Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE) formerly Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer
UK

The following table provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies with a requirement for MCSE qualifications. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered over the 6 months to 29 November 2023 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
29 Nov 2023
Same period 2022 Same period 2021
Rank 502 705 608
Rank change year-on-year +203 -97 -198
Permanent jobs citing MCSE 236 405 565
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 0.44% 0.32% 0.44%
As % of the Qualifications category 1.34% 1.09% 1.77%
Number of salaries quoted 169 362 433
10th Percentile £36,250 £24,500 £29,000
25th Percentile £38,125 £31,250 £36,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £42,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +17.65% -15.00% +11.11%
75th Percentile £67,500 £53,750 £58,750
90th Percentile £72,500 £65,000 £68,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £45,000 £40,000 £44,000
% change year-on-year +12.50% -9.09% +3.53%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

MCSE is in the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies with a requirement for academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Permanent vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 17,632 37,186 31,972
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 32.59% 29.55% 24.77%
Number of salaries quoted 10,990 17,220 17,757
10th Percentile £31,250 £31,250 £31,250
25th Percentile £42,000 £41,250 £40,838
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £57,074 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +0.75% +3.77% -
75th Percentile £75,000 £76,250 £72,500
90th Percentile £92,500 £93,750 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £49,500
% change year-on-year +5.00% +1.01% +1.02%

MCSE
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Job vacancy trend for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Salary Trend

3-month moving average salary quoted in jobs citing MCSE.

Salary trend for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing MCSE over the 6 months to 29 November 2023.

Salary histogram for MCSE in the UK

MCSE
Top 16 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing MCSE within the UK over the 6 months to 29 November 2023. 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
England +165 211 £50,000 +17.65% 101
UK excluding London +119 169 £45,000 +12.50% 76
Work from Home +164 86 £47,000 -1.05% 26
South East +107 67 £40,000 +6.67% 22
London +219 55 £65,000 +25.00% 40
South West +76 35 £42,500 -4.23% 8
Midlands +127 34 £53,750 -2.27% 14
West Midlands +133 29 £55,000 - 6
North of England +74 17 £41,500 +3.75% 25
North West +85 9 £38,500 -8.88% 9
Wales +16 8 £35,250 +13.71% 1
Yorkshire +63 7 £44,000 +58.56% 14
Scotland +54 6 £49,990 +73.88% 4
East Midlands +32 5 £52,500 -12.50% 8
East of England +84 2 £46,000 +2.22% 2
North East +39 1 £50,000 +90.48% 2

