User Stories Contracts

User Story
UK

The following table provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for User Stories skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that have cited User Stories over the 6 months to 18 May 2024 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
18 May 2024
Same period 2023 Same period 2022
Rank 138 117 87
Rank change year-on-year -21 -30 +15
Contract jobs citing User Stories 704 1,259 2,547
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 1.65% 2.21% 2.91%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.92% 2.46% 3.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 487 879 1,785
10th Percentile £363 £400 £400
25th Percentile £425 £450 £431
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £505
Median % change year-on-year - +3.96% +6.32%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £588
90th Percentile £638 £650 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £500 £475
% change year-on-year -2.00% +5.26% +7.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 7 11
10th Percentile £31.71 £47.50 £35.00
25th Percentile £32.03 £62.00 -
Median hourly rate £42.75 £65.00 £42.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.23% +54.76% -16.00%
75th Percentile £62.94 £68.00 £53.38
90th Percentile £69.25 £74.00 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.00 £26.50 £42.00
% change year-on-year +164.15% -36.90% +9.80%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

User Stories is in the Processes and Methodologies category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 36,673 51,121 79,325
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 86.13% 89.77% 90.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,631 35,432 55,673
10th Percentile £300 £325 £344
25th Percentile £413 £438 £430
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £530
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +3.77% +7.07%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £638
90th Percentile £750 £750 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £480
% change year-on-year - +4.17% +9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,440 1,683 1,892
10th Percentile £12.75 £10.63 £12.50
25th Percentile £15.99 £16.01 £15.50
Median hourly rate £36.05 £36.00 £25.68
Median % change year-on-year +0.13% +40.19% +7.00%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.00 £49.54
90th Percentile £72.50 £75.00 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.50 £35.00 £20.00
% change year-on-year +7.14% +75.00% -4.99%

User Stories
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Job vacancy trend for User Stories in the UK

User Stories
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing User Stories.

Daily rate trend for User Stories in the UK

User Stories
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing User Stories over the 6 months to 18 May 2024.

Daily rate histogram for User Stories in the UK

User Stories
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing User Stories.

Hourly rate trend for User Stories in the UK

User Stories
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing User Stories over the 6 months to 18 May 2024.

Hourly rate histogram for User Stories in the UK

User Stories
Top 15 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing User Stories within the UK over the 6 months to 18 May 2024. 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 -32 573 £538 +2.38% 264
London -4 350 £550 +4.76% 131
Work from Home +1 319 £511 -1.73% 125
UK excluding London -38 276 £490 -2.00% 154
Scotland +20 70 £500 +14.29% 8
North of England -21 70 £500 -6.98% 33
South East -20 67 £475 - 48
Yorkshire +13 45 £490 -10.91% 13
Midlands -11 35 £475 - 29
South West -43 26 £595 +8.14% 25
West Midlands -8 24 £488 -2.50% 27
North West -28 23 £538 +2.38% 14
East of England -17 9 £425 -5.56% 6
East Midlands +4 8 £425 -12.82% 2
North East -2 2 - - 6

