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 29 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
29 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 30 39 64
Rank change year-on-year +9 +25 +4
Contract jobs citing Continuous Improvement 271 180 162
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.15% 5.02% 3.26%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 7.26% 5.67% 3.65%
Number of daily rates quoted 172 99 84
10th Percentile £303 £386 £400
25th Percentile £350 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -13.64% - +7.63%
75th Percentile £575 £638 £653
90th Percentile £630 £698 £700
England median daily rate £500 £530 £550
% change year-on-year -5.66% -3.64% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 22 11 10
10th Percentile - £13.25 £16.25
25th Percentile £12.50 £21.00 £32.98
Median hourly rate £16.00 £52.50 £64.40
Median % change year-on-year -69.52% -18.48% +125.38%
75th Percentile £58.00 £59.53 £71.87
90th Percentile £92.52 £61.76 £72.93
England median hourly rate £23.33 £50.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year -53.34% -23.08% +4.00%

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 3,731 3,175 4,436
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 84.60% 88.46% 89.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,450 1,978 2,853
10th Percentile £223 £250 £213
25th Percentile £400 £406 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £511 £518
Median % change year-on-year -2.12% -1.38% +1.37%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £615
90th Percentile £678 £675 £688
England median daily rate £500 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% -1.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 355 119 236
10th Percentile £14.75 £19.84 £19.10
25th Percentile £17.00 £26.13 £27.50
Median hourly rate £22.50 £47.25 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -52.38% -14.10% +29.67%
75th Percentile £48.75 £63.00 £66.30
90th Percentile £75.00 £74.89 £76.53
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -28.14% -21.35% +25.35%

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 29 December 2025.

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 29 December 2025.

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 29 December 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
Thames Valley +6 139 £438 -20.45% 483
Berkshire +1 106 £420 -23.64% 288
Hampshire +14 70 £475 -9.52% 205
Buckinghamshire +6 26 £500 -9.09% 116
Surrey +1 22 £500 -23.08% 124
West Sussex +1 15 £500 +11.11% 62
Sussex 0 9 - - 4
Kent +8 8 £594 +7.91% 115
Oxfordshire -10 7 £529 +17.61% 80
East Sussex +3 6 £600 -14.29% 56
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 8 (2.95%) Confluence
2 6 (2.21%) SharePoint
3 4 (1.48%) Microsoft Exchange
4 3 (1.11%) Camunda
5 2 (0.74%) WebLogic
6 1 (0.37%) Apache Airflow
6 1 (0.37%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.37%) CMS
6 1 (0.37%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.37%) Umbraco
Applications
1 21 (7.75%) Microsoft Office
2 16 (5.90%) Microsoft Excel
3 10 (3.69%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 10 (3.69%) Microsoft Project
3 10 (3.69%) MS Visio
4 2 (0.74%) Chatbot
5 1 (0.37%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 5 (1.85%) Dynamics CRM
2 3 (1.11%) NetSuite
2 3 (1.11%) Workday HCM
3 2 (0.74%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 1 (0.37%) assyst
4 1 (0.37%) iTrent
4 1 (0.37%) Oracle Applications
4 1 (0.37%) Oracle BRM
4 1 (0.37%) Remedy ITSM
4 1 (0.37%) SAP HCM
4 1 (0.37%) SAP HR
4 1 (0.37%) SAP PM
4 1 (0.37%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 76 (28.04%) Azure
2 56 (20.66%) AWS
3 38 (14.02%) GCP
4 13 (4.80%) Azure DevOps
5 12 (4.43%) Google Workspace
6 11 (4.06%) Power Platform
7 10 (3.69%) Microsoft 365
