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 25 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 46 24 21
Rank change year-on-year -22 -3 +2
Contract jobs citing Project Management 2,065 2,225 3,305
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 4.27% 7.73% 7.76%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.05% 8.49% 9.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,287 1,363 2,013
10th Percentile £322 £300 £312
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.00% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £618 £600 £614
90th Percentile £725 £719 £713
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £470 £500
% change year-on-year +6.38% -6.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 105 102 279
10th Percentile £14.64 £21.58 £18.35
25th Percentile £21.00 £31.76 £26.54
Median hourly rate £35.53 £46.30 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year -23.26% +21.46% -22.20%
75th Percentile £57.50 £63.75 £48.88
90th Percentile £73.60 £75.00 £61.30
UK excluding London median hourly rate £35.53 £55.00 £38.12
% change year-on-year -35.40% +44.28% -22.20%

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 40,852 26,213 36,586
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.38% 91.03% 85.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,586 16,831 23,574
10th Percentile £325 £303 £300
25th Percentile £413 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £498 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +4.74% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,418 1,066 2,483
10th Percentile £14.68 £14.20 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.85 £18.13 £16.00
Median hourly rate £42.13 £27.59 £36.05
Median % change year-on-year +52.71% -23.47% -0.22%
75th Percentile £67.50 £58.73 £60.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.69 £25.15 £38.00
% change year-on-year +73.72% -33.82% +8.57%

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 25 May 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 25 May 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 25 May 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 -20 1,848 £520 +1.56% 1,166
UK excluding London -23 1,042 £500 +6.38% 865
London -19 864 £550 +1.85% 453
Work from Home -19 612 £500 +1.01% 479
North of England -20 287 £474 -0.21% 216
South East -15 266 £517 +8.94% 238
Midlands -29 189 £492 +4.90% 139
North West -17 159 £464 -2.37% 125
South West -14 144 £438 -12.50% 90
West Midlands -38 129 £502 +0.30% 91
Yorkshire -33 120 £488 +3.94% 74
East of England -17 78 £518 +1.57% 109
Scotland -29 69 £465 +3.33% 48
East Midlands -12 62 £390 -3.82% 48
Wales -3 16 £256 -48.10% 20
Northern Ireland -5 15 £475 -9.52% 25
North East -23 13 £410 -20.00% 20

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
1 141 (6.83%) Confluence
2 94 (4.55%) SharePoint
3 19 (0.92%) CMS
4 17 (0.82%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (0.44%) Oracle Workflow
6 8 (0.39%) Apache
7 5 (0.24%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 5 (0.24%) WordPress
8 4 (0.19%) Oracle Self-Service HR
9 3 (0.15%) Anypoint
9 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
9 3 (0.15%) Moodle
9 3 (0.15%) MS Project Server
10 2 (0.097%) IIS
10 2 (0.097%) SAS
11 1 (0.048%) IBM HTTP Server
