Service Design Contract Job Trends in England

Service Design
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Service Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 184 270 193
Rank change year-on-year +86 -77 +24
Contract jobs citing Service Design 561 223 464
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.52% 0.90% 1.22%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.76% 0.99% 1.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 434 149 333
10th Percentile £359 £400 £400
25th Percentile £413 £500 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -6.36% - -5.98%
75th Percentile £625 £650 £625
90th Percentile £738 £738 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £534 £540
% change year-on-year -6.28% -1.20% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 1 11
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £60.00 - £17.80
Median hourly rate £75.00 £31.52 £33.07
Median % change year-on-year +137.94% -4.67% -
75th Percentile £101.25 - £34.53
90th Percentile £105.18 - £72.90
UK median hourly rate £60.00 £31.52 £33.07
% change year-on-year +90.36% -4.67% -

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Service Design 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 England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 31,916 22,554 32,925
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 86.52% 90.61% 86.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,413 14,598 21,798
10th Percentile £313 £310 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £614 £639 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,990 810 2,146
10th Percentile £15.31 £15.22 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.87 £21.00 £16.06
Median hourly rate £30.50 £34.06 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year -10.44% +4.78% -12.16%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £75.00 £77.50 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £30.00 £32.50 £32.50
% change year-on-year -7.69% - -7.14%

Service Design
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Service Design relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Service Design job vacancy trend in England

Service Design
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Service Design.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Service Design

Service Design
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Service Design in England over the 6 months to 15 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Service Design in England

Service Design
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Service Design.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Service Design

Service Design
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Service Design in England over the 6 months to 15 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Service Design in England

Service Design
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Service Design within the England region over the 6 months to 15 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
London +51 221 £500 -9.09% 82
North of England +17 118 £500 +5.26% 51
South West +15 70 £725 +28.89% 19
South East -22 68 £531 -7.63% 60
Midlands -11 58 £513 -10.87% 18
North West +5 54 £470 -1.05% 19
West Midlands -24 52 £494 -14.13% 12
Yorkshire -21 39 £524 -12.71% 23
North East +9 25 £454 -4.47% 9
East of England -21 8 £550 -31.25% 19
East Midlands - 6 £581 - 6
Service Design
UK

