Problem-Solving Contract Job Trends in the North of England

Problem Solving
England > North of England

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

6 months to
6 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 5 3 6
Rank change year-on-year -2 +3 +10
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 726 551 617
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 14.28% 16.38% 12.34%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 16.31% 18.51% 14.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 481 334 341
10th Percentile £213 £207 £210
25th Percentile £350 £356 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% -5.00% +5.60%
75th Percentile £538 £550 £575
90th Percentile £625 £634 £688
England median daily rate £492 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -1.60% -2.44% -5.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 34 28 46
10th Percentile £15.18 £13.19 £11.25
25th Percentile £15.76 £16.78 £12.11
Median hourly rate £19.65 £27.13 £17.36
Median % change year-on-year -27.58% +56.25% -47.98%
75th Percentile £63.21 £34.83 £43.75
90th Percentile £74.26 £59.13 £46.18
England median hourly rate £18.82 £24.47 £22.11
% change year-on-year -23.09% +10.67% -29.02%

All Process & Methodology Skills
North of England

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 the North of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 4,450 2,976 4,351
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 87.55% 88.49% 87.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,952 1,757 2,783
10th Percentile £240 £263 £275
25th Percentile £367 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.05% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £550 £575 £588
90th Percentile £650 £663 £675
England median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 268 140 305
10th Percentile £15.25 £15.00 £11.77
25th Percentile £20.82 £17.25 £14.00
Median hourly rate £41.94 £27.50 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +52.51% +22.22% -10.00%
75th Percentile £57.50 £44.92 £46.18
90th Percentile £73.83 £73.68 £53.75
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £35.50
% change year-on-year -28.14% -1.41% +2.66%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the North of England

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Trend in the North of England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Problem-Solving.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Histogram in the North of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the North of England over the 6 months to 6 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the North of England

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Trend in the North of England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Problem-Solving.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North of England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Problem-Solving in the North of England over the 6 months to 6 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the North of England