MCSE
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 37 (15.68%) SharePoint
2 31 (13.14%) MS Exchange
3 15 (6.36%) Apache
3 15 (6.36%) IIS
4 9 (3.81%) WebSphere
5 3 (1.27%) Exchange Server 2010
6 2 (0.85%) Exchange Server 2013
6 2 (0.85%) SharePoint 2010
6 2 (0.85%) SharePoint 2013
6 2 (0.85%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 8 (3.39%) AutoCAD
1 8 (3.39%) PTC Creo
1 8 (3.39%) SOLIDWORKS
2 5 (2.12%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 6 (2.54%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.42%) Fidessa
Cloud Services
1 114 (48.31%) Azure
2 113 (47.88%) Microsoft 365
3 43 (18.22%) Entra ID
4 31 (13.14%) AWS
5 20 (8.47%) Power Platform
6 19 (8.05%) Nutanix
7 18 (7.63%) IaaS
8 15 (6.36%) PaaS
9 13 (5.51%) Azure DevOps
9 13 (5.51%) Power Automate
9 13 (5.51%) PowerApps
10 12 (5.08%) GCP
11 11 (4.66%) Dynamics 365
11 11 (4.66%) OneDrive
12 9 (3.81%) WhatsApp
13 8 (3.39%) Rubrik
14 7 (2.97%) SaaS
15 5 (2.12%) Azure Storage
16 2 (0.85%) Amazon EKS
16 2 (0.85%) Azure Cosmos DB
Communications & Networking
1 76 (32.20%) Firewall
2 51 (21.61%) SAN
3 50 (21.19%) DNS
4 41 (17.37%) WAN
5 39 (16.53%) DHCP
6 34 (14.41%) VPN
7 33 (13.98%) VLAN
8 28 (11.86%) LAN
9 24 (10.17%) Wi-Fi
10 16 (6.78%) Wireless
11 15 (6.36%) SD-WAN
11 15 (6.36%) TCP/IP
12 14 (5.93%) Cisco ASA
12 14 (5.93%) NAS
13 12 (5.08%) Fibre Channel
14 11 (4.66%) iSCSI
14 11 (4.66%) WLAN
15 8 (3.39%) Remote Desktop
16 7 (2.97%) Network Security
17 6 (2.54%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 31 (13.14%) SQL Server
2 9 (3.81%) MySQL
2 9 (3.81%) SAP HANA
3 8 (3.39%) Power BI
4 7 (2.97%) Metadata
5 6 (2.54%) SQL Server Analysis Services
5 6 (2.54%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 6 (2.54%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 5 (2.12%) Data Warehouse
6 5 (2.12%) Relational Database
6 5 (2.12%) Tableau
7 4 (1.69%) RDBMS
8 3 (1.27%) MongoDB
9 2 (0.85%) Apache Cassandra
9 2 (0.85%) OLTP
10 1 (0.42%) Amazon RDS
10 1 (0.42%) Microsoft Analysis Services
10 1 (0.42%) Oracle Database
10 1 (0.42%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 10 (4.24%) Jenkins
2 9 (3.81%) Chocolatey
2 9 (3.81%) Git
3 2 (0.85%) JIRA
3 2 (0.85%) MSBuild
4 1 (0.42%) MSI
General
1 114 (48.31%) Social Skills
2 35 (14.83%) Manufacturing
3 24 (10.17%) Finance
3 24 (10.17%) Public Sector
4 19 (8.05%) Analytical Skills
5 15 (6.36%) Legal
6 13 (5.51%) Billing
7 12 (5.08%) Organisational Skills
8 10 (4.24%) Law
8 10 (4.24%) Telecoms
9 9 (3.81%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 4 (1.69%) Retail
11 3 (1.27%) Banking
12 2 (0.85%) Military
12 2 (0.85%) Presentation Skills
13 1 (0.42%) Pharmaceutical
13 1 (0.42%) Private Banking
13 1 (0.42%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 57 (24.15%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 38 (16.10%) Analyst
3 31 (13.14%) Support Engineer
4 25 (10.59%) Architect
5 21 (8.90%) Senior
6 19 (8.05%) Infrastructure Architect
7 17 (7.20%) IT Engineer
8 15 (6.36%) 3rd Line Engineer
8 15 (6.36%) IT Support
9 14 (5.93%) IT Analyst
9 14 (5.93%) Server Engineer
10 11 (4.66%) Automation Engineer
10 11 (4.66%) Network Engineer
11 10 (4.24%) Consultant
11 10 (4.24%) Lead
11 10 (4.24%) Network Support
11 10 (4.24%) Network Support Engineer
12 9 (3.81%) 3rd Line Infrastructure Engineer
12 9 (3.81%) Infrastructure Support
12 9 (3.81%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (3.81%) Elastic Stack
1 9 (3.81%) XML
1 9 (3.81%) YAML
2 6 (2.54%) Apache NiFi
2 6 (2.54%) Kafka
3 5 (2.12%) .NET
4 3 (1.27%) ARM Templates
5 2 (0.85%) ASP.NET
5 2 (0.85%) Middleware
6 1 (0.42%) .NET Framework
6 1 (0.42%) FIX Protocol
6 1 (0.42%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 42 (17.80%) Data Centre
2 26 (11.02%) Public Cloud
3 21 (8.90%) Management Information System
4 16 (6.78%) Replication
4 16 (6.78%) Self-Motivation
5 15 (6.36%) Client/Server
6 10 (4.24%) Driving Licence
7 9 (3.81%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (3.81%) Onboarding
8 8 (3.39%) Operational Technology
9 6 (2.54%) Video Conferencing
10 5 (2.12%) Product Ownership
11 3 (1.27%) Clustering
11 3 (1.27%) Hybrid Cloud
