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 8 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 18 4 10
Rank change year-on-year -14 +6 +10
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 182 155 154
As % of all contract jobs in Manchester 9.49% 16.08% 10.78%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.36% 18.30% 12.44%
Number of daily rates quoted 103 94 95
10th Percentile £298 £281 £313
25th Percentile £369 £400 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £443 £459 £475
Median % change year-on-year -3.54% -3.42% -5.00%
75th Percentile £538 £588 £556
90th Percentile £638 £703 £654
North West median daily rate £447 £485 £490
% change year-on-year -7.74% -1.17% +1.92%
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 6 5
10th Percentile £14.80 £15.03 £30.95
25th Percentile £30.00 £17.74 £57.50
Median hourly rate £62.50 £20.68 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +202.26% -65.54% +189.79%
75th Percentile £85.00 £58.19 £68.88
90th Percentile £178.75 £71.25 £81.55
North West median hourly rate £37.50 £28.75 £11.20
% change year-on-year +30.43% +156.81% -59.29%

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 1,602 847 1,238
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Manchester 83.52% 87.86% 86.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 962 569 808
10th Percentile £300 £304 £325
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £450 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.78% -10.00% -
75th Percentile £577 £575 £588
90th Percentile £669 £700 £688
North West median daily rate £476 £450 £493
% change year-on-year +5.78% -8.72% -1.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 147 38 80
10th Percentile £21.98 £14.20 £12.50
25th Percentile £30.00 £20.39 £14.20
Median hourly rate £60.50 £35.00 £27.00
Median % change year-on-year +72.86% +29.63% +35.00%
75th Percentile £77.00 £71.88 £58.75
90th Percentile £88.50 £80.48 £75.15
North West median hourly rate £51.00 £29.90 £30.00
% change year-on-year +70.57% -0.33% -

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 8 July 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 8 July 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 8 July 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 10 - - 18
Salford -2 2 £168 -73.20% 14
Stockport 0 1 £140 -72.00% 10
Altrincham 0 1 - - 4
Rochdale - 1 - - 5
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 (6.04%) Confluence
2 3 (1.65%) Apache Spark
3 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.55%) Adobe Experience Manager
4 1 (0.55%) CMS
4 1 (0.55%) nginx
4 1 (0.55%) SharePoint
Applications
1 11 (6.04%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (5.49%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (2.75%) MS Visio
4 2 (1.10%) Chatbot
4 2 (1.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.55%) Acrobat
Business Applications
1 3 (1.65%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (1.10%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.55%) Elite 3E
3 1 (0.55%) FIS Private Capital Suite
3 1 (0.55%) ResourceLink
3 1 (0.55%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 31 (17.03%) Azure
2 24 (13.19%) AWS
3 18 (9.89%) Power Platform
4 17 (9.34%) Microsoft 365
5 9 (4.95%) GitHub
6 7 (3.85%) GCP
7 6 (3.30%) Azure DevOps
7 6 (3.30%) Power Automate
8 5 (2.75%) Azure Monitor
9 4 (2.20%) Azure AKS
9 4 (2.20%) dbt
9 4 (2.20%) Entra ID