Problem-Solving
Contract Job Locations in the North of England

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 North of England region over the 6 months to 6 February 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
North West -2 379 £425 -8.11% 377
Yorkshire -4 292 £482 -3.60% 225
North East -3 63 £450 -12.20% 74
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North of England 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 42 (5.79%) Confluence
2 39 (5.37%) SharePoint
3 31 (4.27%) Microsoft Exchange
4 10 (1.38%) Apache
5 8 (1.10%) Apache Spark
6 7 (0.96%) Exchange Server 2013
6 7 (0.96%) Skype for Business
7 5 (0.69%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.41%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 1 (0.14%) CICS
9 1 (0.14%) CMS
9 1 (0.14%) JBoss
9 1 (0.14%) Moodle
9 1 (0.14%) NetWeaver
9 1 (0.14%) nginx
9 1 (0.14%) SAS
9 1 (0.14%) Tomcat
Applications
1 50 (6.89%) Microsoft Office
2 47 (6.47%) Microsoft Excel
3 32 (4.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 18 (2.48%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.69%) Acrobat
5 5 (0.69%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.28%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.14%) Siemens NX
7 1 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 42 (5.79%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (0.55%) Payment Gateway
2 4 (0.55%) SAP EHS
3 3 (0.41%) Dynamics CRM
3 3 (0.41%) iTrent
3 3 (0.41%) Kondor
3 3 (0.41%) SAP EWM
3 3 (0.41%) SAP Payroll
3 3 (0.41%) SAP SCM
4 2 (0.28%) Advent Geneva
4 2 (0.28%) Dynamics AX
4 2 (0.28%) Elite 3E
4 2 (0.28%) NetSuite
4 2 (0.28%) SAP ERP
4 2 (0.28%) SAP HCM
5 1 (0.14%) Finacle
5 1 (0.14%) SAP BPC
5 1 (0.14%) SAP HR
5 1 (0.14%) SAP PSCD
5 1 (0.14%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 133 (18.32%) Azure
2 106 (14.60%) AWS
3 73 (10.06%) Microsoft 365
4 49 (6.75%) GCP
5 43 (5.92%) Power Platform
6 42 (5.79%) GitHub
7 26 (3.58%) OpenShift
8 24 (3.31%) Entra ID
9 20 (2.75%) Azure DevOps
9 20 (2.75%) Serverless
10 18 (2.48%) SaaS
11 14 (1.93%) GitHub Actions
11 14 (1.93%) Google Workspace
12 11 (1.52%) Dynamics 365
13 10 (1.38%) Apigee
13 10 (1.38%) OneDrive
13 10 (1.38%) Power Automate
14 9 (1.24%) Amazon S3
14 9 (1.24%) AWS CloudFormation
14 9 (1.24%) AWS Lambda
Communications & Networking
1 40 (5.51%) Firewall
2 29 (3.99%) Network Security
3 28 (3.86%) DNS
4 18 (2.48%) TCP/IP
5 15 (2.07%) LAN
5 15 (2.07%) WAN
6 11 (1.52%) DHCP
7 8 (1.10%) BGP
7 8 (1.10%) Wi-Fi
8 7 (0.96%) Skype
8 7 (0.96%) VLAN
8 7 (0.96%) WebEx
9 6 (0.83%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
9 6 (0.83%) Kerberos
9 6 (0.83%) Software-Defined Networking
9 6 (0.83%) VPN
10 5 (0.69%) DMZ
10 5 (0.69%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
10 5 (0.69%) HTTP
10 5 (0.69%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 33 (4.55%) Power BI
2 26 (3.58%) PostgreSQL
3 21 (2.89%) MongoDB
4 17 (2.34%) Relational Database
5 15 (2.07%) NoSQL
5 15 (2.07%) SQL Server
6 12 (1.65%) MySQL
6 12 (1.65%) Power Query
7 11 (1.52%) Data Warehouse
8 10 (1.38%) DynamoDB
9 8 (1.10%) Oracle Database
9 8 (1.10%) PowerPivot
10 7 (0.96%) BigQuery
11 6 (0.83%) Oracle Reports
12 5 (0.69%) Data Lake
12 5 (0.69%) DB2
12 5 (0.69%) Metadata
13 4 (0.55%) Amazon Aurora
13 4 (0.55%) GIS
13 4 (0.55%) MS Access
