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 3 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 18 4 13
Rank change year-on-year -14 +9 +8
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 166 148 141
As % of all contract jobs in Manchester 9.50% 16.48% 9.76%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.34% 18.57% 11.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 89 97 98
10th Percentile £296 £248 £313
25th Percentile £366 £375 £366
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £463 £488
Median % change year-on-year -2.70% -5.13% +2.63%
75th Percentile £525 £545 £575
90th Percentile £642 £685 £656
North West median daily rate £425 £489 £488
% change year-on-year -13.09% +0.31% +1.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 3 5
10th Percentile £13.96 £23.71 £30.95
25th Percentile £28.55 £40.13 £57.50
Median hourly rate £51.25 £70.00 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -26.79% +16.67% +221.50%
75th Percentile £108.44 £71.25 £68.88
90th Percentile £178.75 £72.00 £81.55
North West median hourly rate £38.75 £28.75 £11.20
% change year-on-year +34.78% +156.81% -67.12%

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 1,464 797 1,249
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Manchester 83.75% 88.75% 86.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 875 545 845
10th Percentile £302 £312 £325
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £455 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.40% -9.00% -
75th Percentile £575 £550 £588
90th Percentile £650 £665 £694
North West median daily rate £475 £474 £500
% change year-on-year +0.26% -5.25% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 133 26 79
10th Percentile £21.33 £14.16 £12.48
25th Percentile £37.50 £26.61 £13.81
Median hourly rate £57.50 £60.00 £26.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.17% +130.77% +4.00%
75th Percentile £77.50 £74.69 £60.63
90th Percentile £89.50 £86.63 £72.90
North West median hourly rate £55.00 £31.88 £26.66
% change year-on-year +72.52% +19.58% -23.83%

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 3 June 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 3 June 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 3 June 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 -1 9 - - 15
Stockport +4 4 £155 -69.00% 9
Salford +4 2 £168 -73.20% 8
Altrincham 0 1 - - 10
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 (6.63%) Confluence
2 3 (1.81%) Apache Spark
3 2 (1.20%) Adobe Experience Manager
3 2 (1.20%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.60%) CMS
4 1 (0.60%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.60%) nginx
Applications
1 10 (6.02%) Microsoft Excel
1 10 (6.02%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (3.01%) MS Visio
3 3 (1.81%) Chatbot
4 2 (1.20%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (1.20%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.60%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 3 (1.81%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.60%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.60%) Elite 3E
2 1 (0.60%) ResourceLink
2 1 (0.60%) SAP BPC
2 1 (0.60%) SAP ERP
2 1 (0.60%) SAP SCM
Cloud Services
1 29 (17.47%) Azure
2 21 (12.65%) AWS
3 17 (10.24%) Power Platform
4 14 (8.43%) Microsoft 365
5 9 (5.42%) GitHub
6 7 (4.22%) GCP
7 6 (3.61%) Power Automate
8 5 (3.01%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (3.01%) dbt
