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

6 months to
14 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 2,018 2,081 2,943
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.73% 6.37% 7.66%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.42% 7.03% 8.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,240 1,249 1,694
10th Percentile £310 £308 £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 £614
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 115 118 164
10th Percentile £21.00 £21.29 £21.25
25th Percentile £30.15 £25.25 £26.92
Median hourly rate £45.50 £34.50 £36.48
Median % change year-on-year +31.88% -5.43% -9.36%
75th Percentile £62.41 £57.00 £54.06
90th Percentile £82.95 £71.13 £67.93
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.00 £36.00 £38.12
% change year-on-year +33.33% -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 45,698 29,594 32,877
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.42% 90.53% 85.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,784 18,388 20,318
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 £726 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,048 1,782 1,485
10th Percentile £13.85 £14.23 £14.84
25th Percentile £17.44 £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 £67.50 £43.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £79.00 £66.95 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.00 £22.50 £43.00
% change year-on-year +82.22% -47.67% +7.50%

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 14 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 14 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 14 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 1,776 £520 -0.95% 3,903
UK excluding London -36 956 £500 +6.61% 2,191
London -30 866 £550 - 2,127
Work from Home -21 624 £500 +3.90% 1,770
South East -21 256 £500 - 578
North of England -41 255 £475 -3.46% 463
North West -24 156 £475 -3.01% 254
Midlands -44 143 £538 +16.22% 344
South West -26 131 £450 - 256
West Midlands -54 95 £550 +17.27% 207
Yorkshire -27 91 £475 -5.00% 155
East of England -16 78 £525 -0.57% 221
Scotland -32 75 £500 +14.03% 203
East Midlands -19 48 £525 +17.45% 136
Northern Ireland -8 13 £444 -11.25% 97
Wales -21 12 £400 - 56
North East -39 10 £420 +3.07% 59
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
1 125 (6.19%) SharePoint
2 99 (4.91%) Confluence
3 35 (1.73%) CMS
4 28 (1.39%) Microsoft Exchange
5 18 (0.89%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 8 (0.40%) Sitecore CMS
7 7 (0.35%) WebLogic
7 7 (0.35%) WebSphere
8 6 (0.30%) Apache
8 6 (0.30%) ArcGIS
8 6 (0.30%) JBoss
8 6 (0.30%) WordPress
9 5 (0.25%) Moodle
9 5 (0.25%) SAS
10 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
11 2 (0.099%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.050%) Appian
12 1 (0.050%) Drupal
12 1 (0.050%) Oracle Coherence
12 1 (0.050%) Umbraco
Applications
1 196 (9.71%) Microsoft Excel
2 167 (8.28%) Microsoft Project
3 160 (7.93%) Microsoft Office
4 126 (6.24%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 41 (2.03%) MS Visio
6 18 (0.89%) Spreadsheet
7 14 (0.69%) Trello
8 11 (0.55%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 6 (0.30%) 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 (0.099%) Houdini
13 2 (0.099%) NUKE
14 1 (0.050%) Adobe After Effects
14 1 (0.050%) Notion
14 1 (0.050%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 60 (2.97%) SAP S/4HANA
2 23 (1.14%) Primavera
3 13 (0.64%) Adobe Campaign
3 13 (0.64%) Magento
4 11 (0.55%) SAP CO
4 11 (0.55%) SAP FI
4 11 (0.55%) SAP PS
5 9 (0.45%) Dynamics CRM
5 9 (0.45%) NetSuite
5 9 (0.45%) SAP MM
6 7 (0.35%) NEC Housing
6 7 (0.35%) Oracle Receivables
7 6 (0.30%) Oracle Payables
7 6 (0.30%) SAP FI/CO
7 6 (0.30%) SAP SD
7 6 (0.30%) 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
1 180 (8.92%) Azure
2 137 (6.79%) Power Platform
3 90 (4.46%) SaaS
4 88 (4.36%) Microsoft 365
5 72 (3.57%) AWS