Development Applications
1 94 (12.95%) JIRA
2 48 (6.61%) Jenkins
3 42 (5.79%) Git
4 37 (5.10%) GitLab
5 16 (2.20%) Sonatype Nexus
6 11 (1.52%) Selenium
7 10 (1.38%) Cucumber
8 7 (0.96%) Mockito
8 7 (0.96%) Postman
9 6 (0.83%) Cypress.io
10 5 (0.69%) JMeter
11 4 (0.55%) CircleCI
11 4 (0.55%) JUnit
11 4 (0.55%) Oracle Forms
12 3 (0.41%) Jasmine
12 3 (0.41%) Maven
12 3 (0.41%) REST Assured
12 3 (0.41%) SonarQube
13 2 (0.28%) Gatling
13 2 (0.28%) Gradle
General
1 385 (53.03%) Social Skills
2 256 (35.26%) Analytical Skills
3 209 (28.79%) Finance
4 89 (12.26%) Banking
5 76 (10.47%) Public Sector
6 29 (3.99%) Legal
7 19 (2.62%) Documentation Skills
8 18 (2.48%) Telecoms
9 17 (2.34%) Influencing Skills
10 13 (1.79%) Manufacturing
11 12 (1.65%) Organisational Skills
12 9 (1.24%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 8 (1.10%) Law
13 8 (1.10%) Military
13 8 (1.10%) Presentation Skills
14 6 (0.83%) Electronics
14 6 (0.83%) Health Technology
14 6 (0.83%) Local Government
14 6 (0.83%) Marketing
15 5 (0.69%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 116 (15.98%) Analyst
2 111 (15.29%) Developer
3 59 (8.13%) Business Analyst
4 50 (6.89%) Senior
5 46 (6.34%) Lead
6 40 (5.51%) Consultant
7 37 (5.10%) IT Support
8 35 (4.82%) Project Manager
9 26 (3.58%) Architect
10 25 (3.44%) Administrator
11 21 (2.89%) Java Developer
11 21 (2.89%) Platform Engineer
11 21 (2.89%) Software Engineer
11 21 (2.89%) Support Analyst
12 20 (2.75%) Data Engineer
12 20 (2.75%) IT Engineer
13 17 (2.34%) SAP Consultant
13 17 (2.34%) Technical Analyst
14 16 (2.20%) Support Engineer
14 16 (2.20%) Technical Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (5.79%) REST
2 35 (4.82%) Spring
3 34 (4.68%) Spring Boot
4 26 (3.58%) Kafka
5 25 (3.44%) RESTful
6 22 (3.03%) JSON
7 20 (2.75%) SOAP
8 19 (2.62%) OpenTelemetry
9 18 (2.48%) React
10 17 (2.34%) XML
11 15 (2.07%) .NET
12 14 (1.93%) HTML
12 14 (1.93%) Swagger
13 13 (1.79%) FastAPI
13 13 (1.79%) Node.js
13 13 (1.79%) OAuth
14 12 (1.65%) AngularJS
14 12 (1.65%) CSS
14 12 (1.65%) Elastic Stack
14 12 (1.65%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 62 (8.54%) Product Ownership
2 37 (5.10%) Onboarding
3 25 (3.44%) Cloud Native
4 17 (2.34%) Data Protection Act
5 16 (2.20%) Data Centre
5 16 (2.20%) Legacy Systems
6 15 (2.07%) Data Structures
6 15 (2.07%) SWIFT Messaging Network
7 14 (1.93%) Management Information System
7 14 (1.93%) Self-Motivation
8 13 (1.79%) Enterprise Software
9 12 (1.65%) CMDB
10 11 (1.52%) Mainframe
11 10 (1.38%) Algorithms
11 10 (1.38%) Analytical Mindset
11 10 (1.38%) Hybrid Cloud
12 9 (1.24%) NHS
13 7 (0.96%) Mobile App
14 6 (0.83%) Public Cloud
14 6 (0.83%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 87 (11.98%) Windows
2 69 (9.50%) Linux
3 23 (3.17%) Windows 10
4 22 (3.03%) Windows Server
5 21 (2.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 18 (2.48%) Unix
7 12 (1.65%) Android
8 11 (1.52%) Apple iOS
9 8 (1.10%) CentOS
9 8 (1.10%) Ubuntu
10 7 (0.96%) Mac OS
10 7 (0.96%) Windows Server 2019
11 6 (0.83%) Mac OS X
12 4 (0.55%) Windows Server 2012
13 3 (0.41%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 206 (28.37%) Agile
2 155 (21.35%) CI/CD
3 132 (18.18%) Continuous Improvement
4 121 (16.67%) DevOps
5 110 (15.15%) Stakeholder Management
6 91 (12.53%) Project Management