11 1 (0.048%) JBoss
11 1 (0.048%) Tomcat
11 1 (0.048%) Umbraco
11 1 (0.048%) WebSphere
Applications
1 190 (9.20%) Microsoft Project
2 169 (8.18%) Microsoft Excel
3 137 (6.63%) Microsoft Office
4 108 (5.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 45 (2.18%) MS Visio
6 15 (0.73%) Spreadsheet
7 13 (0.63%) Trello
8 8 (0.39%) Chatbot
9 5 (0.24%) Photoshop
10 3 (0.15%) Simulink
10 3 (0.15%) Stateflow
11 2 (0.097%) Adobe After Effects
11 2 (0.097%) Adobe Creative Suite
11 2 (0.097%) Adobe Illustrator
11 2 (0.097%) AutoCAD
11 2 (0.097%) InDesign
12 1 (0.048%) Adobe XD
12 1 (0.048%) InVision
12 1 (0.048%) Oracle Smart View
12 1 (0.048%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 86 (4.16%) SAP S/4HANA
2 14 (0.68%) Primavera
3 11 (0.53%) Oracle Payables
4 10 (0.48%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 10 (0.48%) Shopify
5 9 (0.44%) Dynamics CRM
5 9 (0.44%) Oracle Assets
5 9 (0.44%) Oracle EBS
6 8 (0.39%) Loan IQ
6 8 (0.39%) Oracle ERP
6 8 (0.39%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 7 (0.34%) NEC Housing
8 6 (0.29%) Oracle General Ledger
8 6 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
8 6 (0.29%) ProductWriter
8 6 (0.29%) SAP CO
8 6 (0.29%) SAP FI
8 6 (0.29%) SAP MM
8 6 (0.29%) Teamcenter
9 5 (0.24%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 153 (7.41%) Azure
2 98 (4.75%) Power Platform
3 81 (3.92%) SaaS
4 80 (3.87%) Microsoft 365
5 77 (3.73%) AWS
6 48 (2.32%) Azure DevOps
7 27 (1.31%) Smartsheet
8 25 (1.21%) Dynamics 365
8 25 (1.21%) GCP
8 25 (1.21%) Google Workspace
9 22 (1.07%) Asana
10 16 (0.77%) Entra ID
11 14 (0.68%) Microsoft Copilot
11 14 (0.68%) OpenShift
12 11 (0.53%) Azure Data Factory
12 11 (0.53%) Azure Synapse Analytics
13 10 (0.48%) BigCommerce
13 10 (0.48%) GitHub
13 10 (0.48%) Google Sheets
13 10 (0.48%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 29 (1.40%) WAN
2 23 (1.11%) Firewall
3 22 (1.07%) Network Security
4 20 (0.97%) LAN
4 20 (0.97%) TCP/IP
5 19 (0.92%) DNS
6 17 (0.82%) SD-WAN
7 16 (0.77%) Wi-Fi
8 15 (0.73%) MPLS
8 15 (0.73%) Structured Cabling
9 12 (0.58%) BGP
9 12 (0.58%) Internet
10 11 (0.53%) VPN
11 8 (0.39%) DHCP
11 8 (0.39%) SAN
12 7 (0.34%) BIG-IP
12 7 (0.34%) DKIM
12 7 (0.34%) DMARC
13 6 (0.29%) Intranet
13 6 (0.29%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 92 (4.46%) Power BI
2 19 (0.92%) Metadata
3 18 (0.87%) Data Warehouse
3 18 (0.87%) Tableau
4 13 (0.63%) Data Lake
4 13 (0.63%) SQL Server
5 10 (0.48%) Electronic Patient Records
6 9 (0.44%) Oracle Reports
6 9 (0.44%) Relational Database
7 6 (0.29%) Power Query
7 6 (0.29%) SAP HANA
8 4 (0.19%) Oracle BI Publisher
8 4 (0.19%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 3 (0.15%) Amazon RDS
9 3 (0.15%) Amazon Redshift
9 3 (0.15%) BigQuery
9 3 (0.15%) NoSQL
10 2 (0.097%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
10 2 (0.097%) MongoDB
10 2 (0.097%) Qlik Sense
Development Applications
1 287 (13.90%) JIRA
2 23 (1.11%) Git
3 14 (0.68%) Jenkins
4 11 (0.53%) GitLab
5 5 (0.24%) Subversion
6 4 (0.19%) Bitbucket
7 3 (0.15%) Selenium
7 3 (0.15%) SonarQube
8 2 (0.097%) Hudson
8 2 (0.097%) Rational Rhapsody
8 2 (0.097%) Visual Studio
8 2 (0.097%) Zephyr
9 1 (0.048%) Atlassian Bamboo
9 1 (0.048%) Axure RP
9 1 (0.048%) Capybara
9 1 (0.048%) Gradle
9 1 (0.048%) LSMW
9 1 (0.048%) MSI