User Stories
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 66 (9.38%) Confluence
2 29 (4.12%) SharePoint
3 16 (2.27%) CMS
4 7 (0.99%) Drupal
5 6 (0.85%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 5 (0.71%) Oracle Workflow
7 4 (0.57%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.43%) ArcGIS
9 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Exchange
9 2 (0.28%) SAS
10 1 (0.14%) Apache
10 1 (0.14%) Appian
10 1 (0.14%) BizTalk Server
10 1 (0.14%) Camunda
10 1 (0.14%) Joomla!
10 1 (0.14%) Moodle
10 1 (0.14%) Sitecore CMS
10 1 (0.14%) WordPress
Applications
1 20 (2.84%) Microsoft Office
2 19 (2.70%) MS Visio
3 16 (2.27%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (2.27%) Sketch
4 10 (1.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.71%) Adobe XD
5 5 (0.71%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.57%) InVision
6 4 (0.57%) Trello
7 2 (0.28%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.28%) Zeplin
8 1 (0.14%) OmniGraffle
Business Applications
1 22 (3.13%) Dynamics CRM
2 14 (1.99%) SAP S/4HANA
3 7 (0.99%) SAP PM
4 6 (0.85%) Shopify
5 5 (0.71%) SAP Hybris
5 5 (0.71%) SimCorp Dimension
6 4 (0.57%) SAP QM
7 3 (0.43%) Salesforce CRM
8 2 (0.28%) Magento
8 2 (0.28%) VisionPLUS
9 1 (0.14%) Dynamics AX
9 1 (0.14%) Endur
9 1 (0.14%) Loan IQ
9 1 (0.14%) Oracle ERP
9 1 (0.14%) SAP CO
9 1 (0.14%) SAP ERP
9 1 (0.14%) SAP FI
9 1 (0.14%) SAP FI/CO
9 1 (0.14%) SAP LE
9 1 (0.14%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 148 (21.02%) Azure
2 63 (8.95%) Azure DevOps
2 63 (8.95%) Power Platform
3 47 (6.68%) Dynamics 365
4 32 (4.55%) AWS
5 21 (2.98%) SaaS
6 20 (2.84%) Figma
7 19 (2.70%) Power Automate
8 14 (1.99%) Microsoft 365
9 11 (1.56%) Azure Service Bus
10 10 (1.42%) PowerApps
11 9 (1.28%) Miro
12 8 (1.14%) Serverless
13 7 (0.99%) Azure Data Factory
13 7 (0.99%) SAP Commerce Cloud
14 6 (0.85%) PaaS
14 6 (0.85%) Snowflake
15 5 (0.71%) GCP
15 5 (0.71%) Lucidchart
15 5 (0.71%) Salesforce Commerce Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 7 (0.99%) Radio Access Network
2 6 (0.85%) DNS
3 4 (0.57%) DHCP
3 4 (0.57%) Firewall
3 4 (0.57%) Wi-Fi
4 3 (0.43%) Internet
5 2 (0.28%) SNA
5 2 (0.28%) Unified Communications
6 1 (0.14%) Broadband
6 1 (0.14%) FTP
6 1 (0.14%) HTTP
6 1 (0.14%) LAN
6 1 (0.14%) Network Security
6 1 (0.14%) SMS
6 1 (0.14%) VPN
6 1 (0.14%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 46 (6.53%) Power BI
2 15 (2.13%) Data Warehouse
3 14 (1.99%) Data Lake
4 12 (1.70%) MongoDB
5 11 (1.56%) NoSQL
6 9 (1.28%) SQL Server
7 7 (0.99%) BusinessObjects
7 7 (0.99%) Tableau
8 6 (0.85%) Oracle Database
9 5 (0.71%) BigQuery
9 5 (0.71%) PostgreSQL
9 5 (0.71%) SAP HANA
9 5 (0.71%) Siebel EIM
10 4 (0.57%) Amazon RDS
10 4 (0.57%) Azure SQL Database
10 4 (0.57%) GIS
10 4 (0.57%) Relational Database
11 3 (0.43%) Data Mining
11 3 (0.43%) Geospatial Data
11 3 (0.43%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 119 (16.90%) JIRA
2 20 (2.84%) Git
3 17 (2.41%) Selenium
3 17 (2.41%) SoapUI
4 16 (2.27%) Postman
5 15 (2.13%) Cucumber
6 14 (1.99%) JUnit
7 12 (1.70%) JMeter
8 11 (1.56%) REST Assured
9 9 (1.28%) Appium
9 9 (1.28%) eggPlant
9 9 (1.28%) SOAtest
9 9 (1.28%) TestNG
9 9 (1.28%) WebDriver
10 7 (0.99%) Eclipse
11 5 (0.71%) GitLab
12 2 (0.28%) Axure RP
12 2 (0.28%) Jenkins
12 2 (0.28%) SpecFlow
12 2 (0.28%) TestRail
General
1 224 (31.82%) Social Skills
2 158 (22.44%) Finance
3 94 (13.35%) Public Sector
4 86 (12.22%) Analytical Skills
5 34 (4.83%) Banking
6 33 (4.69%) Telecoms
7 31 (4.40%) Marketing
8 25 (3.55%) Retail
9 23 (3.27%) Back Office
9 23 (3.27%) Influencing Skills
10 22 (3.13%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 18 (2.56%) Presentation Skills
12 12 (1.70%) Manufacturing
13 9 (1.28%) Organisational Skills
14 8 (1.14%) Publishing
15 7 (0.99%) Local Government
16 6 (0.85%) Billing
16 6 (0.85%) Corporate Banking
16 6 (0.85%) Documentation Skills
16 6 (0.85%) Games
Job Titles
1 325 (46.16%) Analyst
2 274 (38.92%) Business Analyst
3 86 (12.22%) Senior
4 65 (9.23%) Product Owner
5 50 (7.10%) Technical Analyst
6 45 (6.39%) Developer
7 43 (6.11%) Senior Analyst
8 40 (5.68%) Consultant
9 36 (5.11%) Designer
10 35 (4.97%) Product Manager
10 35 (4.97%) Senior Business Analyst
11 33 (4.69%) Technical Business Analyst
12 28 (3.98%) Lead