7 78 (10.74%) Migration
8 73 (10.06%) Containerisation
9 68 (9.37%) Change Management
10 66 (9.09%) Test Automation
11 63 (8.68%) Decision-Making
12 62 (8.54%) ITIL
13 60 (8.26%) Microservices
14 59 (8.13%) Validation
15 58 (7.99%) Analytics
16 57 (7.85%) Mentoring
17 56 (7.71%) Customer Service
17 56 (7.71%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 52 (7.16%) Business Intelligence
19 51 (7.02%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 108 (14.88%) Python
2 85 (11.71%) SQL
3 79 (10.88%) Java
4 46 (6.34%) PowerShell
5 38 (5.23%) Bash
6 30 (4.13%) TypeScript
7 25 (3.44%) JavaScript
8 21 (2.89%) Perl
9 18 (2.48%) C#
10 11 (1.52%) VBA
11 10 (1.38%) Go
11 10 (1.38%) Groovy
12 9 (1.24%) CLIST
12 9 (1.24%) COBOL
12 9 (1.24%) JCL
12 9 (1.24%) REXX
12 9 (1.24%) Ruby
12 9 (1.24%) Shell Script
13 8 (1.10%) T-SQL
14 7 (0.96%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 93 (12.81%) Security Cleared
2 75 (10.33%) Degree
3 66 (9.09%) SC Cleared
4 34 (4.68%) BPSS Clearance
5 33 (4.55%) Computer Science Degree
6 18 (2.48%) Cisco Certification
7 15 (2.07%) CCNA
8 14 (1.93%) PMP
9 12 (1.65%) CCNP
10 9 (1.24%) A+ Certification
10 9 (1.24%) CCDP
10 9 (1.24%) Microsoft Certification
11 8 (1.10%) AWS Certification
11 8 (1.10%) CISSP
11 8 (1.10%) PMI Certification
11 8 (1.10%) RHCE
12 7 (0.96%) Network+ Certification
12 7 (0.96%) Six Sigma Green Belt
13 5 (0.69%) CBAP
13 5 (0.69%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 48 (6.61%) QA
2 26 (3.58%) Data Quality
3 19 (2.62%) Accessibility
3 19 (2.62%) GDPR
4 18 (2.48%) PSD2
5 14 (1.93%) ISO 20022
6 12 (1.65%) SEPA
7 11 (1.52%) PCI DSS
8 10 (1.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 8 (1.10%) PMO
10 6 (0.83%) HL7
11 5 (0.69%) NIST
11 5 (0.69%) SLA
12 4 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 4 (0.55%) WCAG
13 3 (0.41%) Actionable Recommendations
13 3 (0.41%) ISO 8583
14 2 (0.28%) HIPAA
15 1 (0.14%) IEC 61508
15 1 (0.14%) ISO 26262
System Software
1 74 (10.19%) Docker
2 55 (7.58%) Active Directory
3 19 (2.62%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (1.38%) VMware NSX
5 9 (1.24%) ACF2
5 9 (1.24%) RACF
5 9 (1.24%) Time Sharing Option
5 9 (1.24%) vSphere
6 7 (0.96%) Hyper-V
7 6 (0.83%) Virtual Desktop
8 3 (0.41%) ISA Server
8 3 (0.41%) Virtual Machines
9 1 (0.14%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 88 (12.12%) Kubernetes
2 51 (7.02%) Terraform
3 43 (5.92%) Ansible
4 39 (5.37%) Grafana
5 31 (4.27%) Prometheus
6 27 (3.72%) SCCM
7 24 (3.31%) Microsoft Intune
8 14 (1.93%) Control-M
9 13 (1.79%) IBM Guardium
9 13 (1.79%) Nessus
10 10 (1.38%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 10 (1.38%) Puppet
11 9 (1.24%) CA Endevor
11 9 (1.24%) Tivoli
11 9 (1.24%) Tivoli Storage Manager
12 6 (0.83%) Norton AntiVirus
13 5 (0.69%) Argo
14 4 (0.55%) EMC NetWorker
14 4 (0.55%) Kibana
14 4 (0.55%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 161 (22.18%) Microsoft
2 68 (9.37%) SAP
3 40 (5.51%) Oracle
4 32 (4.41%) ServiceNow
4 32 (4.41%) VMware
5 31 (4.27%) Splunk
6 26 (3.58%) Google
7 23 (3.17%) Red Hat
8 17 (2.34%) Cisco
9 14 (1.93%) Workday
10 13 (1.79%) Tenable
11 12 (1.65%) Sonatype
12 11 (1.52%) Databricks
12 11 (1.52%) F5
13 10 (1.38%) Citrix
13 10 (1.38%) Veeam
14 9 (1.24%) Adobe
14 9 (1.24%) Sage
15 8 (1.10%) Brio
15 8 (1.10%) Computacenter