9 1 (0.048%) Rational DOORS
9 1 (0.048%) RSpec
General
1 903 (43.73%) Social Skills
2 781 (37.82%) Finance
3 343 (16.61%) Analytical Skills
4 213 (10.31%) Organisational Skills
5 176 (8.52%) Public Sector
6 152 (7.36%) Banking
7 115 (5.57%) Retail
8 111 (5.38%) Marketing
9 85 (4.12%) Legal
10 73 (3.54%) Manufacturing
11 72 (3.49%) Influencing Skills
12 55 (2.66%) Telecoms
13 45 (2.18%) Presentation Skills
14 38 (1.84%) Investment Banking
15 33 (1.60%) Financial Institution
16 29 (1.40%) Documentation Skills
17 27 (1.31%) Pharmaceutical
18 26 (1.26%) Front Office
19 24 (1.16%) Local Government
20 23 (1.11%) Military
Job Titles
1 815 (39.47%) Project Manager
2 243 (11.77%) Analyst
3 210 (10.17%) Senior
4 157 (7.60%) Lead
5 145 (7.02%) Senior Manager
6 125 (6.05%) Senior Project Manager
7 120 (5.81%) Business Analyst
8 97 (4.70%) IT Manager
9 87 (4.21%) IT Project Manager
10 72 (3.49%) Consultant
10 72 (3.49%) Programme Manager
11 63 (3.05%) Technical Manager
12 60 (2.91%) Delivery Manager
13 56 (2.71%) Architect
14 55 (2.66%) Infrastructure Manager
15 50 (2.42%) Technical Project Manager
16 44 (2.13%) SC Cleared Project Manager
17 43 (2.08%) Developer
18 42 (2.03%) Infrastructure Project Manager
19 41 (1.99%) Project Officer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (1.16%) Middleware
2 23 (1.11%) REST
3 17 (0.82%) Oracle Fusion
4 15 (0.73%) OAuth
5 14 (0.68%) SOAP
5 14 (0.68%) Web Services
6 13 (0.63%) VML
7 12 (0.58%) HTML
8 11 (0.53%) CSS
9 10 (0.48%) ADO
10 8 (0.39%) .NET
10 8 (0.39%) JSON
10 8 (0.39%) RESTful
10 8 (0.39%) SailPoint
10 8 (0.39%) SAML
11 7 (0.34%) OpenID
11 7 (0.34%) XML
12 6 (0.29%) OAuth2
13 5 (0.24%) AngularJS
13 5 (0.24%) FHIR
Miscellaneous
1 105 (5.08%) Management Information System
2 92 (4.46%) Onboarding
3 71 (3.44%) Data Centre
4 66 (3.20%) Data Protection Act
5 64 (3.10%) Product Ownership
6 62 (3.00%) PMI
7 39 (1.89%) Virtual Team
8 38 (1.84%) Self-Motivation
9 37 (1.79%) Legacy Systems
10 22 (1.07%) Analytical Mindset
11 21 (1.02%) Social Media
12 20 (0.97%) Data Structures
12 20 (0.97%) Life Science
12 20 (0.97%) Operational Technology
13 19 (0.92%) CMDB
14 18 (0.87%) Enterprise Software
14 18 (0.87%) NHS
15 16 (0.77%) EPoS
16 15 (0.73%) FMCG
17 12 (0.58%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 49 (2.37%) Windows
2 30 (1.45%) Linux
3 13 (0.63%) Unix
4 12 (0.58%) Windows Server
5 9 (0.44%) Windows 10
6 5 (0.24%) zOS
7 4 (0.19%) Windows Server 2019
8 3 (0.15%) Apple iOS
8 3 (0.15%) Solaris
9 2 (0.097%) Mac OS X
9 2 (0.097%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.097%) Windows 7
9 2 (0.097%) Windows Server 2012
9 2 (0.097%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.048%) AIX
10 1 (0.048%) Android
10 1 (0.048%) FreeRTOS
10 1 (0.048%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.048%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 1 (0.048%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 748 (36.22%) Agile
2 717 (34.72%) Stakeholder Management
3 535 (25.91%) Project Delivery
4 444 (21.50%) Problem-Solving
5 381 (18.45%) PRINCE2
6 319 (15.45%) Migration
7 312 (15.11%) Continuous Improvement
8 304 (14.72%) Change Management
9 302 (14.62%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 256 (12.40%) Decision-Making
11 253 (12.25%) Waterfall
12 241 (11.67%) Risk Management
