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 3 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 34 38
Rank change year-on-year +20 +4 +28
Contract jobs citing Continuous Improvement 612 191 223
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 9.20% 5.46% 4.51%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.35% 6.06% 5.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 362 113 119
10th Percentile £325 £325 £363
25th Percentile £425 £441 £458
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year - - -1.18%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £644
90th Percentile £687 £645 £688
England median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 67 13 16
10th Percentile £47.50 - £18.35
25th Percentile £80.50 £15.13 £25.49
Median hourly rate £85.40 £19.91 £34.50
Median % change year-on-year +328.93% -42.29% -29.59%
75th Percentile £88.00 £67.50 £54.06
90th Percentile - £70.16 £58.75
England median hourly rate £47.50 £28.75 £50.00
% change year-on-year +65.22% -42.50% -14.89%

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 5,392 3,153 4,095
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 81.05% 90.11% 82.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,354 1,968 2,486
10th Percentile £280 £250 £255
25th Percentile £415 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £520
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -3.85% +0.31%
75th Percentile £613 £600 £638
90th Percentile £700 £675 £700
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 564 284 328
10th Percentile £15.25 £13.50 £15.00
25th Percentile £25.60 £15.13 £26.02
Median hourly rate £55.00 £21.67 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year +153.87% -62.22% +14.70%
75th Percentile £80.09 £50.25 £70.00
90th Percentile £88.00 £74.63 £76.90
England median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +78.93% -40.82% -

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 3 August 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 3 August 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 3 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
Thames Valley +16 289 £525 +5.00% 251
Berkshire +23 212 £510 +1.90% 132
Hampshire +18 177 £550 -8.33% 173
Surrey +15 62 £450 -10.00% 87
Buckinghamshire -13 61 £563 +2.27% 65
West Sussex -2 38 £490 +17.01% 28
Oxfordshire -10 16 £650 +44.44% 56
Middlesex - 15 - - 5
Kent +7 6 £405 +12.63% 55
East Sussex +2 5 £615 +11.82% 11
Sussex - 1 £600 - 4
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 25 (4.08%) SharePoint
2 17 (2.78%) Confluence
3 4 (0.65%) Apache Spark
4 2 (0.33%) Oracle Application Server
5 1 (0.16%) Adobe Experience Manager
5 1 (0.16%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.16%) SharePoint 2010
5 1 (0.16%) SharePoint 2013
Applications
1 50 (8.17%) Microsoft Excel
2 20 (3.27%) Microsoft Project
3 16 (2.61%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 12 (1.96%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.33%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.16%) CINEMA 4D
6 1 (0.16%) Houdini
6 1 (0.16%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.16%) NUKE
6 1 (0.16%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 15 (2.45%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (0.98%) Primavera
3 4 (0.65%) Oracle ERP
4 3 (0.49%) iTrent
4 3 (0.49%) Maximo
4 3 (0.49%) Remedy ITSM
4 3 (0.49%) Salesforce CRM
4 3 (0.49%) Workday HCM
5 2 (0.33%) NEC Housing
5 2 (0.33%) SAP SD
5 2 (0.33%) Teamcenter
6 1 (0.16%) Oracle EBS
6 1 (0.16%) Oracle EBS R12
6 1 (0.16%) SAP BPC
6 1 (0.16%) SAP BRIM
6 1 (0.16%) SAP Business One
6 1 (0.16%) SAP Convergent Charging
6 1 (0.16%) SAP ERP
6 1 (0.16%) SAP PLM
6 1 (0.16%) SAP PSCD
Cloud Services
1 109 (17.81%) Azure
2 75 (12.25%) AWS
3 37 (6.05%) Power Platform
4 32 (5.23%) GCP
5 20 (3.27%) Entra ID
6 19 (3.10%) GitHub
6 19 (3.10%) SaaS
7 18 (2.94%) Azure DevOps
8 15 (2.45%) Microsoft 365