9 4 (2.20%) Google Sheets
9 4 (2.20%) Google Workspace
9 4 (2.20%) OpenShift
10 3 (1.65%) Azure Data Factory
10 3 (1.65%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 3 (1.65%) GitHub Actions
11 2 (1.10%) Azure Storage
11 2 (1.10%) Google Kubernetes Engine
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.20%) Firewall
1 4 (2.20%) VPN
2 3 (1.65%) Wireless
3 2 (1.10%) Wi-Fi
4 1 (0.55%) DNS
4 1 (0.55%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
4 1 (0.55%) Kerberos
4 1 (0.55%) Network Security
4 1 (0.55%) Reverse Proxy
4 1 (0.55%) SAN
4 1 (0.55%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (9.34%) Power BI
2 13 (7.14%) MongoDB
2 13 (7.14%) SQL Server
3 12 (6.59%) Data Warehouse
4 7 (3.85%) MySQL
4 7 (3.85%) Relational Database
5 6 (3.30%) NoSQL
5 6 (3.30%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (2.20%) Big Data
6 4 (2.20%) DataStage
6 4 (2.20%) Snowflake Schema
7 3 (1.65%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
7 3 (1.65%) Data Vault
7 3 (1.65%) Db2
7 3 (1.65%) Hadoop
7 3 (1.65%) Metadata
7 3 (1.65%) Power Query
7 3 (1.65%) Tableau
8 2 (1.10%) BusinessObjects
8 2 (1.10%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 26 (14.29%) JIRA
2 14 (7.69%) Git
3 8 (4.40%) Mockito
4 6 (3.30%) GitLab
5 5 (2.75%) Jenkins
5 5 (2.75%) Selenium
6 4 (2.20%) Gatling
6 4 (2.20%) Postman
6 4 (2.20%) REST Assured
7 3 (1.65%) Cucumber
8 2 (1.10%) Burp Suite
8 2 (1.10%) Gradle
8 2 (1.10%) JMeter
8 2 (1.10%) LoadRunner
8 2 (1.10%) Serenity BDD
8 2 (1.10%) SoapUI
8 2 (1.10%) SonarQube
8 2 (1.10%) Sonatype Nexus
9 1 (0.55%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.55%) JUnit
General
1 85 (46.70%) Social Skills
2 78 (42.86%) Analytical Skills
3 39 (21.43%) Finance
4 20 (10.99%) Public Sector
5 15 (8.24%) Banking
6 10 (5.49%) Law
6 10 (5.49%) Manufacturing
6 10 (5.49%) Organisational Skills
7 9 (4.95%) Telecoms
8 7 (3.85%) Influencing Skills
9 4 (2.20%) Documentation Skills
9 4 (2.20%) Legal
9 4 (2.20%) Retail
10 3 (1.65%) Presentation Skills
11 2 (1.10%) Automotive
11 2 (1.10%) Games
11 2 (1.10%) Marketing
12 1 (0.55%) Cantonese Language
12 1 (0.55%) Mandarin Language
12 1 (0.55%) Military
Job Titles
1 42 (23.08%) Analyst
2 28 (15.38%) Developer
3 19 (10.44%) Senior
4 16 (8.79%) Java Developer
4 16 (8.79%) Lead
5 15 (8.24%) Architect
6 14 (7.69%) Data Engineer
7 13 (7.14%) IT Support
8 12 (6.59%) Administrator
9 11 (6.04%) Support Analyst
10 10 (5.49%) IT Analyst
11 9 (4.95%) Business Analyst
11 9 (4.95%) IT Support Analyst
12 8 (4.40%) Senior Analyst
13 7 (3.85%) Technical Administrator
14 6 (3.30%) Senior Business Analyst
14 6 (3.30%) Software Engineer
14 6 (3.30%) Test Engineer
15 5 (2.75%) Solutions Architect
15 5 (2.75%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (9.34%) Kafka
2 15 (8.24%) Spring
3 14 (7.69%) Spring Boot
4 12 (6.59%) React
5 8 (4.40%) ActiveMQ
5 8 (4.40%) JAX-RS
5 8 (4.40%) RESTful
6 5 (2.75%) AngularJS
6 5 (2.75%) HTML
6 5 (2.75%) Node.js
6 5 (2.75%) Playwright
6 5 (2.75%) REST
7 4 (2.20%) ARM Templates
7 4 (2.20%) CSS
7 4 (2.20%) XML
8 3 (1.65%) .NET
8 3 (1.65%) EDI
8 3 (1.65%) EDIFACT
8 3 (1.65%) ISPF
8 3 (1.65%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 17 (9.34%) Onboarding
2 9 (4.95%) Data Protection Act
2 9 (4.95%) Product Ownership
3 7 (3.85%) Cloud Native
4 6 (3.30%) Legacy Systems
5 5 (2.75%) AI Agents
5 5 (2.75%) Driving Licence
6 4 (2.20%) Analytical Mindset
6 4 (2.20%) Data Structures
