Creative Thinking Contracts

Creative Thinking
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring Creative Thinking skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Creative Thinking over the 6 months leading up to 30 April 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Apr 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 437 446 465
Rank change year-on-year +9 +19 +76
Contract jobs citing Creative Thinking 82 155 252
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.28% 0.36% 0.42%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.31% 0.41% 0.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 53 87 164
10th Percentile £363 £313 £400
25th Percentile £425 £416 £458
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £513 £550
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% -6.82% +10.00%
75th Percentile £600 £593 £652
90th Percentile £738 £638 £746
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £515 £550
% change year-on-year -12.62% -6.36% +22.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 10 7
10th Percentile £21.85 £15.28 £26.63
25th Percentile £26.13 £18.25 £36.13
Median hourly rate £30.53 £19.50 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year +56.54% -61.00% +195.33%
75th Percentile £32.05 £54.76 £62.50
90th Percentile - £63.75 £71.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £32.05 £27.52 £50.00
% change year-on-year +16.48% -44.97% +195.33%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

Creative Thinking 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 26,551 37,621 53,662
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 90.82% 86.30% 89.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,137 24,254 37,244
10th Percentile £308 £300 £325
25th Percentile £413 £413 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £521 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.86% -4.55% +4.76%
75th Percentile £630 £638 £650
90th Percentile £744 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -3.80% - +5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,071 2,437 1,746
10th Percentile £14.70 £12.75 £11.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £16.00 £16.25
Median hourly rate £29.00 £35.50 £37.30
Median % change year-on-year -18.31% -4.83% +49.20%
75th Percentile £62.00 £59.95 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £72.50 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.94 £36.50 £36.00
% change year-on-year -23.45% +1.39% +80.00%

Creative Thinking
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Creative Thinking as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Creative Thinking in the UK

Creative Thinking
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Creative Thinking.

Daily rate trend for Creative Thinking in the UK

Creative Thinking
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Creative Thinking over the 6 months to 30 April 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Creative Thinking in the UK

Creative Thinking
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Creative Thinking.

Hourly rate trend for Creative Thinking in the UK

Creative Thinking
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Creative Thinking over the 6 months to 30 April 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Creative Thinking in the UK

Creative Thinking
Top 14 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Creative Thinking within the UK over the 6 months to 30 April 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
England -7 73 £525 +5.00% 445
London +13 50 £538 +10.82% 274
UK excluding London +5 22 £450 -12.62% 187
Work from Home +24 18 £538 +4.37% 217
South East +31 7 £525 +1.20% 41
North of England +13 5 £410 -28.70% 57
North West +1 4 £410 -33.06% 40
East of England +32 3 £600 +23.08% 23
South West +31 2 £513 -14.58% 15
Scotland +5 2 £388 -29.55% 15
Northern Ireland -7 2 £450 -12.20% 2
Midlands +15 1 - - 33
West Midlands +13 1 - - 18
Yorkshire +11 1 £225 -41.94% 15