9 13 (2.12%) GitHub Actions
10 11 (1.80%) Serverless
11 9 (1.47%) AWS CloudFormation
11 9 (1.47%) Azure Monitor
12 8 (1.31%) Datadog
12 8 (1.31%) OCI
13 7 (1.14%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 7 (1.14%) Amazon EKS
13 7 (1.14%) OpenShift
14 6 (0.98%) Azure AKS
14 6 (0.98%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 26 (4.25%) Network Security
2 25 (4.08%) DNS
3 16 (2.61%) Firewall
4 14 (2.29%) LAN
5 9 (1.47%) DHCP
6 8 (1.31%) Broadband
7 7 (1.14%) TCP/IP
7 7 (1.14%) WAN
7 7 (1.14%) Wireless
8 6 (0.98%) SD-WAN
8 6 (0.98%) Wi-Fi
9 5 (0.82%) VPN
10 4 (0.65%) DNSSEC
11 3 (0.49%) Intranet
11 3 (0.49%) Intrusion Detection
11 3 (0.49%) MQTT
11 3 (0.49%) Radio Access Network
11 3 (0.49%) VLAN
12 2 (0.33%) Cisco Nexus
12 2 (0.33%) Modbus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 34 (5.56%) Power BI
2 13 (2.12%) Data Warehouse
3 8 (1.31%) Metadata
3 8 (1.31%) PostgreSQL
3 8 (1.31%) Tableau
4 7 (1.14%) Oracle Reports
5 6 (0.98%) Spark SQL
6 4 (0.65%) Geospatial Data
6 4 (0.65%) GIS
6 4 (0.65%) Redis
6 4 (0.65%) SQL Server
7 3 (0.49%) Big Data
7 3 (0.49%) DynamoDB
7 3 (0.49%) Elasticsearch
7 3 (0.49%) NoSQL
8 2 (0.33%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.33%) Data Lake
8 2 (0.33%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
8 2 (0.33%) Oracle ODI
8 2 (0.33%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 31 (5.07%) JIRA
2 27 (4.41%) Rational DOORS
3 15 (2.45%) GitLab
4 13 (2.12%) Jenkins
5 11 (1.80%) Git
6 5 (0.82%) SonarQube
7 3 (0.49%) Cucumber
7 3 (0.49%) Hudson
8 2 (0.33%) REST Assured
8 2 (0.33%) Selenium
8 2 (0.33%) Sonatype Nexus
8 2 (0.33%) SpecFlow
9 1 (0.16%) ERwin
9 1 (0.16%) JUnit
9 1 (0.16%) Mockito
9 1 (0.16%) MSI
9 1 (0.16%) Postman
9 1 (0.16%) SoapUI
9 1 (0.16%) Subversion
9 1 (0.16%) TestRail
General
1 269 (43.95%) Social Skills
2 169 (27.61%) Analytical Skills
3 117 (19.12%) Finance
4 67 (10.95%) Public Sector
5 58 (9.48%) Aerospace
6 32 (5.23%) Organisational Skills
7 23 (3.76%) Influencing Skills
8 21 (3.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 21 (3.43%) Retail
9 16 (2.61%) Documentation Skills
9 16 (2.61%) French Language
9 16 (2.61%) Spanish Language
9 16 (2.61%) Telecoms
10 15 (2.45%) Legal
11 9 (1.47%) Law
11 9 (1.47%) Military
12 8 (1.31%) Games
12 8 (1.31%) Presentation Skills
13 6 (0.98%) Local Government
13 6 (0.98%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 90 (14.71%) Analyst
2 76 (12.42%) Lead
3 61 (9.97%) Senior
4 52 (8.50%) Architect
5 43 (7.03%) Delivery Manager
6 40 (6.54%) Product Manager
7 29 (4.74%) Product Delivery Manager
8 25 (4.08%) IT Manager
9 22 (3.59%) Data Analyst
9 22 (3.59%) Systems Delivery Manager
9 22 (3.59%) Systems Manager
10 18 (2.94%) Consultant
11 16 (2.61%) 2nd Line Support
11 16 (2.61%) 2nd Line Technical Support
11 16 (2.61%) Senior Analyst
11 16 (2.61%) Technical Support
12 15 (2.45%) Solutions Architect
13 14 (2.29%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 14 (2.29%) Project Manager
13 14 (2.29%) Service Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (2.12%) REST
2 12 (1.96%) RESTful
3 11 (1.80%) .NET
3 11 (1.80%) OAuth
3 11 (1.80%) SOAP
4 9 (1.47%) Kafka
5 8 (1.31%) JSON
5 8 (1.31%) PySpark
5 8 (1.31%) SAML
6 7 (1.14%) ARM Templates
6 7 (1.14%) EDI
6 7 (1.14%) OpenID
7 6 (0.98%) GraphQL
7 6 (0.98%) LDAP
7 6 (0.98%) OAuth2
7 6 (0.98%) XML
8 5 (0.82%) HTML
8 5 (0.82%) Keycloak
8 5 (0.82%) Middleware
8 5 (0.82%) React
Miscellaneous
1 77 (12.58%) Product Ownership
2 35 (5.72%) Onboarding
3 30 (4.90%) Cloud Native
4 27 (4.41%) Management Information System
5 25 (4.08%) Data Structures
6 23 (3.76%) Operational Technology
7 21 (3.43%) Security Posture
8 16 (2.61%) Data Centre
9 14 (2.29%) Analytical Mindset
9 14 (2.29%) Hybrid Cloud
10 12 (1.96%) CMDB
10 12 (1.96%) Cyber Threat
10 12 (1.96%) Self-Motivation
11 11 (1.80%) Data Protection Act
11 11 (1.80%) Legacy Systems
11 11 (1.80%) PMI
