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 19 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 15 5 5
Rank change year-on-year -10 0 +8
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 735 644 545
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 9.63% 16.09% 13.13%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.60% 18.05% 15.65%
Number of daily rates quoted 417 372 310
10th Percentile £270 £263 £250
25th Percentile £353 £369 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £445 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -6.32% - -5.00%
75th Percentile £538 £552 £550
90th Percentile £621 £650 £622
England median daily rate £500 £488 £500
% change year-on-year +2.56% -2.50% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 76 56 13
10th Percentile £13.45 £13.80 £14.85
25th Percentile £16.66 £17.30 £26.25
Median hourly rate £19.00 £20.26 £48.56
Median % change year-on-year -6.20% -58.29% +76.58%
75th Percentile £39.63 £32.13 £63.75
90th Percentile £85.50 £63.40 £76.09
England median hourly rate £19.57 £18.85 £16.23
% change year-on-year +3.82% +16.14% -70.01%

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 6,334 3,567 3,483
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 83.00% 89.13% 83.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,685 2,315 2,010
10th Percentile £313 £265 £300
25th Percentile £405 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £465 £500
Median % change year-on-year +7.53% -7.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £563 £588
90th Percentile £675 £655 £675
England median daily rate £525 £510 £525
% change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 536 206 182
10th Percentile £14.22 £13.63 £12.67
25th Percentile £21.00 £17.39 £16.31
Median hourly rate £43.96 £22.60 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +94.49% -35.42% +27.27%
75th Percentile £69.81 £35.88 £51.90
90th Percentile £78.13 £70.08 £70.00
England median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% -3.37%

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 19 September 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 19 September 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 19 September 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 -9 364 £448 -5.79% 807
Yorkshire -8 299 £450 -6.25% 472
North East -18 74 £375 -16.67% 217
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 28 (3.81%) SharePoint
2 23 (3.13%) Confluence
3 11 (1.50%) Apache Spark
4 10 (1.36%) Apache Airflow
5 8 (1.09%) Apache
6 7 (0.95%) CMS
6 7 (0.95%) Microsoft Exchange
7 6 (0.82%) Jupyter
8 4 (0.54%) CICS
9 3 (0.41%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 3 (0.41%) WordPress
10 2 (0.27%) Camunda
10 2 (0.27%) Oracle Workflow
10 2 (0.27%) WebLogic
11 1 (0.14%) JBoss
11 1 (0.14%) Mule
11 1 (0.14%) Mule ESB
11 1 (0.14%) NetWeaver
11 1 (0.14%) Tomcat
11 1 (0.14%) WebSphere
Applications
1 42 (5.71%) Microsoft Excel
2 40 (5.44%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (1.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (1.22%) MS Visio
5 8 (1.09%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.68%) Spreadsheet
7 4 (0.54%) Chatbot
8 3 (0.41%) Acrobat
9 2 (0.27%) AutoCAD
9 2 (0.27%) CATIA
9 2 (0.27%) Navisworks
9 2 (0.27%) Revit
10 1 (0.14%) EngageOne
Business Applications
1 19 (2.59%) SAP S/4HANA
2 11 (1.50%) Remedy ITSM
3 4 (0.54%) Oracle EBS
4 3 (0.41%) Dynamics CRM
4 3 (0.41%) SAP ERP