Creative Thinking
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 5 (6.10%) CMS
1 5 (6.10%) Confluence
2 4 (4.88%) SharePoint
Applications
1 12 (14.63%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 6 (7.32%) Microsoft Excel
3 5 (6.10%) Adobe Creative Suite
4 4 (4.88%) Microsoft Office
5 3 (3.66%) Acrobat
6 1 (1.22%) Adobe After Effects
6 1 (1.22%) Adobe Illustrator
6 1 (1.22%) Adobe Premiere
6 1 (1.22%) Adobe XD
6 1 (1.22%) Camtasia
6 1 (1.22%) CINEMA 4D
6 1 (1.22%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (1.22%) MS Visio
6 1 (1.22%) Photoshop
6 1 (1.22%) Sketch
6 1 (1.22%) SketchUp
6 1 (1.22%) UserZoom
Business Applications
1 2 (2.44%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (1.22%) SAP HCM
2 1 (1.22%) SAP Payroll
2 1 (1.22%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 10 (12.20%) AWS
2 9 (10.98%) Power Platform
3 7 (8.54%) Azure
3 7 (8.54%) Figma
4 4 (4.88%) Dynamics 365
5 3 (3.66%) SaaS
6 2 (2.44%) Azure Functions
6 2 (2.44%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 2 (2.44%) GCP
6 2 (2.44%) Power Automate
6 2 (2.44%) Serverless
6 2 (2.44%) Snowflake
7 1 (1.22%) Amazon EKS
7 1 (1.22%) Azure AKS
7 1 (1.22%) Azure Monitor
7 1 (1.22%) GitHub Actions
7 1 (1.22%) IBM Watson
7 1 (1.22%) Lucidchart
7 1 (1.22%) PowerApps
7 1 (1.22%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 2 (2.44%) BIG-IP
1 2 (2.44%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
1 2 (2.44%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
1 2 (2.44%) Firewall
1 2 (2.44%) NGFW
1 2 (2.44%) VXLAN
1 2 (2.44%) Wi-Fi
1 2 (2.44%) Wireshark
2 1 (1.22%) Internet
2 1 (1.22%) Intranet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (8.54%) Power BI
2 4 (4.88%) SQL Server
3 3 (3.66%) Data Warehouse
4 2 (2.44%) NoSQL
4 2 (2.44%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 2 (2.44%) Tableau
5 1 (1.22%) Azure SQL Database
5 1 (1.22%) BusinessObjects
5 1 (1.22%) Crystal Reports
5 1 (1.22%) Data Lake
5 1 (1.22%) Delta Lake
5 1 (1.22%) MongoDB
5 1 (1.22%) PostgreSQL
5 1 (1.22%) SAP Data Services
5 1 (1.22%) Spotfire
5 1 (1.22%) SQL Server Analysis Services
Development Applications
1 6 (7.32%) JIRA
2 5 (6.10%) Git
3 4 (4.88%) Postman
3 4 (4.88%) REST Assured
4 2 (2.44%) Balsamiq
5 1 (1.22%) GitLab
5 1 (1.22%) Jenkins
5 1 (1.22%) MLflow
5 1 (1.22%) Selenium
General
1 47 (57.32%) Social Skills
2 34 (41.46%) Analytical Skills
3 20 (24.39%) Finance
4 10 (12.20%) Marketing
5 9 (10.98%) Public Sector
6 6 (7.32%) Presentation Skills
7 5 (6.10%) Legal
8 4 (4.88%) Automotive
8 4 (4.88%) Banking
8 4 (4.88%) Influencing Skills
9 3 (3.66%) Financial Institution
9 3 (3.66%) Local Government
9 3 (3.66%) Pharmaceutical
10 2 (2.44%) Brand Awareness
10 2 (2.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 2 (2.44%) Manufacturing
11 1 (1.22%) Advertising
11 1 (1.22%) Documentation Skills
11 1 (1.22%) Organisational Skills
11 1 (1.22%) Retail
Job Titles
1 11 (13.41%) Analyst
1 11 (13.41%) Designer
2 9 (10.98%) Lead
3 7 (8.54%) Project Manager
3 7 (8.54%) Senior
4 6 (7.32%) Business Analyst
5 4 (4.88%) Visual Designer
6 3 (3.66%) Architect
6 3 (3.66%) Developer
6 3 (3.66%) Java Engineer
6 3 (3.66%) Performance Engineer
