Project Management Contract Job Trends

Project Management
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Project Management skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 10 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 59 27 21
Rank change year-on-year -32 -6 +1
Contract jobs citing Project Management 2,062 2,140 2,934
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.78% 6.49% 7.66%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.47% 7.17% 8.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,263 1,283 1,698
10th Percentile £312 £309 £313
25th Percentile £413 £405 £420
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £511 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.20% -2.86% -
75th Percentile £619 £638 £619
90th Percentile £725 £738 £714
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £469 £500
% change year-on-year +6.61% -6.20% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 114 119 170
10th Percentile £21.00 £21.37 £21.25
25th Percentile £30.00 £25.50 £27.00
Median hourly rate £46.50 £34.50 £37.39
Median % change year-on-year +34.78% -7.73% -8.80%
75th Percentile £62.83 £57.88 £53.75
90th Percentile £83.03 £74.00 £67.78
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.75 £36.51 £38.12
% change year-on-year +30.79% -4.22% -4.70%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Project Management 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 46,112 29,840 32,750
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.63% 90.46% 85.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,098 18,520 20,299
10th Percentile £325 £300 £312
25th Percentile £425 £403 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,038 1,780 1,507
10th Percentile £13.87 £14.23 £14.70
25th Percentile £17.38 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £40.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +59.05% -41.51% +2.87%
75th Percentile £67.50 £45.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £67.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.03 £22.63 £43.00
% change year-on-year +76.89% -47.37% +8.65%

Project Management
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Project Management job vacancy trend in the UK

Project Management
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management

Project Management
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Project Management over the 6 months to 10 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Project Management in the UK

Project Management
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management

Project Management
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Project Management over the 6 months to 10 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Project Management in the UK

Project Management
Top 18 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Project Management within the UK over the 6 months to 10 September 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 -30 1,811 £515 -1.48% 1,902
UK excluding London -36 979 £500 +6.61% 1,276
London -30 883 £550 - 868
Work from Home -22 636 £500 +3.63% 773
North of England -37 263 £475 -3.46% 253
South East -22 261 £500 - 401
North West -22 162 £475 -3.46% 129
Midlands -51 144 £550 +18.92% 224
South West -23 133 £469 +4.22% 154
West Midlands -59 94 £550 +17.27% 135
Yorkshire -34 93 £475 -5.00% 92
East of England -13 82 £525 - 127
Scotland -45 78 £478 +6.11% 61
East Midlands -22 50 £525 +17.45% 89
Northern Ireland -7 13 £444 -11.25% 41
Wales -19 12 £400 - 38
North East -44 10 £420 +3.07% 33
Channel Islands - 3 £600 - 1

