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 2 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 3 9 16
Rank change year-on-year +6 +7 -7
Contract jobs citing SC Cleared 374 161 186
As % of all contract jobs in Berkshire 24.19% 12.31% 9.69%
As % of the Qualifications category 58.26% 34.33% 21.48%
Number of daily rates quoted 289 93 128
10th Percentile £255 £247 £356
25th Percentile £306 £356 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £430 £554 £605
Median % change year-on-year -22.38% -8.43% +3.24%
75th Percentile £513 £656 £660
90th Percentile £589 £673 £688
South East median daily rate £500 £540 £550
% change year-on-year -7.41% -1.82% +1.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 28 10 17
10th Percentile £19.38 £24.04 £28.25
25th Percentile £28.87 £57.74 £52.19
Median hourly rate £79.20 £73.80 £57.32
Median % change year-on-year +7.31% +28.75% +4.22%
75th Percentile £95.00 £83.85 £63.29
90th Percentile £106.53 £87.02 £76.06
South East median hourly rate £25.15 £61.79 £60.00
% change year-on-year -59.30% +2.98% -

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 642 469 866
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Berkshire 41.53% 35.86% 45.13%
Number of daily rates quoted 457 234 459
10th Percentile £253 £236 £205
25th Percentile £335 £380 £335
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £445 £525 £513
Median % change year-on-year -15.24% +2.44% -6.82%
75th Percentile £525 £650 £616
90th Percentile £625 £687 £688
South East median daily rate £500 £525 £536
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.01% -0.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 41 30 74
10th Percentile £19.44 £39.59 £42.00
25th Percentile £22.79 £55.87 £52.37
Median hourly rate £72.00 £61.63 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +16.83% +0.04% -4.75%
75th Percentile £95.00 £66.65 £71.44
90th Percentile £100.00 £78.08 £85.65
South East median hourly rate £25.15 £57.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year -55.88% -5.00% +33.33%

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 2 February 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 2 February 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 2 February 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
Wokingham 0 177 £378 +7.86% 7
Reading +14 156 £500 -20.00% 31
Bracknell -1 17 £550 +2.33% 5
Slough 0 1 - -
Maidenhead -2 1 - - 1
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 5 (1.34%) Confluence
1 5 (1.34%) Microsoft Exchange
2 3 (0.80%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.27%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 18 (4.81%) Microsoft Office
2 16 (4.28%) Microsoft Excel
3 13 (3.48%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.80%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.27%) CATIA
5 1 (0.27%) MS Visio
5 1 (0.27%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 5 (1.34%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (0.53%) SAP HCM
2 2 (0.53%) SAP PS
2 2 (0.53%) SAP WM
3 1 (0.27%) SAP EWM
3 1 (0.27%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 116 (31.02%) Azure
2 97 (25.94%) AWS
3 50 (13.37%) GCP
4 25 (6.68%) Entra ID
5 15 (4.01%) OneDrive
6 14 (3.74%) OpenShift
7 10 (2.67%) Datadog
8 9 (2.41%) Microsoft 365
8 9 (2.41%) SaaS
9 8 (2.14%) IaaS
10 7 (1.87%) Azure DevOps