Service Design
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 45 (8.02%) Confluence
2 14 (2.50%) SharePoint
3 7 (1.25%) Microsoft Exchange
4 2 (0.36%) Appian
5 1 (0.18%) Anypoint
5 1 (0.18%) Drupal
5 1 (0.18%) LiveCycle
5 1 (0.18%) Mule
5 1 (0.18%) Oracle Application Server
Applications
1 42 (7.49%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (5.35%) Microsoft Project
3 15 (2.67%) Microsoft Excel
4 11 (1.96%) Sketch
5 9 (1.60%) Adobe XD
5 9 (1.60%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 5 (0.89%) InVision
6 5 (0.89%) Trello
7 4 (0.71%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.71%) MS Visio
8 3 (0.53%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 3 (0.53%) Spreadsheet
8 3 (0.53%) Zeplin
9 2 (0.36%) Adobe After Effects
Business Applications
1 7 (1.25%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (1.07%) Remedy ITSM
3 5 (0.89%) Dynamics CRM
4 2 (0.36%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.18%) Adobe Campaign
5 1 (0.18%) NetSuite
5 1 (0.18%) Oracle Payroll
5 1 (0.18%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 39 (6.95%) Figma
2 34 (6.06%) Azure
3 24 (4.28%) AWS
4 20 (3.57%) Power Platform
5 13 (2.32%) SaaS
6 11 (1.96%) Microsoft 365
7 8 (1.43%) Miro
8 7 (1.25%) Azure DevOps
8 7 (1.25%) GCP
8 7 (1.25%) OneDrive
9 6 (1.07%) Google Analytics
9 6 (1.07%) Google Tag Manager
10 4 (0.71%) IaaS
10 4 (0.71%) OpenShift
10 4 (0.71%) PaaS
10 4 (0.71%) Power Automate
11 3 (0.53%) Amazon S3
11 3 (0.53%) AWS CloudFormation
11 3 (0.53%) Boomi
11 3 (0.53%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 4 (0.71%) WAN
2 3 (0.53%) 3GPP
2 3 (0.53%) VPN
3 2 (0.36%) Firewall
3 2 (0.36%) Internet
3 2 (0.36%) LAN
3 2 (0.36%) TETRA
4 1 (0.18%) Cisco ISE
4 1 (0.18%) DNS
4 1 (0.18%) SD-WAN
4 1 (0.18%) Unified Communications
4 1 (0.18%) WebEx
4 1 (0.18%) Wi-Fi
4 1 (0.18%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 16 (2.85%) Power BI
2 6 (1.07%) BigQuery
2 6 (1.07%) Looker
3 4 (0.71%) Electronic Patient Records
4 3 (0.53%) SQL Server
4 3 (0.53%) Tableau
5 1 (0.18%) EDRMS
5 1 (0.18%) Metadata
5 1 (0.18%) Oracle Exadata
5 1 (0.18%) PostgreSQL
5 1 (0.18%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 57 (10.16%) JIRA
2 9 (1.60%) Jenkins
3 8 (1.43%) Axure RP
4 6 (1.07%) GitLab
5 2 (0.36%) Cucumber
5 2 (0.36%) Postman
5 2 (0.36%) Selenium
6 1 (0.18%) Cypress.io
6 1 (0.18%) JMeter
6 1 (0.18%) JUnit
6 1 (0.18%) Mocha
6 1 (0.18%) Mockito
6 1 (0.18%) REST Assured
6 1 (0.18%) Zephyr
General
1 186 (33.16%) Social Skills
2 183 (32.62%) Public Sector
3 65 (11.59%) Analytical Skills
4 57 (10.16%) Finance
5 36 (6.42%) Military
6 28 (4.99%) Influencing Skills
7 20 (3.57%) Presentation Skills
8 13 (2.32%) Legal
9 12 (2.14%) Banking
9 12 (2.14%) Local Government
10 10 (1.78%) Retail
11 9 (1.60%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 6 (1.07%) Law
12 6 (1.07%) Marketing
13 5 (0.89%) Financial Institution
13 5 (0.89%) Telecoms
14 3 (0.53%) Digital Healthcare
14 3 (0.53%) Documentation Skills
14 3 (0.53%) Police
15 2 (0.36%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 195 (34.76%) Designer
2 154 (27.45%) Service Designer
3 106 (18.89%) Architect
4 68 (12.12%) Lead
5 67 (11.94%) Senior
6 62 (11.05%) Service Architect
7 61 (10.87%) Analyst
8 52 (9.27%) User Researcher
9 43 (7.66%) Business Analyst
10 29 (5.17%) Senior Designer
11 28 (4.99%) Service Manager
12 27 (4.81%) Lead Designer
12 27 (4.81%) Lead Service Designer
13 23 (4.10%) Senior Service Designer
14 17 (3.03%) UX Designer
15 16 (2.85%) Consultant
15 16 (2.85%) Senior Analyst
16 15 (2.67%) Service Design Manager
17 14 (2.50%) Interaction Designer
18 13 (2.32%) Service Transition Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (1.96%) REST
2 8 (1.43%) HTML
2 8 (1.43%) SOAP
3 6 (1.07%) CSS
4 4 (0.71%) Oracle Fusion
4 4 (0.71%) Spring
4 4 (0.71%) Spring Boot
5 3 (0.53%) .NET
5 3 (0.53%) AngularJS
5 3 (0.53%) Django
5 3 (0.53%) FastAPI
5 3 (0.53%) Flask
