GRC Contract Job Trends

Governance, Risk Management and Compliance (GRC)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring GRC skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 321 366 456
Rank change year-on-year +45 +90 +76
Contract jobs citing GRC 334 154 131
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.70% 0.53% 0.31%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 4.22% 3.36% 2.14%
Number of daily rates quoted 235 96 97
10th Percentile £391 £334 £363
25th Percentile £450 £479 £481
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £575 £575
Median % change year-on-year -8.70% - -4.17%
75th Percentile £638 £691 £725
90th Percentile £738 £756 £850
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £598
% change year-on-year +5.00% -16.32% -0.42%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 1 0
Median hourly rate £36.00 £65.00 -
Median % change year-on-year -44.62% - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £36.00 - -

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

GRC falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 7,908 4,579 6,110
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 16.58% 15.75% 14.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,102 2,941 3,883
10th Percentile £341 £265 £285
25th Percentile £413 £400 £402
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year - -2.44% -2.38%
75th Percentile £600 £620 £625
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £482
% change year-on-year +5.26% -1.35% +0.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 458 173 381
10th Percentile £14.02 £17.86 £10.95
25th Percentile £18.50 £22.14 £13.18
Median hourly rate £36.00 £35.00 £21.12
Median % change year-on-year +2.86% +65.76% -39.67%
75th Percentile £67.25 £65.62 £45.00
90th Percentile £82.08 £82.92 £68.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £50.00 £18.27
% change year-on-year -20.00% +173.67% -47.80%

GRC
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing GRC relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

GRC job vacancy trend in the UK

GRC
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing GRC.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing GRC

GRC
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing GRC over the 6 months to 15 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for GRC in the UK

GRC
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing GRC.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing GRC

GRC
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing GRC within the UK over the 6 months to 15 May 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
England +26 297 £525 -12.50% 125
UK excluding London +9 165 £525 +5.00% 86
London -6 142 £550 -15.38% 59
Work from Home +37 106 £532 -11.42% 74
South East -22 46 £525 -14.29% 31
North of England -28 45 £475 +16.14% 8
Midlands -47 33 £575 -4.17% 12
North West -16 25 £506 +59.62% 7
Yorkshire -38 20 £475 -9.52% 1
West Midlands -52 18 £538 -10.42% 7
Scotland +7 17 £525 +14.02% 8
East Midlands -18 15 £638 +78.07% 4
East of England -20 15 £575 +4.55% 11
South West -25 9 £500 +20.34% 13

