Microsoft Certification Contracts

The following table provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for Microsoft Certification qualifications. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 3 months to 24 June 2017 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

Note that daily and hourly rates are treated separately in these statistics. When calculating contractor rate percentiles, daily rates are never derived from quoted hourly rates or vice versa.

Microsoft Certification UK
Location	3 months to 24 Jun 2017	Same period 2016	Same period 2015
Rank	226	168	171
Rank change year-on-year	-58	+3
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification	483	813	794
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK	1.04%	1.51%	1.42%
As % of the Qualifications category	5.43%	6.93%	7.46%
Number of daily rates quoted	269	477	471
Median daily rate	£338	£330	£325
Median daily rate % change year-on-year	+2.27%	+1.53%
90% offered a daily rate of more than	£137	£200	£150
10% offered a daily rate of more than	£525	£463	£450
UK excluding London median daily rate	£320	£330	£340
% change year-on-year	-3.03%	-2.80%
Number of hourly rates quoted	48	75	80
Median hourly rate	£19.00	£21.33	£18.86
Median hourly rate % change year-on-year	-10.92%	+13.12%
90% offered a hourly rate of more than	£13.03	£12.00	£11.55
10% offered a hourly rate of more than	£50.00	£42.00	£39.70
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£22.52	£23.78	£18.50
% change year-on-year	-5.29%	+28.54%

Microsoft Certification is in the academic qualifications and professional certifications category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all academic qualifications and professional certifications cited in contract job vacancies.

Academic & Professional Certification UK
Contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications	8902	11739	10644
As % of all contract IT job vacancies advertised in the UK	19.24%	21.83%	18.97%
Number of daily rates quoted	5326	7337	6185
Median daily rate	£425	£400	£390
Median daily rate % change year-on-year	+6.25%	+2.56%
90% offered a daily rate of more than	£250	£250	£240
10% offered a daily rate of more than	£575	£575	£550
UK excluding London median daily rate	£400	£375	£375
% change year-on-year	+6.66%	-
Number of hourly rates quoted	486	445	556
Median hourly rate	£32.50	£28.50	£24.12
Median hourly rate % change year-on-year	+14.03%	+18.15%
90% offered a hourly rate of more than	£13.50	£12.64	£13.00
10% offered a hourly rate of more than	£50.00	£49.13	£50.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£33.00	£30.21	£24.12
% change year-on-year	+9.25%	+25.22%

Microsoft Certification
Job Vacancy Trend

The job posting trend of jobs advertised citing Microsoft Certification as a proportion of all contract or permanent IT jobs with a match in the Qualifications category.

Job vacancy trend for Microsoft Certification in the UK

Microsoft Certification
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

This chart provides the 3-month moving average for daily rates quoted in contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor daily rate trend for Microsoft Certification in the UK

Microsoft Certification
Contractor Daily Rate Histogram

The daily rate distribution of IT jobs citing Microsoft Certification over the 3 months to 24 June 2017.

Contractor daily rate histogram for Microsoft Certification in the UK

Microsoft Certification
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

This chart provides the 3-month moving average for contractor hourly rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor hourly rate trend for Microsoft Certification in the UK

Microsoft Certification
Contractor Hourly Rate Histogram

The hourly rate distribution of IT jobs citing Microsoft Certification over the 3 months to 24 June 2017.

Contractor hourly rate histogram for Microsoft Certification in the UK

Microsoft Certification
Top 30 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft Certification within the UK over the 3 months to 24 June 2017. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 3 month period last year.

Location	Rank Change on Same Period Last Year	Matching Contract IT Job Ads	Median Daily Rate Last 3 Months	Median Daily Rate % Change on Same Period Last Year	Live Job Vacancies
England	-31	439	£350	+4.47%	228
London	-7	154	£375	-6.25%	57
South East	-34	89	£325	-10.95%	42
East of England	+23	63	£320	+68.42%	19
Cambridgeshire	+17	30	£525	+82.92%	5
North West	+15	30	£440	+39.68%	41
East Midlands	+13	30	£180	-43.52%	4
Manchester	+19	25	£440	+49.78%	24
North East	-1	25	£300	-4.45%	6
Tyne and Wear	+9	24	£300	-4.76%	4
Newcastle upon Tyne	+10	23	£300	-4.15%	2
City of London	-19	23	£388	-8.82%	13
West Midlands	+5	21	£331	-17.18%	15
Hampshire	+2	21	£323	-10.41%	8
Kent	+14	19	£235	+95.83%	5
Scotland	-49	19	£600	+81.81%	6
South West	-13	15	£210	-47.50%	24
Hertfordshire	+3	14	£375	+40.18%	4
Buckinghamshire	-18	14	£475	+14.04%	6
Milton Keynes	-11	13	£488	+23.41%	6
Yorkshire	+16	12	£319	+10.86%	19
Berkshire	-3	12	£400	+6.66%	9
Watford	+5	11	£320	-17.41%
Surrey	-19	11	£190	-49.33%	6
Huntingdon	-	11	£550	-
Cambridge	+9	10	£155	-	1
Northamptonshire	+7	10	£165	-54.48%	2
Edinburgh	+21	9	£600	+110.52%	4
Northampton	+12	9	£165	-	2
Staffordshire	+9	9	£338	+3.84%	4

