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

6 months to
6 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 114 80 84
Rank change year-on-year -34 +4 +1
Contract jobs citing Service Management 1,088 875 1,080
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.20% 3.01% 2.51%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.60% 3.31% 2.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 708 522 738
10th Percentile £220 £220 £266
25th Percentile £400 £359 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £517 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +3.35% -4.76% +2.44%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £608
90th Percentile £682 £688 £713
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £511 £525
% change year-on-year -2.08% -2.73% +9.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 67 46 17
10th Percentile £16.14 - £12.53
25th Percentile £20.78 £12.62 £15.17
Median hourly rate £60.00 £22.14 £19.00
Median % change year-on-year +171.00% +16.53% -46.10%
75th Percentile £83.75 £31.98 £26.50
90th Percentile £101.70 £40.63 £28.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £60.00 £21.71 £17.72
% change year-on-year +176.37% +22.52% -24.60%

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 41,843 26,418 36,777
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.72% 90.98% 85.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,135 16,804 23,539
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.49% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £615 £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 2,505 1,141 2,540
10th Percentile £14.68 £14.20 £12.75
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.87 £16.00
Median hourly rate £43.96 £27.76 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +58.36% -23.95% +1.39%
75th Percentile £68.00 £56.00 £60.75
90th Percentile £81.24 £73.75 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.78 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +82.03% -34.02% +8.91%

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 6 June 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 6 June 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 6 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 -25 956 £520 +3.95% 465
UK excluding London -24 667 £500 -2.08% 357
London -25 316 £543 +8.50% 144
Work from Home -5 294 £510 +7.37% 199
North of England -19 196 £500 +5.93% 100
South East +21 188 £525 +26.51% 123
South West -31 111 £500 -11.11% 36
North West -9 108 £550 +8.80% 48
Yorkshire -33 81 £468 +10.12% 41
Midlands -39 74 £450 -18.18% 52
West Midlands -48 59 £462 -16.08% 37
East of England -14 44 £475 -13.64% 32
Scotland -28 43 £475 -7.32% 8
East Midlands -19 15 £200 -54.13% 15
Wales -17 7 £340 +22.52% 7
North East -22 7 £440 +125.64% 12
Northern Ireland - 4 - - 12

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 50 (4.60%) Confluence
2 44 (4.04%) SharePoint
3 34 (3.13%) Microsoft Exchange
4 11 (1.01%) Skype for Business
5 6 (0.55%) Mattermost
6 3 (0.28%) IIS
6 3 (0.28%) OpenStack
7 2 (0.18%) nginx
8 1 (0.092%) Apache
8 1 (0.092%) CICS
8 1 (0.092%) CMS
8 1 (0.092%) JBoss
8 1 (0.092%) LiveCycle
8 1 (0.092%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
