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 30 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 49 26 21
Rank change year-on-year -23 -5 +4
Contract jobs citing Project Management 2,047 2,249 3,227
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.99% 7.35% 7.48%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.69% 8.09% 8.77%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,258 1,372 1,955
10th Percentile £308 £308 £306
25th Percentile £406 £406 £411
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £511 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year +2.10% -2.44% -2.38%
75th Percentile £625 £603 £608
90th Percentile £725 £725 £714
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £465 £500
% change year-on-year +7.47% -7.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 125 127 279
10th Percentile £16.40 £21.50 £18.60
25th Percentile £21.00 £29.00 £26.71
Median hourly rate £36.00 £44.50 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year -19.10% +16.74% -15.29%
75th Percentile £57.50 £60.00 £43.75
90th Percentile £71.45 £75.00 £61.40
UK excluding London median hourly rate £35.53 £46.30 £38.12
% change year-on-year -23.26% +21.46% -8.80%

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 43,613 27,816 36,814
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.98% 90.91% 85.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,139 17,565 23,448
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £414 £405 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £504 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.18% -4.00% -4.55%
75th Percentile £623 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,612 1,364 2,554
10th Percentile £14.82 £14.20 £12.74
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.49 £16.06
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -32.93% +4.17%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.95 £61.30
90th Percentile £81.25 £70.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £44.50 £25.00 £38.12
% change year-on-year +78.00% -34.42% +8.91%

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 30 June 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 30 June 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 30 June 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 -23 1,822 £525 +2.44% 955
UK excluding London -27 1,044 £500 +7.47% 840
London -27 850 £550 +1.85% 300
Work from Home -22 620 £500 +4.82% 351
North of England -28 285 £475 - 185
South East -23 265 £500 +3.63% 273
North West -9 175 £470 +4.50% 109
Midlands -35 171 £500 +11.11% 123
South West -18 131 £450 - 78
West Midlands -43 118 £550 +22.22% 81
Yorkshire -36 105 £500 - 58
East of England -8 94 £510 -1.73% 107
Scotland -34 76 £465 +3.33% 31
East Midlands -13 53 £409 -0.15% 41
Northern Ireland -5 18 £449 -14.57% 38
Wales -16 15 £300 -35.48% 26
North East -37 8 £388 -23.65% 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
1 122 (5.96%) Confluence
2 109 (5.32%) SharePoint
3 23 (1.12%) CMS
4 21 (1.03%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (0.44%) Oracle Workflow
6 7 (0.34%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 7 (0.34%) WebLogic
6 7 (0.34%) WebSphere
7 6 (0.29%) Apache
7 6 (0.29%) WordPress
8 4 (0.20%) Moodle