11 6 (1.60%) Power Platform
12 5 (1.34%) Power Automate
13 4 (1.07%) AWS CloudFormation
13 4 (1.07%) Azure Sentinel
14 3 (0.80%) Azure ExpressRoute
14 3 (0.80%) Azure Monitor
14 3 (0.80%) PaaS
15 2 (0.53%) AWS Control Tower
15 2 (0.53%) Azure AKS
Communications & Networking
1 31 (8.29%) DNS
2 28 (7.49%) Network Security
3 27 (7.22%) Firewall
4 24 (6.42%) DHCP
5 16 (4.28%) Wireless
6 15 (4.01%) TCP/IP
7 12 (3.21%) VLAN
8 9 (2.41%) 4G
8 9 (2.41%) LAN
8 9 (2.41%) Wi-Fi
9 8 (2.14%) FTP
9 8 (2.14%) Unified Communications
10 7 (1.87%) Intrusion Detection
10 7 (1.87%) WAN
10 7 (1.87%) Wireshark
10 7 (1.87%) WLAN
11 6 (1.60%) VPN
12 5 (1.34%) BGP
12 5 (1.34%) OSPF
12 5 (1.34%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (1.60%) NoSQL
2 4 (1.07%) Power BI
3 2 (0.53%) SAP HANA
4 1 (0.27%) MongoDB
4 1 (0.27%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 20 (5.35%) Burp Suite
1 20 (5.35%) Metasploit
2 12 (3.21%) JIRA
3 11 (2.94%) Jenkins
4 3 (0.80%) Android Studio
4 3 (0.80%) Bitbucket
4 3 (0.80%) Subversion
5 2 (0.53%) HP UFT
5 2 (0.53%) Visual Studio
6 1 (0.27%) Git
6 1 (0.27%) GitLab
6 1 (0.27%) NeoLoad
6 1 (0.27%) Rational DOORS
General
1 151 (40.37%) Social Skills
2 77 (20.59%) Analytical Skills
3 61 (16.31%) Public Sector
4 24 (6.42%) Documentation Skills
5 9 (2.41%) Telecoms
6 8 (2.14%) Finance
7 4 (1.07%) Aerospace
7 4 (1.07%) Influencing Skills
8 3 (0.80%) Legal
8 3 (0.80%) Manufacturing
8 3 (0.80%) Marketing
8 3 (0.80%) Military
9 2 (0.53%) Advertising
9 2 (0.53%) Presentation Skills
10 1 (0.27%) Banking
10 1 (0.27%) Billing
10 1 (0.27%) Electronics
10 1 (0.27%) Police
Job Titles
1 49 (13.10%) Consultant
2 32 (8.56%) Network Consultant
3 31 (8.29%) Analyst
4 26 (6.95%) Network Engineer
5 25 (6.68%) Architect
6 21 (5.61%) Penetration Tester
7 20 (5.35%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 19 (5.08%) Support Engineer
8 19 (5.08%) Tester
9 18 (4.81%) Lead
9 18 (4.81%) Senior
9 18 (4.81%) SIEM Engineer
10 15 (4.01%) Cisco Engineer
10 15 (4.01%) Cisco Network Engineer
10 15 (4.01%) Infrastructure Support
10 15 (4.01%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
11 12 (3.21%) Project Manager
11 12 (3.21%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
12 11 (2.94%) Cloud Engineer
12 11 (2.94%) Data Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (4.28%) LDAP
2 9 (2.41%) Loki
3 4 (1.07%) Middleware
4 3 (0.80%) ARM Templates
5 2 (0.53%) Elastic Stack
5 2 (0.53%) OAuth
5 2 (0.53%) OAuth2
5 2 (0.53%) OpenID
5 2 (0.53%) SAML
6 1 (0.27%) 802.1X
6 1 (0.27%) RFC 2544
Miscellaneous
1 18 (4.81%) Onboarding
2 17 (4.55%) Cloud Native
2 17 (4.55%) Data Centre
3 15 (4.01%) Cyber Security Posture
4 13 (3.48%) Analytical Mindset
5 11 (2.94%) Management Information System
5 11 (2.94%) Security Posture
6 8 (2.14%) Virtual Team
7 7 (1.87%) Driving Licence
7 7 (1.87%) Enterprise Software
8 6 (1.60%) PKI
8 6 (1.60%) PMI
9 5 (1.34%) Distributed Systems
9 5 (1.34%) Handset
10 4 (1.07%) CSOC
10 4 (1.07%) Data Protection Act
10 4 (1.07%) Security Operations Centre
10 4 (1.07%) Self-Motivation
11 3 (0.80%) Enterprise Storage
11 3 (0.80%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 65 (17.38%) Windows
2 50 (13.37%) Linux
3 14 (3.74%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 13 (3.48%) Windows 10
5 12 (3.21%) Windows Server
6 7 (1.87%) Android
6 7 (1.87%) Kali Linux
