Validation Contract Job Trends in England

Validation
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Validation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 62 108 144
Rank change year-on-year +46 +36 0
Contract jobs citing Validation 1,188 711 695
As % of all contract jobs in England 3.86% 2.28% 1.81%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.30% 2.60% 2.04%
Number of daily rates quoted 715 364 417
10th Percentile £358 £322 £354
25th Percentile £419 £406 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -6.98% -2.27%
75th Percentile £619 £600 £638
90th Percentile £688 £674 £813
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% -2.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 81 81 86
10th Percentile £31.50 £28.00 £51.25
25th Percentile £41.25 £45.22 £58.75
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £68.03
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -8.13% +10.62%
75th Percentile £67.25 £65.00 £87.65
90th Percentile £77.25 £75.00 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £67.53
% change year-on-year +4.00% -7.45% +9.80%

All Process and Methodology Skills
England

Validation 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 27,655 27,305 34,142
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 89.92% 87.48% 88.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,548 16,677 23,333
10th Percentile £300 £313 £313
25th Percentile £405 £416 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £501 £525 £548
Median % change year-on-year -4.67% -4.11% -0.45%
75th Percentile £625 £648 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £533
% change year-on-year -4.76% -1.50% -3.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,803 1,004 1,443
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.22 £14.80
25th Percentile £17.87 £20.29 £19.25
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.43 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -29.01% -21.27% +23.29%
75th Percentile £50.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £68.75 £75.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £34.75 £44.00
% change year-on-year -27.63% -21.02% +25.71%

Validation
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Validation job vacancy trend in England

Validation
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation

Validation
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Validation in England over the 6 months to 27 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Validation in England

Validation
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation

Validation
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Validation in England over the 6 months to 27 November 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Validation in England

Validation
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 Validation within the England region over the 6 months to 27 November 2025. 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 +74 547 £525 +5.00% 199
South East +7 159 £500 +2.56% 283
North of England +24 128 £425 -12.82% 74
East of England +22 113 £500 +33.33% 122
South West +2 105 £475 -21.49% 98
Midlands -6 95 £492 +2.13% 99
North West +13 81 £425 -7.86% 40
West Midlands -9 78 £500 - 59
Yorkshire -20 32 £400 -4.76% 25
East Midlands -6 17 £438 +9.38% 39
North East +4 15 £475 -32.14% 10
Validation
UK

