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 19 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 42 23 20
Rank change year-on-year -19 -3 +4
Contract jobs citing Project Management 2,107 2,405 3,548
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 4.86% 8.21% 7.99%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.65% 9.08% 9.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,321 1,451 2,210
10th Percentile £325 £282 £313
25th Percentile £413 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £610 £600 £625
90th Percentile £702 £700 £715
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% +1.01%
Number of hourly rates quoted 122 113 259
10th Percentile £14.64 £23.63 £18.67
25th Percentile £20.79 £31.12 £26.66
Median hourly rate £39.75 £42.50 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year -6.47% +11.49% -22.20%
75th Percentile £57.50 £60.00 £50.75
90th Percentile £79.38 £75.00 £62.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.25 £46.90 £38.12
% change year-on-year -9.91% +23.03% -30.69%

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 37,265 26,485 38,452
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 85.97% 90.43% 86.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,631 17,037 25,025
10th Percentile £313 £308 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £610 £638 £638
90th Percentile £723 £744 £745
UK excluding London median daily rate £480 £490 £500
% change year-on-year -2.04% -2.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,203 922 2,327
10th Percentile £14.97 £15.25 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.00 £16.00
Median hourly rate £30.00 £32.50 £32.12
Median % change year-on-year -7.69% +1.20% -8.24%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.52 £57.50
90th Percentile £75.00 £77.50 £70.20
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.50 £31.76 £30.91
% change year-on-year -13.41% +2.74% -11.68%

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 19 March 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 19 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Project Management in the UK

Project Management
Top 17 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 19 March 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 -17 1,854 £525 +5.00% 1,253
UK excluding London -18 1,078 £500 +5.26% 1,072
London -15 862 £550 +4.76% 382
Work from Home -18 596 £525 +5.00% 424
South East -10 292 £525 - 303
North of England -23 283 £480 +1.05% 250
Midlands -23 206 £500 +11.11% 176
North West -11 166 £484 +7.56% 122
West Midlands -29 142 £500 - 101
South West -20 115 £450 -10.00% 117
Yorkshire -27 109 £490 +5.89% 100
Scotland -16 85 £450 - 59
East of England -24 73 £500 -1.86% 138
East Midlands -14 66 £402 +1.64% 75
Wales +1 28 £331 -37.35% 45
Northern Ireland -7 15 £447 +15.35% 22
North East -14 12 £430 -18.10% 33

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
1 181 (8.59%) Confluence
2 84 (3.99%) SharePoint
3 23 (1.09%) CMS
4 8 (0.38%) Oracle Workflow
5 6 (0.28%) Apache
6 5 (0.24%) nginx
7 4 (0.19%) Microsoft Exchange
7 4 (0.19%) Oracle Self-Service HR
8 3 (0.14%) Anypoint
8 3 (0.14%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
9 2 (0.095%) SAS
9 2 (0.095%) WordPress
