Critical Thinking Contracts

Critical Thinking
UK

The following table provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for Critical Thinking skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that have cited Critical Thinking over the 6 months to 5 May 2024 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
5 May 2024
Same period 2023 Same period 2022
Rank 375 425 466
Rank change year-on-year +50 +41 -16
Contract jobs citing Critical Thinking 227 311 453
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.53% 0.53% 0.51%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.61% 0.59% 0.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 148 213 283
10th Percentile £254 £361 £350
25th Percentile £393 £419 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% - +5.60%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £619
90th Percentile £750 £835 £701
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +10.53% -2.56% +10.80%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 20 5
10th Percentile £22.14 £20.10 £47.00
25th Percentile £25.09 £20.22 £49.25
Median hourly rate £26.00 £21.67 £53.50
Median % change year-on-year +19.98% -59.50% +24.42%
75th Percentile £35.00 £37.12 £69.05
90th Percentile £45.00 £50.42 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £30.18 £20.71 £61.28
% change year-on-year +45.76% -66.21% +42.50%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

Critical Thinking is in the Processes and Methodologies category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 37,268 53,074 80,383
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 86.35% 89.85% 90.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,016 36,805 56,451
10th Percentile £300 £325 £340
25th Percentile £413 £438 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £530
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +3.77% +8.72%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £638
90th Percentile £750 £750 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £475
% change year-on-year - +5.26% +8.57%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,439 1,749 1,911
10th Percentile £12.75 £11.00 £12.50
25th Percentile £16.00 £16.25 £15.50
Median hourly rate £35.95 £35.80 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year +0.42% +43.20% +2.04%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.00 £49.25
90th Percentile £72.50 £75.00 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.50 £35.00 £20.00
% change year-on-year +7.14% +75.00% -6.98%

Critical Thinking
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Job vacancy trend for Critical Thinking in the UK

Critical Thinking
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

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

Daily rate trend for Critical Thinking in the UK

Critical Thinking
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Critical Thinking over the 6 months to 5 May 2024.

Daily rate histogram for Critical Thinking in the UK

Critical Thinking
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

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

Hourly rate trend for Critical Thinking in the UK

Critical Thinking
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Critical Thinking over the 6 months to 5 May 2024.

Hourly rate histogram for Critical Thinking in the UK

Critical Thinking
Top 16 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Critical Thinking within the UK over the 6 months to 5 May 2024. 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 +44 189 £525 +5.00% 293
UK excluding London +48 119 £525 +10.53% 151
London +53 82 £563 -1.10% 148
Work from Home +72 67 £475 -5.00% 108
Midlands +37 28 £273 -22.14% 22
North of England +21 21 £579 +19.14% 38
South East +5 21 £538 +26.47% 42
East Midlands +33 18 £269 -10.71% 11
North West +19 17 £548 +12.76% 23
South West +9 15 £538 -2.27% 23
Wales +25 13 £600 +9.09% 2
Scotland +40 11 £450 - 10
West Midlands +19 10 £607 +73.43% 11
East of England - 9 £500 - 16
Yorkshire +18 4 £650 +13.04% 14
Northern Ireland - 1 £325 - 2