Validation
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 47 (3.96%) Confluence
2 31 (2.61%) SharePoint
3 25 (2.10%) Apache Spark
4 23 (1.94%) SAS
5 21 (1.77%) Apache Airflow
6 17 (1.43%) Microsoft Exchange
7 15 (1.26%) Skype for Business
8 13 (1.09%) Apache
9 8 (0.67%) CMS
10 7 (0.59%) Exchange Server 2013
10 7 (0.59%) Mattermost
11 6 (0.51%) OpenStack
12 4 (0.34%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 4 (0.34%) Smallworld
12 4 (0.34%) WebLogic
13 3 (0.25%) Anypoint
13 3 (0.25%) ArcGIS
13 3 (0.25%) GeoServer
13 3 (0.25%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
14 2 (0.17%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 76 (6.40%) Microsoft Excel
2 38 (3.20%) Microsoft Office
3 23 (1.94%) MS Visio
4 18 (1.52%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.59%) Chatbot
6 6 (0.51%) Sketch
7 3 (0.25%) Microsoft Project
7 3 (0.25%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.17%) Simulink
9 1 (0.084%) CANalyzer
9 1 (0.084%) NASTRAN
9 1 (0.084%) Notion
9 1 (0.084%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.084%) Stateflow
9 1 (0.084%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 57 (4.80%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (1.09%) Oracle EBS
3 12 (1.01%) Aladdin
4 11 (0.93%) SAP EHS
4 11 (0.93%) SAP FI
5 10 (0.84%) Remedy ITSM
6 8 (0.67%) SAP MDG
7 7 (0.59%) Dynamics CRM
7 7 (0.59%) OpenText VIM for SAP
8 6 (0.51%) SAP MM
9 5 (0.42%) Oracle Payables
9 5 (0.42%) Workday HCM
10 4 (0.34%) Markit EDM
10 4 (0.34%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 4 (0.34%) Oracle Receivables
10 4 (0.34%) Salesforce CRM
10 4 (0.34%) SAP ERP
11 3 (0.25%) Algo Collateral
11 3 (0.25%) Oracle EBS R12
11 3 (0.25%) Oracle General Ledger
Cloud Services
1 270 (22.73%) Azure
2 128 (10.77%) AWS
3 114 (9.60%) Azure DevOps
4 108 (9.09%) Power Platform
5 52 (4.38%) GCP
6 47 (3.96%) GitHub
7 37 (3.11%) SaaS
8 33 (2.78%) Entra ID
9 28 (2.36%) GitHub Actions
9 28 (2.36%) Serverless
10 27 (2.27%) Microsoft 365
11 26 (2.19%) Snowflake
12 23 (1.94%) OpenShift
13 21 (1.77%) Azure Data Factory
13 21 (1.77%) OCI
14 18 (1.52%) Dynamics 365
15 15 (1.26%) Azure Functions
15 15 (1.26%) dbt
15 15 (1.26%) OneDrive
16 14 (1.18%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 35 (2.95%) Firewall
1 35 (2.95%) TCP/IP
2 27 (2.27%) DNS
3 22 (1.85%) Ethernet
4 21 (1.77%) VPN
5 19 (1.60%) BGP
6 18 (1.52%) MPLS
7 16 (1.35%) WAN
8 15 (1.26%) 3GPP
8 15 (1.26%) Skype
9 14 (1.18%) LTE
10 13 (1.09%) OSPF
11 11 (0.93%) Network Security
12 10 (0.84%) SSL
12 10 (0.84%) Wireless
13 9 (0.76%) LAN
13 9 (0.76%) SD-WAN
13 9 (0.76%) SNMP
13 9 (0.76%) VLAN
14 8 (0.67%) DMARC
Database & Business Intelligence
1 103 (8.67%) Power BI
2 58 (4.88%) Data Warehouse
3 48 (4.04%) Metadata
4 35 (2.95%) Tableau
5 27 (2.27%) NoSQL
6 24 (2.02%) SQL Server
7 20 (1.68%) Data Lake
7 20 (1.68%) Relational Database
8 19 (1.60%) Oracle Database
9 17 (1.43%) SAS Enterprise Guide
10 15 (1.26%) Oracle Reports
11 14 (1.18%) Azure SQL Database
11 14 (1.18%) BigQuery
12 13 (1.09%) Amazon Redshift
13 12 (1.01%) Big Data
14 11 (0.93%) Amazon RDS
14 11 (0.93%) PostgreSQL
14 11 (0.93%) SAP HANA
15 10 (0.84%) Geospatial Data
15 10 (0.84%) Looker
Development Applications
1 125 (10.52%) JIRA
2 63 (5.30%) Git
3 61 (5.13%) Jenkins
4 37 (3.11%) Selenium
5 32 (2.69%) GitLab
5 32 (2.69%) Oracle APEX
