Service Management Contract Job Trends

Service Management
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Service Management skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 3 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 98 79 88
Rank change year-on-year -19 +9 -4
Contract jobs citing Service Management 1,366 986 972
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.57% 2.98% 2.49%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.03% 3.29% 2.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 885 598 677
10th Percentile £263 £209 £250
25th Percentile £413 £350 £423
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £523 £492 £525
Median % change year-on-year +6.30% -6.29% +0.96%
75th Percentile £610 £575 £608
90th Percentile £708 £675 £688
UK excluding London median daily rate £513 £495 £525
% change year-on-year +3.64% -5.81% +7.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 85 73 18
10th Percentile £14.50 - £17.50
25th Percentile £19.33 £12.62 £19.44
Median hourly rate £60.00 £18.73 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year +220.34% -31.89% -43.30%
75th Percentile £85.00 £22.14 £48.75
90th Percentile £92.52 £52.70 £54.13
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £18.73 £27.50
% change year-on-year +206.99% -31.89% +29.05%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Service 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 45,145 29,940 33,399
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.95% 90.42% 85.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,873 18,766 21,491
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £420 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £734 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,760 1,664 1,872
10th Percentile £14.50 £14.20 £14.00
25th Percentile £19.50 £17.30 £18.14
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £40.33
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -37.63% -5.12%
75th Percentile £68.00 £50.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £82.25 £68.00 £74.95
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £23.63 £40.94
% change year-on-year +86.03% -42.28% +2.35%

Service Management
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Service Management relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Service Management job vacancy trend in the UK

Service Management
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Service Management.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Service Management

Service Management
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Service Management over the 6 months to 3 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Service Management.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Service Management

Service Management
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Service Management over the 6 months to 3 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Service Management in the UK

Service 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 Service Management within the UK over the 6 months to 3 August 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 1,184 £520 +4.00% 586
UK excluding London -22 812 £513 +3.64% 438
London +20 421 £525 +5.00% 213
Work from Home +4 400 £510 +2.00% 260
South East +21 274 £550 +10.00% 136
North of England -35 203 £450 +1.47% 100
South West -29 120 £525 -4.55% 50
North West -35 113 £480 +3.17% 55
Midlands -39 96 £477 -4.60% 67
West Midlands -40 89 £477 -7.38% 47
Yorkshire -26 85 £443 +26.84% 32
Scotland -7 64 £500 +1.42% 31
East of England -13 42 £525 -4.55% 40
Wales -9 12 £800 +247.83% 10
Northern Ireland +10 8 - - 15
East Midlands -23 7 £450 +50.00% 20
North East -39 5 £440 +125.64% 14

