Problem-Solving Contract Job Trends in Manchester

Problem Solving
North West > Manchester

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in Manchester requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 3 11
Rank change year-on-year -8 +8 +9
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 181 149 141
As % of all contract jobs in Manchester 10.35% 16.87% 9.94%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 12.33% 18.91% 11.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 96 97 98
10th Percentile £299 £211 £313
25th Percentile £365 £367 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £463 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.70% -7.50% +11.11%
75th Percentile £521 £550 £575
90th Percentile £635 £685 £658
North West median daily rate £425 £490 £493
% change year-on-year -13.27% -0.61% +9.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 2 5
10th Percentile £13.96 £18.23 £30.95
25th Percentile £28.55 £26.45 £57.50
Median hourly rate £51.25 £41.38 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +23.85% -31.03% +221.50%
75th Percentile £108.44 £57.57 £68.88
90th Percentile £178.75 £66.53 £81.55
North West median hourly rate £38.75 £28.75 £11.20
% change year-on-year +34.78% +156.81% -72.42%

All Process & Methodology Skills
Manchester

Problem-Solving falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in Manchester.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,468 788 1,230
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Manchester 83.93% 89.24% 86.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 887 540 841
10th Percentile £306 £300 £319
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £463 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.70% -7.50% -
75th Percentile £575 £552 £588
90th Percentile £650 £667 £694
North West median daily rate £474 £475 £500
% change year-on-year -0.21% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 130 26 78
10th Percentile £21.00 £16.73 £12.47
25th Percentile £35.38 £24.48 £13.66
Median hourly rate £56.25 £60.00 £26.00
Median % change year-on-year -6.25% +130.77% -5.80%
75th Percentile £77.13 £74.69 £60.94
90th Percentile £90.00 £86.63 £73.10
North West median hourly rate £52.78 £30.20 £26.00
% change year-on-year +74.75% +16.15% -25.75%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in Manchester

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Problem-Solving relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Manchester.

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in Manchester

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Trend in Manchester

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Problem-Solving.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Histogram in Manchester

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in Manchester over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Problem-Solving in Manchester

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Trend in Manchester

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Problem-Solving.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Histogram in Manchester

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Problem-Solving in Manchester over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Problem-Solving in Manchester

Problem-Solving
Contract Job Locations in Manchester

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the Manchester region over the 6 months to 27 May 2026. 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
Bolton -2 9 - - 11
Stockport +4 4 £155 -69.00% 7
Salford +2 2 £168 -62.78% 12
Altrincham 0 1 - - 7
Rochdale - 1 - - 6
Problem-Solving
North West