6 69 (3.42%) Azure DevOps
7 37 (1.83%) Smartsheet
8 32 (1.59%) Google Workspace
9 27 (1.34%) Dynamics 365
9 27 (1.34%) Entra ID
10 19 (0.94%) Asana
10 19 (0.94%) GCP
11 17 (0.84%) OneDrive
12 16 (0.79%) GitHub
12 16 (0.79%) PowerApps
13 15 (0.74%) Power Automate
14 14 (0.69%) Microsoft Copilot
15 13 (0.64%) SuccessFactors
16 12 (0.59%) Cloud Computing
17 11 (0.55%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 38 (1.88%) Network Security
2 25 (1.24%) WAN
3 24 (1.19%) DNS
4 23 (1.14%) TCP/IP
5 22 (1.09%) Firewall
6 20 (0.99%) LAN
7 18 (0.89%) Structured Cabling
8 13 (0.64%) DHCP
8 13 (0.64%) Intranet
8 13 (0.64%) VPN
8 13 (0.64%) Wi-Fi
9 12 (0.59%) Internet
10 11 (0.55%) BGP
10 11 (0.55%) Wireless
11 9 (0.45%) Radio Access Network
11 9 (0.45%) SD-WAN
12 8 (0.40%) 5G
12 8 (0.40%) BIG-IP
12 8 (0.40%) LTE
12 8 (0.40%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 124 (6.14%) Power BI
2 19 (0.94%) Data Warehouse
2 19 (0.94%) Metadata
3 17 (0.84%) Tableau
4 14 (0.69%) SQL Server
5 13 (0.64%) Data Lake
6 10 (0.50%) Relational Database
7 9 (0.45%) Power Query
8 8 (0.40%) GIS
9 7 (0.35%) Amazon RDS
9 7 (0.35%) Big Data
10 6 (0.30%) 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
1 257 (12.74%) JIRA
2 29 (1.44%) Git
3 20 (0.99%) Jenkins
4 9 (0.45%) Subversion
5 6 (0.30%) 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 (0.099%) Selenium
9 2 (0.099%) Zephyr
10 1 (0.050%) git-flow
10 1 (0.050%) Hudson
10 1 (0.050%) IBM UrbanCode
10 1 (0.050%) ScriptRunner
10 1 (0.050%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.050%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.050%) Terragrunt
10 1 (0.050%) TestRail
10 1 (0.050%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 891 (44.15%) Social Skills
2 764 (37.86%) Finance
3 331 (16.40%) Analytical Skills
4 205 (10.16%) Organisational Skills
5 179 (8.87%) Public Sector
6 172 (8.52%) Banking
7 128 (6.34%) Marketing
8 117 (5.80%) Retail
9 87 (4.31%) Influencing Skills
10 74 (3.67%) Telecoms
11 72 (3.57%) Manufacturing
12 70 (3.47%) Legal
13 56 (2.78%) Presentation Skills
14 39 (1.93%) Investment Banking
15 31 (1.54%) Aerospace
16 30 (1.49%) Front Office
17 29 (1.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 28 (1.39%) Documentation Skills
18 28 (1.39%) Pharmaceutical
19 27 (1.34%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 800 (39.64%) Project Manager
2 187 (9.27%) Senior
3 179 (8.87%) Lead
4 145 (7.19%) Analyst
5 138 (6.84%) Senior Manager
6 118 (5.85%) IT Manager
7 107 (5.30%) Senior Project Manager
8 88 (4.36%) IT Project Manager
9 79 (3.91%) Business Analyst
9 79 (3.91%) Programme Manager
10 76 (3.77%) Technical Manager
11 73 (3.62%) Consultant
12 72 (3.57%) Delivery Manager
13 60 (2.97%) Technical Project Manager
14 43 (2.13%) Infrastructure Manager
15 41 (2.03%) Coordinator
16 40 (1.98%) SC Cleared Project Manager
17 39 (1.93%) Project Officer
18 36 (1.78%) Project Coordinator
19 35 (1.73%) Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (1.09%) Middleware
2 20 (0.99%) 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 (0.55%) .NET
7 11 (0.55%) JSON
8 10 (0.50%) OAuth
9 9 (0.45%) React
9 9 (0.45%) SOAP
10 7 (0.35%) CSS
10 7 (0.35%) pytest
10 7 (0.35%) RESTful
11 6 (0.30%) AngularJS
11 6 (0.30%) FastAPI
11 6 (0.30%) Terraform
12 5 (0.25%) XML
13 4 (0.20%) EDI
Miscellaneous
1 117 (5.80%) Management Information System
2 101 (5.00%) Product Ownership
3 91 (4.51%) Onboarding
4 61 (3.02%) Data Centre
5 52 (2.58%) Data Protection Act
6 48 (2.38%) Virtual Team
7 43 (2.13%) PMI
8 31 (1.54%) Enterprise Software
9 28 (1.39%) Legacy Systems
10 27 (1.34%) FMCG
11 26 (1.29%) Operational Technology
12 25 (1.24%) Self-Motivation
12 25 (1.24%) Social Media
13 22 (1.09%) Credit Risk
14 21 (1.04%) Life Science
15 20 (0.99%) AI Agents
15 20 (0.99%) Analytical Mindset
16 16 (0.79%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
16 16 (0.79%) Mobile App