8 5 (3.01%) Entra ID
9 4 (2.41%) Azure AKS
9 4 (2.41%) Azure Data Factory
9 4 (2.41%) Azure Monitor
9 4 (2.41%) Google Sheets
9 4 (2.41%) Google Workspace
10 3 (1.81%) Azure Logic Apps
10 3 (1.81%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 3 (1.81%) GitHub Actions
10 3 (1.81%) SaaS
10 3 (1.81%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.41%) Firewall
2 3 (1.81%) Wi-Fi
3 2 (1.20%) DNS
3 2 (1.20%) VPN
3 2 (1.20%) Wireless
4 1 (0.60%) BGP
4 1 (0.60%) DHCP
4 1 (0.60%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
4 1 (0.60%) Kerberos
4 1 (0.60%) LAN
4 1 (0.60%) Network Security
4 1 (0.60%) OSPF
4 1 (0.60%) Reverse Proxy
4 1 (0.60%) SAN
4 1 (0.60%) SSL
4 1 (0.60%) Structured Cabling
4 1 (0.60%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (8.43%) Power BI
2 12 (7.23%) MongoDB
3 11 (6.63%) Data Warehouse
3 11 (6.63%) SQL Server
4 8 (4.82%) Relational Database
5 6 (3.61%) MySQL
5 6 (3.61%) NoSQL
5 6 (3.61%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (2.41%) Big Data
7 3 (1.81%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
7 3 (1.81%) Data Vault
7 3 (1.81%) DataStage
7 3 (1.81%) Hadoop
7 3 (1.81%) Metadata
7 3 (1.81%) Power Query
7 3 (1.81%) Snowflake Schema
8 2 (1.20%) BusinessObjects
8 2 (1.20%) DB2
8 2 (1.20%) Oracle Database
8 2 (1.20%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 23 (13.86%) JIRA
2 13 (7.83%) Git
3 7 (4.22%) Mockito
4 6 (3.61%) GitLab
5 5 (3.01%) Selenium
6 4 (2.41%) Jenkins
6 4 (2.41%) Postman
7 3 (1.81%) Gatling
7 3 (1.81%) REST Assured
8 2 (1.20%) Cucumber
8 2 (1.20%) JMeter
8 2 (1.20%) Serenity BDD
8 2 (1.20%) SoapUI
9 1 (0.60%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.60%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.60%) Gradle
9 1 (0.60%) Jasmine
9 1 (0.60%) JUnit
9 1 (0.60%) LoadRunner
9 1 (0.60%) Maven
General
1 79 (47.59%) Social Skills
2 65 (39.16%) Analytical Skills
3 35 (21.08%) Finance
4 20 (12.05%) Public Sector
5 11 (6.63%) Banking
5 11 (6.63%) Organisational Skills
6 10 (6.02%) Law
7 9 (5.42%) Telecoms
8 8 (4.82%) Manufacturing
9 6 (3.61%) Influencing Skills
10 5 (3.01%) Legal
11 4 (2.41%) Retail
12 3 (1.81%) Presentation Skills
13 2 (1.20%) Documentation Skills
13 2 (1.20%) Marketing
14 1 (0.60%) Automotive
14 1 (0.60%) Cantonese Language
14 1 (0.60%) Games
14 1 (0.60%) Mandarin Language
14 1 (0.60%) Military
Job Titles
1 40 (24.10%) Analyst
2 26 (15.66%) Developer
3 21 (12.65%) Senior
4 13 (7.83%) Data Engineer
4 13 (7.83%) Java Developer
5 12 (7.23%) Lead
5 12 (7.23%) Support Analyst
6 11 (6.63%) Architect
6 11 (6.63%) IT Support
7 10 (6.02%) Administrator
7 10 (6.02%) Business Analyst
7 10 (6.02%) IT Analyst
8 9 (5.42%) IT Support Analyst
9 8 (4.82%) Senior Analyst
10 6 (3.61%) Senior Business Analyst
10 6 (3.61%) Software Engineer
10 6 (3.61%) Technical Administrator
11 5 (3.01%) Test Engineer
12 4 (2.41%) Consultant
12 4 (2.41%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (8.43%) Kafka
2 13 (7.83%) Spring
3 12 (7.23%) Spring Boot
4 11 (6.63%) React
5 9 (5.42%) RESTful
6 7 (4.22%) ActiveMQ
6 7 (4.22%) HTML
6 7 (4.22%) JAX-RS
7 6 (3.61%) AngularJS
7 6 (3.61%) CSS
8 5 (3.01%) Playwright
8 5 (3.01%) XML
9 4 (2.41%) ARM Templates
9 4 (2.41%) Node.js
9 4 (2.41%) REST
10 3 (1.81%) .NET
10 3 (1.81%) OAuth
10 3 (1.81%) OAuth2
10 3 (1.81%) SOAP
10 3 (1.81%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 13 (7.83%) Onboarding
2 10 (6.02%) Product Ownership
3 6 (3.61%) Data Protection Act
3 6 (3.61%) Management Information System