8 9 (3.32%) GitHub
8 9 (3.32%) SaaS
9 8 (2.95%) Entra ID
10 5 (1.85%) GitHub Actions
10 5 (1.85%) IaaS
11 4 (1.48%) PaaS
11 4 (1.48%) Serverless
12 3 (1.11%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 3 (1.11%) Azure Functions
12 3 (1.11%) Azure Monitor
12 3 (1.11%) OCI
12 3 (1.11%) OpenShift
12 3 (1.11%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 12 (4.43%) Network Security
2 10 (3.69%) Firewall
3 8 (2.95%) DNS
4 7 (2.58%) VPN
5 4 (1.48%) DHCP
5 4 (1.48%) TCP/IP
6 3 (1.11%) Broadband
6 3 (1.11%) LAN
6 3 (1.11%) MPLS
6 3 (1.11%) WAN
7 2 (0.74%) Internet
7 2 (0.74%) IPv4
7 2 (0.74%) IPv6
7 2 (0.74%) NaaS
7 2 (0.74%) SD-WAN
7 2 (0.74%) Software-Defined Networking
7 2 (0.74%) VLAN
8 1 (0.37%) 5G
8 1 (0.37%) Radio Access Network
8 1 (0.37%) Remote Desktop
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (2.95%) Power BI
2 6 (2.21%) Oracle Database
3 5 (1.85%) SQL Server
4 4 (1.48%) Data Lake
4 4 (1.48%) Data Warehouse
4 4 (1.48%) Relational Database
5 3 (1.11%) Oracle Reports
6 2 (0.74%) DynamoDB
6 2 (0.74%) Oracle Database 11g
6 2 (0.74%) Oracle Database 12c
6 2 (0.74%) Oracle ODI
6 2 (0.74%) Pinecone
6 2 (0.74%) PostgreSQL
6 2 (0.74%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 2 (0.74%) Tableau
6 2 (0.74%) Weaviate
7 1 (0.37%) Data Hub
7 1 (0.37%) Data Vault
7 1 (0.37%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
7 1 (0.37%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 21 (7.75%) JIRA
2 7 (2.58%) Jenkins
3 6 (2.21%) GitLab
4 4 (1.48%) Git
4 4 (1.48%) Selenium
5 3 (1.11%) Bitbucket
5 3 (1.11%) Rational DOORS
6 2 (0.74%) Cucumber
6 2 (0.74%) Oracle APEX
6 2 (0.74%) Oracle Forms
6 2 (0.74%) REST Assured
7 1 (0.37%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.37%) Cypress.io
7 1 (0.37%) Gatling
7 1 (0.37%) HP UFT
7 1 (0.37%) JMeter
7 1 (0.37%) Katalon Studio
7 1 (0.37%) LoadRunner
7 1 (0.37%) Subversion
7 1 (0.37%) Visual Studio
General
1 140 (51.66%) Social Skills
2 69 (25.46%) Analytical Skills
3 50 (18.45%) Finance
4 24 (8.86%) Public Sector
5 18 (6.64%) Organisational Skills
6 13 (4.80%) Influencing Skills
7 12 (4.43%) Manufacturing
8 9 (3.32%) Retail
9 8 (2.95%) Documentation Skills
9 8 (2.95%) Legal
10 7 (2.58%) Aerospace
10 7 (2.58%) Telecoms
11 4 (1.48%) Automotive
11 4 (1.48%) Aviation
11 4 (1.48%) Billing
11 4 (1.48%) Environmental Health
11 4 (1.48%) Law
11 4 (1.48%) Presentation Skills
12 3 (1.11%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 3 (1.11%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 37 (13.65%) Lead
2 26 (9.59%) Analyst
3 25 (9.23%) Senior
4 15 (5.54%) Support Officer
5 14 (5.17%) Project Manager
6 12 (4.43%) Consultant
6 12 (4.43%) IT Support
7 11 (4.06%) Architect
7 11 (4.06%) Support Assistant
8 10 (3.69%) IT Assistant
8 10 (3.69%) IT Support Assistant
9 9 (3.32%) Delivery Manager
10 8 (2.95%) IT Manager
10 8 (2.95%) Senior Analyst
10 8 (2.95%) Service Manager
10 8 (2.95%) Test Manager
11 7 (2.58%) Designer
11 7 (2.58%) Service Analyst
11 7 (2.58%) Service Delivery Manager
12 6 (2.21%) Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (2.58%) .NET
1 7 (2.58%) REST
2 6 (2.21%) React
3 4 (1.48%) Oracle Fusion
3 4 (1.48%) RESTful
3 4 (1.48%) SOAP
4 3 (1.11%) AngularJS
4 3 (1.11%) Node.js
5 2 (0.74%) Faiss
5 2 (0.74%) Kafka
5 2 (0.74%) Oracle GoldenGate
6 1 (0.37%) Elastic Stack
6 1 (0.37%) Keycloak
6 1 (0.37%) Lightning Web Components
6 1 (0.37%) OAuth2
6 1 (0.37%) Play Framework
6 1 (0.37%) Playwright
6 1 (0.37%) Spring Boot
6 1 (0.37%) Unity (Game Engine)
6 1 (0.37%) WebdriverIO
Miscellaneous
1 18 (6.64%) Enterprise Software
2 15 (5.54%) Onboarding
3 12 (4.43%) Data Centre
4 10 (3.69%) Virtual Team
5 9 (3.32%) Product Ownership
5 9 (3.32%) Security Operations Centre
6 8 (2.95%) PMI
7 7 (2.58%) Legacy Systems
8 6 (2.21%) Analytical Mindset
8 6 (2.21%) e-Learning