Service 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 90 (6.59%) SharePoint
2 61 (4.47%) Confluence
3 40 (2.93%) Microsoft Exchange
4 8 (0.59%) Skype for Business
5 6 (0.44%) Mattermost
6 5 (0.37%) OpenStack
7 3 (0.22%) CMS
7 3 (0.22%) IIS
8 2 (0.15%) Apache
9 1 (0.073%) CICS
9 1 (0.073%) Exchange Server 2010
9 1 (0.073%) HCL Notes
9 1 (0.073%) JBoss
9 1 (0.073%) LiveCycle
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
9 1 (0.073%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 67 (4.90%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (2.20%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 14 (1.02%) MS Visio
5 10 (0.73%) Microsoft Project
6 7 (0.51%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.073%) Camtasia
7 1 (0.073%) Maple
7 1 (0.073%) PTC Creo
Business Applications
1 59 (4.32%) Remedy ITSM
2 14 (1.02%) SAP S/4HANA
3 7 (0.51%) Primavera
4 5 (0.37%) ContrOCC
4 5 (0.37%) Teamcenter
5 4 (0.29%) NEC Housing
6 3 (0.22%) Oracle ERP
6 3 (0.22%) SAP CO
6 3 (0.22%) SAP FI
6 3 (0.22%) SAP FI/CO
6 3 (0.22%) SAP SM
7 2 (0.15%) Oracle Applications
7 2 (0.15%) SAP PS
8 1 (0.073%) Dynamics CRM
8 1 (0.073%) iTrent
8 1 (0.073%) Misys Equation
8 1 (0.073%) Misys Midas
8 1 (0.073%) Remedy AR System
8 1 (0.073%) SAP HR
8 1 (0.073%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 223 (16.33%) Azure
2 158 (11.57%) Microsoft 365
3 93 (6.81%) AWS
4 88 (6.44%) Entra ID
5 60 (4.39%) Power Platform
6 55 (4.03%) SaaS
7 44 (3.22%) OneDrive
8 34 (2.49%) Azure DevOps
9 28 (2.05%) GCP
10 20 (1.46%) GitHub
11 16 (1.17%) OCI
12 15 (1.10%) Microsoft Copilot
13 14 (1.02%) Azure Monitor
13 14 (1.02%) PaaS
14 11 (0.81%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 11 (0.81%) AWS Lambda
14 11 (0.81%) Serverless
15 9 (0.66%) Amazon S3
15 9 (0.66%) IaaS
16 8 (0.59%) Google Workspace
Communications & Networking
1 80 (5.86%) Firewall
2 64 (4.69%) DNS
3 41 (3.00%) TCP/IP
3 41 (3.00%) VPN
4 39 (2.86%) WAN
5 38 (2.78%) DHCP
5 38 (2.78%) Network Security
6 36 (2.64%) LAN
7 21 (1.54%) BGP
8 19 (1.39%) Wireless
9 16 (1.17%) OSPF
10 12 (0.88%) Cisco ISE
10 12 (0.88%) SD-WAN
10 12 (0.88%) VXLAN
11 11 (0.81%) BIG-IP
11 11 (0.81%) VLAN
11 11 (0.81%) Wi-Fi
12 10 (0.73%) Junos
13 9 (0.66%) Ethernet VPN
13 9 (0.66%) SSH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 47 (3.44%) Power BI
2 25 (1.83%) SQL Server
3 8 (0.59%) Oracle Database
3 8 (0.59%) PostgreSQL
4 6 (0.44%) Oracle Database 11g
4 6 (0.44%) Oracle Reports
4 6 (0.44%) Relational Database
4 6 (0.44%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 6 (0.44%) SQL Server Reporting Services
5 5 (0.37%) MySQL
5 5 (0.37%) SQL Server Analysis Services
6 3 (0.22%) Amazon RDS
6 3 (0.22%) Azure SQL Database
6 3 (0.22%) MariaDB
7 2 (0.15%) Amazon Redshift
7 2 (0.15%) Elasticsearch
7 2 (0.15%) Microsoft Analysis Services
7 2 (0.15%) SQLite
8 1 (0.073%) InfluxDB
8 1 (0.073%) OpenStack Swift
Development Applications
1 150 (10.98%) JIRA
2 24 (1.76%) Git
2 24 (1.76%) Jenkins
3 23 (1.68%) Bitbucket
4 15 (1.10%) Atlassian Bamboo
5 12 (0.88%) GitLab
6 5 (0.37%) Browser DevTools
7 4 (0.29%) MLflow
7 4 (0.29%) Rational DOORS
7 4 (0.29%) ScriptRunner
8 3 (0.22%) Fiddler
8 3 (0.22%) Hudson
8 3 (0.22%) IntelliJ
9 2 (0.15%) Firebug
9 2 (0.15%) Maven
9 2 (0.15%) Selenium
9 2 (0.15%) Sonatype Nexus
9 2 (0.15%) webpack