7 2 (0.53%) SUSE
7 2 (0.53%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
8 1 (0.27%) Mac OS
8 1 (0.27%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 80 (21.39%) Problem-Solving
2 62 (16.58%) Stakeholder Engagement
3 61 (16.31%) ITIL
4 59 (15.78%) Cybersecurity
5 58 (15.51%) CI/CD
6 48 (12.83%) Roadmaps
6 48 (12.83%) Service Management
7 46 (12.30%) Migration
8 44 (11.76%) Collaborative Working
9 42 (11.23%) DevOps
10 41 (10.96%) SIEM
11 39 (10.43%) Change Management
11 39 (10.43%) Continuous Improvement
12 36 (9.63%) ITSM
13 33 (8.82%) DevSecOps
14 30 (8.02%) Agile
15 27 (7.22%) Infrastructure Engineering
16 26 (6.95%) Performance Metrics
17 25 (6.68%) Stakeholder Management
18 22 (5.88%) Penetration Testing
Programming Languages
1 77 (20.59%) Python
2 55 (14.71%) PowerShell
3 28 (7.49%) Bash
4 13 (3.48%) Kusto Query Language
5 6 (1.60%) Java
6 5 (1.34%) Bicep
6 5 (1.34%) SQL
7 4 (1.07%) Go
8 2 (0.53%) Ada
8 2 (0.53%) Assembly Language
8 2 (0.53%) C
8 2 (0.53%) C#
8 2 (0.53%) MATLAB
8 2 (0.53%) VBScript
9 1 (0.27%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 374 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 37 (9.89%) CISSP
3 29 (7.75%) Degree
4 24 (6.42%) CEH
5 19 (5.08%) CISM
6 18 (4.81%) Azure Certification
7 16 (4.28%) GIAC
8 15 (4.01%) AWS Certification
9 13 (3.48%) CHECK Team Member
9 13 (3.48%) Network+ Certification
10 11 (2.94%) CREST Certified
10 11 (2.94%) Cyber Scheme
10 11 (2.94%) Microsoft Certification
11 10 (2.67%) PMP
12 9 (2.41%) DV Cleared
12 9 (2.41%) Postgraduate
12 9 (2.41%) Server+ Certification
13 8 (2.14%) CCNP
13 8 (2.14%) Cisco Certification
13 8 (2.14%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (9.09%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 29 (7.75%) GDPR
3 21 (5.61%) NIST
4 16 (4.28%) QA
5 14 (3.74%) PMO
6 13 (3.48%) PCI DSS
7 8 (2.14%) NCSC
8 2 (0.53%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (0.53%) SLA
9 1 (0.27%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.27%) Data Quality
9 1 (0.27%) Def Stans
System Software
1 53 (14.17%) Active Directory
2 32 (8.56%) VMware Infrastructure
3 13 (3.48%) vSphere
4 12 (3.21%) Docker
5 11 (2.94%) Hyper-V
6 5 (1.34%) VMware NSX
7 2 (0.53%) Virtual Desktop
8 1 (0.27%) Firmware
8 1 (0.27%) NFS
8 1 (0.27%) Terminal Services
8 1 (0.27%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 31 (8.29%) Kubernetes
2 20 (5.35%) Nmap
3 15 (4.01%) Terraform
4 14 (3.74%) Argo
4 14 (3.74%) Grafana
4 14 (3.74%) Prometheus
4 14 (3.74%) SCCM
5 13 (3.48%) Ansible
5 13 (3.48%) Kibana
6 9 (2.41%) Kustomize
6 9 (2.41%) Microsoft Intune
7 5 (1.34%) QRadar
7 5 (1.34%) Red Hat Satellite
7 5 (1.34%) vCenter Server
8 4 (1.07%) Cisco CUCM
9 3 (0.80%) Nagios
9 3 (0.80%) NetBackup
9 3 (0.80%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.80%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
10 2 (0.53%) Active Directory Federation Services
Vendors
1 66 (17.65%) Cisco
2 49 (13.10%) Microsoft
3 43 (11.50%) VMware
4 32 (8.56%) Aruba
5 30 (8.02%) ServiceNow
6 26 (6.95%) Google
7 20 (5.35%) CyberArk
7 20 (5.35%) Splunk
8 18 (4.81%) Red Hat
9 17 (4.55%) BeyondTrust
9 17 (4.55%) Juniper
10 15 (4.01%) Tanium
11 13 (3.48%) FireEye
12 11 (2.94%) Citrix
12 11 (2.94%) SAP
13 10 (2.67%) AppDynamics
13 10 (2.67%) Dynatrace
14 8 (2.14%) Workday
15 5 (1.34%) BMC
15 5 (1.34%) Pure Storage