MCSE Contracts

Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE) formerly Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for MCSE qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered 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 461 497 547
Rank change year-on-year +36 +50 +58
Contract jobs citing MCSE 58 103 166
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.20% 0.24% 0.28%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.65% 0.77% 1.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 39 75 135
10th Percentile £200 £256 £106
25th Percentile £325 £303 £221
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £350 £475
Median % change year-on-year +53.57% -26.32% +11.76%
75th Percentile £634 £547 £575
90th Percentile £729 £556 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £388 £450
% change year-on-year +41.94% -13.89% +20.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 12 5
10th Percentile £18.79 £13.28 -
25th Percentile £19.24 £15.56 £16.25
Median hourly rate £19.97 £17.50 £18.50
Median % change year-on-year +14.11% -5.41% -20.32%
75th Percentile £19.99 £32.31 £20.00
90th Percentile £19.99 £40.20 £23.89
UK excluding London median hourly rate £19.97 £17.50 £18.50
% change year-on-year +14.11% -5.41% -13.35%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

MCSE falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 8,989 13,363 16,304
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 30.75% 30.65% 27.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,678 8,219 10,866
10th Percentile £288 £300 £325
25th Percentile £413 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £535 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.87% -2.73% +4.76%
75th Percentile £625 £650 £650
90th Percentile £707 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £501 £530 £530
% change year-on-year -5.57% - +6.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 516 1,077 849
10th Percentile £18.13 £13.87 £15.25
25th Percentile £22.00 £17.88 £20.00
Median hourly rate £40.72 £40.00 £54.00
Median % change year-on-year +1.79% -25.93% +29.75%
75th Percentile £66.00 £61.60 £68.25
90th Percentile £80.34 £75.25 £80.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £40.94 £49.57
% change year-on-year +9.92% -17.41% +55.44%

MCSE
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Job vacancy trend for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

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

Daily rate trend for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Daily Rate Histogram

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

Daily rate histogram for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

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

Hourly rate trend for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Top 11 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing MCSE 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 +41 54 £550 +46.67% 48
UK excluding London +24 52 £550 +41.94% 41
South East +43 21 £640 +19.07% 17
Work from Home +52 18 £620 +30.53% 32
South West +45 14 £550 +2.33% 4
Midlands +27 8 £218 +85.90% 10
West Midlands +22 8 £218 +85.90% 6
North of England +19 6 £400 - 6
North West +6 6 £400 +33.33% 5
London +25 5 £350 +7.69% 9
Scotland -8 3 £289 -11.15% 2