10 1 (0.047%) Apache Superset
10 1 (0.047%) IBM HTTP Server
10 1 (0.047%) IIS
10 1 (0.047%) Moodle
10 1 (0.047%) Orchard CMS
10 1 (0.047%) Umbraco
10 1 (0.047%) WebSphere
Applications
1 222 (10.54%) Microsoft Project
2 207 (9.82%) Microsoft Excel
3 151 (7.17%) Microsoft Office
4 114 (5.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 45 (2.14%) MS Visio
6 23 (1.09%) Spreadsheet
7 17 (0.81%) Trello
8 6 (0.28%) Chatbot
9 4 (0.19%) Adobe After Effects
9 4 (0.19%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 4 (0.19%) Adobe XD
10 3 (0.14%) InVision
10 3 (0.14%) Photoshop
10 3 (0.14%) Sketch
11 2 (0.095%) Adobe Illustrator
11 2 (0.095%) AutoCAD
11 2 (0.095%) InDesign
11 2 (0.095%) Windchill
12 1 (0.047%) Camtasia
12 1 (0.047%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 76 (3.61%) SAP S/4HANA
2 24 (1.14%) Primavera
3 15 (0.71%) Oracle Payables
4 13 (0.62%) Oracle ERP
5 12 (0.57%) Loan IQ
5 12 (0.57%) Oracle EBS
6 11 (0.52%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 11 (0.52%) SAP Payroll
7 10 (0.47%) Dynamics CRM
8 9 (0.43%) Oracle Assets
8 9 (0.43%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 8 (0.38%) Oracle General Ledger
9 8 (0.38%) Oracle Receivables
10 7 (0.33%) NetSuite
10 7 (0.33%) SAP HCM
11 6 (0.28%) Salesforce CRM
11 6 (0.28%) SAP ERP
11 6 (0.28%) SAP MM
11 6 (0.28%) SAP PM
11 6 (0.28%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 159 (7.55%) Azure
2 92 (4.37%) AWS
3 90 (4.27%) Power Platform
4 63 (2.99%) SaaS
5 57 (2.71%) Microsoft 365
6 51 (2.42%) Azure DevOps
7 26 (1.23%) GCP
8 25 (1.19%) Dynamics 365
9 21 (1.00%) Smartsheet
10 20 (0.95%) OpenShift
11 18 (0.85%) Asana
12 17 (0.81%) Google Workspace
13 15 (0.71%) GitHub
13 15 (0.71%) Microsoft Copilot
14 14 (0.66%) Entra ID
15 11 (0.52%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 11 (0.52%) Figma
15 11 (0.52%) OCI
15 11 (0.52%) PaaS
15 11 (0.52%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 36 (1.71%) WAN
2 32 (1.52%) Firewall
3 24 (1.14%) LAN
4 22 (1.04%) Network Security
4 22 (1.04%) SD-WAN
5 17 (0.81%) MPLS
5 17 (0.81%) Structured Cabling
6 16 (0.76%) VPN
7 15 (0.71%) Wi-Fi
8 13 (0.62%) DNS
8 13 (0.62%) Internet
9 12 (0.57%) TCP/IP
10 10 (0.47%) BGP
11 7 (0.33%) DHCP
11 7 (0.33%) SSL
12 6 (0.28%) Intranet
12 6 (0.28%) IPsec
12 6 (0.28%) OSPF
12 6 (0.28%) SSH
13 5 (0.24%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 82 (3.89%) Power BI
2 30 (1.42%) Tableau
3 19 (0.90%) Data Warehouse
4 18 (0.85%) Metadata
5 17 (0.81%) SQL Server
6 13 (0.62%) Data Lake
7 10 (0.47%) SAP HANA
8 9 (0.43%) Electronic Patient Records
8 9 (0.43%) Oracle Reports
9 5 (0.24%) Amazon RDS
9 5 (0.24%) Power Query
9 5 (0.24%) Relational Database
10 4 (0.19%) Big Data
10 4 (0.19%) BigQuery
10 4 (0.19%) Elasticsearch
10 4 (0.19%) GIS
10 4 (0.19%) Oracle BI Publisher
10 4 (0.19%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 3 (0.14%) NoSQL
11 3 (0.14%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 335 (15.90%) JIRA
2 19 (0.90%) Git
3 12 (0.57%) GitLab
3 12 (0.57%) Jenkins
4 4 (0.19%) Bitbucket
4 4 (0.19%) SonarQube
5 3 (0.14%) Axure RP
5 3 (0.14%) Selenium
6 1 (0.047%) Ant
6 1 (0.047%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 1 (0.047%) ERwin
6 1 (0.047%) Hudson
6 1 (0.047%) JUnit
6 1 (0.047%) LSMW
