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 24 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 2 6
Rank change year-on-year -8 +4 +10
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 742 658 574
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 11.46% 19.96% 12.40%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.61% 22.20% 14.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 446 390 327
10th Percentile £297 £208 £273
25th Percentile £363 £364 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £486 £490
Median % change year-on-year -7.46% -0.77% -2.00%
75th Percentile £530 £573 £566
90th Percentile £611 £656 £641
England median daily rate £500 £500 £510
% change year-on-year - -1.96% -2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 53 49 73
10th Percentile £14.28 £17.35 -
25th Percentile £17.00 £21.24 £10.95
Median hourly rate £35.00 £27.13 £13.50
Median % change year-on-year +29.03% +100.93% -66.50%
75th Percentile £74.26 £38.00 £28.75
90th Percentile £160.20 £63.08 £60.56
England median hourly rate £22.00 £21.65 £16.37
% change year-on-year +1.64% +32.26% -67.27%

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 5,453 2,964 3,934
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 84.26% 89.90% 84.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,376 1,910 2,403
10th Percentile £313 £263 £300
25th Percentile £400 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £495
Median % change year-on-year - -4.04% -1.00%
75th Percentile £575 £550 £588
90th Percentile £665 £645 £675
England median daily rate £513 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 348 147 374
10th Percentile £16.01 £13.23 £11.07
25th Percentile £22.68 £18.51 £12.53
Median hourly rate £51.89 £25.43 £19.34
Median % change year-on-year +104.04% +31.49% -29.67%
75th Percentile £71.50 £53.88 £45.00
90th Percentile £80.30 £76.75 £62.13
England median hourly rate £45.25 £28.48 £36.50
% change year-on-year +58.88% -21.97% -2.14%

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 24 May 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 24 May 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 24 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
North West -8 351 £434 -11.43% 363
Yorkshire -7 348 £470 -1.05% 232
North East -12 51 £425 -5.56% 80
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 47 (6.33%) Confluence
2 21 (2.83%) SharePoint
3 14 (1.89%) Apache Spark
4 10 (1.35%) Microsoft Exchange
5 4 (0.54%) Apache Airflow
6 3 (0.40%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 3 (0.40%) Apache
7 2 (0.27%) JBoss
7 2 (0.27%) Oracle Workflow
7 2 (0.27%) Tomcat
7 2 (0.27%) WebLogic
8 1 (0.13%) Camunda
8 1 (0.13%) CICS
8 1 (0.13%) CMS
8 1 (0.13%) Mule
8 1 (0.13%) Mule ESB
8 1 (0.13%) nginx
8 1 (0.13%) WebSphere
Applications
1 31 (4.18%) Microsoft Excel
2 25 (3.37%) Microsoft Office
3 14 (1.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (1.35%) MS Visio