MCSE
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 15 (25.86%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (17.24%) SharePoint
3 4 (6.90%) Confluence
4 2 (3.45%) IBM Notes
4 2 (3.45%) SharePoint Server
4 2 (3.45%) Skype for Business
5 1 (1.72%) IIS
Applications
1 15 (25.86%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (3.45%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (3.45%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (1.72%) Dynamics GP
Cloud Services
1 24 (41.38%) Azure
2 17 (29.31%) Microsoft 365
3 9 (15.52%) AWS
3 9 (15.52%) IaaS
3 9 (15.52%) PaaS
3 9 (15.52%) SaaS
4 8 (13.79%) OneDrive
5 7 (12.07%) Entra ID
6 4 (6.90%) Power Platform
7 1 (1.72%) Azure DevOps
7 1 (1.72%) Azure Monitor
7 1 (1.72%) WhatsApp
Communications & Networking
1 11 (18.97%) VPN
1 11 (18.97%) VSAN
2 9 (15.52%) DNS
3 8 (13.79%) SAN
4 6 (10.34%) Skype
5 5 (8.62%) DHCP
5 5 (8.62%) iSCSI
5 5 (8.62%) WAN
6 4 (6.90%) Firewall
6 4 (6.90%) VLAN
7 3 (5.17%) BGP
7 3 (5.17%) Cisco Nexus
7 3 (5.17%) Fibre Channel
7 3 (5.17%) MPLS
7 3 (5.17%) NGFW
7 3 (5.17%) OSPF
7 3 (5.17%) SD-WAN
7 3 (5.17%) TCP/IP
8 2 (3.45%) Cisco ASA
8 2 (3.45%) LAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (5.17%) SQL Server
2 2 (3.45%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (1.72%) Azure SQL Database
3 1 (1.72%) DTS
3 1 (1.72%) SQL Server Integration Services
3 1 (1.72%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 6 (10.34%) JIRA
2 1 (1.72%) Bitbucket
2 1 (1.72%) Git
2 1 (1.72%) Jenkins
General
1 25 (43.10%) Social Skills
2 12 (20.69%) Analytical Skills
3 11 (18.97%) Public Sector
4 6 (10.34%) Legal
5 2 (3.45%) Finance
5 2 (3.45%) Publishing
6 1 (1.72%) Banking
6 1 (1.72%) Financial Institution
6 1 (1.72%) International Banking
6 1 (1.72%) Local Government
6 1 (1.72%) Military
Job Titles
1 23 (39.66%) Architect
2 15 (25.86%) Senior
3 14 (24.14%) Technical Architect
4 10 (17.24%) Senior Architect
4 10 (17.24%) Senior Technical Architect
5 7 (12.07%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 5 (8.62%) VMware Architect
7 4 (6.90%) Infrastructure Architect
7 4 (6.90%) Infrastructure Technical Architect
7 4 (6.90%) Principal Architect
7 4 (6.90%) Senior Wintel Engineer
7 4 (6.90%) Technical Infrastructure Architect
7 4 (6.90%) Wintel Engineer
8 3 (5.17%) Deployment Engineer
8 3 (5.17%) Desktop Engineer
8 3 (5.17%) Security Specialist
9 2 (3.45%) 3rd Line Support
9 2 (3.45%) Cybersecurity Specialist
9 2 (3.45%) Rollout Engineer
9 2 (3.45%) Virtualisation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (3.45%) Flash
2 1 (1.72%) .NET
2 1 (1.72%) Elastic Stack
2 1 (1.72%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 20 (34.48%) PKI
2 13 (22.41%) Hybrid Cloud
3 7 (12.07%) Public Cloud
4 5 (8.62%) Data Centre
5 3 (5.17%) Clustering
5 3 (5.17%) Cyber Threat
5 3 (5.17%) Video Conferencing
6 2 (3.45%) Blackberry
6 2 (3.45%) Driving Licence
6 2 (3.45%) Management Information System
7 1 (1.72%) NHS
7 1 (1.72%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 36 (62.07%) Windows
2 24 (41.38%) Windows Server
3 13 (22.41%) Windows 10
3 13 (22.41%) Windows Server 2012
4 11 (18.97%) Windows Server 2019
5 8 (13.79%) Windows Server 2016
6 6 (10.34%) Linux
7 4 (6.90%) Mac OS
7 4 (6.90%) Unix
8 2 (3.45%) Android
8 2 (3.45%) Apple iOS
8 2 (3.45%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 35 (60.34%) ITIL
2 16 (27.59%) TOGAF
3 15 (25.86%) CI/CD
3 15 (25.86%) Infrastructure as Code
4 14 (24.14%) Containerisation
4 14 (24.14%) Continuous Delivery
4 14 (24.14%) Continuous Integration
4 14 (24.14%) Microservices
4 14 (24.14%) Zachman Framework
5 12 (20.69%) Agile
5 12 (20.69%) IT Strategy
5 12 (20.69%) Technology Strategy
6 11 (18.97%) DevSecOps
6 11 (18.97%) Problem-Solving
7 10 (17.24%) Matrix Organization
7 10 (17.24%) Use Case
8 8 (13.79%) Critical Thinking
8 8 (13.79%) High Availability
8 8 (13.79%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 7 (12.07%) NsoIT
Programming Languages
1 13 (22.41%) PowerShell
2 10 (17.24%) SQL
3 2 (3.45%) Python
3 2 (3.45%) VB
3 2 (3.45%) VBScript
4 1 (1.72%) Bash
4 1 (1.72%) Bicep
4 1 (1.72%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 58 (100.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 31 (53.45%) Security Cleared
3 26 (44.83%) SC Cleared
4 22 (37.93%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
5 19 (32.76%) Degree
6 10 (17.24%) MCSA
7 9 (15.52%) Cisco Certification
8 8 (13.79%) DV Cleared
9 7 (12.07%) CCNP
10 5 (8.62%) MCP
11 4 (6.90%) CCNA
12 3 (5.17%) A+ Certification
12 3 (5.17%) Azure Certification
12 3 (5.17%) VCP5
12 3 (5.17%) VCP6
13 2 (3.45%) Dell Certification
13 2 (3.45%) ITIL Certification
13 2 (3.45%) Master's Degree
14 1 (1.72%) OCA
14 1 (1.72%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (27.59%) NCSC
2 14 (24.14%) NIST
3 10 (17.24%) Cyber Essentials
4 2 (3.45%) SLA
5 1 (1.72%) Disclosure Scotland
5 1 (1.72%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 28 (48.28%) VMware Infrastructure
2 21 (36.21%) Active Directory
3 13 (22.41%) VMware NSX
4 9 (15.52%) VMware ESXi
5 5 (8.62%) Hyper-V
5 5 (8.62%) Virtual Machines
6 3 (5.17%) NFS
6 3 (5.17%) vSphere
7 2 (3.45%) BitLocker
7 2 (3.45%) Microsoft App-V
7 2 (3.45%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 12 (20.69%) SCCM
2 8 (13.79%) WSUS
3 7 (12.07%) vCenter Server
4 4 (6.90%) Microsoft Intune
5 3 (5.17%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 3 (5.17%) SCOM
6 2 (3.45%) OPNET
6 2 (3.45%) Terraform
7 1 (1.72%) Ansible
7 1 (1.72%) CSIRT
7 1 (1.72%) PowerCLI
7 1 (1.72%) SolarWinds Orion
Vendors
1 41 (70.69%) Microsoft
2 33 (56.90%) VMware
3 16 (27.59%) Cisco
4 11 (18.97%) Palo Alto
5 7 (12.07%) Veeam
6 4 (6.90%) Citrix
6 4 (6.90%) Splunk
7 3 (5.17%) Atlassian
7 3 (5.17%) NetApp
7 3 (5.17%) ServiceNow
8 2 (3.45%) Apple
8 2 (3.45%) Dell
8 2 (3.45%) Lotus
8 2 (3.45%) McAfee
8 2 (3.45%) SolarWinds
8 2 (3.45%) Symantec
9 1 (1.72%) Google
9 1 (1.72%) Oracle