SC Cleared Contract Job Trends in Berkshire

Security Check (SC) Clearance
South East > Berkshire

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in Berkshire with a requirement for SC Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 23 March 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 3 13 9
Rank change year-on-year +10 -4 -1
Contract jobs citing SC Cleared 503 136 238
As % of all contract jobs in Berkshire 27.22% 11.55% 11.58%
As % of the Qualifications category 57.88% 33.75% 25.48%
Number of daily rates quoted 361 79 165
10th Percentile £268 £322 £353
25th Percentile £325 £391 £491
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £525 £605
Median % change year-on-year -14.29% -13.22% +3.24%
75th Percentile £538 £616 £660
90th Percentile £613 £675 £688
South East median daily rate £510 £540 £560
% change year-on-year -5.56% -3.57% +6.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 56 10 17
10th Percentile £23.52 £24.04 £28.25
25th Percentile £73.05 £60.75 £52.90
Median hourly rate £82.00 £67.90 £61.65
Median % change year-on-year +20.77% +10.14% +1.42%
75th Percentile £95.00 £79.30 £63.29
90th Percentile £97.50 £87.02 £75.01
South East median hourly rate £47.50 £61.00 £60.82
% change year-on-year -22.13% +0.30% +0.38%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
Berkshire

SC Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in Berkshire.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 869 403 934
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Berkshire 47.02% 34.24% 45.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 561 219 458
10th Percentile £255 £306 £205
25th Percentile £355 £437 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £550 £525
Median % change year-on-year -18.18% +4.76% -6.25%
75th Percentile £555 £675 £619
90th Percentile £644 £700 £688
South East median daily rate £520 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -5.45% - +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 118 24 79
10th Percentile £22.19 £41.25 £41.25
25th Percentile £71.80 £58.22 £52.90
Median hourly rate £83.00 £62.47 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +32.86% +1.41% -4.75%
75th Percentile £88.00 £75.92 £72.33
90th Percentile £95.00 £86.76 £87.09
South East median hourly rate £47.50 £56.75 £57.35
% change year-on-year -16.30% -1.05% +12.45%

SC Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in Berkshire

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SC Cleared relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Berkshire.

SC Cleared job vacancy trend in Berkshire

SC Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in Berkshire

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing SC Cleared.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing SC Cleared

SC Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in Berkshire

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SC Cleared in Berkshire over the 6 months to 23 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SC Cleared in Berkshire

SC Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in Berkshire

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing SC Cleared.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing SC Cleared

SC Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in Berkshire

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SC Cleared in Berkshire over the 6 months to 23 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for SC Cleared in Berkshire

SC Cleared
Contract Job Locations in Berkshire

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SC Cleared within the Berkshire region over the 6 months to 23 March 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
Reading +18 245 £500 -16.67% 21
Wokingham 0 204 £404 -10.33% 15
Bracknell +11 30 £550 - 6
Maidenhead +1 1 - -
Slough -2 1 - - 10
Thatcham - 1 - -
SC Cleared
South East

