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 15 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 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 2,034 2,065 2,928
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.74% 6.36% 7.68%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.43% 7.03% 8.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,252 1,237 1,683
10th Percentile £310 £313 £308
25th Percentile £413 £405 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.51% -2.88% -
75th Percentile £619 £638 £615
90th Percentile £725 £738 £713
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £469 £500
% change year-on-year +6.61% -6.20% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 114 117 163
10th Percentile £21.00 £21.28 £21.25
25th Percentile £30.08 £25.25 £26.84
Median hourly rate £46.50 £34.50 £36.17
Median % change year-on-year +34.78% -4.60% -9.59%
75th Percentile £62.83 £55.49 £54.38
90th Percentile £83.03 £67.08 £67.95
UK excluding London median hourly rate £49.00 £36.00 £38.12
% change year-on-year +36.11% -5.56% -4.16%

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 45,945 29,375 32,666
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.44% 90.50% 85.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,954 18,237 20,159
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
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 3,063 1,777 1,475
10th Percentile £13.85 £14.23 £14.84
25th Percentile £17.42 £17.30 £20.00
Median hourly rate £40.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +59.05% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.47 £43.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £79.00 £66.70 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.08 £22.50 £43.00
% change year-on-year +78.13% -47.67% +6.17%

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 15 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 15 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 15 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 -28 1,790 £525 - 4,800
UK excluding London -35 959 £500 +6.61% 2,659
London -29 876 £550 - 2,576
Work from Home -23 630 £500 +3.09% 1,946
South East -23 257 £500 - 677
North of England -39 255 £475 -3.46% 584
North West -20 156 £475 -3.46% 331
Midlands -46 145 £530 +14.59% 422
South West -29 131 £450 - 304
West Midlands -55 97 £550 +17.27% 254
Yorkshire -22 91 £475 -5.00% 188
East of England -17 78 £525 -0.57% 263
Scotland -33 75 £500 +14.03% 251
East Midlands -15 48 £525 +17.45% 168
Northern Ireland -8 13 £444 -11.25% 118
Wales -21 12 £400 - 67
North East -38 10 £420 +3.07% 70
Channel Islands - 3 £600 - 3

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
1 126 (6.19%) SharePoint
2 100 (4.92%) Confluence
3 35 (1.72%) CMS
4 28 (1.38%) Microsoft Exchange
5 18 (0.88%) 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 (0.25%) Moodle
9 5 (0.25%) SAS
10 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
11 2 (0.098%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.049%) Appian
12 1 (0.049%) Drupal
12 1 (0.049%) Oracle Coherence
12 1 (0.049%) Umbraco
Applications
1 197 (9.69%) Microsoft Excel
2 169 (8.31%) Microsoft Project
3 160 (7.87%) Microsoft Office