13 24 (3.41%) Project Manager
14 23 (3.27%) Agile Business Analyst
15 22 (3.13%) Financial Analyst
16 21 (2.98%) Architect
16 21 (2.98%) Data Analyst
17 20 (2.84%) Data Business Analyst
18 19 (2.70%) Finance Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.69%) .NET
2 23 (3.27%) React
3 20 (2.84%) HTML
4 17 (2.41%) .NET Framework
4 17 (2.41%) CSS
5 16 (2.27%) REST
6 14 (1.99%) Web Services
6 14 (1.99%) XML
7 11 (1.56%) SOAP
8 10 (1.42%) Gherkin
9 9 (1.28%) ASP.NET
10 8 (1.14%) ADO
11 7 (0.99%) AngularJS
11 7 (0.99%) ASP.NET Core
11 7 (0.99%) Flask
11 7 (0.99%) JSON
11 7 (0.99%) LDAP
11 7 (0.99%) Node.js
12 6 (0.85%) RESTful
12 6 (0.85%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 186 (26.42%) Product Ownership
2 21 (2.98%) Mobile App
3 15 (2.13%) Management Information System
4 10 (1.42%) Self-Motivation
5 8 (1.14%) CMDB
5 8 (1.14%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
6 7 (0.99%) Data Protection Act
7 6 (0.85%) Algorithms
7 6 (0.85%) Data Centre
7 6 (0.85%) Onboarding
7 6 (0.85%) Reinsurance
7 6 (0.85%) Smart Meter
8 5 (0.71%) Cloud Native
8 5 (0.71%) Data Structures
8 5 (0.71%) Greenfield Project
8 5 (0.71%) Hybrid Cloud
8 5 (0.71%) Legacy Systems
8 5 (0.71%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 4 (0.57%) Analytical Mindset
9 4 (0.57%) Client/Server
Operating Systems
1 12 (1.70%) Apple iOS
2 11 (1.56%) Android
3 10 (1.42%) Linux
3 10 (1.42%) Windows
4 4 (0.57%) Unix
5 2 (0.28%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 427 (60.65%) Agile
2 214 (30.40%) Acceptance Criteria
3 181 (25.71%) Scrum
4 150 (21.31%) Business Analysis
5 130 (18.47%) Requirements Gathering
6 120 (17.05%) DevOps
7 117 (16.62%) Epics
8 116 (16.48%) Problem-Solving
9 94 (13.35%) Roadmaps
10 93 (13.21%) User Acceptance Testing
11 85 (12.07%) Product Backlog
11 85 (12.07%) Stakeholder Management
12 73 (10.37%) Workshop Facilitation
13 69 (9.80%) Test Automation
14 68 (9.66%) Project Management
15 66 (9.38%) Migration
15 66 (9.38%) User Experience
16 65 (9.23%) User Research
17 63 (8.95%) Use Case
18 62 (8.81%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 64 (9.09%) SQL
2 37 (5.26%) Python
3 31 (4.40%) Java
4 24 (3.41%) C#
4 24 (3.41%) JavaScript
5 10 (1.42%) PowerShell
6 7 (0.99%) TypeScript
7 4 (0.57%) C
7 4 (0.57%) Go
7 4 (0.57%) T-SQL
8 3 (0.43%) VBA
9 2 (0.28%) Bicep
9 2 (0.28%) Ruby
10 1 (0.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 1 (0.14%) Objective-C
10 1 (0.14%) PL/SQL
10 1 (0.14%) R
10 1 (0.14%) Swift
Qualifications
1 92 (13.07%) Security Cleared
2 81 (11.51%) SC Cleared
3 62 (8.81%) Degree
4 10 (1.42%) DV Cleared
4 10 (1.42%) Master's Degree
5 9 (1.28%) CBAP
6 8 (1.14%) Computer Science Degree
6 8 (1.14%) CSPO
7 7 (0.99%) BPSS Clearance
8 6 (0.85%) PMI Certification
9 5 (0.71%) ITIL Certification
9 5 (0.71%) PMP
10 4 (0.57%) MBA
11 3 (0.43%) Microsoft Certification
12 2 (0.28%) APMP
12 2 (0.28%) IIBA
12 2 (0.28%) ISTQB
12 2 (0.28%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
12 2 (0.28%) SAP Certification
13 1 (0.14%) CITP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 86 (12.22%) QA
2 32 (4.55%) Data Quality
3 28 (3.98%) Accessibility
4 18 (2.56%) PCI DSS
5 13 (1.85%) WCAG
6 10 (1.42%) GDPR
7 7 (0.99%) PMO
8 5 (0.71%) GxP
8 5 (0.71%) ISO 20022
9 4 (0.57%) Disclosure Scotland
9 4 (0.57%) SLA
10 3 (0.43%) IFRS
10 3 (0.43%) IFRS 17
10 3 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (0.43%) Solvency II
11 2 (0.28%) PSD2
11 2 (0.28%) Software Quality Assurance
12 1 (0.14%) Basel III
12 1 (0.14%) GRC
12 1 (0.14%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 4 (0.57%) Docker
2 1 (0.14%) Active Directory
2 1 (0.14%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 9 (1.28%) Kubernetes
2 3 (0.43%) Single Sign-On
3 2 (0.28%) HP Quality Center
3 2 (0.28%) Terraform
4 1 (0.14%) Matomo
Vendors
1 76 (10.80%) Microsoft
2 43 (6.11%) SAP
3 26 (3.69%) Salesforce
4 19 (2.70%) Oracle
5 18 (2.56%) ServiceNow
6 16 (2.27%) Adobe
7 9 (1.28%) Atlassian
8 8 (1.14%) Guidewire
9 6 (0.85%) CA Agile Central
9 6 (0.85%) Cadence
9 6 (0.85%) Sitecore
10 5 (0.71%) CyberSource
10 5 (0.71%) Databricks
10 5 (0.71%) Siebel
10 5 (0.71%) SimCorp
11 4 (0.57%) ESRI
11 4 (0.57%) Google
11 4 (0.57%) Hotjar
11 4 (0.57%) Optimizely
11 4 (0.57%) Screaming Frog