10 1 (0.073%) IBM UrbanCode
10 1 (0.073%) TestRail
General
1 504 (36.90%) Social Skills
2 215 (15.74%) Finance
3 211 (15.45%) Analytical Skills
4 153 (11.20%) Public Sector
5 63 (4.61%) Telecoms
6 48 (3.51%) Legal
7 47 (3.44%) Banking
8 46 (3.37%) Influencing Skills
9 42 (3.07%) Documentation Skills
10 40 (2.93%) Organisational Skills
11 29 (2.12%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 29 (2.12%) Military
12 23 (1.68%) Local Government
13 20 (1.46%) Presentation Skills
14 16 (1.17%) Aerospace
15 14 (1.02%) Police
16 12 (0.88%) Financial Institution
16 12 (0.88%) Retail
17 9 (0.66%) Manufacturing
18 8 (0.59%) Law
Job Titles
1 155 (11.35%) Analyst
2 128 (9.37%) Lead
3 125 (9.15%) Architect
4 124 (9.08%) Senior
5 111 (8.13%) Service Manager
6 95 (6.95%) Consultant
7 77 (5.64%) IT Manager
8 65 (4.76%) Project Manager
9 59 (4.32%) Service Analyst
10 58 (4.25%) Developer
11 48 (3.51%) Delivery Manager
12 47 (3.44%) Support Engineer
13 38 (2.78%) ServiceNow Developer
13 38 (2.78%) Solutions Architect
14 36 (2.64%) Network Engineer
15 35 (2.56%) Service Architect
16 34 (2.49%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 34 (2.49%) IT Analyst
17 33 (2.42%) IT Support
17 33 (2.42%) Transition Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 74 (5.42%) REST
2 35 (2.56%) SOAP
3 18 (1.32%) HTML
4 17 (1.24%) CSS
5 13 (0.95%) Web Services
6 12 (0.88%) Middleware
7 11 (0.81%) XML
8 9 (0.66%) 802.1X
8 9 (0.66%) JSON
8 9 (0.66%) OAuth
9 8 (0.59%) SAML
10 7 (0.51%) Elastic Stack
11 6 (0.44%) AngularJS
12 5 (0.37%) ARM Templates
12 5 (0.37%) Lightning Web Components
12 5 (0.37%) Microsoft Graph
12 5 (0.37%) OpenID
12 5 (0.37%) Oracle Fusion
13 4 (0.29%) Bootstrap
13 4 (0.29%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 138 (10.10%) Onboarding
2 108 (7.91%) CMDB
3 65 (4.76%) Product Ownership
4 53 (3.88%) Management Information System
5 45 (3.29%) Data Centre
6 36 (2.64%) Enterprise Software
7 34 (2.49%) PKI
8 29 (2.12%) Virtual Team
9 25 (1.83%) Clustering
9 25 (1.83%) Operational Technology
10 19 (1.39%) Data Protection Act
11 17 (1.24%) Hybrid Cloud
11 17 (1.24%) Self-Motivation
12 15 (1.10%) Analytical Mindset
12 15 (1.10%) Cloud Native
13 14 (1.02%) AI Agents
14 11 (0.81%) Greenfield Project
14 11 (0.81%) Video Conferencing
15 10 (0.73%) Driving Licence
15 10 (0.73%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 252 (18.45%) Windows
2 71 (5.20%) Linux
3 66 (4.83%) Windows Server
4 41 (3.00%) Windows 10
5 19 (1.39%) Mac OS
5 19 (1.39%) Unix
6 18 (1.32%) Apple iOS
7 14 (1.02%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 12 (0.88%) Windows 7
9 10 (0.73%) Android
10 6 (0.44%) Windows Server 2019
11 4 (0.29%) VMS
12 3 (0.22%) Ubuntu
12 3 (0.22%) Windows Server 2012
12 3 (0.22%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.15%) Solaris
13 2 (0.15%) Windows XP
13 2 (0.15%) zOS
14 1 (0.073%) Rocky
14 1 (0.073%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 728 (53.29%) ITIL
2 625 (45.75%) ITSM
3 367 (26.87%) Stakeholder Management
4 350 (25.62%) Continuous Improvement
5 308 (22.55%) Service Delivery
6 294 (21.52%) Agile
7 279 (20.42%) Problem-Solving
8 215 (15.74%) Change Management
9 194 (14.20%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 161 (11.79%) DevOps
11 148 (10.83%) Customer Service
12 137 (10.03%) Incident Management
