Lead Job Trends in Scotland

Leader
UK > Scotland

The median Leader salary in Scotland is £60,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 31 December 2025.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
31 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 42 23 28
Rank change year-on-year -19 +5 +8
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead 122 199 302
As % of all permanent jobs in Scotland 4.48% 7.35% 10.23%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.07% 7.81% 10.58%
Number of salaries quoted 76 85 98
10th Percentile £29,000 £38,500 £52,945
25th Percentile £34,688 £58,250 £63,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £70,000 £73,750
Median % change year-on-year -14.29% -5.08% -7.39%
75th Percentile £76,250 £90,000 £96,539
90th Percentile £100,000 £124,000 £137,913
UK median annual salary £75,000 £72,500 £75,000
% change year-on-year +3.45% -3.33% -

All Permanent IT Job Roles
Scotland

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in Scotland. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in Scotland with a recognized job title 2,407 2,547 2,855
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 88.43% 94.12% 96.71%
Number of salaries quoted 1,205 1,141 1,787
10th Percentile £26,250 £31,250 £25,000
25th Percentile £31,000 £41,250 £32,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £55,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -18.18% +4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £65,000 £70,000 £68,750
90th Percentile £85,000 £90,000 £83,750
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -

Lead
Job Vacancy Trend in Scotland

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Lead' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in Scotland.

Lead job vacancy trend in Scotland

Lead
Salary Trend in Scotland

Salary distribution trend for Lead job vacancies in Scotland.

Salary distribution trend for Lead job vacancies in Scotland

Lead
Salary Histogram in Scotland

Salary distribution for jobs citing Lead in Scotland over the 6 months to 31 December 2025.

Salary histogram for Lead in Scotland

Lead
Job Locations in Scotland

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Lead within the Scotland region over the 6 months to 31 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Edinburgh -41 35 £73,648 +5.21% 77
Glasgow -4 33 £68,750 -8.33% 63
West Lothian +16 10 £30,000 - 6
Aberdeen +9 9 £55,000 -26.67% 60
North Lanarkshire -5 9 £36,000 -37.39%
Clackmannanshire - 7 - -
Dumfries and Galloway - 6 - -
South Ayrshire +10 3 £55,498 -
Dundee - 2 £80,000 -
Stirling - 2 £34,000 - 1
Highlands -13 1 - - 1
Aberdeenshire - 1 - - 3
Fife - 1 - - 4
Renfrewshire - 1 £49,433 - 1
Lead
UK

Lead Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Scotland

For the 6 months to 31 December 2025, Lead job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the Scotland region featuring Lead in the job title.

1 18 (14.75%) Degree
2 17 (13.93%) Azure
2 17 (13.93%) Software Engineering
2 17 (13.93%) Stakeholder Management
3 14 (11.48%) Microsoft
4 13 (10.66%) Agile
4 13 (10.66%) AWS
5 11 (9.02%) Asset Management
5 11 (9.02%) Business Intelligence
5 11 (9.02%) Continuous Improvement
5 11 (9.02%) Java
5 11 (9.02%) Problem-Solving
5 11 (9.02%) Roadmaps
6 10 (8.20%) B2B
6 10 (8.20%) CI/CD
6 10 (8.20%) Customer Service
6 10 (8.20%) Cybersecurity
6 10 (8.20%) E-Commerce
6 10 (8.20%) Telesales
7 9 (7.38%) Business Development
7 9 (7.38%) DevOps
7 9 (7.38%) ERP
7 9 (7.38%) Lead Generation
7 9 (7.38%) Mentoring
8 8 (6.56%) C#
8 8 (6.56%) Coaching
8 8 (6.56%) Decision-Making
9 7 (5.74%) Analytics
9 7 (5.74%) BPSS Clearance
9 7 (5.74%) Budget Management