8 1 (0.092%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.092%) Palantir Foundry
8 1 (0.092%) WebSphere
Applications
1 58 (5.33%) Microsoft Office
2 28 (2.57%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (1.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.83%) Microsoft Project
5 8 (0.74%) MS Visio
6 7 (0.64%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.37%) PTC Creo
8 2 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
9 1 (0.092%) Camtasia
Business Applications
1 48 (4.41%) Remedy ITSM
2 13 (1.19%) SAP S/4HANA
3 9 (0.83%) Teamcenter
4 5 (0.46%) Primavera
5 3 (0.28%) Oracle ERP
6 2 (0.18%) Oracle Applications
6 2 (0.18%) SAP PS
7 1 (0.092%) ContrOCC
7 1 (0.092%) Dynamics NAV
7 1 (0.092%) NetSuite
7 1 (0.092%) Oracle EBS
7 1 (0.092%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.092%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 1 (0.092%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.092%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 1 (0.092%) SAP HR
7 1 (0.092%) SAP Payroll
7 1 (0.092%) SAP PM
7 1 (0.092%) SAP SM
Cloud Services
1 162 (14.89%) Azure
2 109 (10.02%) Microsoft 365
3 58 (5.33%) AWS
4 50 (4.60%) Power Platform
5 46 (4.23%) Entra ID
6 37 (3.40%) SaaS
7 30 (2.76%) Azure DevOps
8 25 (2.30%) OneDrive
9 21 (1.93%) GCP
10 19 (1.75%) GitHub
11 18 (1.65%) PaaS
12 14 (1.29%) OCI
13 10 (0.92%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 10 (0.92%) AWS Lambda
13 10 (0.92%) IaaS
13 10 (0.92%) Microsoft Copilot
13 10 (0.92%) Serverless
14 9 (0.83%) Google Workspace
15 6 (0.55%) Amazon S3
15 6 (0.55%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 61 (5.61%) Firewall
2 46 (4.23%) DNS
3 37 (3.40%) WAN
4 34 (3.13%) VPN
5 33 (3.03%) LAN
6 27 (2.48%) Network Security
7 22 (2.02%) DHCP
8 21 (1.93%) TCP/IP
9 16 (1.47%) BGP
10 13 (1.19%) OSPF
10 13 (1.19%) SD-WAN
10 13 (1.19%) VLAN
10 13 (1.19%) Wi-Fi
11 12 (1.10%) BIG-IP
11 12 (1.10%) Wireless
12 11 (1.01%) Cisco ISE
12 11 (1.01%) Skype
13 10 (0.92%) VXLAN
14 8 (0.74%) Ethernet VPN
14 8 (0.74%) Junos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 40 (3.68%) Power BI
2 15 (1.38%) SQL Server
3 7 (0.64%) Oracle Reports
3 7 (0.64%) PostgreSQL
4 6 (0.55%) Oracle Database
4 6 (0.55%) Relational Database
5 5 (0.46%) Oracle Database 11g
6 4 (0.37%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 4 (0.37%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 3 (0.28%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (0.28%) Elasticsearch
7 3 (0.28%) MySQL
7 3 (0.28%) SQL Server Analysis Services
8 2 (0.18%) Amazon RDS
8 2 (0.18%) Amazon Redshift
8 2 (0.18%) InfluxDB
8 2 (0.18%) MariaDB
8 2 (0.18%) Microsoft Analysis Services
9 1 (0.092%) DTS
9 1 (0.092%) GIS
Development Applications
1 122 (11.21%) JIRA
2 18 (1.65%) Git
3 17 (1.56%) Jenkins
4 16 (1.47%) GitLab
5 13 (1.19%) Bitbucket
6 7 (0.64%) ScriptRunner
7 6 (0.55%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 5 (0.46%) Browser DevTools
9 4 (0.37%) MLflow
10 3 (0.28%) Fiddler
10 3 (0.28%) Hudson
10 3 (0.28%) IntelliJ
11 2 (0.18%) Firebug
11 2 (0.18%) Selenium
11 2 (0.18%) TestRail
12 1 (0.092%) Gemini Tracker
12 1 (0.092%) IBM UrbanCode
12 1 (0.092%) Postman
12 1 (0.092%) Protractor
12 1 (0.092%) webpack
General
1 359 (33.00%) Social Skills
2 178 (16.36%) Finance
3 141 (12.96%) Analytical Skills
