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

6 months to
19 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 104 81 82
Rank change year-on-year -23 +1 +2
Contract jobs citing Service Management 1,155 906 1,091
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.29% 3.04% 2.49%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.69% 3.34% 2.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 753 549 755
10th Percentile £230 £220 £256
25th Percentile £401 £355 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -4.76% +2.44%
75th Percentile £600 £595 £608
90th Percentile £679 £688 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% +10.53%
Number of hourly rates quoted 70 52 15
10th Percentile £16.09 - £12.53
25th Percentile £22.38 £12.62 £14.65
Median hourly rate £60.00 £21.71 £19.00
Median % change year-on-year +176.37% +14.26% -46.10%
75th Percentile £85.00 £29.13 £26.75
90th Percentile £98.55 £33.75 £28.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £60.00 £21.28 £18.36
% change year-on-year +181.95% +15.90% -18.04%

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 42,883 27,154 37,300
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.85% 91.05% 85.01%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,719 17,238 23,736
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £505 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.49% -3.81% -4.55%
75th Percentile £620 £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 2,572 1,254 2,607
10th Percentile £14.70 £14.20 £12.70
25th Percentile £20.07 £17.79 £16.04
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.40 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +73.07% -32.27% +7.05%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.19 £61.30
90th Percentile £82.25 £73.75 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.08 £38.12
% change year-on-year +79.46% -34.22% +17.29%

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 19 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 19 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 19 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 -20 1,004 £520 +4.00% 368
UK excluding London -27 701 £500 - 324
Work from Home +4 340 £510 +7.37% 134
London -18 338 £525 +5.00% 83
South East +21 204 £534 +31.93% 102
North of England -21 203 £481 +2.39% 92
South West -32 114 £500 -11.11% 38
North West -13 113 £513 +3.12% 51
Yorkshire -25 83 £450 - 34
Midlands -43 78 £474 -6.60% 50
West Midlands -47 66 £475 -9.52% 36
Scotland -22 52 £500 -2.44% 6
East of England -26 40 £475 -13.64% 25
Wales -10 12 £700 +152.25% 6
East Midlands -16 12 £200 -54.13% 14
North East -32 7 £440 +125.64% 9
Northern Ireland +4 4 - - 15

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 57 (4.94%) SharePoint
2 55 (4.76%) Confluence
3 34 (2.94%) Microsoft Exchange
4 11 (0.95%) Skype for Business
5 6 (0.52%) Mattermost
6 3 (0.26%) IIS
6 3 (0.26%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.087%) Apache
7 1 (0.087%) CICS
7 1 (0.087%) CMS
7 1 (0.087%) JBoss
7 1 (0.087%) LiveCycle
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.087%) Palantir Foundry
7 1 (0.087%) WebSphere
Applications