6 30 (2.53%) Postman
7 27 (2.27%) Visual Studio
8 22 (1.85%) Eclipse
9 16 (1.35%) Rational DOORS
10 15 (1.26%) TestRail
11 14 (1.18%) Cucumber
12 13 (1.09%) JUnit
13 12 (1.01%) Zephyr
14 11 (0.93%) Bitbucket
14 11 (0.93%) JMeter
15 8 (0.67%) Cypress.io
15 8 (0.67%) REST Assured
16 6 (0.51%) MLflow
16 6 (0.51%) SpecFlow
General
1 494 (41.58%) Social Skills
2 315 (26.52%) Finance
3 270 (22.73%) Analytical Skills
4 110 (9.26%) Public Sector
5 82 (6.90%) Banking
6 74 (6.23%) Documentation Skills
7 51 (4.29%) Presentation Skills
8 33 (2.78%) Military
9 32 (2.69%) Aerospace
10 28 (2.36%) Telecoms
11 27 (2.27%) Front Office
11 27 (2.27%) Marketing
12 26 (2.19%) Electronics
12 26 (2.19%) Investment Banking
13 23 (1.94%) Influencing Skills
14 22 (1.85%) Pharmaceutical
15 21 (1.77%) Manufacturing
15 21 (1.77%) Organisational Skills
16 17 (1.43%) Automotive
17 15 (1.26%) Legal
Job Titles
1 243 (20.45%) Analyst
2 119 (10.02%) Senior
3 106 (8.92%) Developer
4 103 (8.67%) Business Analyst
5 101 (8.50%) Consultant
6 88 (7.41%) Lead
7 65 (5.47%) Data Analyst
8 48 (4.04%) Software Engineer
9 46 (3.87%) Architect
10 43 (3.62%) Tester
11 37 (3.11%) Data Engineer
12 36 (3.03%) Senior Developer
13 33 (2.78%) Data Scientist
13 33 (2.78%) SAP Consultant
14 31 (2.61%) Test Analyst
15 26 (2.19%) Project Manager
15 26 (2.19%) QA Engineer
16 24 (2.02%) Senior Analyst
16 24 (2.02%) Test Engineer
17 21 (1.77%) Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 62 (5.22%) REST
2 44 (3.70%) JSON
3 36 (3.03%) Node.js
4 34 (2.86%) XML
5 31 (2.61%) Oracle Fusion
6 30 (2.53%) Web Services
7 29 (2.44%) SOAP
8 27 (2.27%) .NET
9 26 (2.19%) RESTful
10 22 (1.85%) OAuth
11 20 (1.68%) Middleware
11 20 (1.68%) SAP Fiori
12 17 (1.43%) Playwright
13 16 (1.35%) Kafka
13 16 (1.35%) PySpark
13 16 (1.35%) PyTorch
14 15 (1.26%) SAML
15 14 (1.18%) TensorFlow
16 13 (1.09%) Pandas
16 13 (1.09%) React
Miscellaneous
1 50 (4.21%) Legacy Systems
2 42 (3.54%) Product Ownership
3 41 (3.45%) Data Structures
4 36 (3.03%) Onboarding
5 33 (2.78%) Management Information System
6 29 (2.44%) FPGA
7 26 (2.19%) Data Centre
8 25 (2.10%) Cloud Native
9 22 (1.85%) Data Protection Act
10 18 (1.52%) Algorithms
10 18 (1.52%) Derivative
10 18 (1.52%) IoT
11 16 (1.35%) Enterprise Software
12 15 (1.26%) Analytical Mindset
12 15 (1.26%) NB-IoT
12 15 (1.26%) Virtual Team
13 13 (1.09%) Hybrid Cloud
13 13 (1.09%) Replication
13 13 (1.09%) SCADA
13 13 (1.09%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 100 (8.42%) Linux
2 81 (6.82%) Windows
3 26 (2.19%) Unix
4 8 (0.67%) Windows Server
5 7 (0.59%) Android
5 7 (0.59%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (0.34%) Apple iOS
6 4 (0.34%) VMS
7 3 (0.25%) zOS
8 2 (0.17%) Debian
8 2 (0.17%) Embedded Linux
8 2 (0.17%) Robot Operating System
8 2 (0.17%) Windows Server 2003
9 1 (0.084%) FreeRTOS
9 1 (0.084%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.084%) MVS
9 1 (0.084%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.084%) Windows 7
9 1 (0.084%) Windows Server 2008
9 1 (0.084%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 338 (28.45%) Agile
2 282 (23.74%) Problem-Solving
3 242 (20.37%) Migration
4 219 (18.43%) DevOps
5 199 (16.75%) CI/CD
6 182 (15.32%) Analytics
6 182 (15.32%) Data Validation
7 172 (14.48%) Stakeholder Management
8 149 (12.54%) Test Automation
9 133 (11.20%) Data Migration
