Continuous Improvement Contract Job Trends in the South East

Continual Improvement
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring Continuous Improvement skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 36 39
Rank change year-on-year +22 +3 +24
Contract jobs citing Continuous Improvement 592 185 235
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 8.97% 5.38% 4.49%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.04% 5.97% 5.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 353 113 128
10th Percentile £356 £325 £363
25th Percentile £431 £441 £460
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £537 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.23% +2.29% -
75th Percentile £600 £600 £650
90th Percentile £688 £650 £688
England median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 68 13 17
10th Percentile £47.62 - £18.35
25th Percentile £80.75 £15.13 £25.99
Median hourly rate £86.20 £19.91 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +332.95% -46.91% -25.00%
75th Percentile £88.00 £67.50 £53.75
90th Percentile £98.78 £70.16 £58.75
England median hourly rate £53.00 £32.00 £48.48
% change year-on-year +65.63% -33.99% -12.54%

All Process & Methodology Skills
South East

Continuous Improvement 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 South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 5,361 3,101 4,331
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 81.19% 90.15% 82.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,378 1,942 2,591
10th Percentile £280 £250 £263
25th Percentile £413 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £520
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -3.85% +0.97%
75th Percentile £610 £600 £638
90th Percentile £700 £665 £700
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 538 271 370
10th Percentile £16.00 £13.50 £14.40
25th Percentile £26.06 £15.13 £20.25
Median hourly rate £57.25 £22.50 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +154.44% -59.09% +10.00%
75th Percentile £82.25 £52.30 £70.00
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £77.63
England median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +86.88% -37.13% -6.98%

Continuous Improvement
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Continuous Improvement relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Continuous Improvement job vacancy trend in the South East

Continuous Improvement
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Continuous Improvement.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Continuous Improvement

Continuous Improvement
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Continuous Improvement in the South East over the 6 months to 25 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Continuous Improvement in the South East

Continuous Improvement
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Continuous Improvement.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Continuous Improvement

Continuous Improvement
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Continuous Improvement in the South East over the 6 months to 25 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Continuous Improvement in the South East

Continuous Improvement
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Continuous Improvement within the South East region over the 6 months to 25 July 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
Thames Valley +18 286 £525 +3.70% 200
Berkshire +20 213 £519 +3.80% 105
Hampshire +18 170 £550 -8.33% 159
Buckinghamshire -14 60 £552 +0.30% 49
Surrey +13 58 £475 -5.00% 66
West Sussex -10 36 £495 +18.21% 16
Oxfordshire -15 13 £650 +44.44% 49
Middlesex - 13 - - 5
East Sussex +2 5 £615 +11.82% 6
Kent +3 4 £468 -17.54% 37
Sussex - 1 £600 - 6
Continuous Improvement
England