4 126 (6.19%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 41 (2.02%) MS Visio
6 18 (0.88%) Spreadsheet
7 14 (0.69%) Trello
8 11 (0.54%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 6 (0.29%) Chatbot
10 5 (0.25%) Photoshop
11 4 (0.20%) Simulink
11 4 (0.20%) Stateflow
12 3 (0.15%) Adobe Illustrator
12 3 (0.15%) InDesign
12 3 (0.15%) Windchill
13 2 (0.098%) Houdini
13 2 (0.098%) NUKE
14 1 (0.049%) Adobe After Effects
14 1 (0.049%) Notion
14 1 (0.049%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 60 (2.95%) SAP S/4HANA
2 23 (1.13%) Primavera
3 13 (0.64%) Adobe Campaign
3 13 (0.64%) Magento
4 11 (0.54%) SAP CO
4 11 (0.54%) SAP FI
4 11 (0.54%) SAP PS
5 9 (0.44%) Dynamics CRM
5 9 (0.44%) NetSuite
5 9 (0.44%) SAP MM
6 7 (0.34%) NEC Housing
6 7 (0.34%) Oracle Receivables
7 6 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
7 6 (0.29%) SAP FI/CO
7 6 (0.29%) SAP SD
7 6 (0.29%) Workday HCM
8 5 (0.25%) Oracle ERP
8 5 (0.25%) Salesforce CRM
8 5 (0.25%) SAP PM
8 5 (0.25%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 183 (9.00%) Azure
2 139 (6.83%) Power Platform
3 92 (4.52%) SaaS
4 90 (4.42%) Microsoft 365
5 73 (3.59%) AWS
6 71 (3.49%) Azure DevOps
7 37 (1.82%) Smartsheet
8 32 (1.57%) Google Workspace
9 28 (1.38%) Entra ID
10 27 (1.33%) Dynamics 365
11 20 (0.98%) GCP
12 19 (0.93%) Asana
13 17 (0.84%) OneDrive
14 16 (0.79%) GitHub
14 16 (0.79%) PowerApps
15 15 (0.74%) Microsoft Copilot
15 15 (0.74%) Power Automate
16 13 (0.64%) SuccessFactors
17 12 (0.59%) Cloud Computing
18 11 (0.54%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 37 (1.82%) Network Security
2 25 (1.23%) WAN
3 24 (1.18%) DNS
4 23 (1.13%) TCP/IP
5 22 (1.08%) Firewall
6 21 (1.03%) LAN
7 18 (0.88%) Structured Cabling
8 13 (0.64%) DHCP
8 13 (0.64%) Intranet
8 13 (0.64%) VPN
8 13 (0.64%) Wi-Fi
9 11 (0.54%) BGP
9 11 (0.54%) Internet
9 11 (0.54%) Wireless
10 9 (0.44%) Radio Access Network
11 8 (0.39%) 4G
11 8 (0.39%) 5G
11 8 (0.39%) BIG-IP
11 8 (0.39%) LTE
11 8 (0.39%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 125 (6.15%) Power BI
2 19 (0.93%) Data Warehouse
2 19 (0.93%) Metadata
3 17 (0.84%) Tableau
4 14 (0.69%) SQL Server
5 13 (0.64%) Data Lake
6 10 (0.49%) Relational Database
7 9 (0.44%) Power Query
8 8 (0.39%) GIS
9 7 (0.34%) Amazon RDS
9 7 (0.34%) Big Data
10 6 (0.29%) Oracle Reports
11 5 (0.25%) DynamoDB
11 5 (0.25%) Hadoop
11 5 (0.25%) Looker
12 4 (0.20%) Amazon Redshift
12 4 (0.20%) EDMS
12 4 (0.20%) Electronic Patient Records
13 3 (0.15%) BigQuery
13 3 (0.15%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 259 (12.73%) JIRA
2 29 (1.43%) Git
3 20 (0.98%) Jenkins
4 9 (0.44%) Subversion
5 6 (0.29%) Bitbucket
6 5 (0.25%) GitLab
6 5 (0.25%) Rational Rhapsody
7 4 (0.20%) Rational DOORS
8 3 (0.15%) Visual Studio
9 2 (0.098%) Selenium
9 2 (0.098%) Zephyr
10 1 (0.049%) git-flow
10 1 (0.049%) Hudson
10 1 (0.049%) IBM UrbanCode
10 1 (0.049%) ScriptRunner
10 1 (0.049%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.049%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.049%) Terragrunt
10 1 (0.049%) TestRail
10 1 (0.049%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 899 (44.20%) Social Skills
2 770 (37.86%) Finance
3 331 (16.27%) Analytical Skills
4 209 (10.28%) Organisational Skills