GRC
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 16 (4.79%) Confluence
2 10 (2.99%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.60%) IIS
4 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.30%) NetWeaver
Applications
1 12 (3.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 3 (0.90%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 3 (0.90%) MS Visio
3 2 (0.60%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.60%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.30%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 25 (7.49%) SAP S/4HANA
2 23 (6.89%) SAP GRC
3 2 (0.60%) Oracle Payables
3 2 (0.60%) SAP FI
4 1 (0.30%) SAP CCM
4 1 (0.30%) SAP EWM
4 1 (0.30%) SAP FI-AR
4 1 (0.30%) SAP FI-GL
4 1 (0.30%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 53 (15.87%) Azure
2 42 (12.57%) AWS
3 21 (6.29%) GCP
4 14 (4.19%) Power Platform
5 13 (3.89%) Microsoft 365
6 10 (2.99%) SaaS
7 9 (2.69%) Entra ID
7 9 (2.69%) GitHub
7 9 (2.69%) SuccessFactors
8 8 (2.40%) Azure DevOps
8 8 (2.40%) Microsoft Copilot
9 7 (2.10%) Microsoft Purview
10 6 (1.80%) Power Automate
11 5 (1.50%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 5 (1.50%) AWS CloudFormation
12 4 (1.20%) Amazon GuardDuty
12 4 (1.20%) Azure Sentinel
12 4 (1.20%) Copilot Studio
12 4 (1.20%) GitHub Actions
13 2 (0.60%) AWS KMS
Communications & Networking
1 16 (4.79%) Network Security
2 5 (1.50%) Firewall
3 4 (1.20%) NGFW
4 3 (0.90%) Internet
4 3 (0.90%) Reverse Proxy
5 2 (0.60%) HTTPS
5 2 (0.60%) VPN
6 1 (0.30%) BGP
6 1 (0.30%) Cisco ASA
6 1 (0.30%) Fibre Channel
6 1 (0.30%) Intrusion Detection
6 1 (0.30%) iSCSI
6 1 (0.30%) MPLS
6 1 (0.30%) Multicast
6 1 (0.30%) NAS
6 1 (0.30%) OSPF
6 1 (0.30%) SAN
6 1 (0.30%) SD-WAN
6 1 (0.30%) VLAN
6 1 (0.30%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (3.59%) Metadata
1 12 (3.59%) Power BI
2 7 (2.10%) Data Warehouse
3 5 (1.50%) Power Query
3 5 (1.50%) SAP HANA
4 2 (0.60%) Data Mining
4 2 (0.60%) SAP BW
4 2 (0.60%) SQL Server
5 1 (0.30%) Data Lake
5 1 (0.30%) MongoDB
5 1 (0.30%) Oracle Database
5 1 (0.30%) Oracle Exadata
5 1 (0.30%) PostgreSQL
5 1 (0.30%) Relational Database
5 1 (0.30%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 17 (5.09%) JIRA
2 4 (1.20%) Jaeger
3 3 (0.90%) Git
4 1 (0.30%) Flyway
4 1 (0.30%) GitLab
4 1 (0.30%) Liquibase
General
1 109 (32.63%) Social Skills
2 89 (26.65%) Finance
3 47 (14.07%) Analytical Skills
4 35 (10.48%) Legal
5 34 (10.18%) Public Sector
6 30 (8.98%) Banking
7 9 (2.69%) Influencing Skills
7 9 (2.69%) Telecoms
8 6 (1.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 6 (1.80%) Organisational Skills
8 6 (1.80%) Presentation Skills
9 5 (1.50%) Law
9 5 (1.50%) Marketing
10 4 (1.20%) Aerospace
10 4 (1.20%) Documentation Skills
10 4 (1.20%) Military
10 4 (1.20%) Pharmaceutical
11 3 (0.90%) Financial Institution
12 2 (0.60%) General Ledger
12 2 (0.60%) Retail
Job Titles
1 54 (16.17%) Consultant
2 51 (15.27%) Analyst
3 39 (11.68%) Architect
4 32 (9.58%) Lead
5 27 (8.08%) Senior
6 22 (6.59%) Security Consultant
7 20 (5.99%) Risk Manager
8 17 (5.09%) Security Analyst
9 16 (4.79%) Security Architect
10 14 (4.19%) Senior Consultant
11 13 (3.89%) Governance Manager
11 13 (3.89%) Project Manager
11 13 (3.89%) Risk Analyst
11 13 (3.89%) Security Manager
12 12 (3.59%) Business Analyst
12 12 (3.59%) Developer
12 12 (3.59%) IT Manager
12 12 (3.59%) ServiceNow Architect
13 10 (2.99%) Security Engineer
14 9 (2.69%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (5.99%) REST
2 18 (5.39%) SAP Fiori
3 15 (4.49%) SOAP
4 5 (1.50%) .NET
5 4 (1.20%) Loki
5 4 (1.20%) OpenTelemetry
5 4 (1.20%) SailPoint
6 3 (0.90%) ADO
6 3 (0.90%) OAuth
6 3 (0.90%) OAuth2
6 3 (0.90%) OpenID
6 3 (0.90%) SAML
7 2 (0.60%) JSON
7 2 (0.60%) Middleware
7 2 (0.60%) Web Services
8 1 (0.30%) AngularJS
8 1 (0.30%) ARM Templates
8 1 (0.30%) IDoc
8 1 (0.30%) Oracle Fusion
8 1 (0.30%) SAP PI
Miscellaneous
1 29 (8.68%) Security Posture