Continuous Improvement
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 22 (3.72%) SharePoint
2 17 (2.87%) Confluence
3 4 (0.68%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.17%) Adobe Experience Manager
4 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.17%) SharePoint 2010
4 1 (0.17%) SharePoint 2013
Applications
1 47 (7.94%) Microsoft Excel
2 18 (3.04%) Microsoft Project
3 13 (2.20%) Microsoft Office
3 13 (2.20%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.34%) Chatbot
5 1 (0.17%) CINEMA 4D
5 1 (0.17%) Houdini
5 1 (0.17%) MS Visio
5 1 (0.17%) NUKE
5 1 (0.17%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 15 (2.53%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (0.84%) Primavera
3 4 (0.68%) Oracle ERP
4 3 (0.51%) iTrent
4 3 (0.51%) Maximo
4 3 (0.51%) Remedy ITSM
4 3 (0.51%) Salesforce CRM
5 2 (0.34%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 2 (0.34%) SAP SD
5 2 (0.34%) Teamcenter
5 2 (0.34%) Workday HCM
6 1 (0.17%) Oracle EBS
6 1 (0.17%) Oracle EBS R12
6 1 (0.17%) SAP BPC
6 1 (0.17%) SAP BRIM
6 1 (0.17%) SAP Business One
6 1 (0.17%) SAP Convergent Charging
6 1 (0.17%) SAP ERP
6 1 (0.17%) SAP PLM
6 1 (0.17%) SAP PSCD
Cloud Services
1 98 (16.55%) Azure
2 68 (11.49%) AWS
3 35 (5.91%) Power Platform
4 26 (4.39%) GCP
5 17 (2.87%) Entra ID
5 17 (2.87%) SaaS
6 15 (2.53%) Azure DevOps
6 15 (2.53%) GitHub
7 11 (1.86%) Microsoft 365
7 11 (1.86%) Serverless
8 10 (1.69%) GitHub Actions
9 8 (1.35%) Azure Monitor
10 6 (1.01%) AWS CloudFormation
10 6 (1.01%) Azure AKS
10 6 (1.01%) Microsoft Purview
10 6 (1.01%) OCI
10 6 (1.01%) OpenShift
11 5 (0.84%) Datadog
12 4 (0.68%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 4 (0.68%) Route 53
Communications & Networking
1 26 (4.39%) Network Security
2 23 (3.89%) DNS
3 18 (3.04%) Firewall
4 14 (2.36%) LAN
5 9 (1.52%) DHCP
5 9 (1.52%) TCP/IP
6 7 (1.18%) VPN
6 7 (1.18%) WAN
7 6 (1.01%) Broadband
7 6 (1.01%) SD-WAN
7 6 (1.01%) Wi-Fi
8 5 (0.84%) Wireless
9 4 (0.68%) DNSSEC
10 3 (0.51%) BGP
10 3 (0.51%) Intrusion Detection
10 3 (0.51%) MQTT
10 3 (0.51%) OSPF
10 3 (0.51%) Radio Access Network
10 3 (0.51%) VLAN
11 2 (0.34%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 33 (5.57%) Power BI
2 11 (1.86%) Data Warehouse
3 8 (1.35%) Metadata
3 8 (1.35%) Tableau
4 7 (1.18%) PostgreSQL
5 5 (0.84%) Oracle Reports
6 4 (0.68%) Geospatial Data
6 4 (0.68%) GIS
6 4 (0.68%) Redis
6 4 (0.68%) Spark SQL
7 3 (0.51%) Big Data
7 3 (0.51%) Data Lake
7 3 (0.51%) DynamoDB
7 3 (0.51%) Elasticsearch
7 3 (0.51%) SQL Server
8 2 (0.34%) NoSQL
8 2 (0.34%) SAP HANA
8 2 (0.34%) SQL Server Analysis Services
8 2 (0.34%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 2 (0.34%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 29 (4.90%) JIRA
2 27 (4.56%) Rational DOORS
3 11 (1.86%) GitLab
4 10 (1.69%) Jenkins
5 9 (1.52%) Git
6 5 (0.84%) SonarQube
7 3 (0.51%) Cucumber
7 3 (0.51%) Hudson
8 2 (0.34%) Selenium
8 2 (0.34%) Sonatype Nexus
8 2 (0.34%) SpecFlow
9 1 (0.17%) Balsamiq
9 1 (0.17%) Bitbucket
9 1 (0.17%) ERwin
9 1 (0.17%) JUnit
9 1 (0.17%) Mockito
9 1 (0.17%) MSI
9 1 (0.17%) SoapUI
9 1 (0.17%) Subversion
