Service Management Contracts

Service Management
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring Service Management skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Service Management over the 6 months leading up to 5 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 81 85 85
Rank change year-on-year +4 0 +23
Contract jobs citing Service Management 931 1,072 1,566
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 2.93% 2.47% 2.77%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.23% 2.90% 3.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 567 737 1,127
10th Percentile £213 £263 £250
25th Percentile £350 £425 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £497 £525 £520
Median % change year-on-year -5.33% +0.96% -0.95%
75th Percentile £588 £608 £638
90th Percentile £688 £688 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £496 £525 £475
% change year-on-year -5.52% +10.53% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 58 20 26
10th Percentile - £13.97 £17.00
25th Percentile £12.62 £17.49 £20.11
Median hourly rate £21.06 £23.37 £28.88
Median % change year-on-year -9.91% -19.06% +37.50%
75th Percentile £22.46 £47.81 £62.69
90th Percentile £37.88 £50.38 £132.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.06 £23.37 £21.31
% change year-on-year -9.91% +9.67% +3.95%

All Process and 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 28,850 36,964 50,614
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 90.71% 85.28% 89.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 18,170 23,592 34,850
10th Percentile £300 £300 £325
25th Percentile £405 £413 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% -4.55% +0.92%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £738 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,420 2,515 1,729
10th Percentile £14.20 £12.75 £12.00
25th Percentile £17.42 £16.18 £16.61
Median hourly rate £25.15 £38.00 £37.34
Median % change year-on-year -33.82% +1.77% +43.62%
75th Percentile £53.75 £61.30 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £72.50 £75.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.66 £38.12 £35.00
% change year-on-year -35.31% +8.91% +66.67%

Service Management
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Service Management as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Service Management.

Daily rate trend for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Service Management over the 6 months to 5 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Service Management.

Hourly rate trend for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Service Management over the 6 months to 5 July 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Service Management in the UK

Service Management
Top 18 Contract 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 5 July 2025. 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 +12 798 £500 -4.49% 1,492
UK excluding London -1 573 £496 -5.52% 936
London +15 267 £500 -3.57% 642
Work from Home -30 250 £475 -11.63% 604
South West +31 154 £556 +11.25% 116
North of England -11 154 £463 -7.50% 263
North West +4 94 £492 -0.20% 146
South East -29 74 £375 -37.50% 247
Midlands +17 73 £485 +3.74% 164
Scotland +8 66 £500 -16.67% 51
West Midlands +33 61 £508 +10.93% 105
Yorkshire -16 54 £425 -20.93% 96
East of England +28 42 £550 +4.76% 56
East Midlands -12 12 £436 -9.17% 58
Wales -14 7 £278 -48.13% 35
North East -3 6 £195 -58.95% 22
Channel Islands - 5 £560 -
Northern Ireland -14 1 - - 15

