Project Management Contract Job Trends in the North West

Project Management
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Project Management skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 40 24 20
Rank change year-on-year -16 -4 0
Contract jobs citing Project Management 180 153 171
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 4.79% 7.02% 7.09%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.76% 7.97% 8.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 104 103 98
10th Percentile £358 £351 £304
25th Percentile £400 £402 £386
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -5.00% -
75th Percentile £538 £575 £550
90th Percentile £600 £685 £614
England median daily rate £520 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +1.46% -2.38% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 28 14 20
10th Percentile £21.00 £28.23 £20.72
25th Percentile £28.50 £38.52 £25.34
Median hourly rate £33.75 £60.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -43.75% +71.43% -
75th Percentile £71.45 £77.19 £46.76
90th Percentile £74.99 £80.33 £59.09
England median hourly rate £42.30 £42.07 £38.12
% change year-on-year +0.55% +10.36% -8.80%

All Process & Methodology Skills
North West

Project 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 North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 3,123 1,920 2,037
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 83.06% 88.15% 84.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,821 1,232 1,246
10th Percentile £278 £278 £300
25th Percentile £400 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £461 £500
Median % change year-on-year +6.67% -7.75% -
75th Percentile £594 £575 £588
90th Percentile £675 £671 £675
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 316 125 187
10th Percentile £17.25 £13.50 £10.95
25th Percentile £25.38 £18.87 £16.06
Median hourly rate £50.00 £28.43 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +75.87% -12.52% +6.04%
75th Percentile £74.26 £58.27 £51.91
90th Percentile £85.00 £74.50 £70.90
England median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £42.03
% change year-on-year +78.93% -40.16% -1.11%

Project Management
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Project Management relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Project Management job vacancy trend in the North West

Project Management
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Project Management.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Project Management

Project Management
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Project Management in the North West over the 6 months to 1 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Project Management in the North West

Project Management
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Project Management.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Project Management

Project Management
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Project Management in the North West over the 6 months to 1 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Project Management in the North West

Project Management
Contract Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Project Management within the North West region over the 6 months to 1 August 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
Manchester -21 87 £450 -3.33% 85
Cheshire -10 41 £463 +7.56% 27
Lancashire +7 24 £594 +4.17% 28
Cumbria -4 14 £488 +2.63% 3
Merseyside -12 13 £525 -16.00% 19
Project Management
England