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Manchester 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 11 (6.08%) Confluence
2 3 (1.66%) Adobe Experience Manager
2 3 (1.66%) Apache Spark
3 2 (1.10%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.55%) Apache
4 1 (0.55%) Apache Airflow
4 1 (0.55%) CMS
4 1 (0.55%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.55%) nginx
Applications
1 10 (5.52%) Microsoft Excel
1 10 (5.52%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (2.76%) MS Visio
3 3 (1.66%) Chatbot
4 2 (1.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 3 (1.66%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.55%) Elite 3E
2 1 (0.55%) ResourceLink
2 1 (0.55%) SAP BPC
2 1 (0.55%) SAP ERP
2 1 (0.55%) SAP SCM
Cloud Services
1 30 (16.57%) Azure
2 29 (16.02%) AWS
3 18 (9.94%) Power Platform
4 14 (7.73%) Microsoft 365
5 9 (4.97%) GCP
5 9 (4.97%) GitHub
6 7 (3.87%) Power Automate
7 6 (3.31%) dbt
8 5 (2.76%) Azure Data Factory
8 5 (2.76%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (2.76%) Entra ID
9 4 (2.21%) Azure AKS
9 4 (2.21%) Azure Monitor
9 4 (2.21%) Azure Synapse Analytics
9 4 (2.21%) Google Sheets
9 4 (2.21%) Google Workspace
9 4 (2.21%) Serverless
10 3 (1.66%) Azure Logic Apps
10 3 (1.66%) GitHub Actions
10 3 (1.66%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.21%) Firewall
2 3 (1.66%) Wi-Fi
3 2 (1.10%) DNS
3 2 (1.10%) SAN
3 2 (1.10%) VPN
3 2 (1.10%) Wireless
4 1 (0.55%) BGP
4 1 (0.55%) DHCP
4 1 (0.55%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
4 1 (0.55%) Kerberos
4 1 (0.55%) LAN
4 1 (0.55%) Network Security
4 1 (0.55%) OSPF
4 1 (0.55%) Reverse Proxy
4 1 (0.55%) SSL
4 1 (0.55%) Structured Cabling
4 1 (0.55%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 15 (8.29%) Power BI
2 12 (6.63%) Data Warehouse
2 12 (6.63%) MongoDB
3 9 (4.97%) SQL Server
4 8 (4.42%) NoSQL
4 8 (4.42%) Relational Database
5 6 (3.31%) MySQL
5 6 (3.31%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (2.21%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
6 4 (2.21%) Big Data
6 4 (2.21%) Snowflake Schema
7 3 (1.66%) Data Vault
7 3 (1.66%) DataStage
7 3 (1.66%) Hadoop
7 3 (1.66%) Metadata
7 3 (1.66%) Power Query
8 2 (1.10%) BigQuery
8 2 (1.10%) BusinessObjects
8 2 (1.10%) DB2
8 2 (1.10%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 23 (12.71%) JIRA
2 13 (7.18%) Git
3 7 (3.87%) Mockito
4 6 (3.31%) GitLab
5 5 (2.76%) Selenium
6 4 (2.21%) Jenkins
6 4 (2.21%) Postman
7 3 (1.66%) Gatling
7 3 (1.66%) REST Assured
8 2 (1.10%) Cucumber
8 2 (1.10%) Jasmine
8 2 (1.10%) JMeter
8 2 (1.10%) Serenity BDD
8 2 (1.10%) SoapUI
9 1 (0.55%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.55%) Gradle
9 1 (0.55%) JUnit
9 1 (0.55%) LoadRunner
9 1 (0.55%) Maven
9 1 (0.55%) SonarQube
General
1 80 (44.20%) Social Skills
2 69 (38.12%) Analytical Skills
3 39 (21.55%) Finance
4 23 (12.71%) Public Sector
5 11 (6.08%) Law
5 11 (6.08%) Organisational Skills
6 9 (4.97%) Banking
6 9 (4.97%) Telecoms
7 8 (4.42%) Manufacturing
8 6 (3.31%) Influencing Skills
9 5 (2.76%) Legal
10 4 (2.21%) Retail
11 3 (1.66%) Presentation Skills
12 2 (1.10%) Documentation Skills
12 2 (1.10%) Marketing
13 1 (0.55%) Automotive
13 1 (0.55%) Cantonese Language
13 1 (0.55%) Games
13 1 (0.55%) Mandarin Language
13 1 (0.55%) Military
Job Titles
1 40 (22.10%) Analyst
2 36 (19.89%) Developer
3 23 (12.71%) Senior
4 15 (8.29%) Data Engineer
4 15 (8.29%) Java Developer
5 11 (6.08%) Architect
5 11 (6.08%) Business Analyst
5 11 (6.08%) IT Analyst
5 11 (6.08%) IT Support
5 11 (6.08%) Lead
6 10 (5.52%) Administrator
6 10 (5.52%) Support Analyst
7 9 (4.97%) IT Support Analyst
8 8 (4.42%) Senior Analyst
9 7 (3.87%) Backend Developer
10 6 (3.31%) Full-Stack Developer
10 6 (3.31%) Mobile Developer
10 6 (3.31%) Senior Business Analyst
10 6 (3.31%) Software Engineer
10 6 (3.31%) Technical Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (11.60%) Spring
2 20 (11.05%) Spring Boot
3 16 (8.84%) Kafka
4 13 (7.18%) React
5 10 (5.52%) RESTful