6 1 (0.047%) MSI
6 1 (0.047%) Oracle Forms
6 1 (0.047%) SoapUI
6 1 (0.047%) SpecFlow
6 1 (0.047%) TestDirector
6 1 (0.047%) Toad
General
1 1,035 (49.12%) Social Skills
2 796 (37.78%) Finance
3 366 (17.37%) Analytical Skills
4 218 (10.35%) Public Sector
5 205 (9.73%) Organisational Skills
6 177 (8.40%) Banking
7 101 (4.79%) Retail
8 91 (4.32%) Marketing
9 83 (3.94%) Legal
10 82 (3.89%) Influencing Skills
11 81 (3.84%) Manufacturing
12 54 (2.56%) Presentation Skills
13 52 (2.47%) Telecoms
14 49 (2.33%) Investment Banking
15 36 (1.71%) Financial Institution
16 32 (1.52%) Documentation Skills
17 30 (1.42%) Local Government
18 27 (1.28%) Front Office
19 25 (1.19%) Aerospace
19 25 (1.19%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 853 (40.48%) Project Manager
2 252 (11.96%) Analyst
3 180 (8.54%) Senior
4 161 (7.64%) Lead
5 132 (6.26%) Business Analyst
6 121 (5.74%) Senior Manager
7 104 (4.94%) Senior Project Manager
8 98 (4.65%) IT Manager
9 89 (4.22%) IT Project Manager
10 85 (4.03%) Consultant
11 72 (3.42%) Technical Manager
12 71 (3.37%) Programme Manager
13 62 (2.94%) Infrastructure Manager
14 61 (2.90%) Delivery Manager
15 52 (2.47%) Technical Project Manager
16 51 (2.42%) Infrastructure Project Manager
17 47 (2.23%) Project Officer
18 44 (2.09%) Architect
18 44 (2.09%) SAP Manager
19 43 (2.04%) Data Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (1.28%) Oracle Fusion
2 26 (1.23%) Middleware
3 13 (0.62%) REST
3 13 (0.62%) SOAP
3 13 (0.62%) Web Services
4 12 (0.57%) XML
5 11 (0.52%) CSS
5 11 (0.52%) EDI
6 9 (0.43%) HTML
7 8 (0.38%) .NET
7 8 (0.38%) SailPoint
8 7 (0.33%) OAuth
9 6 (0.28%) ADO
9 6 (0.28%) AngularJS
9 6 (0.28%) OpenID
9 6 (0.28%) SAML
10 5 (0.24%) OAuth2
10 5 (0.24%) RESTful
10 5 (0.24%) VML
10 5 (0.24%) XACML
Miscellaneous
1 116 (5.51%) Onboarding
2 108 (5.13%) Management Information System
3 76 (3.61%) Data Centre
4 67 (3.18%) Data Protection Act
4 67 (3.18%) PMI
5 52 (2.47%) Product Ownership
6 50 (2.37%) Virtual Team
7 44 (2.09%) Self-Motivation
8 38 (1.80%) Legacy Systems
9 30 (1.42%) NHS
10 26 (1.23%) CMDB
10 26 (1.23%) Operational Technology
11 23 (1.09%) Analytical Mindset
12 18 (0.85%) Data Structures
13 17 (0.81%) SCADA
14 16 (0.76%) Web Conferencing
15 15 (0.71%) Enterprise Software
15 15 (0.71%) Social Media
16 14 (0.66%) Cloud Native
17 12 (0.57%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 53 (2.52%) Windows
2 18 (0.85%) Linux
3 11 (0.52%) Windows Server
4 9 (0.43%) Unix
5 8 (0.38%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.095%) AIX
6 2 (0.095%) Ubuntu
6 2 (0.095%) Windows Server 2019
6 2 (0.095%) zOS
7 1 (0.047%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.047%) Mac OS X
7 1 (0.047%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 1 (0.047%) Solaris
7 1 (0.047%) VMS
7 1 (0.047%) Windows 7
7 1 (0.047%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 785 (37.26%) Agile
2 701 (33.27%) Stakeholder Management
3 512 (24.30%) Project Delivery
4 492 (23.35%) Problem-Solving
5 453 (21.50%) PRINCE2
6 349 (16.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 331 (15.71%) Change Management
8 310 (14.71%) Migration
9 297 (14.10%) Continuous Improvement
10 234 (11.11%) Decision-Making
11 232 (11.01%) Waterfall
12 227 (10.77%) Risk Management