Critical 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 25 (11.01%) Confluence
2 22 (9.69%) SharePoint
3 20 (8.81%) Microsoft Exchange
4 7 (3.08%) SAS
5 3 (1.32%) Apache Airflow
5 3 (1.32%) Jupyter
5 3 (1.32%) nginx
6 1 (0.44%) IBM Domino
6 1 (0.44%) IBM Notes
6 1 (0.44%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 22 (9.69%) Microsoft Office
2 16 (7.05%) Microsoft Excel
3 8 (3.52%) Acrobat
4 4 (1.76%) Spreadsheet
5 2 (0.88%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.88%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.44%) Adobe XD
6 1 (0.44%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 1 (0.44%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 4 (1.76%) Oracle Cash Management
1 4 (1.76%) Oracle Receivables
1 4 (1.76%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (1.32%) SAP SD
3 2 (0.88%) SAP ERP
4 1 (0.44%) Distributed Ledger
4 1 (0.44%) OpenText VIM for SAP
4 1 (0.44%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 1 (0.44%) SAP CO
4 1 (0.44%) SAP FI
4 1 (0.44%) SAP FI/CO
4 1 (0.44%) SAP MM
4 1 (0.44%) SAP SCM
Cloud Services
1 34 (14.98%) Azure
2 14 (6.17%) Azure DevOps
3 12 (5.29%) AWS
4 10 (4.41%) Azure AKS
5 9 (3.96%) GCP
5 9 (3.96%) Microsoft 365
5 9 (3.96%) Power Platform
6 8 (3.52%) PaaS
7 7 (3.08%) Azure App Service
8 4 (1.76%) Azure Monitor
8 4 (1.76%) Cloud Computing
8 4 (1.76%) IaaS
8 4 (1.76%) OCI
8 4 (1.76%) Power Automate
8 4 (1.76%) PowerApps
8 4 (1.76%) SaaS
9 3 (1.32%) Azure Machine Learning
9 3 (1.32%) CloudBees
9 3 (1.32%) Entra ID
9 3 (1.32%) Google Kubernetes Engine
Communications & Networking
1 23 (10.13%) DNS
2 16 (7.05%) DHCP
3 7 (3.08%) Firewall
3 7 (3.08%) VSAN
4 5 (2.20%) Intranet
4 5 (2.20%) TCP/IP
4 5 (2.20%) VPN
5 4 (1.76%) HTTP
5 4 (1.76%) Internet
5 4 (1.76%) Kerberos
5 4 (1.76%) SSH
6 2 (0.88%) SSL
6 2 (0.88%) Unified Communications
7 1 (0.44%) BGP
7 1 (0.44%) Cisco Nexus
7 1 (0.44%) LAN
7 1 (0.44%) OSPF
7 1 (0.44%) Skype
7 1 (0.44%) SMTP
7 1 (0.44%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (3.96%) MongoDB
2 8 (3.52%) Power BI
3 7 (3.08%) Relational Database
4 6 (2.64%) KDB
5 5 (2.20%) SQL Server
6 4 (1.76%) Oracle Reports
6 4 (1.76%) SAP HANA
7 3 (1.32%) Apache Cassandra
7 3 (1.32%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (1.32%) ClickHouse
7 3 (1.32%) NoSQL
8 2 (0.88%) Amazon Redshift
8 2 (0.88%) Big Data
8 2 (0.88%) Geospatial Data
8 2 (0.88%) Hadoop
8 2 (0.88%) Snowflake Schema
8 2 (0.88%) Tableau
9 1 (0.44%) MS Access
9 1 (0.44%) MySQL
9 1 (0.44%) SQL Navigator
Development Applications
1 30 (13.22%) JIRA
2 7 (3.08%) Git
3 4 (1.76%) Cypress.io
4 3 (1.32%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.88%) Bitbucket
5 2 (0.88%) Gradle
5 2 (0.88%) IntelliJ
5 2 (0.88%) Selenium
5 2 (0.88%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.44%) Balsamiq
6 1 (0.44%) GoCD
6 1 (0.44%) JUnit
6 1 (0.44%) Oracle Forms
6 1 (0.44%) Toad
General
1 163 (71.81%) Social Skills
2 101 (44.49%) Analytical Skills
3 57 (25.11%) Finance
4 25 (11.01%) Public Sector
5 23 (10.13%) Organisational Skills
6 17 (7.49%) Marketing
7 16 (7.05%) Military
8 14 (6.17%) Presentation Skills
9 12 (5.29%) Telecoms
10 9 (3.96%) Banking
10 9 (3.96%) French Language
10 9 (3.96%) Local Government
11 8 (3.52%) German Language
11 8 (3.52%) Influencing Skills
12 6 (2.64%) Front Office
12 6 (2.64%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 5 (2.20%) Legal
14 3 (1.32%) Arabic Language
14 3 (1.32%) Manufacturing
14 3 (1.32%) Spanish Language
Job Titles
1 50 (22.03%) Analyst
2 31 (13.66%) Senior
3 26 (11.45%) Developer
4 18 (7.93%) Project Manager
5 15 (6.61%) Integration Engineer
5 15 (6.61%) Test and Integration Engineer
5 15 (6.61%) Test Engineer
6 13 (5.73%) Business Analyst
7 11 (4.85%) Senior Manager
8 9 (3.96%) Java Developer
9 8 (3.52%) Bid Manager
9 8 (3.52%) Senior Analyst
9 8 (3.52%) Senior Bid Manager
9 8 (3.52%) Software Engineer
10 7 (3.08%) Architect
10 7 (3.08%) Incident Manager
10 7 (3.08%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 7 (3.08%) SAP Analyst
11 6 (2.64%) Integration Analyst
11 6 (2.64%) Virtualisation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (6.17%) .NET
2 9 (3.96%) React
2 9 (3.96%) Spring
3 8 (3.52%) HTML