6 9 (4.97%) AngularJS
7 8 (4.42%) HTML
7 8 (4.42%) OAuth
7 8 (4.42%) OAuth2
8 7 (3.87%) ActiveMQ
8 7 (3.87%) CSS
8 7 (3.87%) JAX-RS
9 6 (3.31%) Playwright
10 5 (2.76%) Node.js
10 5 (2.76%) REST
10 5 (2.76%) XML
11 4 (2.21%) ARM Templates
11 4 (2.21%) PySpark
12 3 (1.66%) Jest
12 3 (1.66%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 14 (7.73%) Onboarding
2 11 (6.08%) Product Ownership
3 9 (4.97%) Mobile App
4 6 (3.31%) Data Protection Act
4 6 (3.31%) Management Information System
5 5 (2.76%) AI Agents
5 5 (2.76%) Analytical Mindset
5 5 (2.76%) Cloud Native
5 5 (2.76%) Driving Licence
5 5 (2.76%) Legacy Systems
6 4 (2.21%) Mainframe
6 4 (2.21%) Self-Motivation
7 3 (1.66%) CMDB
7 3 (1.66%) Data Structures
7 3 (1.66%) Greenfield Project
7 3 (1.66%) Public Cloud
8 2 (1.10%) Distributed Systems
8 2 (1.10%) Enterprise Software
8 2 (1.10%) iPad
8 2 (1.10%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 12 (6.63%) Windows
2 11 (6.08%) Linux
3 10 (5.52%) Windows 10
4 9 (4.97%) Unix
5 5 (2.76%) Mac OS X
6 3 (1.66%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.55%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 44 (24.31%) Agile
2 32 (17.68%) Continuous Improvement
2 32 (17.68%) Microservices
3 29 (16.02%) CI/CD
4 28 (15.47%) Test Automation
5 24 (13.26%) Data Modelling
5 24 (13.26%) Stakeholder Management
6 22 (12.15%) Analytics
7 19 (10.50%) DevOps
7 19 (10.50%) ETL
8 18 (9.94%) TDD
9 17 (9.39%) Requirements Gathering
9 17 (9.39%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 16 (8.84%) Business Intelligence
11 15 (8.29%) BDD
11 15 (8.29%) Decision-Making
11 15 (8.29%) ITIL
12 14 (7.73%) Actionable Insight
12 14 (7.73%) Customer Service
12 14 (7.73%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 40 (22.10%) SQL
2 34 (18.78%) Java
3 17 (9.39%) Python
4 12 (6.63%) JavaScript
5 8 (4.42%) Kotlin
5 8 (4.42%) TypeScript
6 6 (3.31%) PowerShell
7 4 (2.21%) T-SQL
8 3 (1.66%) CLIST
8 3 (1.66%) COBOL
8 3 (1.66%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 3 (1.66%) JCL
8 3 (1.66%) PL/SQL
8 3 (1.66%) REXX
8 3 (1.66%) Shell Script
9 2 (1.10%) Bash
9 2 (1.10%) Bicep
9 2 (1.10%) C#
9 2 (1.10%) Go
9 2 (1.10%) VBA
Qualifications
1 23 (12.71%) Degree
2 20 (11.05%) Security Cleared
3 12 (6.63%) Microsoft Certification
4 11 (6.08%) A+ Certification
4 11 (6.08%) BPSS Clearance
4 11 (6.08%) Computer Science Degree
4 11 (6.08%) Network+ Certification
5 6 (3.31%) SC Cleared
6 3 (1.66%) CCNA
6 3 (1.66%) Cisco Certification
7 2 (1.10%) Azure Certification
7 2 (1.10%) CISM
7 2 (1.10%) CISSP
7 2 (1.10%) City & Guilds
7 2 (1.10%) CompTIA Security+
7 2 (1.10%) MCSE
7 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Certified Professional
8 1 (0.55%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.55%) PMP
8 1 (0.55%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 22 (12.15%) Data Quality
2 5 (2.76%) QA
3 4 (2.21%) Accessibility
3 4 (2.21%) GDPR
3 4 (2.21%) PMO
4 2 (1.10%) GRC
5 1 (0.55%) HIPAA
5 1 (0.55%) NIST
5 1 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 1 (0.55%) SLA
5 1 (0.55%) WCAG
System Software
1 15 (8.29%) Active Directory
2 13 (7.18%) Docker
3 3 (1.66%) ACF2
3 3 (1.66%) RACF
3 3 (1.66%) Time Sharing Option
3 3 (1.66%) Virtual Machines
4 2 (1.10%) ISA Server
5 1 (0.55%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 12 (6.63%) Kubernetes
2 9 (4.97%) Terraform
3 5 (2.76%) Grafana
4 4 (2.21%) Prometheus
5 3 (1.66%) CA Endevor
5 3 (1.66%) Tivoli
5 3 (1.66%) Tivoli Storage Manager
6 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Intune
6 2 (1.10%) SCCM
7 1 (0.55%) Ansible
7 1 (0.55%) Istio
Vendors
1 27 (14.92%) Microsoft
2 15 (8.29%) SAP
3 10 (5.52%) Oracle
4 7 (3.87%) Google
4 7 (3.87%) ServiceNow
5 5 (2.76%) Databricks
5 5 (2.76%) DocuSign
5 5 (2.76%) Splunk
6 4 (2.21%) Adobe
6 4 (2.21%) Concur
7 3 (1.66%) Dell
7 3 (1.66%) IBM
8 2 (1.10%) Atlassian
8 2 (1.10%) CA Agile Central
8 2 (1.10%) IFS
8 2 (1.10%) PagerDuty
8 2 (1.10%) Teradata
8 2 (1.10%) Workday
9 1 (0.55%) Netskope
9 1 (0.55%) Optimizely