4 109 (10.02%) Public Sector
5 55 (5.06%) Legal
6 41 (3.77%) Banking
7 40 (3.68%) Telecoms
8 31 (2.85%) Documentation Skills
9 27 (2.48%) Organisational Skills
10 22 (2.02%) Influencing Skills
11 18 (1.65%) Military
12 17 (1.56%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 16 (1.47%) Retail
14 12 (1.10%) Aerospace
14 12 (1.10%) Local Government
15 9 (0.83%) Police
16 8 (0.74%) Financial Institution
16 8 (0.74%) Investment Banking
16 8 (0.74%) Manufacturing
16 8 (0.74%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 126 (11.58%) Analyst
2 108 (9.93%) Service Manager
3 102 (9.38%) Architect
4 100 (9.19%) Lead
5 85 (7.81%) Senior
6 71 (6.53%) Consultant
7 70 (6.43%) IT Manager
8 52 (4.78%) Project Manager
9 46 (4.23%) Service Analyst
10 39 (3.58%) Delivery Manager
11 35 (3.22%) Support Engineer
12 33 (3.03%) Developer
13 31 (2.85%) IT Analyst
14 29 (2.67%) ServiceNow Architect
15 28 (2.57%) IT Services Manager
16 27 (2.48%) Hardware Engineer
16 27 (2.48%) Network Engineer
16 27 (2.48%) Transition Manager
17 26 (2.39%) IT Support
18 25 (2.30%) Service Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 49 (4.50%) REST
2 28 (2.57%) SOAP
3 12 (1.10%) HTML
4 11 (1.01%) CSS
5 9 (0.83%) 802.1X
5 9 (0.83%) Middleware
5 9 (0.83%) OAuth
6 7 (0.64%) Oracle Fusion
6 7 (0.64%) Web Services
7 6 (0.55%) XML
8 5 (0.46%) Elastic Stack
8 5 (0.46%) JSON
8 5 (0.46%) Lightning Web Components
8 5 (0.46%) OpenID
8 5 (0.46%) SAML
9 4 (0.37%) LDAP
9 4 (0.37%) Microsoft Graph
9 4 (0.37%) OAuth2
9 4 (0.37%) Software Packaging
9 4 (0.37%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 81 (7.44%) Onboarding
2 78 (7.17%) CMDB
3 58 (5.33%) Product Ownership
4 49 (4.50%) Data Centre
5 28 (2.57%) Virtual Team
6 27 (2.48%) Management Information System
6 27 (2.48%) PKI
7 25 (2.30%) Enterprise Software
8 21 (1.93%) Clustering
9 16 (1.47%) Data Protection Act
9 16 (1.47%) Driving Licence
9 16 (1.47%) Operational Technology
10 11 (1.01%) PMI
11 10 (0.92%) Algorithms
11 10 (0.92%) Analytical Mindset
11 10 (0.92%) Cloud Native
12 8 (0.74%) Legacy Systems
12 8 (0.74%) Replication
13 6 (0.55%) Linux Command Line
13 6 (0.55%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 196 (18.01%) Windows
2 54 (4.96%) Linux
3 42 (3.86%) Windows 10
3 42 (3.86%) Windows Server
4 16 (1.47%) Unix
5 15 (1.38%) Windows 7
6 13 (1.19%) Mac OS
7 11 (1.01%) Android
7 11 (1.01%) Apple iOS
8 8 (0.74%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.37%) VMS
10 3 (0.28%) Ubuntu
10 3 (0.28%) Windows Server 2019
10 3 (0.28%) Windows XP
11 2 (0.18%) Solaris
11 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
11 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.18%) zOS
12 1 (0.092%) Rocky
12 1 (0.092%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 557 (51.19%) ITIL
2 468 (43.01%) ITSM
3 250 (22.98%) Stakeholder Management
4 240 (22.06%) Continuous Improvement
5 218 (20.04%) Agile
6 210 (19.30%) Problem-Solving
7 188 (17.28%) Service Delivery
8 154 (14.15%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 147 (13.51%) Change Management
10 117 (10.75%) DevOps
11 109 (10.02%) Customer Service
12 94 (8.64%) Roadmaps
13 91 (8.36%) Incident Management
14 87 (8.00%) Problem Management
15 76 (6.99%) Configuration Management
15 76 (6.99%) Service Design
16 75 (6.89%) Project Management