Project Management
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
1 124 (6.01%) SharePoint
2 104 (5.04%) Confluence
3 36 (1.75%) CMS
4 29 (1.41%) Microsoft Exchange
5 18 (0.87%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 8 (0.39%) Sitecore CMS
7 7 (0.34%) WebLogic
7 7 (0.34%) WebSphere
8 6 (0.29%) Apache
8 6 (0.29%) ArcGIS
8 6 (0.29%) JBoss
8 6 (0.29%) WordPress
9 5 (0.24%) Moodle
9 5 (0.24%) SAS
10 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
10 3 (0.15%) Oracle Workflow
11 2 (0.097%) Oracle Self-Service HR
12 1 (0.048%) Apache Spark
12 1 (0.048%) Appian
12 1 (0.048%) Camunda
Applications
1 198 (9.60%) Microsoft Excel
2 176 (8.54%) Microsoft Project
3 163 (7.90%) Microsoft Office
4 129 (6.26%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 42 (2.04%) MS Visio
6 18 (0.87%) Spreadsheet
7 14 (0.68%) Trello
8 11 (0.53%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 6 (0.29%) Chatbot
10 5 (0.24%) Photoshop
11 4 (0.19%) Simulink
11 4 (0.19%) Stateflow
12 3 (0.15%) Adobe Illustrator
12 3 (0.15%) InDesign
12 3 (0.15%) Windchill
13 2 (0.097%) Houdini
13 2 (0.097%) NUKE
14 1 (0.048%) CATIA
14 1 (0.048%) Notion
14 1 (0.048%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 61 (2.96%) SAP S/4HANA
2 25 (1.21%) Primavera
3 13 (0.63%) Adobe Campaign
3 13 (0.63%) Magento
4 10 (0.48%) SAP CO
4 10 (0.48%) SAP FI
4 10 (0.48%) SAP PS
5 9 (0.44%) Dynamics CRM
5 9 (0.44%) NetSuite
6 8 (0.39%) NEC Housing
6 8 (0.39%) Oracle Receivables
6 8 (0.39%) SAP MM
7 7 (0.34%) Oracle Payables
8 6 (0.29%) SAP FI/CO
8 6 (0.29%) Shopify
8 6 (0.29%) Workday HCM
9 5 (0.24%) Oracle ERP
9 5 (0.24%) Oracle General Ledger
9 5 (0.24%) ProductWriter
9 5 (0.24%) SAP SD
Cloud Services
1 186 (9.02%) Azure
2 140 (6.79%) Power Platform
3 94 (4.56%) SaaS
4 91 (4.41%) Microsoft 365
5 74 (3.59%) AWS
6 70 (3.39%) Azure DevOps
7 38 (1.84%) Smartsheet
8 30 (1.45%) Google Workspace
9 29 (1.41%) Entra ID
10 26 (1.26%) Dynamics 365
11 21 (1.02%) GCP
12 19 (0.92%) Asana
13 17 (0.82%) GitHub
13 17 (0.82%) OneDrive
14 16 (0.78%) PowerApps
15 15 (0.73%) Power Automate
16 14 (0.68%) Microsoft Copilot
17 13 (0.63%) SuccessFactors
18 12 (0.58%) Cloud Computing
19 11 (0.53%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 40 (1.94%) Network Security
2 29 (1.41%) WAN
3 25 (1.21%) DNS
3 25 (1.21%) Firewall
4 24 (1.16%) LAN
4 24 (1.16%) TCP/IP
5 18 (0.87%) Structured Cabling
6 14 (0.68%) DHCP
6 14 (0.68%) VPN
7 13 (0.63%) Internet
7 13 (0.63%) Intranet
7 13 (0.63%) SD-WAN
7 13 (0.63%) Wi-Fi
8 12 (0.58%) BGP
8 12 (0.58%) Wireless
9 10 (0.48%) SAN
10 9 (0.44%) Radio Access Network
11 8 (0.39%) 4G
11 8 (0.39%) LTE
11 8 (0.39%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 127 (6.16%) Power BI
2 21 (1.02%) Data Warehouse
3 18 (0.87%) Metadata
4 17 (0.82%) Tableau
5 14 (0.68%) SQL Server
6 13 (0.63%) Data Lake
7 10 (0.48%) Power Query
7 10 (0.48%) Relational Database
8 8 (0.39%) GIS
9 7 (0.34%) Amazon RDS
9 7 (0.34%) Big Data
10 6 (0.29%) Electronic Patient Records
11 5 (0.24%) DynamoDB
11 5 (0.24%) Hadoop
11 5 (0.24%) Looker
11 5 (0.24%) Oracle Reports
12 4 (0.19%) Amazon Redshift
12 4 (0.19%) EDMS
13 3 (0.15%) BigQuery
13 3 (0.15%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 266 (12.90%) JIRA
2 29 (1.41%) Git
3 21 (1.02%) Jenkins
4 9 (0.44%) Subversion
5 7 (0.34%) Bitbucket
6 6 (0.29%) GitLab
7 5 (0.24%) Rational Rhapsody
8 4 (0.19%) Rational DOORS