13 190 (9.20%) Scrum
14 184 (8.91%) ERP
15 171 (8.28%) Budget Management
16 155 (7.51%) AI
17 141 (6.83%) Roadmaps
18 139 (6.73%) Validation
19 136 (6.59%) DevOps
20 133 (6.44%) Data Migration
Programming Languages
1 87 (4.21%) SQL
2 47 (2.28%) Python
3 17 (0.82%) Java
3 17 (0.82%) JavaScript
4 12 (0.58%) VBA
5 11 (0.53%) C#
6 9 (0.44%) C++
7 8 (0.39%) C
8 7 (0.34%) PowerShell
9 6 (0.29%) ABAP
10 5 (0.24%) R
10 5 (0.24%) TypeScript
11 4 (0.19%) Ada
11 4 (0.19%) PL/SQL
12 3 (0.15%) JCL
12 3 (0.15%) MATLAB
12 3 (0.15%) Perl
12 3 (0.15%) Shell Script
12 3 (0.15%) SOQL
12 3 (0.15%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 333 (16.13%) Security Cleared
2 312 (15.11%) Degree
3 279 (13.51%) PMP
4 245 (11.86%) SC Cleared
5 242 (11.72%) PMI Certification
6 65 (3.15%) DV Cleared
7 44 (2.13%) Master's Degree
8 42 (2.03%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 33 (1.60%) ACCA
9 33 (1.60%) CIMA
10 32 (1.55%) BPSS Clearance
11 30 (1.45%) APMP
12 22 (1.07%) CISSP
12 22 (1.07%) Computer Science Degree
13 20 (0.97%) MBA
14 19 (0.92%) CISM
15 17 (0.82%) CBAP
16 14 (0.68%) PRINCE2 Certification
17 12 (0.58%) IIBA
18 10 (0.48%) APMG
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 256 (12.40%) PMO
2 128 (6.20%) QA
3 74 (3.58%) Data Quality
4 51 (2.47%) GDPR
5 42 (2.03%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 35 (1.69%) SLA
7 31 (1.50%) NIST
8 20 (0.97%) Accessibility
9 13 (0.63%) GRC
10 10 (0.48%) Basel III
11 9 (0.44%) EMIR
12 8 (0.39%) ISO 9001
13 7 (0.34%) GMP
13 7 (0.34%) MiFID
13 7 (0.34%) PCI DSS
13 7 (0.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 6 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials
14 6 (0.29%) SOC 2
15 5 (0.24%) Disclosure Scotland
15 5 (0.24%) HL7
System Software
1 29 (1.40%) Active Directory
2 9 (0.44%) VMware Infrastructure
3 5 (0.24%) RACF
4 4 (0.19%) Docker
5 3 (0.15%) NFS
5 3 (0.15%) Time Sharing Option
5 3 (0.15%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (0.097%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.097%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.048%) Firmware
7 1 (0.048%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.048%) Microsoft App-V
7 1 (0.048%) Sendmail
7 1 (0.048%) Virtual Servers
7 1 (0.048%) VMware NSX
7 1 (0.048%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 19 (0.92%) Single Sign-On
2 15 (0.73%) Ansible
3 9 (0.44%) Kubernetes
3 9 (0.44%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (0.29%) Tivoli Storage Manager
5 4 (0.19%) RSA Archer
5 4 (0.19%) SCCM
6 3 (0.15%) FortiGate
6 3 (0.15%) Terraform
6 3 (0.15%) vCenter Server
7 2 (0.097%) Grafana
7 2 (0.097%) logstash
7 2 (0.097%) SCOM
8 1 (0.048%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 1 (0.048%) Docker Swarm
8 1 (0.048%) Prometheus
8 1 (0.048%) Puppet
8 1 (0.048%) Tivoli
8 1 (0.048%) vRealize
8 1 (0.048%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 300 (14.53%) Microsoft
2 188 (9.10%) SAP
3 112 (5.42%) ServiceNow
4 68 (3.29%) Oracle
5 50 (2.42%) Salesforce
6 43 (2.08%) Google
7 31 (1.50%) Cisco
8 28 (1.36%) Adobe
9 24 (1.16%) Workday
10 21 (1.02%) Databricks
11 20 (0.97%) Sitecore
12 18 (0.87%) VMware
13 16 (0.77%) Ariba
13 16 (0.77%) CyberArk
14 15 (0.73%) Atlassian
14 15 (0.73%) NEC
15 14 (0.68%) Sage
16 12 (0.58%) IBM
17 10 (0.48%) IFS
18 9 (0.44%) F5