5 6 (0.81%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.67%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.54%) Acrobat
7 4 (0.54%) Spreadsheet
8 3 (0.40%) CATIA
9 1 (0.13%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 37 (4.99%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (0.81%) Remedy ITSM
3 4 (0.54%) Payment Gateway
4 3 (0.40%) Oracle EBS
4 3 (0.40%) SAP SCM
5 1 (0.13%) Actimize
5 1 (0.13%) Dynamics CRM
5 1 (0.13%) Elite 3E
5 1 (0.13%) NetSuite
5 1 (0.13%) Oracle Applications
5 1 (0.13%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 1 (0.13%) ResourceLink
5 1 (0.13%) SAP BPC
5 1 (0.13%) SAP ERP
5 1 (0.13%) SAP HCM
5 1 (0.13%) SAP Payroll
5 1 (0.13%) SystmOne
5 1 (0.13%) Teamcenter
5 1 (0.13%) VisionPLUS
Cloud Services
1 136 (18.33%) Azure
2 106 (14.29%) AWS
3 56 (7.55%) Microsoft 365
4 50 (6.74%) GCP
4 50 (6.74%) Power Platform
5 49 (6.60%) OpenShift
6 42 (5.66%) GitHub
7 24 (3.23%) Entra ID
8 19 (2.56%) Azure DevOps
9 18 (2.43%) Serverless
10 17 (2.29%) SaaS
11 10 (1.35%) GitHub Actions
12 9 (1.21%) Microsoft Copilot
13 8 (1.08%) Azure Functions
13 8 (1.08%) Google Workspace
13 8 (1.08%) Power Automate
14 7 (0.94%) Apigee
14 7 (0.94%) Azure AKS
14 7 (0.94%) Azure Monitor
14 7 (0.94%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 34 (4.58%) DNS
2 26 (3.50%) Firewall
3 17 (2.29%) TCP/IP
4 16 (2.16%) WAN
5 14 (1.89%) Network Security
6 13 (1.75%) LAN
7 11 (1.48%) SAN
7 11 (1.48%) Wi-Fi
8 9 (1.21%) DHCP
9 8 (1.08%) VLAN
10 7 (0.94%) Kerberos
11 6 (0.81%) VPN
12 5 (0.67%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
12 5 (0.67%) Wireless
13 4 (0.54%) DMZ
13 4 (0.54%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
13 4 (0.54%) NetScaler
14 3 (0.40%) VoIP
14 3 (0.40%) WebEx
14 3 (0.40%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 39 (5.26%) Power BI
2 28 (3.77%) MongoDB
3 24 (3.23%) PostgreSQL
3 24 (3.23%) SQL Server
4 21 (2.83%) Data Warehouse
5 16 (2.16%) NoSQL
6 15 (2.02%) Relational Database
7 12 (1.62%) Tableau
8 11 (1.48%) Hadoop
9 10 (1.35%) Metadata
10 8 (1.08%) Big Data
11 7 (0.94%) MySQL
11 7 (0.94%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 5 (0.67%) DataStage
12 5 (0.67%) DB2
12 5 (0.67%) Power Query
12 5 (0.67%) Snowflake Schema
13 4 (0.54%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
13 4 (0.54%) Data Vault
13 4 (0.54%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 112 (15.09%) JIRA
2 47 (6.33%) Jenkins
3 28 (3.77%) Git
4 25 (3.37%) GitLab
5 12 (1.62%) Sonatype Nexus
6 11 (1.48%) Mockito
7 10 (1.35%) Selenium
8 9 (1.21%) Postman
9 7 (0.94%) JUnit
10 6 (0.81%) Cucumber
10 6 (0.81%) REST Assured
11 5 (0.67%) Gatling
12 3 (0.40%) CircleCI
12 3 (0.40%) Jasmine
12 3 (0.40%) JMeter
12 3 (0.40%) MSI
12 3 (0.40%) Oracle Forms
12 3 (0.40%) Serenity BDD
13 2 (0.27%) Cypress.io
13 2 (0.27%) Gradle
General
1 361 (48.65%) Social Skills
2 289 (38.95%) Analytical Skills
3 214 (28.84%) Finance
4 85 (11.46%) Banking
5 66 (8.89%) Public Sector
6 35 (4.72%) Documentation Skills
7 27 (3.64%) Legal
8 25 (3.37%) Influencing Skills
9 23 (3.10%) Organisational Skills