8 4 (0.20%) Oracle Self-Service HR
9 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
9 3 (0.15%) SAS
10 2 (0.098%) Anypoint
10 2 (0.098%) MS Project Server
11 1 (0.049%) nginx
11 1 (0.049%) Oracle Coherence
11 1 (0.049%) Sitecore CMS
11 1 (0.049%) Umbraco
Applications
1 184 (8.99%) Microsoft Excel
2 169 (8.26%) Microsoft Project
3 140 (6.84%) Microsoft Office
4 118 (5.76%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 45 (2.20%) MS Visio
6 20 (0.98%) Spreadsheet
7 9 (0.44%) Trello
8 7 (0.34%) Chatbot
9 5 (0.24%) Photoshop
10 4 (0.20%) Simulink
10 4 (0.20%) Stateflow
11 3 (0.15%) Adobe Creative Suite
11 3 (0.15%) Windchill
12 2 (0.098%) Adobe Illustrator
12 2 (0.098%) InDesign
13 1 (0.049%) Adobe After Effects
13 1 (0.049%) AutoCAD
13 1 (0.049%) CATIA
13 1 (0.049%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 85 (4.15%) SAP S/4HANA
2 20 (0.98%) Primavera
3 12 (0.59%) Oracle Payables
4 9 (0.44%) Oracle Assets
4 9 (0.44%) Oracle ERP
4 9 (0.44%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 9 (0.44%) Shopify
5 8 (0.39%) Dynamics CRM
5 8 (0.39%) Loan IQ
5 8 (0.39%) NetSuite
5 8 (0.39%) Oracle Receivables
6 7 (0.34%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 7 (0.34%) Teamcenter
7 6 (0.29%) Magento
7 6 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
7 6 (0.29%) ProductWriter
7 6 (0.29%) SAP CO
7 6 (0.29%) SAP FI
7 6 (0.29%) SAP FI/CO
7 6 (0.29%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 152 (7.43%) Azure
2 108 (5.28%) Power Platform
3 82 (4.01%) SaaS
4 78 (3.81%) AWS
5 73 (3.57%) Microsoft 365
6 48 (2.34%) Azure DevOps
7 26 (1.27%) Smartsheet
8 25 (1.22%) Dynamics 365
9 23 (1.12%) Google Workspace
10 22 (1.07%) GCP
11 19 (0.93%) Entra ID
12 18 (0.88%) Asana
13 12 (0.59%) Microsoft Copilot
14 11 (0.54%) Google Sheets
15 10 (0.49%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 10 (0.49%) GitHub
15 10 (0.49%) OCI
16 9 (0.44%) BigCommerce
16 9 (0.44%) PaaS
16 9 (0.44%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 29 (1.42%) Network Security
2 25 (1.22%) WAN
3 21 (1.03%) TCP/IP
4 19 (0.93%) DNS
4 19 (0.93%) Firewall
4 19 (0.93%) LAN
5 16 (0.78%) Structured Cabling
6 15 (0.73%) MPLS
6 15 (0.73%) SD-WAN
7 13 (0.64%) BGP
7 13 (0.64%) Wi-Fi
8 11 (0.54%) Internet
8 11 (0.54%) VPN
9 10 (0.49%) BIG-IP
9 10 (0.49%) DHCP
10 9 (0.44%) Intranet
11 8 (0.39%) SAN
12 7 (0.34%) DKIM
12 7 (0.34%) DMARC
13 6 (0.29%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 102 (4.98%) Power BI
2 17 (0.83%) Tableau
3 14 (0.68%) SQL Server
4 13 (0.64%) Data Warehouse
4 13 (0.64%) Metadata
5 12 (0.59%) Data Lake
6 10 (0.49%) Oracle Reports
7 9 (0.44%) Relational Database
8 8 (0.39%) Electronic Patient Records
8 8 (0.39%) Power Query
9 6 (0.29%) SAP HANA
10 5 (0.24%) Amazon RDS
11 4 (0.20%) Oracle BI Publisher
12 3 (0.15%) BigQuery
12 3 (0.15%) EDMS
12 3 (0.15%) NoSQL
12 3 (0.15%) Oracle Database
12 3 (0.15%) QlikView
12 3 (0.15%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 2 (0.098%) GIS
Development Applications
1 251 (12.26%) JIRA
2 20 (0.98%) Git
3 17 (0.83%) Jenkins
4 8 (0.39%) GitLab
5 7 (0.34%) Bitbucket
6 6 (0.29%) Subversion
7 2 (0.098%) Hudson
7 2 (0.098%) Rational Rhapsody
7 2 (0.098%) SonarQube
7 2 (0.098%) Visual Studio
7 2 (0.098%) Zephyr
8 1 (0.049%) git-flow
8 1 (0.049%) IBM UrbanCode
8 1 (0.049%) LoadRunner