Service Management
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 66 (7.09%) Confluence
2 42 (4.51%) Microsoft Exchange
3 24 (2.58%) SharePoint
4 9 (0.97%) WebSphere
5 8 (0.86%) IIS
6 7 (0.75%) Skype for Business
7 6 (0.64%) Apache
8 3 (0.32%) CMS
8 3 (0.32%) OpenStack
9 2 (0.21%) Apache Solr
10 1 (0.11%) Anypoint
10 1 (0.11%) JBoss
10 1 (0.11%) NetWeaver
10 1 (0.11%) Oracle Self-Service HR
10 1 (0.11%) Oracle Workflow
10 1 (0.11%) SAS
10 1 (0.11%) Umbraco
10 1 (0.11%) WebLogic
10 1 (0.11%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 109 (11.71%) Microsoft Office
2 27 (2.90%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.72%) MS Visio
4 12 (1.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.54%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.21%) Adobe Illustrator
6 2 (0.21%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.21%) Photoshop
7 1 (0.11%) Camtasia
7 1 (0.11%) Final Cut Pro
7 1 (0.11%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.11%) Trello
Business Applications
1 21 (2.26%) Remedy ITSM
2 10 (1.07%) SAP S/4HANA
3 6 (0.64%) Maximo
4 5 (0.54%) assyst
4 5 (0.54%) Oracle ERP
5 4 (0.43%) Salesforce CRM
5 4 (0.43%) Workday HCM
6 3 (0.32%) Dynamics CRM
6 3 (0.32%) SAP LE
6 3 (0.32%) SAP WM
7 2 (0.21%) Aladdin
7 2 (0.21%) ResourceLink
7 2 (0.21%) SAP ERP
8 1 (0.11%) Cloudability
8 1 (0.11%) IBM Planning Analytics
8 1 (0.11%) Oracle EBS
8 1 (0.11%) Oracle EBS R12
8 1 (0.11%) Oracle iProcurement
8 1 (0.11%) Remedy AR System
8 1 (0.11%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 106 (11.39%) Azure
2 104 (11.17%) Microsoft 365
3 73 (7.84%) AWS
4 34 (3.65%) Entra ID
5 23 (2.47%) GCP
6 22 (2.36%) SaaS
7 21 (2.26%) Power Platform
8 19 (2.04%) Azure DevOps
9 13 (1.40%) GitHub
10 9 (0.97%) Azure Monitor
10 9 (0.97%) Dynamics 365
10 9 (0.97%) Google Workspace
11 8 (0.86%) Azure Sentinel
11 8 (0.86%) PaaS
11 8 (0.86%) Power Automate
11 8 (0.86%) PowerApps
12 7 (0.75%) OpenShift
13 6 (0.64%) IaaS
13 6 (0.64%) OCI
14 5 (0.54%) Azure AKS
Communications & Networking
1 74 (7.95%) Firewall
2 37 (3.97%) DNS
3 34 (3.65%) VPN
4 29 (3.11%) Network Security
5 27 (2.90%) WAN
6 25 (2.69%) BGP
7 24 (2.58%) DHCP
7 24 (2.58%) LAN
8 17 (1.83%) OSPF
8 17 (1.83%) TCP/IP
9 16 (1.72%) Cisco IOS
10 14 (1.50%) Wi-Fi
11 13 (1.40%) Skype
11 13 (1.40%) Unified Communications
12 12 (1.29%) HTTP
13 11 (1.18%) EIGRP
13 11 (1.18%) RIP
13 11 (1.18%) Spanning Tree
14 10 (1.07%) MPLS
14 10 (1.07%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 20 (2.15%) SQL Server
2 14 (1.50%) Power BI
3 11 (1.18%) DB2
3 11 (1.18%) MySQL
4 10 (1.07%) Relational Database
5 9 (0.97%) Amazon RDS
6 8 (0.86%) Oracle Reports
7 7 (0.75%) Elasticsearch
7 7 (0.75%) NoSQL
8 5 (0.54%) Oracle Database
8 5 (0.54%) Pentaho
9 4 (0.43%) Amazon Aurora
9 4 (0.43%) InterSystems Cache
9 4 (0.43%) MariaDB
9 4 (0.43%) RDBMS
9 4 (0.43%) SAP HANA
10 3 (0.32%) Oracle Exadata
10 3 (0.32%) PostgreSQL
10 3 (0.32%) Tableau
11 2 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 115 (12.35%) JIRA
2 31 (3.33%) Jenkins
3 18 (1.93%) Bitbucket
4 15 (1.61%) Git
5 13 (1.40%) GitLab
6 6 (0.64%) ScriptRunner
7 4 (0.43%) JMeter
7 4 (0.43%) LoadRunner
8 3 (0.32%) Artifactory
8 3 (0.32%) NeoLoad
9 2 (0.21%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.21%) Storybook
9 2 (0.21%) webpack
9 2 (0.21%) Zephyr