11 3 (1.27%) Security Posture
12 2 (0.85%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
12 2 (0.85%) HP Storage
12 2 (0.85%) Smartphone
13 1 (0.42%) Data Protection Act
13 1 (0.42%) Enterprise Storage
Operating Systems
1 164 (69.49%) Windows
2 98 (41.53%) Windows Server
3 68 (28.81%) Linux
4 40 (16.95%) Windows Server 2012
5 35 (14.83%) Android
6 21 (8.90%) Windows Server 2019
7 14 (5.93%) Ubuntu
7 14 (5.93%) Windows 10
8 13 (5.51%) SUSE
8 13 (5.51%) Windows Server 2016
9 7 (2.97%) Windows Server 2008
10 6 (2.54%) Unix
10 6 (2.54%) Windows Server 2003
11 3 (1.27%) VMS
12 2 (0.85%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 2 (0.85%) Windows 7
12 2 (0.85%) Windows 8
13 1 (0.42%) Mac OS X
13 1 (0.42%) Solaris
13 1 (0.42%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 64 (27.12%) Infrastructure Engineering
1 64 (27.12%) ITIL
2 40 (16.95%) Problem-Solving
3 36 (15.25%) Mathematics
4 35 (14.83%) Mentoring
5 29 (12.29%) Customer Service
6 27 (11.44%) Migration
6 27 (11.44%) Project Delivery
7 22 (9.32%) Continuous Improvement
8 19 (8.05%) Agile
8 19 (8.05%) Virtual Infrastructure
9 18 (7.63%) DevOps
9 18 (7.63%) Disaster Recovery
10 17 (7.20%) Computer Science
10 17 (7.20%) Presales
10 17 (7.20%) Project Management
10 17 (7.20%) TOGAF
11 16 (6.78%) Budget Management
11 16 (6.78%) Enterprise Architecture
11 16 (6.78%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 58 (24.58%) PowerShell
2 44 (18.64%) SQL
3 13 (5.51%) Bash
4 8 (3.39%) MATLAB
5 7 (2.97%) Python
6 3 (1.27%) C#
6 3 (1.27%) T-SQL
7 2 (0.85%) PHP
7 2 (0.85%) Shell Script
7 2 (0.85%) VBScript
8 1 (0.42%) VB.NET
Qualifications
1 236 (100.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 80 (33.90%) MCSA
3 58 (24.58%) Degree
4 56 (23.73%) Cisco Certification
5 54 (22.88%) CCNA
6 53 (22.46%) MCP
7 38 (16.10%) Security Cleared
8 34 (14.41%) CCNP
8 34 (14.41%) Linux+ Certification
9 32 (13.56%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 25 (10.59%) SC Cleared
11 15 (6.36%) TOGAF Certification
12 13 (5.51%) Azure Certification
13 12 (5.08%) Computer Science Degree
13 12 (5.08%) DV Cleared
14 11 (4.66%) AWS Certification
14 11 (4.66%) ITIL Certification
15 10 (4.24%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 9 (3.81%) DBS Check
17 8 (3.39%) MCITP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (7.20%) Cyber Essentials
2 14 (5.93%) SLA
3 10 (4.24%) GDPR
4 2 (0.85%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 2 (0.85%) NIST
4 2 (0.85%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.42%) Data Quality
5 1 (0.42%) GxP
5 1 (0.42%) NCSC
5 1 (0.42%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 128 (54.24%) Active Directory
2 76 (32.20%) VMware Infrastructure
3 31 (13.14%) vSphere
4 25 (10.59%) Hyper-V
5 13 (5.51%) vCloud
6 11 (4.66%) VMware ESXi
7 10 (4.24%) Firmware
8 9 (3.81%) Terminal Server
9 8 (3.39%) Docker
10 6 (2.54%) VMware NSX
11 5 (2.12%) Virtual Servers
12 4 (1.69%) XenApp
13 3 (1.27%) Virtual Machines
13 3 (1.27%) XenDesktop
14 1 (0.42%) BitLocker
14 1 (0.42%) Microsoft App-V
14 1 (0.42%) Microsoft Virtual Server
14 1 (0.42%) Terminal Services
14 1 (0.42%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 33 (13.98%) SCCM
2 30 (12.71%) Microsoft Intune
3 24 (10.17%) Terraform
4 23 (9.75%) Ansible
5 16 (6.78%) FortiGate
5 16 (6.78%) SCOM
6 10 (4.24%) WSUS
7 9 (3.81%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 8 (3.39%) Kubernetes
9 6 (2.54%) Consul
10 4 (1.69%) vCenter Server
11 3 (1.27%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
12 2 (0.85%) Backup Exec
12 2 (0.85%) Demisto
12 2 (0.85%) Failover Clustering
12 2 (0.85%) Prometheus
12 2 (0.85%) vRealize
13 1 (0.42%) PowerCLI
13 1 (0.42%) vRealize Orchestrator
13 1 (0.42%) VxRail
Vendors
1 199 (84.32%) Microsoft
2 91 (38.56%) VMware
3 34 (14.41%) Apple
4 33 (13.98%) Cisco
5 31 (13.14%) HP
6 24 (10.17%) Veeam
7 18 (7.63%) Citrix
8 17 (7.20%) Dell
9 15 (6.36%) Meraki
10 13 (5.51%) CheckPoint
10 13 (5.51%) Fujitsu
10 13 (5.51%) Oracle
11 11 (4.66%) Google
11 11 (4.66%) IBM
11 11 (4.66%) Red Hat
12 9 (3.81%) SAP
12 9 (3.81%) TOWER Software
13 8 (3.39%) Avaya
13 8 (3.39%) MathWorks
13 8 (3.39%) PTC