8 6 (2.21%) Management Information System
8 6 (2.21%) PKI
9 5 (1.85%) Cloud Native
10 4 (1.48%) Cyber Threat
10 4 (1.48%) Hybrid Cloud
10 4 (1.48%) Learning Management System
10 4 (1.48%) Life Science
10 4 (1.48%) Operational Technology
10 4 (1.48%) Security Posture
10 4 (1.48%) Web Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 27 (9.96%) Windows
2 26 (9.59%) Linux
3 5 (1.85%) Windows 10
3 5 (1.85%) Windows Server
4 4 (1.48%) Unix
5 3 (1.11%) Mac OS
6 2 (0.74%) CentOS
6 2 (0.74%) Ubuntu
7 1 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 1 (0.37%) Solaris
7 1 (0.37%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 79 (29.15%) Problem-Solving
2 78 (28.78%) Agile
3 63 (23.25%) ITIL
4 55 (20.30%) Change Management
4 55 (20.30%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 48 (17.71%) Service Management
6 47 (17.34%) ITSM
7 43 (15.87%) Stakeholder Management
8 35 (12.92%) Performance Metrics
9 31 (11.44%) Decision-Making
10 28 (10.33%) DevOps
11 27 (9.96%) Roadmaps
12 26 (9.59%) Project Management
13 25 (9.23%) Service Delivery
14 23 (8.49%) Collaborative Working
15 22 (8.12%) Cybersecurity
15 22 (8.12%) Incident Response
15 22 (8.12%) PRINCE2
16 20 (7.38%) ERP
16 20 (7.38%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 21 (7.75%) Python
2 16 (5.90%) PowerShell
3 14 (5.17%) SQL
4 8 (2.95%) Bash
5 5 (1.85%) Java
5 5 (1.85%) PL/SQL
6 4 (1.48%) C#
7 3 (1.11%) Perl
8 2 (0.74%) Bicep
9 1 (0.37%) Apex Code
9 1 (0.37%) JavaScript
9 1 (0.37%) Scala
9 1 (0.37%) TypeScript
9 1 (0.37%) VB
Qualifications
1 83 (30.63%) Security Cleared
2 56 (20.66%) SC Cleared
3 31 (11.44%) Degree
4 18 (6.64%) DV Cleared
5 16 (5.90%) PMI Certification
6 11 (4.06%) Computer Science Degree
7 10 (3.69%) CISSP
8 9 (3.32%) PMP
9 7 (2.58%) ISTQB
9 7 (2.58%) Microsoft Certification
10 6 (2.21%) ACCA
10 6 (2.21%) CIMA
10 6 (2.21%) Cisco Certification
11 5 (1.85%) CCNA
11 5 (1.85%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
11 5 (1.85%) Master's Degree
12 4 (1.48%) Azure Certification
12 4 (1.48%) GCIA
12 4 (1.48%) GCIH
12 4 (1.48%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (7.01%) GDPR
2 15 (5.54%) PMO
3 13 (4.80%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 13 (4.80%) SLA
4 12 (4.43%) NIST
4 12 (4.43%) QA
5 5 (1.85%) Data Quality
6 4 (1.48%) Accessibility
7 3 (1.11%) Actionable Recommendations
7 3 (1.11%) Cyber Essentials
7 3 (1.11%) GRC
8 2 (0.74%) HIPAA
8 2 (0.74%) ISO/IEC 19770
8 2 (0.74%) NCSC
8 2 (0.74%) PCI DSS
9 1 (0.37%) COBIT
9 1 (0.37%) COSHH
9 1 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 1 (0.37%) JSP 440
9 1 (0.37%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 13 (4.80%) VMware Infrastructure
2 11 (4.06%) Active Directory
2 11 (4.06%) Docker
3 6 (2.21%) vSphere
4 5 (1.85%) VMware NSX
5 2 (0.74%) KVM
5 2 (0.74%) Virtual Desktop
5 2 (0.74%) VMware ESXi
6 1 (0.37%) Firmware
6 1 (0.37%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 11 (4.06%) Ansible
2 9 (3.32%) Kubernetes
3 8 (2.95%) Terraform
4 6 (2.21%) SCCM
5 4 (1.48%) Single Sign-On
6 3 (1.11%) Grafana
6 3 (1.11%) Microsoft Intune
6 3 (1.11%) Nagios
6 3 (1.11%) Podman
6 3 (1.11%) Progress Chef
6 3 (1.11%) Prometheus
6 3 (1.11%) Proxmox
6 3 (1.11%) Puppet
7 2 (0.74%) CSIRT
7 2 (0.74%) vRealize
7 2 (0.74%) vRealize Orchestrator
8 1 (0.37%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 1 (0.37%) Argo
8 1 (0.37%) Avamar
8 1 (0.37%) VxRail
Vendors
1 52 (19.19%) Microsoft
2 33 (12.18%) Google
3 21 (7.75%) Oracle
4 20 (7.38%) ServiceNow
5 17 (6.27%) VMware
6 10 (3.69%) SAP
7 9 (3.32%) Cisco
7 9 (3.32%) Juniper
8 8 (2.95%) Workday
9 7 (2.58%) Splunk
10 6 (2.21%) Zscaler
11 5 (1.85%) Salesforce
12 4 (1.48%) BMC
12 4 (1.48%) Fortinet
13 3 (1.11%) Citrix
13 3 (1.11%) CyberArk
13 3 (1.11%) IFS
13 3 (1.11%) Palo Alto
13 3 (1.11%) Red Hat
13 3 (1.11%) SolarWinds