6 4 (2.20%) Mainframe
6 4 (2.20%) Management Information System
6 4 (2.20%) Self-Motivation
7 3 (1.65%) Enterprise Software
7 3 (1.65%) Mobile App
7 3 (1.65%) Private Cloud
7 3 (1.65%) Public Cloud
8 2 (1.10%) CMDB
8 2 (1.10%) iPad
8 2 (1.10%) Linux Command Line
8 2 (1.10%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 17 (9.34%) Windows
2 13 (7.14%) Linux
3 12 (6.59%) Windows 10
4 11 (6.04%) Unix
5 6 (3.30%) Mac OS X
6 2 (1.10%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.55%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 46 (25.27%) Agile
2 35 (19.23%) Stakeholder Management
3 32 (17.58%) CI/CD
3 32 (17.58%) Continuous Improvement
4 25 (13.74%) Microservices
5 24 (13.19%) Data Modelling
6 23 (12.64%) Test Automation
7 22 (12.09%) DevOps
8 21 (11.54%) Analytics
9 20 (10.99%) Decision-Making
9 20 (10.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 19 (10.44%) ITIL
11 18 (9.89%) Business Intelligence
12 16 (8.79%) Data Analysis
12 16 (8.79%) ETL
13 15 (8.24%) AI
13 15 (8.24%) Change Management
13 15 (8.24%) Requirements Gathering
14 14 (7.69%) Customer Service
14 14 (7.69%) Data Pipeline
Programming Languages
1 36 (19.78%) SQL
2 27 (14.84%) Java
3 19 (10.44%) Python
4 11 (6.04%) JavaScript
5 8 (4.40%) PowerShell
6 6 (3.30%) TypeScript
7 4 (2.20%) Shell Script
7 4 (2.20%) T-SQL
8 3 (1.65%) Bash
8 3 (1.65%) CLIST
8 3 (1.65%) COBOL
8 3 (1.65%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 3 (1.65%) JCL
8 3 (1.65%) Kotlin
8 3 (1.65%) PL/SQL
8 3 (1.65%) REXX
9 2 (1.10%) Bicep
9 2 (1.10%) Go
9 2 (1.10%) VBA
10 1 (0.55%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 22 (12.09%) Security Cleared
2 21 (11.54%) Degree
3 14 (7.69%) BPSS Clearance
4 13 (7.14%) Microsoft Certification
5 12 (6.59%) SC Cleared
6 10 (5.49%) A+ Certification
6 10 (5.49%) Network+ Certification
7 9 (4.95%) Computer Science Degree
8 2 (1.10%) Azure Certification
8 2 (1.10%) CISM
8 2 (1.10%) CISSP
8 2 (1.10%) City & Guilds
8 2 (1.10%) CompTIA Security+
8 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Certified Professional
8 2 (1.10%) PMI Certification
8 2 (1.10%) PMP
9 1 (0.55%) Cisco Certification
9 1 (0.55%) HNC
9 1 (0.55%) HND
9 1 (0.55%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (13.74%) Data Quality
2 5 (2.75%) PMO
3 4 (2.20%) Accessibility
4 3 (1.65%) GRC
4 3 (1.65%) QA
5 2 (1.10%) GDPR
5 2 (1.10%) SLA
6 1 (0.55%) NIST
6 1 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 16 (8.79%) Active Directory
2 15 (8.24%) Docker
3 4 (2.20%) Virtual Machines
4 3 (1.65%) ACF2
4 3 (1.65%) RACF
4 3 (1.65%) Time Sharing Option
5 1 (0.55%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 16 (8.79%) Kubernetes
2 13 (7.14%) Terraform
3 7 (3.85%) Grafana
4 4 (2.20%) Prometheus
5 3 (1.65%) CA Endevor
5 3 (1.65%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (1.65%) Tivoli
5 3 (1.65%) Tivoli Storage Manager
6 2 (1.10%) Ansible
6 2 (1.10%) Istio
6 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (0.55%) Data Guard
7 1 (0.55%) SCOM
Vendors
1 34 (18.68%) Microsoft
2 15 (8.24%) SAP
2 15 (8.24%) ServiceNow
3 10 (5.49%) Oracle
4 7 (3.85%) Google
5 6 (3.30%) Splunk
6 5 (2.75%) DocuSign
7 4 (2.20%) Concur
7 4 (2.20%) Dynatrace
7 4 (2.20%) IBM
8 3 (1.65%) Adobe
8 3 (1.65%) CyberArk
8 3 (1.65%) Teradata
9 2 (1.10%) AppDynamics
9 2 (1.10%) Atlassian
9 2 (1.10%) CA Agile Central
9 2 (1.10%) Databricks
9 2 (1.10%) Dell
9 2 (1.10%) PagerDuty
9 2 (1.10%) Sage