1 57 (4.94%) Microsoft Office
2 29 (2.51%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (1.04%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 11 (0.95%) MS Visio
5 10 (0.87%) Microsoft Project
6 7 (0.61%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.35%) PTC Creo
8 2 (0.17%) Spreadsheet
9 1 (0.087%) Camtasia
Business Applications
1 52 (4.50%) Remedy ITSM
2 15 (1.30%) SAP S/4HANA
3 9 (0.78%) Teamcenter
4 7 (0.61%) Primavera
5 3 (0.26%) Oracle ERP
6 2 (0.17%) ContrOCC
6 2 (0.17%) Oracle Applications
6 2 (0.17%) SAP PS
6 2 (0.17%) SAP SM
7 1 (0.087%) Dynamics NAV
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.087%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 1 (0.087%) SAP CO
7 1 (0.087%) SAP FI
7 1 (0.087%) SAP FI/CO
7 1 (0.087%) SAP HR
7 1 (0.087%) SAP Payroll
7 1 (0.087%) SAP PM
Cloud Services
1 174 (15.06%) Azure
2 114 (9.87%) Microsoft 365
3 69 (5.97%) AWS
4 53 (4.59%) Entra ID
4 53 (4.59%) Power Platform
5 40 (3.46%) SaaS
6 32 (2.77%) Azure DevOps
7 27 (2.34%) OneDrive
8 25 (2.16%) GCP
9 19 (1.65%) PaaS
10 18 (1.56%) GitHub
11 14 (1.21%) OCI
12 12 (1.04%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 11 (0.95%) AWS Lambda
13 11 (0.95%) IaaS
13 11 (0.95%) Serverless
14 10 (0.87%) Microsoft Copilot
15 9 (0.78%) Amazon S3
15 9 (0.78%) Google Workspace
16 7 (0.61%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 63 (5.45%) Firewall
2 45 (3.90%) DNS
3 38 (3.29%) WAN
4 34 (2.94%) VPN
5 33 (2.86%) LAN
6 25 (2.16%) Network Security
7 23 (1.99%) TCP/IP
8 22 (1.90%) DHCP
9 16 (1.39%) BGP
10 14 (1.21%) Wi-Fi
11 13 (1.13%) OSPF
11 13 (1.13%) VLAN
11 13 (1.13%) Wireless
12 12 (1.04%) BIG-IP
12 12 (1.04%) Cisco ISE
12 12 (1.04%) SD-WAN
13 11 (0.95%) Skype
13 11 (0.95%) VXLAN
14 9 (0.78%) Junos
15 8 (0.69%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 45 (3.90%) Power BI
2 15 (1.30%) SQL Server
3 8 (0.69%) Oracle Database
4 7 (0.61%) Oracle Reports
4 7 (0.61%) PostgreSQL
4 7 (0.61%) Relational Database
5 6 (0.52%) Oracle Database 11g
6 4 (0.35%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 4 (0.35%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 3 (0.26%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (0.26%) MySQL
7 3 (0.26%) SQL Server Analysis Services
8 2 (0.17%) Amazon Redshift
8 2 (0.17%) GIS
8 2 (0.17%) MariaDB
8 2 (0.17%) Microsoft Analysis Services
9 1 (0.087%) Amazon RDS
9 1 (0.087%) Elasticsearch
9 1 (0.087%) InfluxDB
9 1 (0.087%) Oracle Database 12c
Development Applications
1 135 (11.69%) JIRA
2 19 (1.65%) Git
2 19 (1.65%) Jenkins
3 13 (1.13%) Bitbucket
3 13 (1.13%) GitLab
4 7 (0.61%) ScriptRunner
5 5 (0.43%) Atlassian Bamboo
5 5 (0.43%) Browser DevTools
6 4 (0.35%) MLflow
7 3 (0.26%) Fiddler
7 3 (0.26%) Hudson
7 3 (0.26%) IntelliJ
8 2 (0.17%) Firebug
8 2 (0.17%) Selenium
8 2 (0.17%) TestRail
9 1 (0.087%) Artifactory
9 1 (0.087%) IBM UrbanCode
9 1 (0.087%) Protractor
9 1 (0.087%) Visual Studio Code
9 1 (0.087%) webpack
General
1 377 (32.64%) Social Skills
2 187 (16.19%) Finance
3 150 (12.99%) Analytical Skills
4 118 (10.22%) Public Sector
5 51 (4.42%) Legal
6 47 (4.07%) Telecoms
7 42 (3.64%) Banking
8 33 (2.86%) Documentation Skills
9 32 (2.77%) Influencing Skills