3 8 (3.52%) LDAP
4 7 (3.08%) JSON
4 7 (3.08%) Node.js
5 6 (2.64%) CSS
5 6 (2.64%) RESTful
6 5 (2.20%) AngularJS
6 5 (2.20%) Flash
6 5 (2.20%) YAML
7 4 (1.76%) scikit-learn
8 3 (1.32%) Django
8 3 (1.32%) Flask
8 3 (1.32%) Kafka
8 3 (1.32%) OAuth
8 3 (1.32%) OpenID
8 3 (1.32%) Regular Expression
8 3 (1.32%) XACML
Miscellaneous
1 25 (11.01%) Self-Motivation
2 18 (7.93%) PKI
3 15 (6.61%) Product Ownership
4 14 (6.17%) Management Information System
5 11 (4.85%) Enterprise Software
5 11 (4.85%) Virtual Team
6 8 (3.52%) Algorithms
7 6 (2.64%) Data Structures
7 6 (2.64%) Derivative
7 6 (2.64%) Fixed Income
8 5 (2.20%) Clustering
9 4 (1.76%) Renewable Energy
10 3 (1.32%) Cyber Kill Chain
10 3 (1.32%) Operational Technology
10 3 (1.32%) Video Conferencing
11 2 (0.88%) Data Centre
11 2 (0.88%) Distributed Applications
11 2 (0.88%) FMCG
11 2 (0.88%) Low-Code
11 2 (0.88%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 24 (10.57%) Windows
2 17 (7.49%) Windows Server
3 16 (7.05%) Windows Server 2012
4 13 (5.73%) Linux
5 4 (1.76%) Android
5 4 (1.76%) Windows 10
6 3 (1.32%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.44%) Unix
7 1 (0.44%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 127 (55.95%) Problem-Solving
2 82 (36.12%) Agile
3 49 (21.59%) Project Management
4 36 (15.86%) Decision-Making
5 30 (13.22%) Computer Science
6 29 (12.78%) DevOps
6 29 (12.78%) Stakeholder Management
7 27 (11.89%) Continuous Improvement
7 27 (11.89%) Time Management
8 26 (11.45%) Analytical Thinking
9 25 (11.01%) Risk Management
10 19 (8.37%) Business Analysis
11 18 (7.93%) People Management
11 18 (7.93%) PRINCE2
12 17 (7.49%) CI/CD
12 17 (7.49%) Cybersecurity
12 17 (7.49%) Incident Management
13 16 (7.05%) Collaborative Working
13 16 (7.05%) Conflict Management
13 16 (7.05%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 38 (16.74%) SQL
2 22 (9.69%) Java
3 18 (7.93%) C#
4 17 (7.49%) Python
5 14 (6.17%) JavaScript
6 12 (5.29%) TypeScript
7 10 (4.41%) Bicep
8 9 (3.96%) PowerShell
9 3 (1.32%) Go
9 3 (1.32%) Groovy
9 3 (1.32%) Perl
9 3 (1.32%) R
9 3 (1.32%) Ruby
9 3 (1.32%) Scala
10 2 (0.88%) PHP
11 1 (0.44%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.44%) VB
Qualifications
1 64 (28.19%) Degree
2 40 (17.62%) Security Cleared
3 38 (16.74%) SC Cleared
4 21 (9.25%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
5 16 (7.05%) MCSE
5 16 (7.05%) Microsoft Certification
6 15 (6.61%) HNC
6 15 (6.61%) HND
6 15 (6.61%) MCSA
7 14 (6.17%) Master's Degree
8 12 (5.29%) PMI Certification
8 12 (5.29%) PMP
9 9 (3.96%) Computer Science Degree
10 7 (3.08%) Cisco Certification
11 6 (2.64%) CCNA
11 6 (2.64%) ITIL Certification
11 6 (2.64%) Postgraduate
12 4 (1.76%) Chartered Engineer
13 3 (1.32%) BPSS Clearance
13 3 (1.32%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (6.61%) QA
2 7 (3.08%) SLA
3 6 (2.64%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 6 (2.64%) PMO
4 3 (1.32%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 3 (1.32%) NIST
4 3 (1.32%) PCI DSS
5 2 (0.88%) Data Quality
6 1 (0.44%) Accessibility
6 1 (0.44%) Disclosure Scotland
6 1 (0.44%) FedRAMP
6 1 (0.44%) HAZOP
6 1 (0.44%) HIPAA
6 1 (0.44%) ISO 20022
6 1 (0.44%) SOC 2
System Software
1 23 (10.13%) Active Directory
1 23 (10.13%) VMware Infrastructure
2 7 (3.08%) VMware NSX
3 6 (2.64%) VMware ESXi
4 5 (2.20%) Docker
4 5 (2.20%) Hyper-V
5 4 (1.76%) NFS
6 3 (1.32%) Apache ZooKeeper
7 1 (0.44%) Microsoft Virtual Server
7 1 (0.44%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 6 (2.64%) Terraform
1 6 (2.64%) vCenter Server
2 4 (1.76%) Ansible
2 4 (1.76%) Single Sign-On
3 3 (1.32%) Grafana
3 3 (1.32%) Microsoft Intune
3 3 (1.32%) PingFederate
4 1 (0.44%) FortiGate
4 1 (0.44%) Nessus
4 1 (0.44%) Nmap
4 1 (0.44%) PowerCLI
4 1 (0.44%) SCCM
4 1 (0.44%) SCOM
4 1 (0.44%) WSUS
Vendors
1 53 (23.35%) Microsoft
2 24 (10.57%) VMware
3 18 (7.93%) SAP
4 10 (4.41%) Oracle
5 9 (3.96%) Adobe
6 8 (3.52%) Cisco
7 7 (3.08%) Atlassian
8 6 (2.64%) ION Trading
8 6 (2.64%) ServiceNow
9 4 (1.76%) Databricks
10 3 (1.32%) Avaya
10 3 (1.32%) Citrix
10 3 (1.32%) Ivanti
10 3 (1.32%) Ping Identity
10 3 (1.32%) Sun
11 2 (0.88%) Cadence
11 2 (0.88%) Conga
11 2 (0.88%) ESRI
11 2 (0.88%) Google
11 2 (0.88%) Salesforce