Microsoft Certification
Top 30 Co-occurring IT Skills

For the 6 months to 24 June 2017, IT contractor jobs citing Microsoft Certification also mentioned the following skills in order of popularity. The figures indicate the number co-occurrences and its proportion to all contract ads with a requirement for Microsoft Certification.

1	697 (72.60%)	Microsoft
2	599 (62.40%)	Windows
3	484 (50.42%)	Active Directory
4	462 (48.13%)	MCSE
5	360 (37.50%)	ITIL
6	287 (29.90%)	Windows Server
7	252 (26.25%)	VMware
8	220 (22.92%)	Office 365
9	212 (22.08%)	Windows Server 2012
10	202 (21.04%)	SQL Server
11	199 (20.73%)	MS Exchange
12	190 (19.79%)	PowerShell
13	187 (19.48%)	Windows Server 2008
14	180 (18.75%)	MCP
15	178 (18.54%)	MCSA

16	170 (17.71%)	Citrix
17	168 (17.50%)	Microsoft Office
18	166 (17.29%)	VMware Infrastructure
19	164 (17.08%)	Cisco
20	161 (16.77%)	Microsoft Azure
21	155 (16.15%)	MCITP
22	152 (15.83%)	Windows 7
23	150 (15.63%)	SQL
24	144 (15.00%)	Security Cleared
25	137 (14.27%)	Hyper-V
26	136 (14.17%)	HP
27	135 (14.06%)	Cisco Certification
28	127 (13.23%)	Firewall
29	126 (13.13%)	Finance
29	126 (13.13%)	SharePoint

Microsoft Certification
Co-occurring IT Skills by Category

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

Application Platforms
Applications
Business Applications
Cloud Services
Communications & Networking
Database & Business Intelligence
Development Applications
General
Job Titles
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
Miscellaneous
Operating Systems
Processes & Methodologies
Programming Languages
Qualifications
Quality Assurance & Compliance
System Software
Systems Management
Vendors

Application Platforms
1	199 (20.73%)	MS Exchange
2	126 (13.13%)	SharePoint
3	98 (10.21%)	Exchange Server 2010
4	90 (9.38%)	Skype for Business
5	51 (5.31%)	Exchange Server 2013
6	45 (4.69%)	SharePoint 2013
7	41 (4.27%)	IIS
8	27 (2.81%)	SharePoint 2010
9	22 (2.29%)	Blackberry Enterprise Server
10	20 (2.08%)	BizTalk Server
11	17 (1.77%)	Exchange Server 2007
12	13 (1.35%)	SharePoint Server
13	11 (1.15%)	Apache
13	11 (1.15%)	IBM Notes
14	10 (1.04%)	ArcGIS
14	10 (1.04%)	Exchange Server 2003
15	9 (0.94%)	Office Communications Server
16	8 (0.83%)	CMS
16	8 (0.83%)	EPiServer
16	8 (0.83%)	MS Project Server

Applications
1	168 (17.50%)	Microsoft Office
2	25 (2.60%)	MS Visio
3	24 (2.50%)	Microsoft Excel
4	6 (0.63%)	Spreadsheet
5	3 (0.31%)	AutoCAD
5	3 (0.31%)	Microsoft PowerPoint
6	2 (0.21%)	Microsoft Project
7	1 (0.10%)	Adobe Creative Suite

Business Applications
1	19 (1.98%)	Dynamics CRM
2	12 (1.25%)	Dynamics AX
2	12 (1.25%)	Remedy ITSM
3	5 (0.52%)	Dynamics NAV
4	4 (0.42%)	SAP Oil and Gas
5	2 (0.21%)	Dynamics GP
5	2 (0.21%)	WebTrends
6	1 (0.10%)	Eikon
6	1 (0.10%)	SAP ERP