17 15 (0.74%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 60 (2.97%) Windows
2 56 (2.78%) Linux
3 24 (1.19%) Unix
4 23 (1.14%) Windows Server
5 9 (0.45%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (0.35%) Windows 10
7 6 (0.30%) zOS
8 5 (0.25%) Apple iOS
9 4 (0.20%) Android
9 4 (0.20%) FreeRTOS
10 2 (0.099%) Solaris
10 2 (0.099%) Windows Server 2012
10 2 (0.099%) Windows Server 2019
11 1 (0.050%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.050%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.050%) Windows 7
11 1 (0.050%) Windows Server 2003
11 1 (0.050%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 895 (44.35%) Stakeholder Management
2 771 (38.21%) Agile
3 588 (29.14%) Project Delivery
4 448 (22.20%) PRINCE2
5 342 (16.95%) Continuous Improvement
6 337 (16.70%) Problem-Solving
7 330 (16.35%) Change Management
8 293 (14.52%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 282 (13.97%) Migration
10 274 (13.58%) Decision-Making
11 256 (12.69%) Risk Management
12 249 (12.34%) Waterfall
13 216 (10.70%) AI
14 206 (10.21%) Scrum
15 194 (9.61%) Project Governance
16 163 (8.08%) Project Planning
17 162 (8.03%) Programme Management
17 162 (8.03%) Roadmaps
18 156 (7.73%) Analytics
19 150 (7.43%) Change Control
Programming Languages
1 74 (3.67%) SQL
2 69 (3.42%) Python
3 18 (0.89%) JavaScript
4 17 (0.84%) Java
5 16 (0.79%) VBA
6 13 (0.64%) C++
7 10 (0.50%) C#
8 9 (0.45%) PowerShell
9 8 (0.40%) Korn
9 8 (0.40%) TypeScript
10 7 (0.35%) Ada
10 7 (0.35%) Bash
10 7 (0.35%) 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 (0.099%) R
Qualifications
1 323 (16.01%) Security Cleared
2 310 (15.36%) Degree
3 297 (14.72%) PMP
4 256 (12.69%) PMI Certification
5 222 (11.00%) SC Cleared
6 76 (3.77%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
7 72 (3.57%) DV Cleared
8 33 (1.64%) BPSS Clearance
9 25 (1.24%) Master's Degree
10 19 (0.94%) ACCA
10 19 (0.94%) CIMA
11 17 (0.84%) ITIL Certification
12 15 (0.74%) Azure Certification
12 15 (0.74%) 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 (0.50%) CISM
15 10 (0.50%) MBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 259 (12.83%) PMO
2 100 (4.96%) QA
3 53 (2.63%) Data Quality
4 34 (1.68%) GDPR
5 24 (1.19%) Accessibility
5 24 (1.19%) GRC
5 24 (1.19%) SLA
6 21 (1.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 18 (0.89%) NIST
8 8 (0.40%) P3O
9 7 (0.35%) FINREP
9 7 (0.35%) GMP
10 6 (0.30%) COREP
10 6 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials
10 6 (0.30%) EMIR
10 6 (0.30%) ISO 9001
10 6 (0.30%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 5 (0.25%) MiFID
11 5 (0.25%) SOC 2
11 5 (0.25%) WCAG
System Software
1 39 (1.93%) Active Directory
2 25 (1.24%) VMware Infrastructure
3 9 (0.45%) Virtual Machines
4 7 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
5 6 (0.30%) vSphere
6 4 (0.20%) VMware NSX
7 3 (0.15%) Hyper-V
7 3 (0.15%) NFS
7 3 (0.15%) Time Sharing Option
7 3 (0.15%) VMware ESXi
8 2 (0.099%) Docker
8 2 (0.099%) Firmware
9 1 (0.050%) ACF2
9 1 (0.050%) IAG
9 1 (0.050%) RACF
9 1 (0.050%) Sendmail
9 1 (0.050%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 22 (1.09%) Ansible
2 11 (0.55%) Microsoft Intune
3 10 (0.50%) Single Sign-On
4 6 (0.30%) 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 (0.099%) BMC PATROL
8 2 (0.099%) BMC Performance Manager
8 2 (0.099%) Perfmon
8 2 (0.099%) ZABBIX
9 1 (0.050%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.050%) Nagios
9 1 (0.050%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.050%) vCenter Server
9 1 (0.050%) vRealize
Vendors
1 366 (18.14%) Microsoft
2 158 (7.83%) SAP
3 107 (5.30%) ServiceNow
4 84 (4.16%) Oracle
5 54 (2.68%) Salesforce
6 48 (2.38%) Google
7 45 (2.23%) Adobe
8 40 (1.98%) VMware
9 29 (1.44%) Cisco
10 23 (1.14%) Sitecore
11 22 (1.09%) Workday
12 21 (1.04%) Atlassian
13 19 (0.94%) Ariba
14 18 (0.89%) Databricks
14 18 (0.89%) NEC
15 15 (0.74%) IBM
16 14 (0.69%) Planview
17 12 (0.59%) Alteryx
18 11 (0.55%) JD Edwards
19 10 (0.50%) Dell