10 127 (10.69%) Business Intelligence
11 117 (9.85%) Data Modelling
12 114 (9.60%) ETL
13 113 (9.51%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 112 (9.43%) Data Analysis
15 111 (9.34%) User Acceptance Testing
16 107 (9.01%) Data Governance
17 106 (8.92%) AI
18 102 (8.59%) Scrum
19 95 (8.00%) Visualisation
Programming Languages
1 296 (24.92%) SQL
2 271 (22.81%) Python
3 95 (8.00%) JavaScript
4 67 (5.64%) C#
5 64 (5.39%) Java
6 53 (4.46%) C++
7 48 (4.04%) PL/SQL
8 39 (3.28%) Bash
9 37 (3.11%) PowerShell
10 26 (2.19%) R
11 19 (1.60%) C
12 18 (1.52%) TypeScript
13 15 (1.26%) Shell Script
13 15 (1.26%) VBA
14 13 (1.09%) Groovy
14 13 (1.09%) T-SQL
15 10 (0.84%) ABAP
16 9 (0.76%) Apex Code
17 8 (0.67%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 8 (0.67%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 271 (22.81%) Security Cleared
2 208 (17.51%) SC Cleared
3 132 (11.11%) Degree
4 37 (3.11%) Computer Science Degree
5 31 (2.61%) DV Cleared
6 30 (2.53%) Master's Degree
7 27 (2.27%) BPSS Clearance
8 23 (1.94%) ISTQB
9 18 (1.52%) PMI Certification
10 17 (1.43%) Cisco Certification
11 13 (1.09%) AWS Certification
11 13 (1.09%) PhD
12 12 (1.01%) CISSP
13 11 (0.93%) Oracle Certification
13 11 (0.93%) PMP
14 10 (0.84%) CBAP
14 10 (0.84%) CCNP
15 9 (0.76%) CCIE
15 9 (0.76%) ITIL Certification
16 8 (0.67%) OCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 146 (12.29%) QA
2 135 (11.36%) Data Quality
3 54 (4.55%) GDPR
4 43 (3.62%) NIST
5 28 (2.36%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 24 (2.02%) Accessibility
7 14 (1.18%) EU AI Act
8 11 (0.93%) Def Stans
9 10 (0.84%) COBIT
9 10 (0.84%) MiFID
10 9 (0.76%) IFRS
11 8 (0.67%) EMIR
11 8 (0.67%) GxP
11 8 (0.67%) MISRA
11 8 (0.67%) PCI DSS
12 7 (0.59%) DO-178B
13 6 (0.51%) NCSC
13 6 (0.51%) PMO
13 6 (0.51%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 4 (0.34%) GRC
System Software
1 46 (3.87%) Active Directory
2 37 (3.11%) Docker
3 32 (2.69%) VMware Infrastructure
4 18 (1.52%) Firmware
5 16 (1.35%) VMware ESXi
6 14 (1.18%) vSphere
7 9 (0.76%) VMware NSX
8 6 (0.51%) Dovecot
8 6 (0.51%) Postfix
9 3 (0.25%) Embedded Firmware
9 3 (0.25%) QEMU
9 3 (0.25%) Virtual Desktop
9 3 (0.25%) Virtual Machines
10 2 (0.17%) OpenAM
10 2 (0.17%) OpenDJ
10 2 (0.17%) OpenIDM
11 1 (0.084%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.084%) Hyper-V
11 1 (0.084%) KVM
11 1 (0.084%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 50 (4.21%) Kubernetes
2 46 (3.87%) Ansible
2 46 (3.87%) Terraform
3 15 (1.26%) Single Sign-On
4 11 (0.93%) Microsoft Intune
5 10 (0.84%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 9 (0.76%) Nessus
6 9 (0.76%) SCCM
7 8 (0.67%) Argo
7 8 (0.67%) Istio
7 8 (0.67%) Puppet
7 8 (0.67%) SCOM
8 7 (0.59%) Grafana
8 7 (0.59%) HP SiteScope
8 7 (0.59%) Kibana
9 6 (0.51%) Nmap
10 5 (0.42%) HP ALM
10 5 (0.42%) vCenter Server
11 4 (0.34%) CASB
11 4 (0.34%) Functional Safety
Vendors
1 195 (16.41%) Microsoft
2 132 (11.11%) Oracle
3 88 (7.41%) SAP
4 55 (4.63%) ServiceNow
5 49 (4.12%) VMware
6 39 (3.28%) Salesforce
7 36 (3.03%) Cisco
8 30 (2.53%) Databricks
9 29 (2.44%) Splunk
10 24 (2.02%) Google
11 22 (1.85%) Workday
12 15 (1.26%) MuleSoft
13 14 (1.18%) IBM
13 14 (1.18%) Red Hat
13 14 (1.18%) Remedy
14 12 (1.01%) CyberArk
14 12 (1.01%) Palo Alto
15 11 (0.93%) EMC
16 10 (0.84%) Bloomberg
16 10 (0.84%) Informatica