Cloud Services
1	220 (22.92%)	Office 365
2	161 (16.77%)	Microsoft Azure
3	51 (5.31%)	Amazon AWS
4	33 (3.44%)	Azure Active Directory
5	31 (3.23%)	IaaS
6	22 (2.29%)	PaaS
7	20 (2.08%)	SaaS
8	13 (1.35%)	OneDrive
9	11 (1.15%)	Yammer
10	8 (0.83%)	GitHub
11	7 (0.73%)	Mimecast
12	4 (0.42%)	AWS CloudFormation
12	4 (0.42%)	Cloud Computing
13	2 (0.21%)	Amazon CloudWatch
13	2 (0.21%)	AWS OpsWorks
13	2 (0.21%)	Dynamics 365
14	1 (0.10%)	AWS CloudTrail
14	1 (0.10%)	CloudFront
14	1 (0.10%)	Google Cloud Platform
14	1 (0.10%)	Virtual Private Cloud

Communications & Networking
1	127 (13.23%)	Firewall
2	117 (12.19%)	DNS
3	104 (10.83%)	DHCP
4	85 (8.85%)	SAN
5	77 (8.02%)	LAN
6	70 (7.29%)	WAN
7	67 (6.98%)	Skype
8	59 (6.15%)	VPN
9	58 (6.04%)	TCP/IP
10	32 (3.33%)	NAS
11	31 (3.23%)	VoIP
12	24 (2.50%)	Wireless
13	23 (2.40%)	Remote Desktop
14	20 (2.08%)	Internet
14	20 (2.08%)	Network Security
15	14 (1.46%)	Cisco IOS
16	13 (1.35%)	SSL
16	13 (1.35%)	VLAN
17	12 (1.25%)	Wi-Fi
18	11 (1.15%)	NetScaler

Database & Business Intelligence
1	202 (21.04%)	SQL Server
2	70 (7.29%)	SQL Server 2012
3	53 (5.52%)	SQL Server 2008
4	39 (4.06%)	SQL Server Integration Services
5	37 (3.85%)	SQL Server Reporting Services
6	29 (3.02%)	SQL Server 2005
7	21 (2.19%)	SQL Server Analysis Services
8	19 (1.98%)	SQL Server 2016
9	17 (1.77%)	SQL Server 2014
10	14 (1.46%)	Data Warehouse
10	14 (1.46%)	Oracle Database
10	14 (1.46%)	Relational Database
11	11 (1.15%)	Hadoop
12	10 (1.04%)	RDBMS
13	9 (0.94%)	Power BI
14	8 (0.83%)	Azure SQL Database
14	8 (0.83%)	Big Data
14	8 (0.83%)	Oracle Database 12c
15	7 (0.73%)	NoSQL
15	7 (0.73%)	QlikView

Development Applications
1	30 (3.13%)	Visual Studio
2	20 (2.08%)	Team Foundation Server
3	13 (1.35%)	Git (software)
3	13 (1.35%)	JIRA
4	12 (1.25%)	Octopus Deploy
5	7 (0.73%)	MorphX
6	5 (0.52%)	gulp
6	5 (0.52%)	Jenkins
6	5 (0.52%)	Moq
6	5 (0.52%)	Visual Studio Team System
7	4 (0.42%)	MSI
7	4 (0.42%)	WiX
8	3 (0.31%)	Artifactory
8	3 (0.31%)	Atlassian Bamboo
8	3 (0.31%)	Eclipse
8	3 (0.31%)	Gerrit
8	3 (0.31%)	Maven
8	3 (0.31%)	Metasploit
8	3 (0.31%)	StarTeam
8	3 (0.31%)	TeamCity

General
1	126 (13.13%)	Finance
2	30 (3.13%)	Banking
3	28 (2.92%)	Manufacturing
4	21 (2.19%)	Telecoms
5	17 (1.77%)	Financial Institution
5	17 (1.77%)	Military
6	16 (1.67%)	Law
7	15 (1.56%)	Retail
8	10 (1.04%)	Avionics
8	10 (1.04%)	Legal
9	8 (0.83%)	Billing
9	8 (0.83%)	Investment Banking
10	5 (0.52%)	Advertising
10	5 (0.52%)	Aerospace
10	5 (0.52%)	Automotive
10	5 (0.52%)	Back Office
10	5 (0.52%)	Local Government
10	5 (0.52%)	Marketing
11	4 (0.42%)	Front Office
12	3 (0.31%)	Publishing