10 29 (2.51%) Organisational Skills
11 20 (1.73%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 19 (1.65%) Military
13 15 (1.30%) Aerospace
13 15 (1.30%) Retail
14 12 (1.04%) Financial Institution
14 12 (1.04%) Local Government
14 12 (1.04%) Presentation Skills
15 10 (0.87%) Police
16 8 (0.69%) Investment Banking
16 8 (0.69%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 140 (12.12%) Analyst
2 114 (9.87%) Service Manager
3 107 (9.26%) Lead
4 104 (9.00%) Architect
5 96 (8.31%) Senior
6 80 (6.93%) Consultant
7 73 (6.32%) IT Manager
8 55 (4.76%) Project Manager
9 54 (4.68%) Service Analyst
10 45 (3.90%) Developer
11 42 (3.64%) Delivery Manager
12 34 (2.94%) IT Analyst
13 33 (2.86%) Support Engineer
14 31 (2.68%) ServiceNow Architect
15 30 (2.60%) Network Engineer
16 29 (2.51%) IT Services Manager
17 27 (2.34%) Administrator
17 27 (2.34%) Transition Manager
18 26 (2.25%) IT Support
18 26 (2.25%) Service Delivery Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 51 (4.42%) REST
2 28 (2.42%) SOAP
3 13 (1.13%) HTML
4 12 (1.04%) CSS
4 12 (1.04%) Middleware
5 9 (0.78%) 802.1X
5 9 (0.78%) JSON
5 9 (0.78%) OAuth
6 8 (0.69%) XML
7 7 (0.61%) Elastic Stack
7 7 (0.61%) Oracle Fusion
8 5 (0.43%) AngularJS
8 5 (0.43%) Lightning Web Components
8 5 (0.43%) Microsoft Graph
8 5 (0.43%) OpenID
8 5 (0.43%) SAML
8 5 (0.43%) Web Services
9 4 (0.35%) Bootstrap
9 4 (0.35%) Software Packaging
9 4 (0.35%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 98 (8.48%) CMDB
2 87 (7.53%) Onboarding
3 64 (5.54%) Product Ownership
4 48 (4.16%) Data Centre
5 30 (2.60%) Management Information System
5 30 (2.60%) Virtual Team
6 29 (2.51%) Enterprise Software
7 27 (2.34%) PKI
8 21 (1.82%) Clustering
9 19 (1.65%) Data Protection Act
10 16 (1.39%) Operational Technology
11 13 (1.13%) Driving Licence
12 11 (0.95%) Analytical Mindset
12 11 (0.95%) Self-Motivation
13 10 (0.87%) Algorithms
13 10 (0.87%) Cloud Native
13 10 (0.87%) Security Posture
14 9 (0.78%) PMI
15 8 (0.69%) Legacy Systems
15 8 (0.69%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 202 (17.49%) Windows
2 55 (4.76%) Linux
3 42 (3.64%) Windows 10
4 38 (3.29%) Windows Server
5 18 (1.56%) Unix
6 15 (1.30%) Windows 7
7 14 (1.21%) Mac OS
8 13 (1.13%) Android
8 13 (1.13%) Apple iOS
9 10 (0.87%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 5 (0.43%) Windows Server 2019
11 4 (0.35%) VMS
12 3 (0.26%) Ubuntu
12 3 (0.26%) Windows XP
13 2 (0.17%) Solaris
13 2 (0.17%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.17%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.17%) zOS
14 1 (0.087%) Rocky
14 1 (0.087%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 591 (51.17%) ITIL
2 498 (43.12%) ITSM
3 284 (24.59%) Stakeholder Management
4 266 (23.03%) Continuous Improvement
5 237 (20.52%) Agile
6 222 (19.22%) Problem-Solving
7 206 (17.84%) Service Delivery
8 165 (14.29%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 154 (13.33%) Change Management
10 127 (11.00%) DevOps
11 116 (10.04%) Customer Service
12 105 (9.09%) Roadmaps
13 97 (8.40%) Incident Management
14 89 (7.71%) Problem Management
15 82 (7.10%) Migration
16 80 (6.93%) Decision-Making
17 78 (6.75%) Project Delivery