10 17 (2.29%) Law
10 17 (2.29%) Retail
11 15 (2.02%) Telecoms
12 14 (1.89%) Manufacturing
13 9 (1.21%) Presentation Skills
14 8 (1.08%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 7 (0.94%) Retail Banking
16 4 (0.54%) Financial Institution
16 4 (0.54%) Marketing
16 4 (0.54%) Military
17 3 (0.40%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 139 (18.73%) Analyst
2 98 (13.21%) Developer
3 60 (8.09%) Lead
4 57 (7.68%) Business Analyst
5 48 (6.47%) Senior
6 35 (4.72%) Project Manager
7 34 (4.58%) Consultant
8 32 (4.31%) Architect
9 28 (3.77%) Data Engineer
9 28 (3.77%) Java Developer
10 25 (3.37%) Administrator
11 24 (3.23%) IT Support
12 22 (2.96%) DevOps Engineer
13 19 (2.56%) Python Developer
14 18 (2.43%) IT Engineer
15 17 (2.29%) Data Analyst
16 16 (2.16%) IT Analyst
16 16 (2.16%) Technical Analyst
17 15 (2.02%) SAP Consultant
18 14 (1.89%) Risk Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 38 (5.12%) REST
2 36 (4.85%) Kafka
2 36 (4.85%) Spring
3 32 (4.31%) OpenTelemetry
4 30 (4.04%) Spring Boot
5 23 (3.10%) RESTful
6 21 (2.83%) React
7 19 (2.56%) FastAPI
7 19 (2.56%) JSON
8 16 (2.16%) HTML
8 16 (2.16%) SOAP
9 15 (2.02%) CSS
9 15 (2.02%) OAuth
9 15 (2.02%) XML
10 13 (1.75%) AngularJS
11 12 (1.62%) .NET
11 12 (1.62%) LDAP
11 12 (1.62%) YAML
12 11 (1.48%) Swagger
13 9 (1.21%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 67 (9.03%) Product Ownership
2 32 (4.31%) Onboarding
3 29 (3.91%) Cloud Native
4 27 (3.64%) Data Protection Act
5 23 (3.10%) Legacy Systems
6 22 (2.96%) Data Centre
6 22 (2.96%) Self-Motivation
7 20 (2.70%) Analytical Mindset
8 19 (2.56%) Hybrid Cloud
9 18 (2.43%) Management Information System
10 15 (2.02%) Mobile App
11 13 (1.75%) Mainframe
12 12 (1.62%) AI Agents
13 11 (1.48%) Driving Licence
14 10 (1.35%) Virtual Team
15 9 (1.21%) CMDB
15 9 (1.21%) Data Structures
16 8 (1.08%) Distributed Systems
16 8 (1.08%) Public Cloud
17 7 (0.94%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 71 (9.57%) Windows
2 54 (7.28%) Linux
3 19 (2.56%) Windows 10
4 18 (2.43%) Unix
5 17 (2.29%) Apple iOS
6 16 (2.16%) Mac OS
7 13 (1.75%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 11 (1.48%) Android
9 10 (1.35%) Windows Server
10 9 (1.21%) Ubuntu
11 8 (1.08%) CentOS
12 7 (0.94%) Windows Server 2019
13 6 (0.81%) Mac OS X
14 4 (0.54%) Windows Server 2012
15 3 (0.40%) VMS
16 2 (0.27%) AIX
16 2 (0.27%) HPUX
16 2 (0.27%) Oracle Linux
16 2 (0.27%) Solaris
16 2 (0.27%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 204 (27.49%) Agile
2 156 (21.02%) CI/CD
3 147 (19.81%) Continuous Improvement
4 142 (19.14%) DevOps
5 103 (13.88%) Migration
5 103 (13.88%) Stakeholder Management
6 90 (12.13%) Project Management
7 79 (10.65%) Change Management
8 72 (9.70%) Analytics
9 70 (9.43%) Validation
10 63 (8.49%) Decision-Making
10 63 (8.49%) Test Automation
11 62 (8.36%) Containerisation
12 60 (8.09%) ITIL
12 60 (8.09%) Microservices
13 59 (7.95%) Customer Service
13 59 (7.95%) Workshop Facilitation
14 56 (7.55%) ERP
15 55 (7.41%) AI