Job Titles
1	135 (14.06%)	Analyst
2	93 (9.69%)	Architect
3	83 (8.65%)	Support Engineer
4	80 (8.33%)	Infrastructure Engineer
5	73 (7.60%)	Desktop Support
6	65 (6.77%)	Developer
7	62 (6.46%)	2nd Line Support
7	62 (6.46%)	Consultant
8	59 (6.15%)	Support Analyst
9	42 (4.38%)	Administrator
10	36 (3.75%)	Server Engineer
10	36 (3.75%)	Windows Engineer
11	34 (3.54%)	IT Support
12	33 (3.44%)	Desktop Engineer
13	31 (3.23%)	3rd Line Engineer
13	31 (3.23%)	3rd Line Support
13	31 (3.23%)	IT Engineer
14	28 (2.92%)	2nd Line Engineer
14	28 (2.92%)	DBA
14	28 (2.92%)	Service Desk Analyst

Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1	88 (9.17%)	.NET
2	34 (3.54%)	ASP.NET
2	34 (3.54%)	XML
3	33 (3.44%)	CSS
4	28 (2.92%)	Web Services
5	27 (2.81%)	HTML
6	22 (2.29%)	jQuery
7	16 (1.67%)	AngularJS
8	14 (1.46%)	WPF
9	12 (1.25%)	COM
9	12 (1.25%)	WCF
10	11 (1.15%)	.NET Framework
10	11 (1.15%)	ASP.NET MVC
11	10 (1.04%)	DCOM
11	10 (1.04%)	HTML5
12	9 (0.94%)	XSLT
13	7 (0.73%)	ASP.NET Web API
13	7 (0.73%)	Middleware
14	6 (0.63%)	Entity Framework
14	6 (0.63%)	LINQ

Miscellaneous
1	108 (11.25%)	Data Centre
2	82 (8.54%)	Analytical Skills
3	61 (6.35%)	Clustering
4	54 (5.63%)	Blackberry
5	44 (4.58%)	Computer Science
6	36 (3.75%)	Management Information System
7	29 (3.02%)	PKI
8	26 (2.71%)	Video Conferencing
9	22 (2.29%)	NHS
9	22 (2.29%)	Replication
10	19 (1.98%)	iPad
11	18 (1.88%)	PDA
12	17 (1.77%)	User Experience
13	16 (1.67%)	Private Cloud
14	12 (1.25%)	Enterprise Software
15	11 (1.15%)	Fat Client
15	11 (1.15%)	Thin Client
16	10 (1.04%)	iPhone
17	9 (0.94%)	Handset
18	8 (0.83%)	Life Science

Operating Systems
1	599 (62.40%)	Windows
2	287 (29.90%)	Windows Server
3	212 (22.08%)	Windows Server 2012
4	187 (19.48%)	Windows Server 2008
5	152 (15.83%)	Windows 7
6	108 (11.25%)	Windows 10
7	99 (10.31%)	Windows Server 2003
8	90 (9.38%)	Linux
9	51 (5.31%)	Windows 8
10	35 (3.65%)	Android
11	32 (3.33%)	Unix
12	28 (2.92%)	Windows XP
13	27 (2.81%)	Red Hat Enterprise Linux
14	25 (2.60%)	Apple iOS
15	13 (1.35%)	CentOS
15	13 (1.35%)	Mac OS X
15	13 (1.35%)	Windows Vista
16	11 (1.15%)	Solaris
17	6 (0.63%)	Ubuntu
18	5 (0.52%)	Mac OS

Processes & Methodologies
1	360 (37.50%)	ITIL
2	123 (12.81%)	Migration
3	85 (8.85%)	Change Management
4	71 (7.40%)	Service Management
5	70 (7.29%)	ITIL V3
6	55 (5.73%)	Agile Software Development
7	54 (5.63%)	Project Management
8	51 (5.31%)	High Availability
9	50 (5.21%)	Incident Management
10	44 (4.58%)	Business Intelligence
10	44 (4.58%)	PRINCE2
10	44 (4.58%)	Service Delivery
11	42 (4.38%)	DevOps
12	39 (4.06%)	Disaster Recovery
13	37 (3.85%)	Problem Management
14	33 (3.44%)	ITSM
15	30 (3.13%)	Scrum
16	29 (3.02%)	Performance Tuning
16	29 (3.02%)	TOGAF
17	28 (2.92%)	Asset Management

Programming Languages
1	190 (19.79%)	PowerShell
2	150 (15.63%)	SQL
3	73 (7.60%)	C#
4	34 (3.54%)	JavaScript
5	30 (3.13%)	VBScript
6	29 (3.02%)	VB
7	28 (2.92%)	T-SQL
8	19 (1.98%)	C
9	18 (1.88%)	Python
10	10 (1.04%)	Java
10	10 (1.04%)	X++
11	8 (0.83%)	Bash Shell
12	7 (0.73%)	Perl
13	5 (0.52%)	Ruby
13	5 (0.52%)	Shell Script
14	3 (0.31%)	Ada
14	3 (0.31%)	Ada 83
14	3 (0.31%)	Ada 95
14	3 (0.31%)	VB.NET
15	2 (0.21%)	Data Analysis Expressions (DAX)