9 3 (0.15%) Visual Studio
10 2 (0.097%) Zephyr
11 1 (0.048%) Artifactory
11 1 (0.048%) Capybara
11 1 (0.048%) git-flow
11 1 (0.048%) Gradle
11 1 (0.048%) ScriptRunner
11 1 (0.048%) Snyk
11 1 (0.048%) SonarQube
11 1 (0.048%) Sonatype Nexus
11 1 (0.048%) Terragrunt
11 1 (0.048%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 909 (44.08%) Social Skills
2 781 (37.88%) Finance
3 343 (16.63%) Analytical Skills
4 207 (10.04%) Organisational Skills
5 177 (8.58%) Public Sector
6 176 (8.54%) Banking
7 134 (6.50%) Marketing
8 120 (5.82%) Retail
9 83 (4.03%) Influencing Skills
10 78 (3.78%) Telecoms
11 73 (3.54%) Manufacturing
12 70 (3.39%) Legal
13 60 (2.91%) Presentation Skills
14 41 (1.99%) Investment Banking
15 32 (1.55%) Pharmaceutical
16 31 (1.50%) Front Office
17 29 (1.41%) Aerospace
17 29 (1.41%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 29 (1.41%) Local Government
18 28 (1.36%) Documentation Skills
Job Titles
1 819 (39.72%) Project Manager
2 192 (9.31%) Senior
3 181 (8.78%) Lead
4 156 (7.57%) Analyst
5 142 (6.89%) Senior Manager
6 117 (5.67%) IT Manager
7 111 (5.38%) Senior Project Manager
8 87 (4.22%) IT Project Manager
9 85 (4.12%) Business Analyst
10 84 (4.07%) Programme Manager
11 78 (3.78%) Technical Manager
12 73 (3.54%) Consultant
13 72 (3.49%) Delivery Manager
14 62 (3.01%) Technical Project Manager
15 47 (2.28%) Infrastructure Manager
16 42 (2.04%) Coordinator
17 41 (1.99%) SC Cleared Project Manager
18 36 (1.75%) Architect
18 36 (1.75%) Developer
18 36 (1.75%) Infrastructure Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (1.16%) Middleware
2 20 (0.97%) REST
3 17 (0.82%) ADO
4 15 (0.73%) HTML
4 15 (0.73%) Oracle Fusion
5 13 (0.63%) VML
5 13 (0.63%) Web Services
6 11 (0.53%) .NET
6 11 (0.53%) JSON
7 10 (0.48%) OAuth
8 9 (0.44%) React
8 9 (0.44%) SOAP
9 7 (0.34%) AngularJS
9 7 (0.34%) CSS
9 7 (0.34%) pytest
9 7 (0.34%) RESTful
10 6 (0.29%) FastAPI
10 6 (0.29%) Terraform
10 6 (0.29%) XML
11 5 (0.24%) FHIR
Miscellaneous
1 118 (5.72%) Management Information System
2 102 (4.95%) Product Ownership
3 94 (4.56%) Onboarding
4 65 (3.15%) Data Centre
5 54 (2.62%) Data Protection Act
6 49 (2.38%) Virtual Team
7 44 (2.13%) PMI
8 31 (1.50%) Enterprise Software
9 28 (1.36%) Legacy Systems
9 28 (1.36%) Self-Motivation
10 27 (1.31%) FMCG
11 26 (1.26%) Operational Technology
12 25 (1.21%) Social Media
13 24 (1.16%) Analytical Mindset
13 24 (1.16%) Life Science
14 22 (1.07%) Credit Risk
15 20 (0.97%) AI Agents
16 18 (0.87%) Data Structures
17 16 (0.78%) Marketing Technology
17 16 (0.78%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 64 (3.10%) Windows
2 59 (2.86%) Linux
3 24 (1.16%) Unix
3 24 (1.16%) Windows Server
4 9 (0.44%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (0.39%) Windows 10
6 7 (0.34%) zOS
7 5 (0.24%) Apple iOS
8 4 (0.19%) Android
8 4 (0.19%) FreeRTOS
9 2 (0.097%) Mac OS X
9 2 (0.097%) Solaris
9 2 (0.097%) Windows 7
9 2 (0.097%) Windows Server 2012
9 2 (0.097%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.048%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.048%) Windows Server 2003
10 1 (0.048%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 911 (44.18%) Stakeholder Management
2 793 (38.46%) Agile
3 599 (29.05%) Project Delivery
4 461 (22.36%) PRINCE2
5 345 (16.73%) Continuous Improvement
5 345 (16.73%) Problem-Solving
6 339 (16.44%) Change Management