Lead Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Scotland 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 1 (0.82%) Apache Airflow
1 1 (0.82%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 5 (4.10%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.82%) Chatbot
2 1 (0.82%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (0.82%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 17 (13.93%) Azure
2 13 (10.66%) AWS
3 5 (4.10%) GCP
4 4 (3.28%) Entra ID
4 4 (3.28%) Microsoft 365
4 4 (3.28%) Power Platform
4 4 (3.28%) SaaS
5 2 (1.64%) Azure Data Factory
5 2 (1.64%) Azure Stack
5 2 (1.64%) dbt
5 2 (1.64%) PaaS
6 1 (0.82%) Amazon Bedrock
6 1 (0.82%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 1 (0.82%) Azure AI
6 1 (0.82%) ChatGPT
6 1 (0.82%) Datadog
6 1 (0.82%) GitHub
6 1 (0.82%) GitHub Actions
6 1 (0.82%) OpenShift
6 1 (0.82%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 6 (4.92%) Firewall
2 1 (0.82%) BGP
2 1 (0.82%) Broadband
2 1 (0.82%) LAN
2 1 (0.82%) MPLS
2 1 (0.82%) WAN
2 1 (0.82%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (3.28%) Data Warehouse
1 4 (3.28%) Power BI
2 3 (2.46%) SQL Server
3 2 (1.64%) Oracle Database
3 2 (1.64%) Oracle ODI
3 2 (1.64%) Tableau
4 1 (0.82%) Azure SQL Database
4 1 (0.82%) Metadata
4 1 (0.82%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 5 (4.10%) JIRA
2 2 (1.64%) Git
2 2 (1.64%) Visual Studio
3 1 (0.82%) Cucumber
3 1 (0.82%) JMeter
3 1 (0.82%) Locust
3 1 (0.82%) Rational DOORS
3 1 (0.82%) Rational Rhapsody
3 1 (0.82%) Rational Statemate
General
1 30 (24.59%) Finance
2 25 (20.49%) Social Skills
3 10 (8.20%) Analytical Skills
4 9 (7.38%) Games
5 8 (6.56%) Organisational Skills
6 7 (5.74%) Banking
6 7 (5.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 7 (5.74%) Public Sector
7 6 (4.92%) Law
7 6 (4.92%) Retail
8 4 (3.28%) Legal
8 4 (3.28%) Military
8 4 (3.28%) Private Banking
8 4 (3.28%) Telecoms
9 3 (2.46%) Avionics
10 2 (1.64%) Documentation Skills
11 1 (0.82%) Influencing Skills
11 1 (0.82%) Manufacturing
11 1 (0.82%) Marketing
11 1 (0.82%) Tech for Good
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (3.28%) .NET
1 4 (3.28%) React
2 3 (2.46%) AngularJS
2 3 (2.46%) RESTful
3 2 (1.64%) .NET Framework
3 2 (1.64%) Next.js
4 1 (0.82%) .NET Core
4 1 (0.82%) Blazor
4 1 (0.82%) Gherkin
4 1 (0.82%) Hugging Face
4 1 (0.82%) Kafka
4 1 (0.82%) LangChain
4 1 (0.82%) Node.js
4 1 (0.82%) React Native
4 1 (0.82%) Spring Boot
4 1 (0.82%) Vue
Miscellaneous
1 7 (5.74%) Driving Licence
2 4 (3.28%) Management Information System
3 3 (2.46%) Cloud Native
4 2 (1.64%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 2 (1.64%) Life Science
4 2 (1.64%) Onboarding
4 2 (1.64%) Product Ownership
4 2 (1.64%) Robotics
4 2 (1.64%) Video Conferencing
5 1 (0.82%) AI Agents
5 1 (0.82%) Data Protection Act
5 1 (0.82%) Distributed Systems
5 1 (0.82%) e-Learning
5 1 (0.82%) Operational Technology
5 1 (0.82%) PMI
5 1 (0.82%) Public Cloud
5 1 (0.82%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 3 (2.46%) Windows
2 2 (1.64%) Linux
2 2 (1.64%) Ubuntu
3 1 (0.82%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 17 (13.93%) Software Engineering
1 17 (13.93%) Stakeholder Management
2 13 (10.66%) Agile
3 11 (9.02%) Asset Management
3 11 (9.02%) Business Intelligence
3 11 (9.02%) Continuous Improvement
3 11 (9.02%) Problem-Solving
3 11 (9.02%) Roadmaps
4 10 (8.20%) B2B
4 10 (8.20%) CI/CD
4 10 (8.20%) Customer Service
4 10 (8.20%) Cybersecurity
4 10 (8.20%) E-Commerce
4 10 (8.20%) Telesales
5 9 (7.38%) Business Development
5 9 (7.38%) DevOps
5 9 (7.38%) ERP
5 9 (7.38%) Lead Generation
5 9 (7.38%) Mentoring
6 8 (6.56%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 11 (9.02%) Java
2 8 (6.56%) C#
3 6 (4.92%) SQL
4 5 (4.10%) Python
5 4 (3.28%) Ada
5 4 (3.28%) C
5 4 (3.28%) PowerShell
6 2 (1.64%) TypeScript
7 1 (0.82%) Bash
7 1 (0.82%) C++
7 1 (0.82%) JavaScript
7 1 (0.82%) Scala
Qualifications
1 18 (14.75%) Degree
2 7 (5.74%) BPSS Clearance
3 6 (4.92%) HNC
4 4 (3.28%) SC Cleared
4 4 (3.28%) Security Cleared
5 3 (2.46%) CISM
5 3 (2.46%) CISSP
6 2 (1.64%) CCNA
6 2 (1.64%) Cisco Certification
6 2 (1.64%) Microsoft Certification
7 1 (0.82%) ACCA
7 1 (0.82%) AWS Certification
7 1 (0.82%) Chartered Engineer
7 1 (0.82%) HND
7 1 (0.82%) Master's Degree
7 1 (0.82%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 5 (4.10%) SLA
2 3 (2.46%) GDPR
3 2 (1.64%) Accessibility
3 2 (1.64%) Data Quality
3 2 (1.64%) PMO
4 1 (0.82%) Cyber Essentials
4 1 (0.82%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 1 (0.82%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (0.82%) QA
4 1 (0.82%) WCAG
System Software
1 5 (4.10%) VMware Infrastructure
2 3 (2.46%) Docker
3 2 (1.64%) Firmware
4 1 (0.82%) Active Directory
4 1 (0.82%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 5 (4.10%) Cisco CUCM
2 3 (2.46%) Ansible
2 3 (2.46%) Kubernetes
2 3 (2.46%) Microsoft Intune
3 2 (1.64%) Grafana
3 2 (1.64%) Terraform
4 1 (0.82%) Prometheus
4 1 (0.82%) SCCM
Vendors
1 14 (11.48%) Microsoft
2 7 (5.74%) Cisco
3 5 (4.10%) VMware
4 4 (3.28%) Oracle
5 2 (1.64%) Alteryx
6 1 (0.82%) Citrix
6 1 (0.82%) Computacenter
6 1 (0.82%) Databricks
6 1 (0.82%) F5
6 1 (0.82%) Fortinet
6 1 (0.82%) Green Hills
6 1 (0.82%) OpenAI
6 1 (0.82%) Openreach
6 1 (0.82%) ServiceNow
6 1 (0.82%) SolarWinds
6 1 (0.82%) Splunk