6 3 (3.66%) QA Tester
6 3 (3.66%) Solutions Architect
6 3 (3.66%) Technical Analyst
6 3 (3.66%) Tester
6 3 (3.66%) UX Designer
7 2 (2.44%) Administrator
7 2 (2.44%) Product Manager
7 2 (2.44%) Senior Manager
7 2 (2.44%) Technical Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (4.88%) Gherkin
2 3 (3.66%) .NET
2 3 (3.66%) .NET Framework
2 3 (3.66%) Entity Framework
3 2 (2.44%) EDI
3 2 (2.44%) REST
3 2 (2.44%) RESTful
4 1 (1.22%) .NET Core
4 1 (1.22%) AngularJS
4 1 (1.22%) ASP.NET
4 1 (1.22%) ASP.NET Web API
4 1 (1.22%) Dapper ORM
4 1 (1.22%) Django
4 1 (1.22%) Flask
4 1 (1.22%) GraphQL
4 1 (1.22%) Pandas
4 1 (1.22%) PySpark
4 1 (1.22%) Spring
4 1 (1.22%) WinForms
4 1 (1.22%) WS-I
Miscellaneous
1 8 (9.76%) Enterprise Software
1 8 (9.76%) Product Ownership
2 7 (8.54%) Algorithms
3 6 (7.32%) Self-Motivation
3 6 (7.32%) Social Media
4 4 (4.88%) Learning Management System
4 4 (4.88%) Legacy Systems
4 4 (4.88%) Life Science
4 4 (4.88%) Mobile App
5 3 (3.66%) Data Structures
5 3 (3.66%) Distributed Systems
5 3 (3.66%) Hedge funds
5 3 (3.66%) Management Information System
6 2 (2.44%) e-Learning
6 2 (2.44%) Graphic Design
6 2 (2.44%) Greenfield Project
6 2 (2.44%) Onboarding
6 2 (2.44%) PKI
6 2 (2.44%) Podcast
6 2 (2.44%) Renewable Energy
Operating Systems
1 4 (4.88%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 40 (48.78%) Problem-Solving
2 33 (40.24%) Agile
3 16 (19.51%) Strategic Thinking
4 13 (15.85%) Project Management
5 12 (14.63%) Collaborative Working
5 12 (14.63%) Scrum
6 10 (12.20%) Change Management
7 9 (10.98%) Analytics
8 8 (9.76%) Business Analysis
8 8 (9.76%) Prototyping
8 8 (9.76%) Roadmaps
8 8 (9.76%) Storytelling
8 8 (9.76%) Test Automation
8 8 (9.76%) User Experience
9 7 (8.54%) Artificial Intelligence
9 7 (8.54%) Customer Experience
9 7 (8.54%) Decision-Making
9 7 (8.54%) Waterfall
10 6 (7.32%) Product Management
10 6 (7.32%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 16 (19.51%) Python
2 8 (9.76%) Java
3 7 (8.54%) SQL
4 6 (7.32%) C#
5 3 (3.66%) C
5 3 (3.66%) C++
6 2 (2.44%) JavaScript
6 2 (2.44%) PowerShell
7 1 (1.22%) Bash
7 1 (1.22%) R
7 1 (1.22%) TypeScript
7 1 (1.22%) VB
7 1 (1.22%) VB6
Qualifications
1 18 (21.95%) Degree
2 6 (7.32%) SC Cleared
2 6 (7.32%) Security Cleared
3 4 (4.88%) IIBA
3 4 (4.88%) ISEB
4 3 (3.66%) Computer Science Degree
4 3 (3.66%) Master's Degree
5 1 (1.22%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (15.85%) QA
2 6 (7.32%) Accessibility
2 6 (7.32%) Data Quality
3 1 (1.22%) Actionable Recommendations
3 1 (1.22%) GDPR
3 1 (1.22%) IFRS
3 1 (1.22%) IFRS 17
3 1 (1.22%) PMO
3 1 (1.22%) Solvency II
System Software
1 4 (4.88%) Docker
2 1 (1.22%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 3 (3.66%) Terraform
2 2 (2.44%) Ansible
2 2 (2.44%) Kubernetes
3 1 (1.22%) Kubeflow
Vendors
1 10 (12.20%) Microsoft
2 7 (8.54%) Adobe
3 6 (7.32%) Databricks
4 4 (4.88%) SAP
5 2 (2.44%) Arista
5 2 (2.44%) Aruba
5 2 (2.44%) BMC
5 2 (2.44%) F5
5 2 (2.44%) Facebook
5 2 (2.44%) Instagram
5 2 (2.44%) NetScout
5 2 (2.44%) Oracle
5 2 (2.44%) Palo Alto
6 1 (1.22%) Cegedim Rx
6 1 (1.22%) Foundry
6 1 (1.22%) Google
6 1 (1.22%) Informatica
6 1 (1.22%) Palantir
6 1 (1.22%) Qualtrics
6 1 (1.22%) ServiceNow