8 1 (0.049%) LSMW
8 1 (0.049%) minitest
8 1 (0.049%) MSI
8 1 (0.049%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.049%) Terragrunt
8 1 (0.049%) TestDirector
General
1 903 (44.11%) Social Skills
2 785 (38.35%) Finance
3 324 (15.83%) Analytical Skills
4 214 (10.45%) Organisational Skills
5 166 (8.11%) Public Sector
6 144 (7.03%) Banking
7 118 (5.76%) Marketing
8 115 (5.62%) Retail
9 83 (4.05%) Manufacturing
10 76 (3.71%) Legal
11 70 (3.42%) Influencing Skills
12 55 (2.69%) Presentation Skills
13 51 (2.49%) Telecoms
14 41 (2.00%) Investment Banking
15 35 (1.71%) Financial Institution
16 33 (1.61%) Documentation Skills
17 30 (1.47%) Front Office
18 28 (1.37%) Pharmaceutical
19 26 (1.27%) Aerospace
20 23 (1.12%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 818 (39.96%) Project Manager
2 227 (11.09%) Analyst
3 205 (10.01%) Senior
4 157 (7.67%) Lead
5 144 (7.03%) Senior Manager
6 124 (6.06%) Senior Project Manager
7 114 (5.57%) Business Analyst
8 104 (5.08%) IT Manager
9 90 (4.40%) IT Project Manager
10 75 (3.66%) Programme Manager
11 72 (3.52%) Consultant
12 65 (3.18%) Technical Manager
13 54 (2.64%) Infrastructure Manager
14 53 (2.59%) Delivery Manager
14 53 (2.59%) Technical Project Manager
15 50 (2.44%) Architect
16 48 (2.34%) Project Officer
17 43 (2.10%) Infrastructure Project Manager
18 40 (1.95%) SC Cleared Project Manager
19 38 (1.86%) Support Officer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 28 (1.37%) Middleware
2 20 (0.98%) Oracle Fusion
2 20 (0.98%) REST
3 14 (0.68%) OAuth
4 13 (0.64%) VML
4 13 (0.64%) Web Services
5 12 (0.59%) HTML
5 12 (0.59%) SOAP
6 11 (0.54%) JSON
7 9 (0.44%) .NET
7 9 (0.44%) ADO
7 9 (0.44%) CSS
8 8 (0.39%) RESTful
8 8 (0.39%) SailPoint
9 7 (0.34%) SAML
10 6 (0.29%) OpenID
10 6 (0.29%) React
10 6 (0.29%) XML
11 5 (0.24%) AngularJS
11 5 (0.24%) FHIR
Miscellaneous
1 110 (5.37%) Management Information System
2 94 (4.59%) Onboarding
3 68 (3.32%) Data Centre
4 65 (3.18%) Data Protection Act
5 64 (3.13%) Product Ownership
6 51 (2.49%) PMI
7 37 (1.81%) Self-Motivation
8 34 (1.66%) Virtual Team
9 29 (1.42%) Legacy Systems
10 26 (1.27%) Operational Technology
11 24 (1.17%) Analytical Mindset
11 24 (1.17%) FMCG
12 21 (1.03%) Enterprise Software
13 20 (0.98%) Life Science
13 20 (0.98%) Social Media
14 18 (0.88%) Data Structures
14 18 (0.88%) NHS
15 17 (0.83%) EPoS
16 14 (0.68%) CMDB
17 13 (0.64%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 51 (2.49%) Windows
2 31 (1.51%) Linux
3 20 (0.98%) Unix
4 15 (0.73%) Windows Server
5 6 (0.29%) Windows 10
6 5 (0.24%) zOS
7 3 (0.15%) Apple iOS
7 3 (0.15%) Solaris
8 2 (0.098%) Mac OS X
8 2 (0.098%) Ubuntu
8 2 (0.098%) Windows 7
8 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2012
8 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.049%) AIX
9 1 (0.049%) Android
9 1 (0.049%) FreeRTOS
9 1 (0.049%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.049%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2003
9 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 729 (35.61%) Stakeholder Management
2 724 (35.37%) Agile
3 533 (26.04%) Project Delivery
4 393 (19.20%) Problem-Solving
5 377 (18.42%) PRINCE2
6 321 (15.68%) Migration
7 317 (15.49%) Continuous Improvement
8 312 (15.24%) Change Management