Project Management
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 13 (7.22%) Confluence
2 8 (4.44%) SharePoint
3 4 (2.22%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.56%) SAS
Applications
1 13 (7.22%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (6.67%) Microsoft Project
3 8 (4.44%) Microsoft Excel
4 7 (3.89%) MS Visio
5 6 (3.33%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 14 (7.78%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (3.33%) Primavera
3 5 (2.78%) SAP HCM
3 5 (2.78%) SAP MM
4 3 (1.67%) SAP Payroll
5 1 (0.56%) Dynamics CRM
5 1 (0.56%) ResourceLink
5 1 (0.56%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 13 (7.22%) Power Platform
2 11 (6.11%) Azure
3 7 (3.89%) Google Workspace
4 6 (3.33%) Microsoft 365
5 4 (2.22%) Azure DevOps
5 4 (2.22%) GCP
5 4 (2.22%) Google Sheets
5 4 (2.22%) SaaS
6 3 (1.67%) Asana
6 3 (1.67%) AWS
6 3 (1.67%) Google Drive
6 3 (1.67%) Power Automate
6 3 (1.67%) PowerApps
6 3 (1.67%) Smartsheet
7 2 (1.11%) Azure Data Factory
7 2 (1.11%) Azure Synapse Analytics
7 2 (1.11%) Snowflake
8 1 (0.56%) GitHub Actions
8 1 (0.56%) OCI
8 1 (0.56%) Rubrik
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.22%) BGP
1 4 (2.22%) DNS
1 4 (2.22%) Network Security
1 4 (2.22%) SSH
1 4 (2.22%) TCP/IP
2 3 (1.67%) DKIM
2 3 (1.67%) DMARC
3 1 (0.56%) Cisco Nexus
3 1 (0.56%) DHCP
3 1 (0.56%) Ethernet VPN
3 1 (0.56%) Firewall
3 1 (0.56%) MPLS
3 1 (0.56%) OSPF
3 1 (0.56%) SD-WAN
3 1 (0.56%) Software-Defined Networking
3 1 (0.56%) VPN
3 1 (0.56%) VXLAN
3 1 (0.56%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (6.67%) Power BI
2 5 (2.78%) SAP HANA
3 4 (2.22%) Data Warehouse
4 2 (1.11%) Data Lake
4 2 (1.11%) Power Query
4 2 (1.11%) SQL Server
5 1 (0.56%) Big Data
5 1 (0.56%) Data Mining
5 1 (0.56%) Electronic Patient Records
5 1 (0.56%) MySQL
5 1 (0.56%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 18 (10.00%) JIRA
2 2 (1.11%) Git
2 2 (1.11%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.56%) GitLab
3 1 (0.56%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 86 (47.78%) Social Skills
2 84 (46.67%) Finance
3 43 (23.89%) Analytical Skills
4 16 (8.89%) Banking
5 15 (8.33%) Public Sector
6 13 (7.22%) Manufacturing
6 13 (7.22%) Organisational Skills
7 12 (6.67%) Retail
8 8 (4.44%) Telecoms
9 7 (3.89%) Influencing Skills
10 6 (3.33%) Legal
11 3 (1.67%) Aviation
11 3 (1.67%) Retail Banking
12 2 (1.11%) Corporate Banking
12 2 (1.11%) Financial Institution
13 1 (0.56%) Aerospace
13 1 (0.56%) Automotive
13 1 (0.56%) Law
13 1 (0.56%) Marketing
13 1 (0.56%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 72 (40.00%) Project Manager
2 17 (9.44%) Senior
3 16 (8.89%) Lead
3 16 (8.89%) Senior Manager
4 15 (8.33%) Senior Project Manager
5 14 (7.78%) Consultant
6 12 (6.67%) Finance Manager
6 12 (6.67%) SAP Consultant
7 11 (6.11%) Finance Project Manager
8 10 (5.56%) Accountant
8 10 (5.56%) Engagement Manager
8 10 (5.56%) IT Manager
8 10 (5.56%) IT Project Manager
8 10 (5.56%) Systems Accountant
9 7 (3.89%) Analyst
9 7 (3.89%) Programme Manager
9 7 (3.89%) Security Manager
9 7 (3.89%) Security Project Manager
9 7 (3.89%) Transformation Consultant
10 6 (3.33%) Migration Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.22%) OAuth
2 2 (1.11%) REST
3 1 (0.56%) JSON
3 1 (0.56%) LangChain
3 1 (0.56%) LangGraph
3 1 (0.56%) Middleware
3 1 (0.56%) SailPoint
3 1 (0.56%) SAML
3 1 (0.56%) SOAP
3 1 (0.56%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 16 (8.89%) Management Information System
2 8 (4.44%) Product Ownership
3 6 (3.33%) Distributed Systems
3 6 (3.33%) EPoS
3 6 (3.33%) Taxonomies
4 5 (2.78%) Credit Risk
4 5 (2.78%) Freedom of Information
4 5 (2.78%) Mobile App
4 5 (2.78%) Onboarding
4 5 (2.78%) PKI
5 4 (2.22%) Legacy Systems
5 4 (2.22%) Low-Code
5 4 (2.22%) PMI
6 3 (1.67%) Data Protection Act
6 3 (1.67%) Operational Technology
6 3 (1.67%) Tandem
7 2 (1.11%) AI Agents
7 2 (1.11%) Analytical Mindset
7 2 (1.11%) Client/Server
8 1 (0.56%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 6 (3.33%) Windows
2 5 (2.78%) Unix
3 2 (1.11%) Windows Server
4 1 (0.56%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 68 (37.78%) Stakeholder Management
2 43 (23.89%) Problem-Solving
3 42 (23.33%) Agile
4 41 (22.78%) Change Management
5 40 (22.22%) Migration
6 35 (19.44%) Project Delivery
7 33 (18.33%) Continuous Improvement
8 28 (15.56%) ERP
9 25 (13.89%) PRINCE2
10 24 (13.33%) Risk Management
11 22 (12.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 21 (11.67%) Workshop Facilitation
13 20 (11.11%) AI
13 20 (11.11%) Data Migration
14 18 (10.00%) Decision-Making
14 18 (10.00%) Validation
15 17 (9.44%) Business Transformation
15 17 (9.44%) Cybersecurity
16 16 (8.89%) Budget Management
16 16 (8.89%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 7 (3.89%) Python
2 5 (2.78%) SQL
3 3 (1.67%) ABAP
4 1 (0.56%) Bash
4 1 (0.56%) JavaScript
4 1 (0.56%) MATLAB
4 1 (0.56%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 24 (13.33%) Security Cleared
2 17 (9.44%) Degree
3 15 (8.33%) SC Cleared
4 11 (6.11%) PMI Certification
5 10 (5.56%) ACCA
5 10 (5.56%) CIMA
5 10 (5.56%) CIPFA
5 10 (5.56%) PMP
6 4 (2.22%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (2.22%) Computer Science Degree
7 3 (1.67%) PRINCE2 Certification
8 2 (1.11%) AWS Certification
8 2 (1.11%) Azure Certification
8 2 (1.11%) CISA
8 2 (1.11%) CISM
8 2 (1.11%) CISSP
8 2 (1.11%) CRISC
8 2 (1.11%) DBS Check
8 2 (1.11%) Master's Degree
8 2 (1.11%) SAFe Agilist
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (4.44%) PMO
2 6 (3.33%) Data Quality
3 4 (2.22%) SLA
4 3 (1.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 3 (1.67%) NIST
4 3 (1.67%) QA
5 2 (1.11%) GRC
5 2 (1.11%) ISO/IEC 27005
6 1 (0.56%) Basel III
6 1 (0.56%) Disclosure Scotland
6 1 (0.56%) GDPR
System Software
1 4 (2.22%) Active Directory
2 1 (0.56%) Docker
2 1 (0.56%) VMware Infrastructure
2 1 (0.56%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 4 (2.22%) Ansible
2 3 (1.67%) Single Sign-On
3 1 (0.56%) Kubernetes
3 1 (0.56%) Microsoft Intune
3 1 (0.56%) Progress Chef
3 1 (0.56%) Puppet
3 1 (0.56%) Terraform
Vendors
1 30 (16.67%) SAP
2 19 (10.56%) Microsoft
3 7 (3.89%) Google
3 7 (3.89%) Sage
4 4 (2.22%) Cisco
4 4 (2.22%) Concur
4 4 (2.22%) Databricks
4 4 (2.22%) DocuSign
4 4 (2.22%) Gemalto
4 4 (2.22%) Oracle
4 4 (2.22%) Salesforce
4 4 (2.22%) ServiceNow
4 4 (2.22%) Thales
5 3 (1.67%) Alteryx
5 3 (1.67%) Arista
5 3 (1.67%) IBM
6 2 (1.11%) Atlassian
6 2 (1.11%) Infor
7 1 (0.56%) Qualys
7 1 (0.56%) Veeam