SC Cleared
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Berkshire 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 8 (1.59%) Microsoft Exchange
2 7 (1.39%) Confluence
2 7 (1.39%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.20%) Apache
3 1 (0.20%) ArcGIS
3 1 (0.20%) Skype for Business
3 1 (0.20%) Smallworld
Applications
1 21 (4.17%) Microsoft Excel
1 21 (4.17%) Microsoft Office
2 16 (3.18%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (0.99%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.20%) Autodesk Inventor
4 1 (0.20%) CATIA
4 1 (0.20%) MicroStation
4 1 (0.20%) MS Visio
4 1 (0.20%) Siemens NX
4 1 (0.20%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 9 (1.79%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (0.40%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 126 (25.05%) Azure
2 96 (19.09%) AWS
3 54 (10.74%) GCP
4 27 (5.37%) Entra ID
5 17 (3.38%) OneDrive
6 16 (3.18%) OpenShift
7 14 (2.78%) Microsoft 365
8 12 (2.39%) Azure DevOps
9 11 (2.19%) Power Platform
10 10 (1.99%) Datadog
11 8 (1.59%) IaaS
12 7 (1.39%) Power Automate
13 6 (1.19%) Azure Sentinel
14 4 (0.80%) AWS CloudFormation
14 4 (0.80%) PowerApps
14 4 (0.80%) SaaS
15 3 (0.60%) Azure ExpressRoute
15 3 (0.60%) Azure Monitor
15 3 (0.60%) PaaS
15 3 (0.60%) Viva Engage
Communications & Networking
1 38 (7.55%) Firewall
2 33 (6.56%) Network Security
3 28 (5.57%) DNS
4 21 (4.17%) DHCP
4 21 (4.17%) Wireless
5 20 (3.98%) LAN
6 17 (3.38%) WAN
7 15 (2.98%) TCP/IP
8 13 (2.58%) BGP
8 13 (2.58%) OSPF
9 12 (2.39%) VPN
10 11 (2.19%) Unified Communications
10 11 (2.19%) Wi-Fi
11 10 (1.99%) 4G
12 9 (1.79%) SD-WAN
12 9 (1.79%) Wireshark
12 9 (1.79%) WLAN
13 8 (1.59%) FTP
13 8 (1.59%) MPLS
13 8 (1.59%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (2.39%) SQL Server
2 9 (1.79%) Oracle Database
2 9 (1.79%) Power BI
3 6 (1.19%) Oracle Database 12c
4 3 (0.60%) Data Warehouse
4 3 (0.60%) NoSQL
4 3 (0.60%) Tableau
5 2 (0.40%) PostgreSQL
5 2 (0.40%) SAP Data Services
5 2 (0.40%) SAP HANA
6 1 (0.20%) Amazon RDS
6 1 (0.20%) Data Mining
6 1 (0.20%) GIS
6 1 (0.20%) MongoDB
6 1 (0.20%) MySQL
6 1 (0.20%) Oracle Database 11g
6 1 (0.20%) Oracle Reports
6 1 (0.20%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 21 (4.17%) Burp Suite
1 21 (4.17%) Metasploit
2 17 (3.38%) JIRA
3 14 (2.78%) Jenkins
4 11 (2.19%) Rational DOORS
5 7 (1.39%) Subversion
6 4 (0.80%) Bitbucket
6 4 (0.80%) Eclipse
6 4 (0.80%) Maven
7 3 (0.60%) Android Studio
8 2 (0.40%) Balsamiq
8 2 (0.40%) GitLab
8 2 (0.40%) HP UFT
9 1 (0.20%) Browser DevTools
9 1 (0.20%) Git
9 1 (0.20%) JUnit
9 1 (0.20%) Liquibase
9 1 (0.20%) Mockito
9 1 (0.20%) NeoLoad
General
1 183 (36.38%) Social Skills
2 73 (14.51%) Public Sector
3 71 (14.12%) Analytical Skills
4 27 (5.37%) Aerospace
4 27 (5.37%) Documentation Skills
5 20 (3.98%) Finance
6 10 (1.99%) Telecoms
7 7 (1.39%) Advertising
8 6 (1.19%) Influencing Skills
9 5 (0.99%) Military
10 4 (0.80%) Legal
11 3 (0.60%) Manufacturing
11 3 (0.60%) Marketing
12 2 (0.40%) Local Government
12 2 (0.40%) Presentation Skills
13 1 (0.20%) Avionics
13 1 (0.20%) Banking
13 1 (0.20%) Electronics
13 1 (0.20%) Law
13 1 (0.20%) Police
Job Titles
1 55 (10.93%) Consultant
2 39 (7.75%) Lead
3 37 (7.36%) Analyst
4 36 (7.16%) Network Engineer
5 33 (6.56%) Senior
6 32 (6.36%) Architect
6 32 (6.36%) Network Consultant
7 22 (4.37%) Penetration Tester
7 22 (4.37%) SIEM Engineer
8 21 (4.17%) Project Manager
9 20 (3.98%) Tester
10 19 (3.78%) Cisco Engineer
10 19 (3.78%) Cisco Network Engineer
11 18 (3.58%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
11 18 (3.58%) Support Engineer
12 17 (3.38%) Developer
13 15 (2.98%) Delivery Manager
14 14 (2.78%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 14 (2.78%) SC Cleared Project Manager
14 14 (2.78%) Systems Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 18 (3.58%) LDAP
2 9 (1.79%) Loki
2 9 (1.79%) Oracle GoldenGate
3 5 (0.99%) Middleware
4 4 (0.80%) Elastic Stack
4 4 (0.80%) XML
5 3 (0.60%) ARM Templates
5 3 (0.60%) SAML
6 2 (0.40%) 802.1X
6 2 (0.40%) ADO
6 2 (0.40%) OAuth
6 2 (0.40%) OAuth2
6 2 (0.40%) OpenID
7 1 (0.20%) LAMP
7 1 (0.20%) MERN Stack
7 1 (0.20%) React
7 1 (0.20%) WPF
7 1 (0.20%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 27 (5.37%) Data Centre
2 22 (4.37%) Onboarding
3 17 (3.38%) Cloud Native
4 16 (3.18%) Security Posture
