Exploring the UK's tech skills and entrepreneurship
We’ve conducted a thorough review of the UK’s skills and hiring trends, taking into account desirable skills that companies now look for, to suit current vacancies. Training and development opportunities are also evaluated, with a view towards closing the digital skills gap.
26 February 2025
Our Exploring the UK’s tech skills and entrepreneurship report, has been published in partnership with Beauhurst and is funded by the UK Government. This report provides a detailed view of trends within workforce skills and hiring, as well as a regional breakdown of salary ranges, actively hiring companies, and much more.
Within the UK tech sector, flexible work arrangements have remained prominent, with 37% of roles offering flexible options throughout 2024, an increase of 4.27% across the industry since 2020. These shifts are in support of work-life balance and overall inclusivity, which are crucial towards attracting and retaining talent.
Demand for technical expertise, inclusive of programming languages such as SQL, Java, AWS and Python have surged, particularly post-pandemic. This has created an environment where currently 27% of workers report insufficient skills for their roles. The UK Government has launched various skills development initiatives, inclusive of government funded Skills Bootcamps and training programmes run by the likes of Microsoft and Google, to help boost worker efficiency. These interventions have been made to ensure that the UK maintains its status as a global leader in innovation, as well as to strengthen the nation’s economic future and to enhance prospects regarding diversity and entrepreneurship.
A survey we conducted between January and February 2025 in collaboration with Beauhurst, found that 54.7% of the 3,000 tech sector employees surveyed, felt that the skills gap presented the biggest development opportunity for the UK tech industry. Cost of talent came in second (51.1%) and employee expectations from companies (44.7%), came in as the third largest opportunity area.
Collaboration with universities and wider educational establishments proved highly prominent when identifying skilled employees, with 71.9% of survey respondents agreeing that higher education establishments have played a role in sourcing suitable talent within their industries. Additionally, outside of London, tech clusters such as Manchester and Edinburgh are growing, largely because of talent pipelines produced by universities.
Between 2023 – 2024, London remained home to the largest proportion of actively hiring tech companies (44.6%) as well as the largest median salary per employee, at £66,712, up by 1.62% from 2023. However, in a year where median wages across tech companies rose in eight out of 12 national regions, Northern Ireland saw the greatest increment – growing by 15.9%, up to £50,071.
Barclays (including its employees, Directors and agents) accepts no responsibility and shall have no liability in contract, tort or otherwise to any person in connection with this content or the use of or reliance on any information or data set out in this content unless it expressly agrees otherwise in writing. It does not constitute an offer to sell or buy any security, investment, financial product or service and does not constitute investment, professional, legal or tax advice, or a recommendation with respect to any securities or financial instruments.
The information, statements and opinions contained in this content are of a general nature only and do not take into account your individual circumstances including any laws, policies, procedures or practices you, or your employer or businesses may have or be subject to. Although the statements of fact on this page have been obtained from and are based upon sources that Barclays believes to be reliable, Barclays does not guarantee their accuracy or completeness.
Topic
Related tags