7 296 (14.35%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 294 (14.26%) Migration
9 275 (13.34%) Decision-Making
10 257 (12.46%) Risk Management
10 257 (12.46%) Waterfall
11 217 (10.52%) AI
12 210 (10.18%) Scrum
13 192 (9.31%) Project Governance
14 169 (8.20%) Roadmaps
15 161 (7.81%) Project Planning
16 160 (7.76%) Analytics
17 159 (7.71%) Programme Management
18 156 (7.57%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 78 (3.78%) SQL
2 71 (3.44%) Python
3 18 (0.87%) JavaScript
4 16 (0.78%) Java
4 16 (0.78%) VBA
5 13 (0.63%) C++
6 10 (0.48%) C#
7 9 (0.44%) PowerShell
7 9 (0.44%) TypeScript
8 8 (0.39%) Korn
9 7 (0.34%) Ada
9 7 (0.34%) Bash
9 7 (0.34%) C
10 5 (0.24%) MATLAB
10 5 (0.24%) Shell Script
11 4 (0.19%) Apex Code
11 4 (0.19%) JCL
12 3 (0.15%) ABAP
12 3 (0.15%) REXX
13 2 (0.097%) R
Qualifications
1 327 (15.86%) Security Cleared
2 319 (15.47%) Degree
3 303 (14.69%) PMP
4 264 (12.80%) PMI Certification
5 226 (10.96%) SC Cleared
6 75 (3.64%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
7 73 (3.54%) DV Cleared
8 31 (1.50%) BPSS Clearance
9 27 (1.31%) Master's Degree
10 20 (0.97%) ACCA
10 20 (0.97%) CIMA
11 18 (0.87%) ITIL Certification
12 15 (0.73%) Azure Certification
12 15 (0.73%) Computer Science Degree
12 15 (0.73%) ISTQB
12 15 (0.73%) PRINCE2 Certification
13 13 (0.63%) APMP
14 12 (0.58%) CISSP
15 11 (0.53%) MBA
16 10 (0.48%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 263 (12.75%) PMO
2 104 (5.04%) QA
3 57 (2.76%) Data Quality
4 38 (1.84%) GDPR
5 25 (1.21%) SLA
6 24 (1.16%) GRC
7 23 (1.12%) Accessibility
8 22 (1.07%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 19 (0.92%) NIST
10 9 (0.44%) P3O
11 7 (0.34%) EMIR
11 7 (0.34%) FINREP
11 7 (0.34%) GMP
12 6 (0.29%) COREP
12 6 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials
12 6 (0.29%) ISO 9001
12 6 (0.29%) MiFID
12 6 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 5 (0.24%) SOC 2
13 5 (0.24%) WCAG
System Software
1 45 (2.18%) Active Directory
2 26 (1.26%) VMware Infrastructure
3 9 (0.44%) Virtual Machines
4 7 (0.34%) Virtual Desktop
5 6 (0.29%) vSphere
6 5 (0.24%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.19%) Hyper-V
7 4 (0.19%) NFS
7 4 (0.19%) Time Sharing Option
8 3 (0.15%) VMware ESXi
9 2 (0.097%) Docker
9 2 (0.097%) Firmware
10 1 (0.048%) ACF2
10 1 (0.048%) IAG
10 1 (0.048%) RACF
10 1 (0.048%) Sendmail
10 1 (0.048%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 22 (1.07%) Ansible
2 13 (0.63%) Microsoft Intune
3 10 (0.48%) Single Sign-On
4 6 (0.29%) Puppet
4 6 (0.29%) Tivoli Storage Manager
5 5 (0.24%) Failover Clustering
5 5 (0.24%) Red Hat Satellite
6 4 (0.19%) ITRS Geneos
6 4 (0.19%) Kubernetes
7 3 (0.15%) RSA Archer
7 3 (0.15%) SCCM
8 2 (0.097%) BMC PATROL
8 2 (0.097%) BMC Performance Manager
8 2 (0.097%) Perfmon
8 2 (0.097%) ZABBIX
9 1 (0.048%) Nagios
9 1 (0.048%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.048%) Tivoli
9 1 (0.048%) vCenter Server
9 1 (0.048%) vRealize
Vendors
1 370 (17.94%) Microsoft
2 157 (7.61%) SAP
3 110 (5.33%) ServiceNow
4 85 (4.12%) Oracle
5 59 (2.86%) Salesforce
6 50 (2.42%) Google
7 46 (2.23%) Adobe
8 42 (2.04%) VMware
9 29 (1.41%) Cisco
10 24 (1.16%) Sitecore
11 21 (1.02%) Atlassian
12 20 (0.97%) Workday
13 19 (0.92%) Ariba
13 19 (0.92%) Databricks
14 18 (0.87%) NEC
15 16 (0.78%) IBM
16 14 (0.68%) Planview
17 12 (0.58%) Alteryx
18 11 (0.53%) Dell
18 11 (0.53%) JD Edwards