16 52 (7.01%) Business Intelligence
Programming Languages
1 127 (17.12%) Python
2 99 (13.34%) SQL
3 67 (9.03%) Java
4 51 (6.87%) PowerShell
5 34 (4.58%) Bash
6 25 (3.37%) JavaScript
7 20 (2.70%) TypeScript
8 11 (1.48%) Kotlin
9 10 (1.35%) C#
10 9 (1.21%) Perl
10 9 (1.21%) R
10 9 (1.21%) Ruby
11 8 (1.08%) Go
11 8 (1.08%) PL/SQL
11 8 (1.08%) Shell Script
12 7 (0.94%) Bicep
12 7 (0.94%) COBOL
13 6 (0.81%) Groovy
13 6 (0.81%) JCL
13 6 (0.81%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 75 (10.11%) Security Cleared
2 73 (9.84%) Degree
3 43 (5.80%) SC Cleared
4 40 (5.39%) BPSS Clearance
5 30 (4.04%) Computer Science Degree
6 25 (3.37%) Microsoft Certification
7 18 (2.43%) A+ Certification
7 18 (2.43%) Cisco Certification
8 17 (2.29%) Network+ Certification
9 16 (2.16%) CCNA
9 16 (2.16%) CISSP
9 16 (2.16%) PMP
10 11 (1.48%) PMI Certification
11 10 (1.35%) RHCE
12 8 (1.08%) AWS Certification
12 8 (1.08%) MCSE
13 7 (0.94%) Azure Certification
13 7 (0.94%) CCNP
13 7 (0.94%) CompTIA Security+
14 6 (0.81%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 37 (4.99%) Data Quality
2 27 (3.64%) QA
3 16 (2.16%) GDPR
4 12 (1.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 11 (1.48%) Accessibility
5 11 (1.48%) PMO
6 10 (1.35%) PSD2
6 10 (1.35%) SLA
7 9 (1.21%) GRC
7 9 (1.21%) NIST
8 8 (1.08%) PCI DSS
9 6 (0.81%) ISO 20022
10 5 (0.67%) Actionable Recommendations
10 5 (0.67%) SEPA
11 4 (0.54%) ISO 8583
12 3 (0.40%) HIPAA
12 3 (0.40%) HL7
12 3 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 2 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 2 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 60 (8.09%) Docker
2 47 (6.33%) Active Directory
3 25 (3.37%) VMware Infrastructure
4 18 (2.43%) vSphere
5 16 (2.16%) VMware NSX
6 8 (1.08%) Hyper-V
7 7 (0.94%) Virtual Desktop
7 7 (0.94%) Virtual Machines
8 3 (0.40%) ACF2
8 3 (0.40%) Firmware
8 3 (0.40%) ISA Server
8 3 (0.40%) RACF
8 3 (0.40%) Time Sharing Option
9 1 (0.13%) EMC RecoverPoint
9 1 (0.13%) NFS
9 1 (0.13%) SRDF
9 1 (0.13%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 88 (11.86%) Kubernetes
2 61 (8.22%) Ansible
3 54 (7.28%) Terraform
4 43 (5.80%) Grafana
5 34 (4.58%) Prometheus
6 19 (2.56%) Microsoft Intune
7 15 (2.02%) Control-M
8 14 (1.89%) Argo
8 14 (1.89%) IBM Guardium
8 14 (1.89%) Nessus
8 14 (1.89%) vCenter Server
9 12 (1.62%) SCCM
10 10 (1.35%) Puppet
11 5 (0.67%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 5 (0.67%) CA Endevor
11 5 (0.67%) Kustomize
12 4 (0.54%) Kibana
13 3 (0.40%) Tivoli
13 3 (0.40%) Tivoli Storage Manager
14 2 (0.27%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 119 (16.04%) Microsoft
2 60 (8.09%) SAP
3 50 (6.74%) Splunk
4 33 (4.45%) ServiceNow
5 32 (4.31%) Oracle
6 31 (4.18%) VMware
7 25 (3.37%) Red Hat
8 22 (2.96%) Google
9 16 (2.16%) Cisco
9 16 (2.16%) Workday
10 14 (1.89%) Pure Storage
10 14 (1.89%) Tenable
11 13 (1.75%) Sage
12 12 (1.62%) Dell
13 9 (1.21%) F5
13 9 (1.21%) Veeam
14 8 (1.08%) Adobe
14 8 (1.08%) Apple
14 8 (1.08%) IFS
14 8 (1.08%) Sonatype