18 77 (6.67%) Configuration Management
19 75 (6.49%) Cybersecurity
20 74 (6.41%) Project Management
Programming Languages
1 84 (7.27%) PowerShell
2 59 (5.11%) Python
3 54 (4.68%) SQL
4 47 (4.07%) JavaScript
5 21 (1.82%) Bash
6 16 (1.39%) Java
7 11 (0.95%) PL/SQL
7 11 (0.95%) VB
7 11 (0.95%) VBScript
8 6 (0.52%) Apex Code
8 6 (0.52%) Groovy
9 5 (0.43%) Kotlin
10 4 (0.35%) C
10 4 (0.35%) C#
10 4 (0.35%) Perl
11 3 (0.26%) Shell Script
11 3 (0.26%) SOQL
11 3 (0.26%) T-SQL
12 2 (0.17%) ActionScript 2.0
12 2 (0.17%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 408 (35.32%) Security Cleared
2 281 (24.33%) SC Cleared
3 129 (11.17%) DV Cleared
4 92 (7.97%) Degree
5 58 (5.02%) ITIL Certification
6 30 (2.60%) PMI Certification
7 29 (2.51%) PMP
8 28 (2.42%) Cisco Certification
9 23 (1.99%) BPSS Clearance
10 20 (1.73%) Computer Science Degree
11 17 (1.47%) Microsoft Certification
12 15 (1.30%) CCNA
13 13 (1.13%) CISM
13 13 (1.13%) CISSP
13 13 (1.13%) Master's Degree
14 11 (0.95%) A+ Certification
15 10 (0.87%) CCNP
15 10 (0.87%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 9 (0.78%) JNCIA
16 9 (0.78%) JNCIS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 78 (6.75%) SLA
2 39 (3.38%) Data Quality
2 39 (3.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 31 (2.68%) QA
4 28 (2.42%) PMO
5 26 (2.25%) GDPR
6 22 (1.90%) NCSC
7 21 (1.82%) COBIT
8 19 (1.65%) GRC
9 14 (1.21%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 14 (1.21%) NIST
10 9 (0.78%) Cyber Essentials
10 9 (0.78%) PCI DSS
11 8 (0.69%) Accessibility
12 7 (0.61%) Government Security Classifications
13 6 (0.52%) ISO 31000
13 6 (0.52%) ISO/IEC 27005
14 5 (0.43%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
14 5 (0.43%) ISO 9001
14 5 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 114 (9.87%) Active Directory
2 39 (3.38%) VMware Infrastructure
3 16 (1.39%) VMware ESXi
4 12 (1.04%) BitLocker
4 12 (1.04%) Docker
5 8 (0.69%) VMware NSX
6 7 (0.61%) Virtual Desktop
6 7 (0.61%) vSphere
7 6 (0.52%) Hyper-V
7 6 (0.52%) vCloud
8 5 (0.43%) NFS
9 4 (0.35%) Oracle RAC
9 4 (0.35%) Virtual Machines
10 3 (0.26%) Firmware
11 2 (0.17%) GPFS
11 2 (0.17%) IAG
11 2 (0.17%) KVM
12 1 (0.087%) iptables
12 1 (0.087%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.087%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 43 (3.72%) SCCM
2 40 (3.46%) Microsoft Intune
3 28 (2.42%) Ansible
4 22 (1.90%) Terraform
5 16 (1.39%) Kubernetes
6 13 (1.13%) Jamf Pro
7 10 (0.87%) Single Sign-On
8 9 (0.78%) FortiGate
9 8 (0.69%) Grafana
9 8 (0.69%) vCenter Server
10 7 (0.61%) Data Guard
10 7 (0.61%) Oracle RMAN
10 7 (0.61%) WSUS
11 6 (0.52%) Puppet
11 6 (0.52%) SCOM
12 5 (0.43%) Prometheus
12 5 (0.43%) vMotion
13 4 (0.35%) PowerCLI
13 4 (0.35%) Progress Chef
14 3 (0.26%) vRealize
Vendors
1 322 (27.88%) ServiceNow
2 188 (16.28%) Microsoft
3 58 (5.02%) Remedy
4 54 (4.68%) VMware
5 45 (3.90%) Cisco
6 39 (3.38%) Oracle
7 30 (2.60%) SAP
8 28 (2.42%) Atlassian
9 26 (2.25%) BMC
10 24 (2.08%) IFS
11 22 (1.90%) Splunk
12 21 (1.82%) HP
13 18 (1.56%) SolarWinds
14 14 (1.21%) Dell
14 14 (1.21%) Salesforce
15 13 (1.13%) Citrix
15 13 (1.13%) Dynatrace
15 13 (1.13%) F5
15 13 (1.13%) Zscaler
16 12 (1.04%) Google