5 3 (0.53%) Microsoft Graph
5 3 (0.53%) OAuth
5 3 (0.53%) RESTful
5 3 (0.53%) Vue
5 3 (0.53%) Web Services
6 2 (0.36%) FHIR
6 2 (0.36%) Framer.js
6 2 (0.36%) Model Context Protocol
Miscellaneous
1 58 (10.34%) Product Ownership
2 22 (3.92%) NHS
3 15 (2.67%) Onboarding
4 13 (2.32%) Cloud Native
5 10 (1.78%) Legacy Systems
6 8 (1.43%) Data Centre
6 8 (1.43%) Hybrid Cloud
6 8 (1.43%) Management Information System
7 7 (1.25%) AI Agents
8 6 (1.07%) CMDB
9 4 (0.71%) Data Protection Act
9 4 (0.71%) IVR
9 4 (0.71%) Mobile App
10 3 (0.53%) Analytical Mindset
10 3 (0.53%) Hackathon
10 3 (0.53%) PMI
10 3 (0.53%) Security Posture
10 3 (0.53%) Taxonomies
11 2 (0.36%) Self-Motivation
11 2 (0.36%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 6 (1.07%) Windows
2 4 (0.71%) Windows 10
3 1 (0.18%) MVS
Processes & Methodologies
1 251 (44.74%) Agile
2 165 (29.41%) User Research
3 140 (24.96%) ITIL
4 110 (19.61%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
5 103 (18.36%) Service Management
6 93 (16.58%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 91 (16.22%) User Experience
8 86 (15.33%) Workshop Facilitation
9 81 (14.44%) Stakeholder Management
10 76 (13.55%) Roadmaps
11 71 (12.66%) Journey Map
12 69 (12.30%) Continuous Improvement
13 66 (11.76%) Service Delivery
14 64 (11.41%) Acceptance Criteria
15 63 (11.23%) UX Design
16 61 (10.87%) Decision-Making
17 56 (9.98%) Prototyping
18 55 (9.80%) Usability Testing
19 49 (8.73%) TOGAF
20 48 (8.56%) ITSM
Programming Languages
1 9 (1.60%) Python
2 8 (1.43%) PowerShell
3 7 (1.25%) Java
3 7 (1.25%) SQL
4 6 (1.07%) JavaScript
5 4 (0.71%) Bash
6 3 (0.53%) Kusto Query Language
7 2 (0.36%) C#
7 2 (0.36%) PL/SQL
7 2 (0.36%) T-SQL
7 2 (0.36%) TypeScript
8 1 (0.18%) DataWeave
8 1 (0.18%) Groovy
8 1 (0.18%) R
8 1 (0.18%) Scala
Qualifications
1 201 (35.83%) Security Cleared
2 161 (28.70%) SC Cleared
3 60 (10.70%) Degree
4 39 (6.95%) TOGAF Certification
5 34 (6.06%) DV Cleared
6 20 (3.57%) BPSS Clearance
7 18 (3.21%) ITIL Certification
8 9 (1.60%) AWS Certification
9 8 (1.43%) Azure Certification
10 4 (0.71%) PMI Certification
11 3 (0.53%) CISM
11 3 (0.53%) CISSP
12 2 (0.36%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
12 2 (0.36%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 2 (0.36%) CRISC
13 1 (0.18%) APMG
13 1 (0.18%) Computer Science Degree
13 1 (0.18%) CSPO
13 1 (0.18%) CTC Cleared
13 1 (0.18%) Six Sigma Yellow Belt
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 102 (18.18%) Accessibility
2 24 (4.28%) WCAG
3 14 (2.50%) Actionable Recommendations
3 14 (2.50%) QA
4 13 (2.32%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 10 (1.78%) Data Quality
6 8 (1.43%) SLA
7 7 (1.25%) GDPR
8 6 (1.07%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 6 (1.07%) NCSC
9 5 (0.89%) Government Security Classifications
10 4 (0.71%) COBIT
11 3 (0.53%) GRC
11 3 (0.53%) ISO 9001
12 2 (0.36%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 2 (0.36%) NIST
12 2 (0.36%) PMO
13 1 (0.18%) Cyber Essentials
13 1 (0.18%) FINRA
13 1 (0.18%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 6 (1.07%) Docker
2 3 (0.53%) VMware NSX
3 1 (0.18%) Active Directory
3 1 (0.18%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 30 (5.35%) OPNET
2 10 (1.78%) Kubernetes
3 7 (1.25%) Terraform
4 5 (0.89%) Ansible
4 5 (0.89%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (0.53%) vRealize
6 1 (0.18%) Grafana
6 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (0.18%) Prometheus
6 1 (0.18%) SCCM
6 1 (0.18%) VxRail
Vendors
1 56 (9.98%) ServiceNow
2 40 (7.13%) Microsoft
3 36 (6.42%) Remedy
4 30 (5.35%) Atlassian
5 14 (2.50%) Adobe
6 11 (1.96%) VMware
7 10 (1.78%) Oracle
7 10 (1.78%) SAP
8 7 (1.25%) Google
9 6 (1.07%) Cisco
9 6 (1.07%) Salesforce
10 4 (0.71%) Workday
11 3 (0.53%) Foundry
11 3 (0.53%) Genesys
11 3 (0.53%) Palo Alto
11 3 (0.53%) UiPath
11 3 (0.53%) Zscaler
12 2 (0.36%) BMC
12 2 (0.36%) MuleSoft
12 2 (0.36%) Red Hat