5 182 (8.95%) Public Sector
6 172 (8.46%) Banking
7 129 (6.34%) Marketing
8 117 (5.75%) Retail
9 91 (4.47%) Influencing Skills
10 73 (3.59%) Telecoms
11 72 (3.54%) Manufacturing
12 70 (3.44%) Legal
13 57 (2.80%) Presentation Skills
14 39 (1.92%) Investment Banking
15 31 (1.52%) Aerospace
15 31 (1.52%) Front Office
16 29 (1.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 29 (1.43%) Local Government
16 29 (1.43%) Pharmaceutical
17 28 (1.38%) Documentation Skills
Job Titles
1 809 (39.77%) Project Manager
2 190 (9.34%) Senior
3 180 (8.85%) Lead
4 145 (7.13%) Analyst
5 140 (6.88%) Senior Manager
6 120 (5.90%) IT Manager
7 108 (5.31%) Senior Project Manager
8 90 (4.42%) IT Project Manager
9 81 (3.98%) Programme Manager
10 79 (3.88%) Business Analyst
11 78 (3.83%) Technical Manager
12 74 (3.64%) Consultant
13 73 (3.59%) Delivery Manager
14 62 (3.05%) Technical Project Manager
15 43 (2.11%) Infrastructure Manager
16 41 (2.02%) Coordinator
17 40 (1.97%) Project Officer
17 40 (1.97%) SC Cleared Project Manager
18 36 (1.77%) Project Coordinator
19 35 (1.72%) Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (1.08%) Middleware
2 20 (0.98%) REST
3 17 (0.84%) ADO
4 15 (0.74%) HTML
5 13 (0.64%) Oracle Fusion
5 13 (0.64%) Web Services
6 12 (0.59%) VML
7 11 (0.54%) .NET
7 11 (0.54%) JSON
8 10 (0.49%) OAuth
9 9 (0.44%) React
9 9 (0.44%) SOAP
10 7 (0.34%) CSS
10 7 (0.34%) pytest
10 7 (0.34%) RESTful
11 6 (0.29%) AngularJS
11 6 (0.29%) FastAPI
11 6 (0.29%) Terraform
12 5 (0.25%) XML
13 4 (0.20%) EDI
Miscellaneous
1 118 (5.80%) Management Information System
2 101 (4.97%) Product Ownership
3 91 (4.47%) Onboarding
4 62 (3.05%) Data Centre
5 52 (2.56%) Data Protection Act
6 48 (2.36%) Virtual Team
7 43 (2.11%) PMI
8 32 (1.57%) Enterprise Software
9 29 (1.43%) Legacy Systems
10 27 (1.33%) FMCG
10 27 (1.33%) Operational Technology
11 26 (1.28%) Self-Motivation
12 25 (1.23%) Social Media
13 22 (1.08%) Credit Risk
13 22 (1.08%) Life Science
14 20 (0.98%) AI Agents
14 20 (0.98%) Analytical Mindset
15 16 (0.79%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
15 16 (0.79%) Mobile App
16 15 (0.74%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 60 (2.95%) Windows
2 56 (2.75%) Linux
3 24 (1.18%) Unix
4 23 (1.13%) Windows Server
5 9 (0.44%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (0.34%) Windows 10
7 6 (0.29%) zOS
8 5 (0.25%) Apple iOS
9 4 (0.20%) Android
9 4 (0.20%) FreeRTOS
10 2 (0.098%) Solaris
10 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2012
10 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2019
11 1 (0.049%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.049%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.049%) Windows 7
11 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2003
11 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 906 (44.54%) Stakeholder Management
2 776 (38.15%) Agile
3 597 (29.35%) Project Delivery
4 452 (22.22%) PRINCE2
5 345 (16.96%) Continuous Improvement
6 339 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
7 335 (16.47%) Change Management
8 299 (14.70%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 284 (13.96%) Migration
10 281 (13.82%) Decision-Making
11 261 (12.83%) Risk Management
12 252 (12.39%) Waterfall
