Interim managers hired for change and transformation projects within IT are commanding some of the highest pay rates in the UK, research shows.
IT managers are the most in demand to assist with change management, restructuring and turnaround projects in UK firms. On average, temporary IT employees are paid £754 a day on average, just behind financial services (£804) and energy roles (£945).
The need for temporary IT staff rose by almost half in the last six months, according to a survey conducted by Russam GMS of 17,000 interims across all professions in the past six months.
Jason Atkinson, Managing Director, Russam GMS said: “Interims in the IT field are very much in demand – particularly those with expertise in big data projects and digital specialists. As such, they can command some of the highest daily rates in the market.
“Technology is core to virtually every aspect of business and is underpinning change and growth. Increasingly, firms are using interims to steer them through changes and to help them gain strategic advantage and growth, through the launch of new products and services.
“The appeal of interims lies in their immediacy, experience and flexibility - they offer a low risk, affordable and high value way of delivering change and transformation.”
Generally, those working in central England receive higher rates than their London and Southern peers – a difference of £37 a day on average.
Workers in their fifties are getting the most work, followed by those in their sixties and forties.
Many of the respondents consider themselves ‘career interims’, with 35% stating they wouldn’t take a permanent job and 20% stating they would take a permanent job, only if it was tempting enough.
Few temp employees in their twenties or thirties were working on assignment.
Which skills do they need?
Big data skills including Hadoop, MongoDB and FLUME are most in demand for firms in the UK - and come with the highest salary for fulltime employees thanks to businesses’ increasing desire to predict what their customers want.
Big data roles advertised in the first three months of this year promised a UK-wide average of £59,899 rising to £62,853 for full time, London-based roles.
IT security roles offered the second highest salary at £55,797 on average (£58,049 in London) followed by cloud at £53,712, mobile at £48,900 and web development at £41,598.