Qualifications
1	462 (48.13%)	MCSE
2	180 (18.75%)	MCP
3	178 (18.54%)	MCSA
4	155 (16.15%)	MCITP
5	144 (15.00%)	Security Cleared
6	135 (14.06%)	Cisco Certification
7	122 (12.71%)	Degree
8	114 (11.88%)	SC Cleared
9	107 (11.15%)	CCNA
10	91 (9.48%)	VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11	69 (7.19%)	MCTS
12	59 (6.15%)	MCDST
13	39 (4.06%)	ITIL Certification
14	38 (3.96%)	Computer Science Degree
15	31 (3.23%)	CCNP
16	25 (2.60%)	Citrix Certification
17	24 (2.50%)	A+ Certification
17	24 (2.50%)	DV Cleared
18	21 (2.19%)	MCDBA
19	20 (2.08%)	MCSD

Quality Assurance & Compliance
1	74 (7.71%)	SLA
2	27 (2.81%)	ISO/IEC 27001
3	11 (1.15%)	Disclosure Scotland
4	10 (1.04%)	MIL-STD-1553
5	9 (0.94%)	QA
6	8 (0.83%)	PCI DSS
7	7 (0.73%)	PMO
8	4 (0.42%)	Sarbanes-Oxley
9	1 (0.10%)	COBIT
9	1 (0.10%)	Cyber Essentials
9	1 (0.10%)	Data Quality
9	1 (0.10%)	HMG Security Policy Framework
9	1 (0.10%)	ISO/IEC 20000
9	1 (0.10%)	PMBOK

System Software
1	484 (50.42%)	Active Directory
2	166 (17.29%)	VMware Infrastructure
3	137 (14.27%)	Hyper-V
4	46 (4.79%)	XenApp
5	38 (3.96%)	VMware ESXi
6	32 (3.33%)	vSphere
7	27 (2.81%)	XenDesktop
8	22 (2.29%)	Virtual Machines
9	19 (1.98%)	Microsoft App-V
10	18 (1.88%)	Virtual Desktop
11	17 (1.77%)	Virtual Servers
12	14 (1.46%)	VMware Workstation
13	11 (1.15%)	UAG
14	9 (0.94%)	Terminal Services
15	8 (0.83%)	Microsoft Virtual Server
16	7 (0.73%)	BitLocker
17	6 (0.63%)	ISA Server
17	6 (0.63%)	Terminal Server
18	5 (0.52%)	Firmware
18	5 (0.52%)	Forefront TMG

Systems Management
1	116 (12.08%)	SCCM
2	77 (8.02%)	SCOM
3	27 (2.81%)	Microsoft Clustering
4	19 (1.98%)	WSUS
5	17 (1.77%)	NetBackup
6	16 (1.67%)	AirWatch
7	15 (1.56%)	HP Data Protector
8	14 (1.46%)	Tivoli
8	14 (1.46%)	Tivoli Storage Manager
8	14 (1.46%)	vCenter Server
9	11 (1.15%)	Microsoft Data Protection Manager
9	11 (1.15%)	Symantec Endpoint Protection
10	10 (1.04%)	PowerCLI
11	9 (0.94%)	Norton AntiVirus
11	9 (0.94%)	Puppet
12	8 (0.83%)	WMI
13	7 (0.73%)	Opscode Chef
14	6 (0.63%)	Ansible
14	6 (0.63%)	SCVMM
14	6 (0.63%)	XenMobile

Vendors
1	697 (72.60%)	Microsoft
2	252 (26.25%)	VMware
3	170 (17.71%)	Citrix
4	164 (17.08%)	Cisco
5	136 (14.17%)	HP
6	49 (5.10%)	NetApp
7	45 (4.69%)	Oracle
8	44 (4.58%)	Apple
9	29 (3.02%)	Red Hat
9	29 (3.02%)	Symantec
10	28 (2.92%)	Dell
10	28 (2.92%)	Remedy
11	27 (2.81%)	ServiceNow
12	24 (2.50%)	SolarWinds
13	22 (2.29%)	McAfee
14	18 (1.88%)	Polycom
15	17 (1.77%)	EMC
16	15 (1.56%)	Sophos
17	14 (1.46%)	Avaya
17	14 (1.46%)	CheckPoint