10 1 (0.11%) Atlassian Bamboo
10 1 (0.11%) Gatling
10 1 (0.11%) JIRA Agile
10 1 (0.11%) Selenium
10 1 (0.11%) Team Foundation Server
10 1 (0.11%) WebDriver
General
1 372 (39.96%) Social Skills
2 194 (20.84%) Analytical Skills
3 152 (16.33%) Finance
4 129 (13.86%) Public Sector
5 49 (5.26%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 47 (5.05%) Telecoms
7 32 (3.44%) Retail
8 29 (3.11%) Legal
8 29 (3.11%) Organisational Skills
9 28 (3.01%) Banking
10 24 (2.58%) Presentation Skills
11 23 (2.47%) Manufacturing
11 23 (2.47%) Military
12 19 (2.04%) Marketing
13 15 (1.61%) Police
14 12 (1.29%) Electronics
15 11 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
16 10 (1.07%) Local Government
17 9 (0.97%) Documentation Skills
17 9 (0.97%) Law
Job Titles
1 119 (12.78%) Analyst
2 90 (9.67%) Service Manager
3 84 (9.02%) Architect
4 63 (6.77%) Support Engineer
5 56 (6.02%) IT Support
6 55 (5.91%) Senior
7 54 (5.80%) Lead
8 50 (5.37%) Developer
9 46 (4.94%) IT Manager
10 45 (4.83%) Support Analyst
11 35 (3.76%) Network Engineer
12 34 (3.65%) Administrator
13 33 (3.54%) Delivery Manager
13 33 (3.54%) IT Engineer
13 33 (3.54%) Project Manager
14 31 (3.33%) 2nd Line Support
15 30 (3.22%) Consultant
16 28 (3.01%) Desktop Support
17 27 (2.90%) 1st Line Support
17 27 (2.90%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (4.51%) Web Services
2 41 (4.40%) HTML
3 38 (4.08%) SOAP
4 33 (3.54%) CSS
5 32 (3.44%) REST
6 28 (3.01%) .NET
7 19 (2.04%) AngularJS
8 18 (1.93%) XML
9 17 (1.83%) RFC 2544
10 11 (1.18%) Flash
10 11 (1.18%) JSON
10 11 (1.18%) RESTful
11 10 (1.07%) 802.1X
12 9 (0.97%) Ajax
12 9 (0.97%) Middleware
13 8 (0.86%) NETCONF
14 7 (0.75%) LDAP
14 7 (0.75%) RESTCONF
15 6 (0.64%) Node.js
15 6 (0.64%) React
Miscellaneous
1 63 (6.77%) CMDB
2 52 (5.59%) Management Information System
3 35 (3.76%) Data Centre
4 33 (3.54%) Onboarding
5 25 (2.69%) iPhone
6 22 (2.36%) Self-Motivation
6 22 (2.36%) Smartphone
7 21 (2.26%) PKI
8 15 (1.61%) Cloud Native
8 15 (1.61%) Product Ownership
9 14 (1.50%) Clustering
10 12 (1.29%) Enterprise Software
11 10 (1.07%) Data Protection Act
12 9 (0.97%) Legacy Systems
12 9 (0.97%) Virtual Team
13 8 (0.86%) Analytical Mindset
13 8 (0.86%) Fibre Optics
13 8 (0.86%) Replication
14 7 (0.75%) Distributed Systems
15 6 (0.64%) iPad
Operating Systems
1 166 (17.83%) Windows
2 59 (6.34%) Linux
3 50 (5.37%) Windows 10
4 47 (5.05%) Windows Server
5 27 (2.90%) Mac OS
6 19 (2.04%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 19 (2.04%) Unix
7 18 (1.93%) Apple iOS
8 12 (1.29%) Android
9 11 (1.18%) Solaris
10 5 (0.54%) AIX
10 5 (0.54%) CatOS
10 5 (0.54%) HPUX
10 5 (0.54%) Windows 7
10 5 (0.54%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.43%) Windows Server 2016
12 3 (0.32%) Ubuntu
12 3 (0.32%) VMS
13 1 (0.11%) SUSE
13 1 (0.11%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 485 (52.09%) ITIL
2 396 (42.53%) ITSM
3 202 (21.70%) Agile
4 199 (21.37%) Problem-Solving
5 154 (16.54%) Service Delivery
6 152 (16.33%) Customer Service
7 147 (15.79%) Stakeholder Management
8 125 (13.43%) Change Management
9 96 (10.31%) DevOps
10 95 (10.20%) Continuous Improvement
11 90 (9.67%) Incident Management
12 81 (8.70%) Project Management
13 69 (7.41%) Configuration Management
13 69 (7.41%) Problem Management