2 21 (6.29%) Management Information System
2 21 (6.29%) Product Ownership
3 18 (5.39%) Onboarding
3 18 (5.39%) Operational Technology
4 17 (5.09%) CMDB
5 8 (2.40%) Cloud Native
5 8 (2.40%) Cyber Threat
5 8 (2.40%) Data Centre
6 7 (2.10%) Data Protection Act
6 7 (2.10%) Taxonomies
6 7 (2.10%) Virtual Team
7 6 (1.80%) Hybrid Cloud
8 5 (1.50%) Distributed Systems
8 5 (1.50%) IoT
8 5 (1.50%) Legacy Systems
8 5 (1.50%) Public Cloud
9 4 (1.20%) AI Agents
9 4 (1.20%) Enterprise Software
9 4 (1.20%) PropTech
Operating Systems
1 9 (2.69%) Linux
2 6 (1.80%) Windows
3 4 (1.20%) AIX
3 4 (1.20%) HPUX
3 4 (1.20%) Oracle Linux
3 4 (1.20%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 4 (1.20%) Solaris
3 4 (1.20%) SUSE
3 4 (1.20%) Unix
4 1 (0.30%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 123 (36.83%) Risk Management
2 90 (26.95%) Cybersecurity
3 89 (26.65%) Information Security
4 84 (25.15%) Stakeholder Management
5 58 (17.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 54 (16.17%) Problem-Solving
7 46 (13.77%) Continuous Improvement
8 44 (13.17%) Roadmaps
9 43 (12.87%) Security Operations
10 41 (12.28%) Agile
11 38 (11.38%) Risk Assessment
12 35 (10.48%) Cloud Security
13 33 (9.88%) Data Protection
14 32 (9.58%) Risk Register
15 31 (9.28%) Vulnerability Management
16 30 (8.98%) Identity Access Management
16 30 (8.98%) Regulatory Compliance
17 28 (8.38%) AI
18 27 (8.08%) Analytics
18 27 (8.08%) Incident Response
Programming Languages
1 11 (3.29%) SQL
2 9 (2.69%) Python
3 7 (2.10%) Bash
3 7 (2.10%) JavaScript
4 6 (1.80%) Data Analysis Expressions
4 6 (1.80%) PowerShell
5 4 (1.20%) Bicep
5 4 (1.20%) Go
6 1 (0.30%) ABAP
6 1 (0.30%) Java
6 1 (0.30%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 75 (22.46%) Security Cleared
2 56 (16.77%) CISSP
3 48 (14.37%) SC Cleared
4 39 (11.68%) CISM
5 25 (7.49%) CISA
5 25 (7.49%) Degree
6 24 (7.19%) CRISC
7 23 (6.89%) DV Cleared
8 14 (4.19%) PMI Certification
9 13 (3.89%) PMP
10 9 (2.69%) Cisco Certification
11 8 (2.40%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 8 (2.40%) Azure Certification
11 8 (2.40%) CCSP
11 8 (2.40%) CompTIA Security+
11 8 (2.40%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
11 8 (2.40%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
12 7 (2.10%) BPSS Clearance
13 6 (1.80%) OSCP
13 6 (1.80%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 91 (27.25%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 78 (23.35%) NIST
3 43 (12.87%) GDPR
4 20 (5.99%) PCI DSS
5 17 (5.09%) COBIT
6 14 (4.19%) SOC 2
7 12 (3.59%) Cyber Essentials
7 12 (3.59%) NCSC
7 12 (3.59%) QA
8 10 (2.99%) ISO/IEC 27005
8 10 (2.99%) SLA
9 7 (2.10%) Actionable Recommendations
9 7 (2.10%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 7 (2.10%) ISO 31000
9 7 (2.10%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
9 7 (2.10%) PMO
9 7 (2.10%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 6 (1.80%) ITGC
11 5 (1.50%) ISO 22301
11 5 (1.50%) NIST 800
System Software
1 8 (2.40%) Active Directory
2 3 (0.90%) IAG
3 2 (0.60%) Docker
4 1 (0.30%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 13 (3.89%) Terraform
2 11 (3.29%) Kubernetes
2 11 (3.29%) Single Sign-On
3 4 (1.20%) Grafana
3 4 (1.20%) Istio
3 4 (1.20%) Prometheus
3 4 (1.20%) RSA Archer
4 3 (0.90%) Rancher
5 2 (0.60%) Ansible
5 2 (0.60%) QRadar
6 1 (0.30%) Cisco Prime
6 1 (0.30%) Data Guard
6 1 (0.30%) Fluentd
6 1 (0.30%) Iperf
6 1 (0.30%) logstash
6 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (0.30%) NetBackup
6 1 (0.30%) Nmap
6 1 (0.30%) Oracle RMAN
Vendors
1 45 (13.47%) ServiceNow
2 35 (10.48%) Microsoft
3 33 (9.88%) SAP
4 10 (2.99%) Oracle
5 6 (1.80%) Google
5 6 (1.80%) Palo Alto
6 5 (1.50%) Atlassian
6 5 (1.50%) Splunk
7 4 (1.20%) Ariba
7 4 (1.20%) Fortinet
7 4 (1.20%) HP
7 4 (1.20%) Rapid7
7 4 (1.20%) Red Hat
8 3 (0.90%) Okta
9 2 (0.60%) CheckPoint
9 2 (0.60%) Cisco
9 2 (0.60%) CrowdStrike
9 2 (0.60%) IBM
9 2 (0.60%) OneTrust
9 2 (0.60%) Zscaler