Incident Response Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Incident Response
England > West Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the West Midlands requiring Incident Response skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 28 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 58 83 85
Rank change year-on-year +25 +2 +68
Contract jobs citing Incident Response 83 27 26
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 3.62% 1.62% 1.43%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.18% 1.87% 1.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 41 14 22
10th Percentile £425 £508 £551
25th Percentile £513 £544 £575
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £635 £618
Median % change year-on-year -13.39% +2.83% +30.00%
75th Percentile £600 £784 £650
90th Percentile £738 £792 £688
England median daily rate £529 £600 £600
% change year-on-year -11.90% - +9.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
West Midlands

Incident Response 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 in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,985 1,441 1,546
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 86.68% 86.24% 84.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,256 900 1,034
10th Percentile £263 £225 £263
25th Percentile £400 £400 £394
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.75% +3.90% -
75th Percentile £584 £613 £600
90th Percentile £675 £714 £688
England median daily rate £500 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% -1.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 99 49 54
10th Percentile £13.25 £14.70 £14.26
25th Percentile £16.12 £16.75 £17.56
Median hourly rate £18.87 £21.59 £24.80
Median % change year-on-year -12.60% -12.94% +40.11%
75th Percentile £27.21 £33.75 £54.06
90th Percentile £36.80 £52.50 £68.38
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -28.14% -21.35% +25.64%

Incident Response
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Incident Response relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands.

Incident Response job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

Incident Response
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Incident Response.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Incident Response

Incident Response
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Incident Response in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 28 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Incident Response in the West Midlands

Incident Response
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Incident Response within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 28 December 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
Birmingham +6 27 £504 -10.49% 21
Shropshire - 20 £540 - 19
Warwickshire -1 17 £575 +21.05% 5
Worcestershire - 7 £600 - 12
Coventry -8 5 £525 +5.00% 9
Staffordshire - 2 £550 - 15
Incident Response
England