9 298 (14.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 250 (12.21%) Decision-Making
11 237 (11.58%) Risk Management
12 232 (11.33%) Waterfall
13 177 (8.65%) Scrum
14 174 (8.50%) ERP
15 172 (8.40%) AI
16 148 (7.23%) Budget Management
17 133 (6.50%) Data Migration
17 133 (6.50%) Validation
18 132 (6.45%) Roadmaps
19 125 (6.11%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 88 (4.30%) SQL
2 56 (2.74%) Python
3 18 (0.88%) JavaScript
4 14 (0.68%) VBA
5 12 (0.59%) Java
6 11 (0.54%) C#
7 10 (0.49%) C++
8 8 (0.39%) C
9 7 (0.34%) TypeScript
10 6 (0.29%) PowerShell
11 5 (0.24%) ABAP
11 5 (0.24%) MATLAB
12 4 (0.20%) Ada
12 4 (0.20%) JCL
12 4 (0.20%) R
12 4 (0.20%) Shell Script
13 3 (0.15%) Apex Code
13 3 (0.15%) PL/SQL
13 3 (0.15%) REXX
13 3 (0.15%) SOQL
Qualifications
1 312 (15.24%) Security Cleared
2 297 (14.51%) Degree
3 277 (13.53%) PMP
4 238 (11.63%) PMI Certification
5 228 (11.14%) SC Cleared
6 71 (3.47%) DV Cleared
7 50 (2.44%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 34 (1.66%) ACCA
8 34 (1.66%) CIMA
9 31 (1.51%) Master's Degree
10 25 (1.22%) BPSS Clearance
11 20 (0.98%) Computer Science Degree
12 19 (0.93%) APMP
13 18 (0.88%) CISSP
14 15 (0.73%) CISM
15 12 (0.59%) ITIL Certification
15 12 (0.59%) MBA
15 12 (0.59%) PRINCE2 Certification
16 11 (0.54%) Azure Certification
16 11 (0.54%) CBAP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 250 (12.21%) PMO
2 116 (5.67%) QA
3 66 (3.22%) Data Quality
4 44 (2.15%) GDPR
5 40 (1.95%) SLA
6 33 (1.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 28 (1.37%) NIST
8 20 (0.98%) Accessibility
9 15 (0.73%) GRC
10 9 (0.44%) EMIR
11 8 (0.39%) GMP
11 8 (0.39%) MiFID
12 7 (0.34%) PCI DSS
13 6 (0.29%) SOC 2
14 5 (0.24%) Cyber Essentials
14 5 (0.24%) FINREP
14 5 (0.24%) GxP
14 5 (0.24%) HL7
14 5 (0.24%) ISO 9001
14 5 (0.24%) P3O
System Software
1 32 (1.56%) Active Directory
2 13 (0.64%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (0.24%) RACF
5 4 (0.20%) NFS
5 4 (0.20%) Time Sharing Option
5 4 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
6 3 (0.15%) VMware NSX
7 2 (0.098%) Docker
7 2 (0.098%) Firmware
7 2 (0.098%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.049%) ACF2
8 1 (0.049%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.049%) Microsoft App-V
8 1 (0.049%) Sendmail
8 1 (0.049%) Virtual Servers
8 1 (0.049%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 18 (0.88%) Ansible
2 17 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
3 11 (0.54%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (0.29%) Tivoli Storage Manager
5 4 (0.20%) Kubernetes
5 4 (0.20%) RSA Archer
6 3 (0.15%) ITRS Geneos
6 3 (0.15%) Terraform
7 2 (0.098%) FortiGate
7 2 (0.098%) SCCM
7 2 (0.098%) vCenter Server
7 2 (0.098%) ZABBIX
8 1 (0.049%) HP Quality Center
8 1 (0.049%) logstash
8 1 (0.049%) Nagios
8 1 (0.049%) OMEGAMON
8 1 (0.049%) SCOM
8 1 (0.049%) Tivoli
8 1 (0.049%) vRealize
Vendors
1 309 (15.10%) Microsoft
2 190 (9.28%) SAP
3 107 (5.23%) ServiceNow
4 83 (4.05%) Oracle
5 57 (2.78%) Salesforce
6 45 (2.20%) Google
7 33 (1.61%) Adobe
8 31 (1.51%) Cisco
9 22 (1.07%) VMware
10 20 (0.98%) Sitecore
10 20 (0.98%) Workday
11 18 (0.88%) Databricks
12 13 (0.64%) Ariba
12 13 (0.64%) IBM
12 13 (0.64%) NEC
12 13 (0.64%) Sage
13 12 (0.59%) Atlassian
13 12 (0.59%) CyberArk
13 12 (0.59%) F5
14 11 (0.54%) IFS