13 131 (9.59%) Roadmaps
14 116 (8.49%) Project Delivery
15 109 (7.98%) Migration
16 108 (7.91%) Cybersecurity
17 106 (7.76%) Project Management
18 101 (7.39%) Problem Management
18 101 (7.39%) Service Design
19 99 (7.25%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 111 (8.13%) PowerShell
2 78 (5.71%) Python
3 68 (4.98%) SQL
4 55 (4.03%) JavaScript
5 40 (2.93%) Bash
6 19 (1.39%) Java
7 11 (0.81%) PL/SQL
8 8 (0.59%) VB
8 8 (0.59%) VBScript
9 7 (0.51%) Bicep
9 7 (0.51%) Groovy
10 6 (0.44%) Apex Code
10 6 (0.44%) C
10 6 (0.44%) Perl
11 5 (0.37%) C#
11 5 (0.37%) Kotlin
11 5 (0.37%) T-SQL
12 4 (0.29%) Shell Script
13 3 (0.22%) Lua
13 3 (0.22%) SOQL
Qualifications
1 496 (36.31%) Security Cleared
2 324 (23.72%) SC Cleared
3 153 (11.20%) DV Cleared
4 130 (9.52%) Degree
5 66 (4.83%) ITIL Certification
6 49 (3.59%) PMP
7 45 (3.29%) PMI Certification
8 39 (2.86%) BPSS Clearance
9 32 (2.34%) Cisco Certification
10 26 (1.90%) Computer Science Degree
11 25 (1.83%) Microsoft Certification
12 22 (1.61%) A+ Certification
13 20 (1.46%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
14 19 (1.39%) CISM
14 19 (1.39%) CISSP
15 16 (1.17%) CCNA
16 14 (1.02%) DBS Check
16 14 (1.02%) Master's Degree
17 11 (0.81%) CCNP
18 9 (0.66%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 106 (7.76%) SLA
2 44 (3.22%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 44 (3.22%) QA
3 33 (2.42%) Data Quality
4 31 (2.27%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 30 (2.20%) PMO
6 28 (2.05%) GRC
7 26 (1.90%) NCSC
8 25 (1.83%) GDPR
9 18 (1.32%) COBIT
10 16 (1.17%) ISO 9001
11 15 (1.10%) NIST
12 12 (0.88%) Cyber Essentials
13 8 (0.59%) Accessibility
13 8 (0.59%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 8 (0.59%) Disclosure Scotland
14 7 (0.51%) Government Security Classifications
14 7 (0.51%) PCI DSS
15 6 (0.44%) ISO 31000
15 6 (0.44%) ISO/IEC 27005
System Software
1 153 (11.20%) Active Directory
2 60 (4.39%) VMware Infrastructure
3 21 (1.54%) VMware ESXi
4 18 (1.32%) Hyper-V
5 16 (1.17%) Docker
6 15 (1.10%) VMware NSX
7 12 (0.88%) vSphere
8 11 (0.81%) Virtual Desktop
9 9 (0.66%) BitLocker
9 9 (0.66%) vCloud
10 6 (0.44%) IAG
11 5 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
12 4 (0.29%) NFS
12 4 (0.29%) Oracle RAC
13 3 (0.22%) Firmware
14 2 (0.15%) GPFS
14 2 (0.15%) KVM
14 2 (0.15%) Virtual Servers
15 1 (0.073%) iptables
15 1 (0.073%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 72 (5.27%) Microsoft Intune
2 56 (4.10%) SCCM
3 40 (2.93%) Terraform
4 39 (2.86%) Ansible
5 18 (1.32%) Kubernetes
6 16 (1.17%) SCOM
7 14 (1.02%) Single Sign-On
8 13 (0.95%) vCenter Server
9 11 (0.81%) Jamf Pro
10 8 (0.59%) FortiGate
11 7 (0.51%) Data Guard
11 7 (0.51%) Oracle RMAN
11 7 (0.51%) Puppet
12 6 (0.44%) Grafana
12 6 (0.44%) WSUS
13 5 (0.37%) NetBackup
13 5 (0.37%) Progress Chef
14 4 (0.29%) PowerCLI
14 4 (0.29%) Prometheus
14 4 (0.29%) vMotion
Vendors
1 398 (29.14%) ServiceNow
2 274 (20.06%) Microsoft
3 85 (6.22%) VMware
4 63 (4.61%) Remedy
5 56 (4.10%) Cisco
6 39 (2.86%) BMC
7 38 (2.78%) Oracle
8 36 (2.64%) Atlassian
9 33 (2.42%) SAP
10 29 (2.12%) Splunk
11 22 (1.61%) IFS
12 21 (1.54%) SolarWinds
13 20 (1.46%) Salesforce
14 19 (1.39%) Citrix
14 19 (1.39%) Zscaler
15 18 (1.32%) Dynatrace
16 17 (1.24%) Juniper
17 15 (1.10%) IBM
18 13 (0.95%) HP
19 12 (0.88%) Apple