Incident Response
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 14 (16.87%) Apache
1 14 (16.87%) WebLogic
2 1 (1.20%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (1.20%) OpenStack
Cloud Services
1 31 (37.35%) AWS
2 29 (34.94%) Azure
3 15 (18.07%) Azure Monitor
4 6 (7.23%) Virtual Private Cloud
5 4 (4.82%) Amazon CloudWatch
5 4 (4.82%) Amazon EKS
5 4 (4.82%) Azure Sentinel
5 4 (4.82%) GCP
6 3 (3.61%) Amazon EC2
6 3 (3.61%) Amazon ELB
6 3 (3.61%) Amazon S3
6 3 (3.61%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 3 (3.61%) Azure Logic Apps
7 2 (2.41%) AWS Direct Connect
7 2 (2.41%) OpenShift
8 1 (1.20%) Microsoft 365
8 1 (1.20%) Microsoft Purview
8 1 (1.20%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 20 (24.10%) Firewall
2 9 (10.84%) Network Security
3 7 (8.43%) DNS
3 7 (8.43%) VPN
4 4 (4.82%) Intrusion Detection
4 4 (4.82%) LAN
4 4 (4.82%) VLAN
5 3 (3.61%) BGP
5 3 (3.61%) Cisco ASA
5 3 (3.61%) DHCP
5 3 (3.61%) EIGRP
5 3 (3.61%) Internet
5 3 (3.61%) IPv4
5 3 (3.61%) IPv6
5 3 (3.61%) MPLS
5 3 (3.61%) OSPF
5 3 (3.61%) SSL
5 3 (3.61%) TCP/IP
5 3 (3.61%) WAN
5 3 (3.61%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (20.48%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (2.41%) Oracle Database
3 1 (1.20%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 8 (9.64%) GitLab
2 7 (8.43%) Git
3 3 (3.61%) Jenkins
General
1 44 (53.01%) Social Skills
2 18 (21.69%) Analytical Skills
3 7 (8.43%) Public Sector
4 5 (6.02%) Documentation Skills
5 4 (4.82%) Presentation Skills
6 3 (3.61%) Influencing Skills
7 2 (2.41%) Aeronautics
7 2 (2.41%) Finance
8 1 (1.20%) Banking
8 1 (1.20%) Fire and Rescue
8 1 (1.20%) Law
8 1 (1.20%) Manufacturing
8 1 (1.20%) Military
8 1 (1.20%) Police
Job Titles
1 13 (15.66%) Splunk Engineer
2 12 (14.46%) Platform Engineer
3 11 (13.25%) Monitoring Engineer
3 11 (13.25%) Site Engineer
3 11 (13.25%) Site Reliability Engineer
4 8 (9.64%) Senior
5 6 (7.23%) IT Security Officer
5 6 (7.23%) Security Engineer
5 6 (7.23%) Security Officer
6 5 (6.02%) SIEM Engineer
7 4 (4.82%) Architect
7 4 (4.82%) AWS Engineer
7 4 (4.82%) Cloud Engineer
7 4 (4.82%) Cybersecurity Engineer
7 4 (4.82%) Cybersecurity Specialist
7 4 (4.82%) DevOps Engineer
7 4 (4.82%) Security Specialist
7 4 (4.82%) SOC Manager
8 3 (3.61%) Analyst
8 3 (3.61%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (19.28%) Elastic Stack
2 1 (1.20%) LDAP
2 1 (1.20%) Lucene
2 1 (1.20%) OAuth
2 1 (1.20%) OpenTelemetry
2 1 (1.20%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 13 (15.66%) Management Information System
2 12 (14.46%) Security Operations Centre
3 10 (12.05%) Security Posture
4 7 (8.43%) PKI
5 4 (4.82%) Onboarding
5 4 (4.82%) Operational Technology
6 3 (3.61%) Cyber Threat
6 3 (3.61%) Data Centre
7 2 (2.41%) CSOC
7 2 (2.41%) Enterprise Software
8 1 (1.20%) Cloud Native
8 1 (1.20%) Cyber Defence
8 1 (1.20%) Legacy Systems
8 1 (1.20%) Linux Command Line
8 1 (1.20%) MISP
8 1 (1.20%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 32 (38.55%) Linux
2 25 (30.12%) Unix
3 24 (28.92%) Windows
4 4 (4.82%) Windows Server
5 1 (1.20%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (37.35%) Continuous Improvement
1 31 (37.35%) Observability
2 26 (31.33%) Incident Management
3 23 (27.71%) Performance Monitoring
3 23 (27.71%) Security Operations
4 22 (26.51%) Analytics
5 21 (25.30%) Service Management
6 20 (24.10%) Cybersecurity
6 20 (24.10%) Visualisation
7 19 (22.89%) Business Intelligence
7 19 (22.89%) Full-Stack Development
7 19 (22.89%) Log Analytics
7 19 (22.89%) Proactive Management
7 19 (22.89%) Synthetic Monitoring
7 19 (22.89%) Test Strategy
8 18 (21.69%) DevOps
8 18 (21.69%) SIEM
9 17 (20.48%) Proactive Monitoring
10 16 (19.28%) Agile
10 16 (19.28%) Performance Metrics
Programming Languages
1 22 (26.51%) Python
2 18 (21.69%) Bash
3 15 (18.07%) SQL
4 3 (3.61%) Kusto Query Language
5 1 (1.20%) Korn
5 1 (1.20%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 37 (44.58%) Security Cleared
2 32 (38.55%) SC Cleared
3 18 (21.69%) Degree
4 14 (16.87%) CISSP
5 12 (14.46%) Computer Science Degree
6 8 (9.64%) AWS Certification
6 8 (9.64%) Azure Certification
7 7 (8.43%) CISM
8 5 (6.02%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 5 (6.02%) Microsoft Certification
9 4 (4.82%) CREST Certified
9 4 (4.82%) DV Cleared
9 4 (4.82%) GIAC
10 3 (3.61%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 3 (3.61%) CCIE
10 3 (3.61%) CCIE Security
10 3 (3.61%) CCNP
10 3 (3.61%) CCSP
10 3 (3.61%) Cisco Certification
11 2 (2.41%) JNCIP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (13.25%) NIST
2 8 (9.64%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (6.02%) GDPR
3 5 (6.02%) PCI DSS
4 2 (2.41%) Actionable Recommendations
4 2 (2.41%) GRC
5 1 (1.20%) Accessibility
5 1 (1.20%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 1 (1.20%) NCSC
5 1 (1.20%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 19 (22.89%) Docker
2 5 (6.02%) Active Directory
3 3 (3.61%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (3.61%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 24 (28.92%) Ansible
2 19 (22.89%) Kubernetes
3 16 (19.28%) Kibana
4 11 (13.25%) Puppet
4 11 (13.25%) Terraform
5 5 (6.02%) logstash
5 5 (6.02%) QRadar
6 1 (1.20%) Fluentd
6 1 (1.20%) FortiGate
6 1 (1.20%) Grafana
6 1 (1.20%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (1.20%) Prometheus
6 1 (1.20%) Rsyslog
Vendors
1 36 (43.37%) Splunk
2 22 (26.51%) Cisco
3 19 (22.89%) AppDynamics
3 19 (22.89%) Dynatrace
4 16 (19.28%) Oracle
5 12 (14.46%) Microsoft
6 6 (7.23%) F5
6 6 (7.23%) Palo Alto
7 4 (4.82%) CrowdStrike
7 4 (4.82%) Google
8 3 (3.61%) CheckPoint
8 3 (3.61%) Fortinet
8 3 (3.61%) Meraki
8 3 (3.61%) Qualys
8 3 (3.61%) SolarWinds
8 3 (3.61%) VMware
9 2 (2.41%) Forcepoint
9 2 (2.41%) Juniper
10 1 (1.20%) Atlassian
10 1 (1.20%) CyberArk