2.45%) Self-Motivation
8 16 (2.30%) Virtual Team
9 14 (2.01%) Analytical Mindset
10 13 (1.87%) Mainframe
11 9 (1.29%) NHS
12 7 (1.01%) PMI
13 6 (0.86%) Enterprise Software
13 6 (0.86%) Fibre Optics
13 6 (0.86%) Public Cloud
13 6 (0.86%) Tandem
13 6 (0.86%) Video Conferencing
14 5 (0.72%) Distributed Systems
15 4 (0.58%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 171 (24.60%) Windows
2 67 (9.64%) Linux
3 52 (7.48%) Windows Server
4 39 (5.61%) Windows 10
5 24 (3.45%) Unix
6 12 (1.73%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (1.58%) Mac OS
8 7 (1.01%) Apple iOS
8 7 (1.01%) Windows Server 2012
9 6 (0.86%) Android
10 5 (0.72%) Windows 7
11 4 (0.58%) Ubuntu
11 4 (0.58%) Windows Server 2003
11 4 (0.58%) Windows Server 2016
11 4 (0.58%) Windows Server 2019
12 3 (0.43%) CentOS
12 3 (0.43%) Windows Server 2008
13 1 (0.14%) AIX
13 1 (0.14%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.14%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 422 (60.72%) ITIL
2 300 (43.17%) ITSM
3 144 (20.72%) Problem-Solving
4 119 (17.12%) Change Management
5 110 (15.83%) Continuous Improvement
6 105 (15.11%) Agile
7 101 (14.53%) Service Design
8 93 (13.38%) Customer Service
9 90 (12.95%) Stakeholder Management
10 85 (12.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 84 (12.09%) Service Delivery
12 69 (9.93%) Incident Management
13 63 (9.06%) Project Delivery
13 63 (9.06%) Project Management
14 54 (7.77%) Knowledge Transfer
15 53 (7.63%) Acceptance Criteria
16 51 (7.34%) DevOps
17 49 (7.05%) Problem Management
18 45 (6.47%) Business Continuity
18 45 (6.47%) Performance Metrics
Programming Languages
1 60 (8.63%) PowerShell
2 56 (8.06%) SQL
3 49 (7.05%) Python
4 15 (2.16%) Perl
4 15 (2.16%) Shell Script
5 12 (1.73%) Bash
5 12 (1.73%) JavaScript
6 9 (1.29%) Java
7 5 (0.72%) TypeScript
7 5 (0.72%) VB
7 5 (0.72%) VBScript
8 4 (0.58%) Go
9 3 (0.43%) Apex Code
10 2 (0.29%) PHP
11 1 (0.14%) C#
11 1 (0.14%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.14%) T-SQL
11 1 (0.14%) VBA
Qualifications
1 337 (48.49%) Security Cleared
2 272 (39.14%) SC Cleared
3 101 (14.53%) Degree
4 67 (9.64%) DV Cleared
5 41 (5.90%) ITIL Certification
6 35 (5.04%) Microsoft Certification
7 30 (4.32%) TOGAF Certification
8 17 (2.45%) A+ Certification
9 16 (2.30%) Cisco Certification
9 16 (2.30%) MCSE
10 15 (2.16%) Computer Science Degree
11 14 (2.01%) PMP
11 14 (2.01%) Server+ Certification
12 13 (1.87%) Azure Certification
12 13 (1.87%) PMI Certification
13 12 (1.73%) BPSS Clearance
13 12 (1.73%) CCNA
13 12 (1.73%) CCNP
14 11 (1.58%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
14 11 (1.58%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 37 (5.32%) SLA
2 30 (4.32%) ISO/IEC 20000
3 11 (1.58%) GDPR
4 9 (1.29%) Data Quality
4 9 (1.29%) PMO
5 8 (1.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 5 (0.72%) Disclosure Scotland
6 5 (0.72%) QA
7 4 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.43%) Accessibility
8 3 (0.43%) ISO 9001
8 3 (0.43%) NCSC
9 1 (0.14%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.14%) COBIT
9 1 (0.14%) GRC
9 1 (0.14%) GxP
9 1 (0.14%) NIST
9 1 (0.14%) PCI DSS
9 1 (0.14%) WCAG
System Software
1 82 (11.80%) Active Directory
2 31 (4.46%) VMware Infrastructure
3 21 (3.02%) VMware NSX
4 13 (1.87%) Hyper-V
5 8 (1.15%) Docker
6 6 (0.86%) Virtual Desktop
6 6 (0.86%) Virtual Servers
7 5 (0.72%) BitLocker
7 5 (0.72%) Microsoft Virtual Server
8 4 (0.58%) VMware ESXi
9 3 (0.43%) Virtual Machines
10 1 (0.14%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 32 (4.60%) OPNET
2 26 (3.74%) vCenter Server
3 19 (2.73%) Ansible
3 19 (2.73%) SCCM
4 16 (2.30%) Terraform
5 15 (2.16%) Kubernetes
6 14 (2.01%) Microsoft Intune
7 11 (1.58%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 11 (1.58%) WSUS
8 5 (0.72%) Grafana
9 4 (0.58%) Nessus
9 4 (0.58%) Packer
9 4 (0.58%) Progress Chef
9 4 (0.58%) Prometheus
10 2 (0.29%) Docker Swarm
10 2 (0.29%) FortiGate
10 2 (0.29%) Jamf Pro
10 2 (0.29%) PowerCLI
10 2 (0.29%) Puppet
10 2 (0.29%) SCOM
Vendors
1 157 (22.59%) ServiceNow
2 133 (19.14%) Microsoft
3 78 (11.22%) Cisco
4 56 (8.06%) Atlassian
5 53 (7.63%) Remedy
6 43 (6.19%) Oracle
6 43 (6.19%) VMware
7 33 (4.75%) Splunk
8 32 (4.60%) Google
9 31 (4.46%) SolarWinds
10 22 (3.17%) HP
10 22 (3.17%) SAP
11 20 (2.88%) AppDynamics
11 20 (2.88%) Juniper
12 19 (2.73%) Dynatrace
13 14 (2.01%) Salesforce
14 13 (1.87%) Palo Alto
14 13 (1.87%) Red Hat
14 13 (1.87%) Veeam
15 10 (1.44%) Citrix