5 11 (2.19%) Cyber Security Posture
5 11 (2.19%) Management Information System
6 10 (1.99%) Virtual Team
7 9 (1.79%) Product Ownership
8 8 (1.59%) Analytical Mindset
8 8 (1.59%) Enterprise Software
9 7 (1.39%) Driving Licence
9 7 (1.39%) PMI
9 7 (1.39%) Self-Motivation
10 6 (1.19%) PKI
11 5 (0.99%) Data Protection Act
11 5 (0.99%) Distributed Systems
11 5 (0.99%) Handset
12 4 (0.80%) Legacy Systems
12 4 (0.80%) Operational Technology
12 4 (0.80%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 67 (13.32%) Windows
2 63 (12.52%) Linux
3 24 (4.77%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 14 (2.78%) Windows Server
5 13 (2.58%) Windows 10
6 8 (1.59%) Unix
7 7 (1.39%) Android
7 7 (1.39%) Kali Linux
8 4 (0.80%) Mac OS
9 2 (0.40%) SUSE
9 2 (0.40%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
10 1 (0.20%) OpenVMS
10 1 (0.20%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 89 (17.69%) ITIL
2 84 (16.70%) Problem-Solving
3 73 (14.51%) Cybersecurity
4 71 (14.12%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 70 (13.92%) CI/CD
5 70 (13.92%) Migration
6 65 (12.92%) Roadmaps
7 54 (10.74%) Continuous Improvement
7 54 (10.74%) DevOps
8 49 (9.74%) Change Management
8 49 (9.74%) Collaborative Working
9 48 (9.54%) Service Management
10 47 (9.34%) Agile
11 46 (9.15%) SIEM
11 46 (9.15%) Stakeholder Management
12 43 (8.55%) DevSecOps
13 42 (8.35%) ITSM
14 28 (5.57%) Validation
15 26 (5.17%) Performance Metrics
16 23 (4.57%) Infrastructure Engineering
Programming Languages
1 85 (16.90%) Python
2 64 (12.72%) PowerShell
3 29 (5.77%) Bash
4 20 (3.98%) Kusto Query Language
5 13 (2.58%) SQL
6 9 (1.79%) Korn
6 9 (1.79%) Shell Script
7 8 (1.59%) Java
8 5 (0.99%) Bicep
9 4 (0.80%) Go
10 2 (0.40%) C++
10 2 (0.40%) VBScript
11 1 (0.20%) C#
11 1 (0.20%) JavaScript
11 1 (0.20%) Perl
11 1 (0.20%) PHP
11 1 (0.20%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 503 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 39 (7.75%) Degree
3 37 (7.36%) CISSP
4 21 (4.17%) CISM
5 20 (3.98%) CEH
5 20 (3.98%) DV Cleared
6 18 (3.58%) PMP
7 14 (2.78%) AWS Certification
7 14 (2.78%) Azure Certification
7 14 (2.78%) CHECK Team Member
8 13 (2.58%) PMI Certification
9 12 (2.39%) BPSS Clearance
9 12 (2.39%) CREST Certified
9 12 (2.39%) Cyber Scheme
9 12 (2.39%) GIAC
10 10 (1.99%) Postgraduate
11 9 (1.79%) CCNP
11 9 (1.79%) Cisco Certification
12 7 (1.39%) GPEN
12 7 (1.39%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 47 (9.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 37 (7.36%) NIST
3 33 (6.56%) GDPR
4 17 (3.38%) PMO
5 15 (2.98%) QA
6 14 (2.78%) PCI DSS
7 13 (2.58%) NCSC
8 5 (0.99%) NIST 800
9 3 (0.60%) Accessibility
9 3 (0.60%) DO-254
9 3 (0.60%) IEC 61508
9 3 (0.60%) ISO 26262
9 3 (0.60%) SLA
10 2 (0.40%) Cyber Essentials
10 2 (0.40%) JSP 440
11 1 (0.20%) Actionable Recommendations
11 1 (0.20%) Data Quality
11 1 (0.20%) Def Stans
11 1 (0.20%) ISO 22301
System Software
1 63 (12.52%) Active Directory
2 29 (5.77%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (2.78%) vSphere
4 12 (2.39%) Docker
5 9 (1.79%) Oracle RAC
6 5 (0.99%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.80%) Hyper-V
8 3 (0.60%) Firmware
9 2 (0.40%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.20%) NFS
10 1 (0.20%) Terminal Services
10 1 (0.20%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 33 (6.56%) Kubernetes
2 21 (4.17%) Nmap
3 16 (3.18%) Ansible
4 15 (2.98%) SCCM
4 15 (2.98%) Terraform
5 14 (2.78%) Argo
5 14 (2.78%) Grafana
5 14 (2.78%) Prometheus
6 12 (2.39%) Kibana
7 11 (2.19%) Microsoft Intune
8 10 (1.99%) Oracle RMAN
9 9 (1.79%) Kustomize
9 9 (1.79%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 9 (1.79%) Red Hat Satellite
10 5 (0.99%) Nagios
10 5 (0.99%) vCenter Server
11 4 (0.80%) Cisco CUCM
11 4 (0.80%) Single Sign-On
12 3 (0.60%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
13 2 (0.40%) NetBackup
Vendors
1 74 (14.71%) Cisco
2 57 (11.33%) Microsoft
3 43 (8.55%) VMware
4 37 (7.36%) ServiceNow
5 34 (6.76%) Aruba
6 28 (5.57%) Google
6 28 (5.57%) Red Hat
7 23 (4.57%) Juniper
8 22 (4.37%) CyberArk
9 19 (3.78%) BeyondTrust
10 16 (3.18%) SAP
11 15 (2.98%) Tanium
12 14 (2.78%) Oracle
13 12 (2.39%) FireEye
13 12 (2.39%) Splunk
14 11 (2.19%) Citrix
15 10 (1.99%) AppDynamics
15 10 (1.99%) Dynatrace
16 7 (1.39%) Atlassian
17 6 (1.19%) SolarWinds