12 10 (1.63%) Enterprise Software
12 10 (1.63%) Security Operations Centre
13 8 (1.31%) Animation
13 8 (1.31%) Graphic Design
Operating Systems
1 62 (10.13%) Windows
2 28 (4.58%) Linux
3 19 (3.10%) Windows Server
4 7 (1.14%) Windows Server 2019
5 4 (0.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.16%) Embedded Linux
6 1 (0.16%) Mac OS
6 1 (0.16%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 213 (34.80%) Agile
2 153 (25.00%) Stakeholder Management
3 152 (24.84%) Problem-Solving
4 149 (24.35%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 103 (16.83%) ITIL
6 91 (14.87%) Decision-Making
7 84 (13.73%) Service Delivery
8 80 (13.07%) Roadmaps
9 76 (12.42%) Cybersecurity
9 76 (12.42%) Service Management
10 72 (11.76%) CI/CD
10 72 (11.76%) ITSM
11 69 (11.27%) DevOps
12 59 (9.64%) Change Management
12 59 (9.64%) PRINCE2
13 58 (9.48%) Project Delivery
14 56 (9.15%) Computer Science
15 55 (8.99%) Project Management
16 52 (8.50%) Risk Management
17 50 (8.17%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 59 (9.64%) SQL
2 56 (9.15%) Python
3 35 (5.72%) PowerShell
4 22 (3.59%) Bash
5 19 (3.10%) Java
6 10 (1.63%) C#
7 7 (1.14%) Bicep
7 7 (1.14%) JavaScript
8 5 (0.82%) TypeScript
9 4 (0.65%) Apex Code
9 4 (0.65%) PL/SQL
9 4 (0.65%) Shell Script
10 3 (0.49%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 3 (0.49%) Go
10 3 (0.49%) Rust
11 2 (0.33%) ABAP
11 2 (0.33%) Kusto Query Language
11 2 (0.33%) T-SQL
12 1 (0.16%) VB
12 1 (0.16%) VBA
Qualifications
1 304 (49.67%) Security Cleared
2 155 (25.33%) SC Cleared
3 112 (18.30%) Degree
4 97 (15.85%) DV Cleared
5 32 (5.23%) PMI Certification
6 23 (3.76%) PMP
7 17 (2.78%) ACCA
7 17 (2.78%) CIMA
8 16 (2.61%) Azure Certification
9 15 (2.45%) BPSS Clearance
10 13 (2.12%) AWS Certification
10 13 (2.12%) CISSP
11 12 (1.96%) Computer Science Degree
12 10 (1.63%) Cisco Certification
13 8 (1.31%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
14 7 (1.14%) CCNP
15 6 (0.98%) ITIL Certification
15 6 (0.98%) Master's Degree
16 5 (0.82%) CCNA
16 5 (0.82%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 49 (8.01%) QA
2 46 (7.52%) Data Quality
3 41 (6.70%) PMO
4 33 (5.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 23 (3.76%) NIST
6 18 (2.94%) GDPR
6 18 (2.94%) SLA
7 16 (2.61%) NCSC
8 9 (1.47%) Cyber Essentials
9 7 (1.14%) GRC
9 7 (1.14%) ISO 9001
10 5 (0.82%) Accessibility
11 4 (0.65%) ISO 31000
12 3 (0.49%) Def Stans
12 3 (0.49%) ISO 22301
12 3 (0.49%) NIST 800
13 2 (0.33%) Disclosure Scotland
13 2 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 2 (0.33%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 1 (0.16%) COBIT
System Software
1 28 (4.58%) Active Directory
2 25 (4.08%) Docker
3 24 (3.92%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (0.82%) Virtual Desktop
4 5 (0.82%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (0.82%) vSphere
5 4 (0.65%) IAG
5 4 (0.65%) VMware NSX
6 3 (0.49%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.33%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 41 (6.70%) Terraform
2 38 (6.21%) Kubernetes
3 26 (4.25%) Ansible
4 12 (1.96%) Grafana
5 8 (1.31%) Prometheus
5 8 (1.31%) Puppet
6 7 (1.14%) Microsoft Intune
7 6 (0.98%) SCCM
8 5 (0.82%) Progress Chef
9 4 (0.65%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 3 (0.49%) Argo
10 3 (0.49%) Podman
10 3 (0.49%) Single Sign-On
11 2 (0.33%) CASB
11 2 (0.33%) CSIRT
11 2 (0.33%) Nessus
11 2 (0.33%) Rancher
11 2 (0.33%) vCenter Server
11 2 (0.33%) WMI
12 1 (0.16%) SCOM
Vendors
1 95 (15.52%) Microsoft
2 51 (8.33%) ServiceNow
3 45 (7.35%) SAP
4 33 (5.39%) VMware
5 26 (4.25%) Oracle
6 25 (4.08%) IBM
7 14 (2.29%) Databricks
7 14 (2.29%) Google
7 14 (2.29%) Salesforce
8 12 (1.96%) Juniper
9 9 (1.47%) Cisco
10 8 (1.31%) Dynatrace
10 8 (1.31%) Workday
11 7 (1.14%) Splunk
12 6 (0.98%) Baan
12 6 (0.98%) SolarWinds
12 6 (0.98%) Virgin Media
13 5 (0.82%) Aruba
13 5 (0.82%) Red Hat
14 4 (0.65%) Palo Alto