9 1 (0.17%) TestRail
General
1 267 (45.10%) Social Skills
2 155 (26.18%) Analytical Skills
3 113 (19.09%) Finance
4 63 (10.64%) Public Sector
5 57 (9.63%) Aerospace
6 29 (4.90%) Organisational Skills
7 22 (3.72%) Influencing Skills
8 21 (3.55%) Retail
9 20 (3.38%) Telecoms
10 17 (2.87%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 16 (2.70%) French Language
11 16 (2.70%) Spanish Language
12 15 (2.53%) Documentation Skills
13 14 (2.36%) Legal
14 8 (1.35%) Law
14 8 (1.35%) Presentation Skills
15 7 (1.18%) Aviation
15 7 (1.18%) Games
16 6 (1.01%) Military
17 5 (0.84%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 84 (14.19%) Analyst
2 73 (12.33%) Lead
3 55 (9.29%) Senior
4 50 (8.45%) Architect
5 41 (6.93%) Delivery Manager
6 39 (6.59%) Product Manager
7 28 (4.73%) Product Delivery Manager
8 27 (4.56%) IT Manager
9 22 (3.72%) Systems Delivery Manager
9 22 (3.72%) Systems Manager
10 20 (3.38%) Data Analyst
11 16 (2.70%) 2nd Line Support
11 16 (2.70%) 2nd Line Technical Support
11 16 (2.70%) Consultant
11 16 (2.70%) Technical Support
12 15 (2.53%) Senior Analyst
13 14 (2.36%) Project Manager
13 14 (2.36%) Service Manager
13 14 (2.36%) Solutions Architect
14 13 (2.20%) Change Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (1.86%) OAuth
1 11 (1.86%) REST
2 10 (1.69%) RESTful
2 10 (1.69%) SOAP
3 9 (1.52%) .NET
4 8 (1.35%) Kafka
4 8 (1.35%) SAML
5 7 (1.18%) EDI
5 7 (1.18%) OpenID
6 6 (1.01%) ARM Templates
6 6 (1.01%) GraphQL
6 6 (1.01%) LDAP
6 6 (1.01%) OAuth2
6 6 (1.01%) PySpark
6 6 (1.01%) React
7 5 (0.84%) JSON
7 5 (0.84%) Keycloak
7 5 (0.84%) Middleware
7 5 (0.84%) YAML
8 4 (0.68%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 78 (13.18%) Product Ownership
2 33 (5.57%) Onboarding
3 30 (5.07%) Cloud Native
4 29 (4.90%) Management Information System
5 25 (4.22%) Data Structures
6 22 (3.72%) Security Posture
7 21 (3.55%) Operational Technology
8 15 (2.53%) Data Centre
9 14 (2.36%) Analytical Mindset
10 13 (2.20%) Legacy Systems
11 12 (2.03%) Data Protection Act
12 11 (1.86%) CMDB
12 11 (1.86%) Hybrid Cloud
12 11 (1.86%) PMI
12 11 (1.86%) Self-Motivation
13 10 (1.69%) Cyber Threat
13 10 (1.69%) Enterprise Software
14 8 (1.35%) Security Operations Centre
15 7 (1.18%) Animation
15 7 (1.18%) Graphic Design
Operating Systems
1 57 (9.63%) Windows
2 26 (4.39%) Linux
3 14 (2.36%) Windows Server
4 6 (1.01%) Windows Server 2019
5 4 (0.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.34%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.17%) Android
7 1 (0.17%) Embedded Linux
7 1 (0.17%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.17%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 198 (33.45%) Agile
2 157 (26.52%) Stakeholder Management
3 143 (24.16%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 138 (23.31%) Problem-Solving
5 104 (17.57%) ITIL
6 90 (15.20%) Decision-Making
7 78 (13.18%) Roadmaps
7 78 (13.18%) Service Delivery
8 76 (12.84%) Service Management
9 70 (11.82%) Cybersecurity
10 68 (11.49%) ITSM
11 62 (10.47%) CI/CD
12 60 (10.14%) Change Management
12 60 (10.14%) DevOps
13 57 (9.63%) PRINCE2
14 55 (9.29%) Project Delivery