13 216 (10.25%) Scrum
14 180 (8.54%) Budget Management
15 174 (8.26%) ERP
16 159 (7.55%) DevOps
17 150 (7.12%) Roadmaps
18 146 (6.93%) Project Governance
19 142 (6.74%) ITIL
20 141 (6.69%) Data Migration
Programming Languages
1 95 (4.51%) SQL
2 38 (1.80%) Python
3 14 (0.66%) ABAP
4 13 (0.62%) Java
4 13 (0.62%) JavaScript
5 11 (0.52%) C#
6 5 (0.24%) Perl
6 5 (0.24%) PL/SQL
6 5 (0.24%) PowerShell
6 5 (0.24%) R
6 5 (0.24%) T-SQL
6 5 (0.24%) VBA
7 4 (0.19%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 3 (0.14%) C++
8 3 (0.14%) Google Apps Script
8 3 (0.14%) SOQL
8 3 (0.14%) TypeScript
9 2 (0.095%) Apex Code
9 2 (0.095%) C
9 2 (0.095%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 348 (16.52%) Degree
2 331 (15.71%) Security Cleared
3 310 (14.71%) PMP
4 289 (13.72%) PMI Certification
5 238 (11.30%) SC Cleared
6 68 (3.23%) DV Cleared
7 49 (2.33%) Master's Degree
8 46 (2.18%) BPSS Clearance
9 39 (1.85%) APMP
10 35 (1.66%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
11 28 (1.33%) Computer Science Degree
12 25 (1.19%) PRINCE2 Certification
13 24 (1.14%) CISSP
14 21 (1.00%) MBA
15 20 (0.95%) CISM
16 18 (0.85%) ACCA
16 18 (0.85%) CIMA
17 17 (0.81%) CBAP
18 15 (0.71%) IIBA
19 11 (0.52%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 243 (11.53%) PMO
2 134 (6.36%) QA
3 70 (3.32%) Data Quality
4 58 (2.75%) GDPR
5 46 (2.18%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 33 (1.57%) NIST
7 27 (1.28%) SLA
8 15 (0.71%) Accessibility
9 13 (0.62%) GRC
9 13 (0.62%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 12 (0.57%) PCI DSS
11 10 (0.47%) Basel III
12 9 (0.43%) MiFID
13 8 (0.38%) Disclosure Scotland
13 8 (0.38%) EMIR
14 7 (0.33%) ISO 9001
14 7 (0.33%) P3O
14 7 (0.33%) WCAG
15 6 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials
15 6 (0.28%) JSP 440
System Software
1 28 (1.33%) Active Directory
2 12 (0.57%) Docker
3 10 (0.47%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (0.24%) RACF
5 4 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.095%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.095%) VMware NSX
7 1 (0.047%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.047%) Microsoft App-V
7 1 (0.047%) NFS
7 1 (0.047%) PowerHA
7 1 (0.047%) Sendmail
7 1 (0.047%) Time Sharing Option
7 1 (0.047%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 15 (0.71%) Kubernetes
2 11 (0.52%) Single Sign-On
2 11 (0.52%) Terraform
3 7 (0.33%) Ansible
4 5 (0.24%) logstash
4 5 (0.24%) Microsoft Intune
5 4 (0.19%) Consul
5 4 (0.19%) FortiGate
5 4 (0.19%) Kibana
5 4 (0.19%) Packer
5 4 (0.19%) RSA Archer
6 3 (0.14%) vCenter Server
7 2 (0.095%) Grafana
7 2 (0.095%) SCCM
7 2 (0.095%) Tivoli Storage Manager
8 1 (0.047%) Cisco UCCE
8 1 (0.047%) Control-M
8 1 (0.047%) Puppet
8 1 (0.047%) SCOM
8 1 (0.047%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 302 (14.33%) Microsoft
2 202 (9.59%) SAP
3 108 (5.13%) ServiceNow
4 80 (3.80%) Oracle
5 71 (3.37%) Salesforce
6 35 (1.66%) Cisco
7 34 (1.61%) Google
8 31 (1.47%) Adobe
9 28 (1.33%) Workday
10 25 (1.19%) Atlassian
11 20 (0.95%) Databricks
12 18 (0.85%) Ariba
12 18 (0.85%) CyberArk
12 18 (0.85%) VMware
13 15 (0.71%) IBM
13 15 (0.71%) Sage
14 13 (0.62%) Palo Alto
15 12 (0.57%) Planview
16 10 (0.47%) CheckPoint
16 10 (0.47%) Juniper