14 68 (7.30%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 64 (6.87%) Migration
16 59 (6.34%) Service Design
17 56 (6.02%) Asset Management
18 54 (5.80%) System Testing
19 53 (5.69%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 63 (6.77%) JavaScript
2 56 (6.02%) Python
3 52 (5.59%) SQL
4 48 (5.16%) PowerShell
5 25 (2.69%) Java
6 22 (2.36%) Bash
7 17 (1.83%) C#
8 6 (0.64%) Bicep
8 6 (0.64%) Groovy
9 5 (0.54%) ActionScript
9 5 (0.54%) ActionScript 2.0
9 5 (0.54%) Kusto Query Language
9 5 (0.54%) TypeScript
9 5 (0.54%) VB
9 5 (0.54%) VBScript
10 4 (0.43%) C
10 4 (0.43%) MUMPS
11 2 (0.21%) Shell Script
12 1 (0.11%) SOQL
12 1 (0.11%) SOSL
Qualifications
1 302 (32.44%) Security Cleared
2 245 (26.32%) SC Cleared
3 117 (12.57%) Degree
4 65 (6.98%) ITIL Certification
5 57 (6.12%) DV Cleared
6 56 (6.02%) Cisco Certification
7 43 (4.62%) CCNP
8 28 (3.01%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 26 (2.79%) Computer Science Degree
10 21 (2.26%) Microsoft Certification
11 18 (1.93%) CCNA
12 14 (1.50%) Azure Certification
12 14 (1.50%) BPSS Clearance
12 14 (1.50%) PMI Certification
12 14 (1.50%) PMP
13 11 (1.18%) Master's Degree
13 11 (1.18%) Oracle Certification
14 10 (1.07%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
15 9 (0.97%) OCA
15 9 (0.97%) RHCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 56 (6.02%) SLA
2 32 (3.44%) QA
3 16 (1.72%) GDPR
4 11 (1.18%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 10 (1.07%) GxP
6 9 (0.97%) COBIT
6 9 (0.97%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 8 (0.86%) Data Quality
7 8 (0.86%) Disclosure Scotland
8 6 (0.64%) Accessibility
8 6 (0.64%) NCSC
8 6 (0.64%) PMO
9 5 (0.54%) GRC
9 5 (0.54%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 4 (0.43%) Actionable Recommendations
10 4 (0.43%) NIST
11 3 (0.32%) HIPAA
12 2 (0.21%) Cyber Essentials
12 2 (0.21%) ISO 9001
12 2 (0.21%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 91 (9.77%) Active Directory
2 61 (6.55%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (2.15%) VMware ESXi
4 18 (1.93%) Docker
5 14 (1.50%) VMware NSX
6 13 (1.40%) Hyper-V
7 11 (1.18%) Virtual Desktop
8 7 (0.75%) vSphere
9 4 (0.43%) BitLocker
9 4 (0.43%) Microsoft Virtual Server
9 4 (0.43%) Oracle RAC
9 4 (0.43%) Virtual Servers
10 3 (0.32%) Apache ZooKeeper
11 1 (0.11%) Btrfs
11 1 (0.11%) Firmware
11 1 (0.11%) Virtual Machines
11 1 (0.11%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 44 (4.73%) Ansible
2 34 (3.65%) Kubernetes
3 33 (3.54%) Terraform
4 28 (3.01%) vCenter Server
5 22 (2.36%) Microsoft Intune
6 21 (2.26%) Puppet
7 20 (2.15%) Jamf Pro
8 18 (1.93%) Grafana
8 18 (1.93%) SCCM
9 14 (1.50%) Progress Chef
10 11 (1.18%) Prometheus
11 9 (0.97%) Single Sign-On
12 8 (0.86%) NSN NetAct
12 8 (0.86%) WSUS
13 6 (0.64%) SCOM
14 5 (0.54%) Data Guard
14 5 (0.54%) HP ALM
15 4 (0.43%) OpenView
16 3 (0.32%) Check_MK
16 3 (0.32%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
Vendors
1 249 (26.75%) ServiceNow
2 197 (21.16%) Microsoft
3 86 (9.24%) Cisco
4 67 (7.20%) VMware
5 48 (5.16%) Oracle
6 46 (4.94%) Atlassian
7 42 (4.51%) SAP
8 27 (2.90%) Google
9 26 (2.79%) IBM
10 25 (2.69%) Apple
10 25 (2.69%) Remedy
11 23 (2.47%) Juniper
12 14 (1.50%) HP
13 12 (1.29%) BMC
13 12 (1.29%) Salesforce
13 12 (1.29%) Splunk
14 11 (1.18%) Fortinet
15 10 (1.07%) Dell
15 10 (1.07%) Red Hat
15 10 (1.07%) SolarWinds