15 54 (9.12%) Computer Science
15 54 (9.12%) Project Management
16 53 (8.95%) Risk Management
17 49 (8.28%) Scaled Agile Framework
Programming Languages
1 54 (9.12%) SQL
2 49 (8.28%) Python
3 32 (5.41%) PowerShell
4 23 (3.89%) Bash
5 17 (2.87%) Java
6 8 (1.35%) C#
7 6 (1.01%) Bicep
8 5 (0.84%) JavaScript
9 4 (0.68%) Apex Code
9 4 (0.68%) Shell Script
9 4 (0.68%) TypeScript
10 3 (0.51%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 3 (0.51%) Go
10 3 (0.51%) Rust
11 2 (0.34%) ABAP
11 2 (0.34%) Kusto Query Language
11 2 (0.34%) PL/SQL
11 2 (0.34%) T-SQL
12 1 (0.17%) C
12 1 (0.17%) VBA
Qualifications
1 293 (49.49%) Security Cleared
2 152 (25.68%) SC Cleared
3 109 (18.41%) Degree
4 89 (15.03%) DV Cleared
5 32 (5.41%) PMI Certification
6 23 (3.89%) PMP
7 18 (3.04%) ACCA
7 18 (3.04%) CIMA
8 15 (2.53%) Azure Certification
9 14 (2.36%) BPSS Clearance
10 13 (2.20%) CISSP
11 12 (2.03%) Cisco Certification
12 10 (1.69%) AWS Certification
12 10 (1.69%) Computer Science Degree
13 9 (1.52%) CCNP
14 8 (1.35%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
15 6 (1.01%) ISTQB
15 6 (1.01%) ITIL Certification
15 6 (1.01%) Master's Degree
16 5 (0.84%) CCNA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 45 (7.60%) QA
2 43 (7.26%) Data Quality
3 37 (6.25%) PMO
4 31 (5.24%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 22 (3.72%) NIST
6 18 (3.04%) GDPR
6 18 (3.04%) NCSC
7 17 (2.87%) SLA
8 8 (1.35%) GRC
9 7 (1.18%) Accessibility
9 7 (1.18%) Cyber Essentials
10 6 (1.01%) ISO 9001
11 4 (0.68%) Def Stans
11 4 (0.68%) ISO 31000
11 4 (0.68%) NIST 800
12 3 (0.51%) ISO 22301
13 2 (0.34%) Disclosure Scotland
13 2 (0.34%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 2 (0.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 1 (0.17%) COBIT
System Software
1 24 (4.05%) Active Directory
2 23 (3.89%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (3.38%) Docker
4 5 (0.84%) Virtual Desktop
4 5 (0.84%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (0.84%) vSphere
5 4 (0.68%) IAG
5 4 (0.68%) VMware NSX
6 3 (0.51%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.34%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 33 (5.57%) Terraform
2 32 (5.41%) Kubernetes
3 24 (4.05%) Ansible
4 9 (1.52%) Grafana
5 8 (1.35%) Prometheus
5 8 (1.35%) Puppet
6 6 (1.01%) Microsoft Intune
6 6 (1.01%) SCCM
7 5 (0.84%) Progress Chef
8 4 (0.68%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 4 (0.68%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.51%) Podman
10 2 (0.34%) Argo
10 2 (0.34%) CASB
10 2 (0.34%) CSIRT
10 2 (0.34%) Iperf
10 2 (0.34%) Nmap
10 2 (0.34%) Rancher
10 2 (0.34%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.34%) WMI
Vendors
1 79 (13.34%) Microsoft
2 49 (8.28%) ServiceNow
3 43 (7.26%) SAP
4 31 (5.24%) VMware
5 25 (4.22%) IBM
6 23 (3.89%) Oracle
7 11 (1.86%) Cisco
7 11 (1.86%) Databricks
7 11 (1.86%) Juniper
8 10 (1.69%) Google
8 10 (1.69%) Salesforce
9 8 (1.35%) SolarWinds
10 7 (1.18%) Workday
11 6 (1.01%) Baan
11 6 (1.01%) Palo Alto
11 6 (1.01%) Virgin Media
12 5 (0.84%) Aruba
12 5 (0.84%) Dynatrace
12 5 (0.84%) Red Hat
13 4 (0.68%) Splunk