17 72 (6.62%) Migration
18 71 (6.53%) Decision-Making
18 71 (6.53%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 72 (6.62%) PowerShell
2 55 (5.06%) SQL
3 46 (4.23%) JavaScript
4 44 (4.04%) Python
5 17 (1.56%) Bash
6 15 (1.38%) Java
7 11 (1.01%) VB
7 11 (1.01%) VBScript
8 10 (0.92%) PL/SQL
9 6 (0.55%) Apex Code
9 6 (0.55%) Groovy
10 5 (0.46%) C#
10 5 (0.46%) Kotlin
11 4 (0.37%) C
11 4 (0.37%) Shell Script
12 3 (0.28%) SOQL
12 3 (0.28%) T-SQL
13 2 (0.18%) ActionScript 2.0
13 2 (0.18%) Bicep
13 2 (0.18%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 395 (36.31%) Security Cleared
2 272 (25.00%) SC Cleared
3 123 (11.31%) DV Cleared
4 90 (8.27%) Degree
5 55 (5.06%) ITIL Certification
6 31 (2.85%) PMI Certification
7 29 (2.67%) PMP
8 28 (2.57%) Cisco Certification
9 22 (2.02%) BPSS Clearance
10 21 (1.93%) Computer Science Degree
11 16 (1.47%) CCNA
11 16 (1.47%) Microsoft Certification
12 13 (1.19%) Master's Degree
13 12 (1.10%) A+ Certification
13 12 (1.10%) CISM
13 12 (1.10%) CISSP
14 11 (1.01%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
15 9 (0.83%) JNCIA
15 9 (0.83%) JNCIS
15 9 (0.83%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 74 (6.80%) SLA
2 37 (3.40%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 36 (3.31%) Data Quality
4 27 (2.48%) PMO
5 26 (2.39%) GDPR
6 25 (2.30%) QA
7 21 (1.93%) COBIT
8 18 (1.65%) GRC
8 18 (1.65%) NCSC
9 14 (1.29%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 14 (1.29%) NIST
10 11 (1.01%) Cyber Essentials
11 10 (0.92%) PCI DSS
12 9 (0.83%) Accessibility
13 7 (0.64%) Government Security Classifications
14 6 (0.55%) ISO 31000
14 6 (0.55%) ISO/IEC 27005
14 6 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 5 (0.46%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 5 (0.46%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 111 (10.20%) Active Directory
2 40 (3.68%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (1.38%) Docker
3 15 (1.38%) VMware ESXi
4 12 (1.10%) BitLocker
5 8 (0.74%) VMware NSX
6 7 (0.64%) Hyper-V
7 6 (0.55%) vCloud
7 6 (0.55%) vSphere
8 5 (0.46%) NFS
8 5 (0.46%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
10 3 (0.28%) Firmware
11 2 (0.18%) GPFS
11 2 (0.18%) IAG
11 2 (0.18%) KVM
11 2 (0.18%) Oracle RAC
12 1 (0.092%) iptables
12 1 (0.092%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.092%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 34 (3.13%) SCCM
2 30 (2.76%) Microsoft Intune
3 25 (2.30%) Ansible
4 19 (1.75%) Terraform
5 18 (1.65%) Kubernetes
6 13 (1.19%) Jamf Pro
7 10 (0.92%) FortiGate
8 9 (0.83%) Grafana
8 9 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
8 9 (0.83%) WSUS
9 8 (0.74%) vCenter Server
10 6 (0.55%) Prometheus
10 6 (0.55%) SCOM
11 5 (0.46%) Data Guard
11 5 (0.46%) Oracle RMAN
11 5 (0.46%) Progress Chef
11 5 (0.46%) Puppet
11 5 (0.46%) vMotion
12 4 (0.37%) PowerCLI
13 3 (0.28%) vRealize
Vendors
1 280 (25.74%) ServiceNow
2 175 (16.08%) Microsoft
3 56 (5.15%) VMware
4 54 (4.96%) Remedy
5 46 (4.23%) Cisco
6 36 (3.31%) Oracle
7 30 (2.76%) HP
8 29 (2.67%) Atlassian
9 27 (2.48%) SAP
10 24 (2.21%) IFS
11 22 (2.02%) BMC
12 21 (1.93%) Splunk
13 19 (1.75%) Dell
14 14 (1.29%) Canon
15 13 (1.19%) Citrix
15 13 (1.19%) F5
15 13 (1.19%) Google
15 13 (1.19%) Salesforce
15 13 (1.19%) SolarWinds
15 13 (1.19%) Zscaler