13 217 (10.67%) AI
14 208 (10.23%) Scrum
15 197 (9.69%) Project Governance
16 165 (8.11%) Programme Management
16 165 (8.11%) Project Planning
17 163 (8.01%) Roadmaps
18 156 (7.67%) Analytics
19 154 (7.57%) Change Control
Programming Languages
1 74 (3.64%) SQL
2 69 (3.39%) Python
3 18 (0.88%) JavaScript
4 17 (0.84%) Java
5 16 (0.79%) VBA
6 13 (0.64%) C++
7 10 (0.49%) C#
8 9 (0.44%) PowerShell
9 8 (0.39%) Korn
9 8 (0.39%) TypeScript
10 7 (0.34%) Ada
10 7 (0.34%) Bash
10 7 (0.34%) C
11 5 (0.25%) MATLAB
11 5 (0.25%) Shell Script
12 4 (0.20%) Apex Code
13 3 (0.15%) ABAP
13 3 (0.15%) JCL
13 3 (0.15%) REXX
14 2 (0.098%) R
Qualifications
1 324 (15.93%) Security Cleared
2 314 (15.44%) Degree
3 300 (14.75%) PMP
4 259 (12.73%) PMI Certification
5 223 (10.96%) SC Cleared
6 76 (3.74%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
7 72 (3.54%) DV Cleared
8 34 (1.67%) BPSS Clearance
9 25 (1.23%) Master's Degree
10 19 (0.93%) ACCA
10 19 (0.93%) CIMA
11 17 (0.84%) ITIL Certification
12 16 (0.79%) Azure Certification
12 16 (0.79%) PRINCE2 Certification
13 14 (0.69%) Computer Science Degree
13 14 (0.69%) ISTQB
14 13 (0.64%) APMP
14 13 (0.64%) CISSP
15 10 (0.49%) CISM
15 10 (0.49%) MBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 261 (12.83%) PMO
2 101 (4.97%) QA
3 53 (2.61%) Data Quality
4 34 (1.67%) GDPR
5 24 (1.18%) Accessibility
5 24 (1.18%) GRC
5 24 (1.18%) SLA
6 21 (1.03%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 18 (0.88%) NIST
8 8 (0.39%) P3O
9 7 (0.34%) FINREP
9 7 (0.34%) GMP
10 6 (0.29%) COREP
10 6 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials
10 6 (0.29%) EMIR
10 6 (0.29%) ISO 9001
10 6 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 5 (0.25%) MiFID
11 5 (0.25%) SOC 2
11 5 (0.25%) WCAG
System Software
1 39 (1.92%) Active Directory
2 26 (1.28%) VMware Infrastructure
3 9 (0.44%) Virtual Machines
4 7 (0.34%) Virtual Desktop
4 7 (0.34%) vSphere
5 5 (0.25%) VMware NSX
6 4 (0.20%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (0.15%) Hyper-V
7 3 (0.15%) NFS
7 3 (0.15%) Time Sharing Option
8 2 (0.098%) Docker
8 2 (0.098%) Firmware
9 1 (0.049%) ACF2
9 1 (0.049%) IAG
9 1 (0.049%) RACF
9 1 (0.049%) Sendmail
9 1 (0.049%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 22 (1.08%) Ansible
2 12 (0.59%) Microsoft Intune
3 10 (0.49%) Single Sign-On
4 6 (0.29%) Puppet
5 5 (0.25%) Failover Clustering
5 5 (0.25%) Red Hat Satellite
5 5 (0.25%) Tivoli Storage Manager
6 4 (0.20%) ITRS Geneos
6 4 (0.20%) Kubernetes
7 3 (0.15%) RSA Archer
7 3 (0.15%) SCCM
8 2 (0.098%) BMC PATROL
8 2 (0.098%) BMC Performance Manager
8 2 (0.098%) Perfmon
8 2 (0.098%) ZABBIX
9 1 (0.049%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.049%) Nagios
9 1 (0.049%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.049%) vCenter Server
9 1 (0.049%) vRealize
Vendors
1 369 (18.14%) Microsoft
2 158 (7.77%) SAP
3 111 (5.46%) ServiceNow
4 84 (4.13%) Oracle
5 54 (2.65%) Salesforce
6 48 (2.36%) Google
7 45 (2.21%) Adobe
8 41 (2.02%) VMware
9 29 (1.43%) Cisco
10 23 (1.13%) Sitecore
11 22 (1.08%) Workday
12 21 (1.03%) Atlassian
13 19 (0.93%) Ariba
13 19 (0.93%) NEC
14 18 (0.88%) Databricks
15 15 (0.74%) IBM
16 14 (0.69%) Planview
17 12 (0.59%) Alteryx
18 11 (0.54%) JD Edwards
19 10 (0.49%) Dell