4 5 (3.01%) AI Agents
4 5 (3.01%) Cloud Native
4 5 (3.01%) Driving Licence
4 5 (3.01%) Legacy Systems
5 4 (2.41%) Analytical Mindset
5 4 (2.41%) Mainframe
5 4 (2.41%) Mobile App
5 4 (2.41%) Self-Motivation
6 3 (1.81%) Data Structures
6 3 (1.81%) Public Cloud
7 2 (1.20%) Distributed Systems
7 2 (1.20%) Enterprise Software
7 2 (1.20%) Greenfield Project
7 2 (1.20%) iPad
7 2 (1.20%) PKI
7 2 (1.20%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 14 (8.43%) Windows
2 11 (6.63%) Linux
3 10 (6.02%) Windows 10
4 9 (5.42%) Unix
5 5 (3.01%) Mac OS X
6 3 (1.81%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.60%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 42 (25.30%) Agile
2 28 (16.87%) CI/CD
3 27 (16.27%) Continuous Improvement
4 24 (14.46%) Microservices
4 24 (14.46%) Stakeholder Management
5 23 (13.86%) Test Automation
6 21 (12.65%) Data Modelling
7 19 (11.45%) Analytics
7 19 (11.45%) DevOps
8 17 (10.24%) ITIL
8 17 (10.24%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 15 (9.04%) Business Intelligence
9 15 (9.04%) Decision-Making
9 15 (9.04%) ETL
10 13 (7.83%) Actionable Insight
10 13 (7.83%) Conflict Resolution
10 13 (7.83%) Customer Service
10 13 (7.83%) Requirements Gathering
10 13 (7.83%) TDD
11 12 (7.23%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 32 (19.28%) SQL
2 25 (15.06%) Java
3 14 (8.43%) Python
4 12 (7.23%) JavaScript
5 7 (4.22%) TypeScript
6 6 (3.61%) PowerShell
7 3 (1.81%) CLIST
7 3 (1.81%) COBOL
7 3 (1.81%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 3 (1.81%) JCL
7 3 (1.81%) Kotlin
7 3 (1.81%) PL/SQL
7 3 (1.81%) REXX
7 3 (1.81%) Shell Script
7 3 (1.81%) T-SQL
8 2 (1.20%) Bash
8 2 (1.20%) Bicep
8 2 (1.20%) C#
8 2 (1.20%) Go
8 2 (1.20%) VBA
Qualifications
1 23 (13.86%) Degree
2 17 (10.24%) Security Cleared
3 11 (6.63%) BPSS Clearance
3 11 (6.63%) Computer Science Degree
3 11 (6.63%) Microsoft Certification
4 10 (6.02%) A+ Certification
4 10 (6.02%) Network+ Certification
5 6 (3.61%) SC Cleared
6 2 (1.20%) Azure Certification
6 2 (1.20%) CCNA
6 2 (1.20%) Cisco Certification
6 2 (1.20%) CISM
6 2 (1.20%) CISSP
6 2 (1.20%) City & Guilds
6 2 (1.20%) CompTIA Security+
6 2 (1.20%) Microsoft Certified Professional
7 1 (0.60%) CCA
7 1 (0.60%) CCNP
7 1 (0.60%) MCSE
7 1 (0.60%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (12.05%) Data Quality
2 5 (3.01%) QA
3 4 (2.41%) Accessibility
3 4 (2.41%) PMO
4 3 (1.81%) GDPR
5 2 (1.20%) GRC
6 1 (0.60%) NIST
6 1 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 1 (0.60%) SLA
6 1 (0.60%) WCAG
System Software
1 15 (9.04%) Active Directory
2 12 (7.23%) Docker
3 3 (1.81%) ACF2
3 3 (1.81%) RACF
3 3 (1.81%) Time Sharing Option
3 3 (1.81%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (0.60%) ISA Server
4 1 (0.60%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 11 (6.63%) Kubernetes
2 9 (5.42%) Terraform
3 5 (3.01%) Grafana
4 4 (2.41%) Prometheus
5 3 (1.81%) CA Endevor
5 3 (1.81%) Tivoli
5 3 (1.81%) Tivoli Storage Manager
6 2 (1.20%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (0.60%) Ansible
7 1 (0.60%) Istio
Vendors
1 27 (16.27%) Microsoft
2 15 (9.04%) SAP
3 10 (6.02%) Oracle
4 7 (4.22%) Google
4 7 (4.22%) ServiceNow
5 6 (3.61%) Splunk
6 5 (3.01%) DocuSign
7 4 (2.41%) Concur
7 4 (2.41%) Databricks
8 3 (1.81%) Adobe
8 3 (1.81%) IBM
9 2 (1.20%) AppDynamics
9 2 (1.20%) Atlassian
9 2 (1.20%) CA Agile Central
9 2 (1.20%) Dell
9 2 (1.20%) Moogsoft
9 2 (1.20%) PagerDuty
9 2 (1.20%) Teradata
9 2 (1.20%) Workday
10 1 (0.60%) Netskope