4 3 (0.41%) Teamcenter
4 3 (0.41%) Workday HCM
5 2 (0.27%) Oracle Payables
5 2 (0.27%) SAP HCM
5 2 (0.27%) SAP Payroll
5 2 (0.27%) SAP R/3
6 1 (0.14%) Actimize
6 1 (0.14%) CA PPM
6 1 (0.14%) ENOVIA
6 1 (0.14%) NetSuite
6 1 (0.14%) Oracle Applications
6 1 (0.14%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 1 (0.14%) Salesforce CRM
6 1 (0.14%) SAP GRC
6 1 (0.14%) VisionPLUS
Cloud Services
1 126 (17.14%) Azure
2 101 (13.74%) Microsoft 365
3 100 (13.61%) AWS
4 58 (7.89%) Power Platform
5 46 (6.26%) GCP
6 33 (4.49%) Entra ID
7 25 (3.40%) GitHub
8 17 (2.31%) Azure DevOps
8 17 (2.31%) Serverless
9 14 (1.90%) OpenShift
10 13 (1.77%) Microsoft Copilot
11 12 (1.63%) SaaS
12 11 (1.50%) Power Automate
13 10 (1.36%) Google Kubernetes Engine
14 9 (1.22%) AWS Lambda
14 9 (1.22%) OneDrive
14 9 (1.22%) PowerApps
15 8 (1.09%) IaaS
16 7 (0.95%) Amazon CloudWatch
16 7 (0.95%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 45 (6.12%) VPN
2 39 (5.31%) Firewall
3 28 (3.81%) DNS
4 24 (3.27%) LAN
4 24 (3.27%) Network Security
4 24 (3.27%) WAN
5 20 (2.72%) Wi-Fi
6 18 (2.45%) Wireless
7 15 (2.04%) DHCP
7 15 (2.04%) VLAN
7 15 (2.04%) VoIP
8 14 (1.90%) TCP/IP
9 11 (1.50%) Cisco Nexus
10 10 (1.36%) BGP
10 10 (1.36%) OSPF
11 9 (1.22%) WLAN
12 8 (1.09%) BIG-IP
12 8 (1.09%) Cisco ASA
12 8 (1.09%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
12 8 (1.09%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
Database & Business Intelligence
1 41 (5.58%) Power BI
2 29 (3.95%) SQL Server
3 24 (3.27%) Data Warehouse
4 20 (2.72%) MongoDB
5 15 (2.04%) Relational Database
6 12 (1.63%) PostgreSQL
6 12 (1.63%) Tableau
7 11 (1.50%) Db2
8 9 (1.22%) Metadata
9 8 (1.09%) DataStage
9 8 (1.09%) NoSQL
10 7 (0.95%) Big Data
10 7 (0.95%) MySQL
11 6 (0.82%) Oracle Database
12 5 (0.68%) Data Lake
12 5 (0.68%) Neo4j
13 4 (0.54%) Amazon Athena
13 4 (0.54%) Amazon Redshift
13 4 (0.54%) Power Query
14 3 (0.41%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 61 (8.30%) JIRA
2 37 (5.03%) Git
3 30 (4.08%) Jenkins
4 21 (2.86%) GitLab
5 8 (1.09%) REST Assured
5 8 (1.09%) Selenium
6 7 (0.95%) Sonatype Nexus
7 6 (0.82%) Cucumber
7 6 (0.82%) Gatling
8 5 (0.68%) Maven
9 4 (0.54%) Cypress.io
9 4 (0.54%) Gradle
9 4 (0.54%) MSI
10 3 (0.41%) Claude Code
10 3 (0.41%) JUnit
10 3 (0.41%) LoadRunner
10 3 (0.41%) Serenity BDD
10 3 (0.41%) SonarQube
11 2 (0.27%) Postman
11 2 (0.27%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 371 (50.48%) Social Skills
2 306 (41.63%) Analytical Skills
3 170 (23.13%) Finance
4 85 (11.56%) Banking
5 61 (8.30%) Public Sector
6 46 (6.26%) Manufacturing
7 37 (5.03%) Organisational Skills
8 29 (3.95%) Documentation Skills
8 29 (3.95%) Legal
9 22 (2.99%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 21 (2.86%) Influencing Skills
11 16 (2.18%) Law
11 16 (2.18%) Retail
12 11 (1.50%) Telecoms
13 10 (1.36%) Automotive
14 9 (1.22%) Aerospace
14 9 (1.22%) Marketing
15 8 (1.09%) Financial Institution
15 8 (1.09%) Presentation Skills
16 6 (0.82%) Police
Job Titles
1 116 (15.78%) Analyst
2 87 (11.84%) Developer
3 62 (8.44%) Senior
4 50 (6.80%) Lead
5 49 (6.67%) IT Support
6 37 (5.03%) Architect
7 35 (4.76%) Support Engineer
8 27 (3.67%) IT Engineer
9 26 (3.54%) Business Analyst
10 24 (3.27%) Administrator
10 24 (3.27%) Network Engineer
11 22 (2.99%) IT Support Engineer
11 22 (2.99%) Java Developer
12 21 (2.86%) Consultant
12 21 (2.86%) Data Analyst
13 18 (2.45%) IT Analyst
13 18 (2.45%) Service Analyst
13 18 (2.45%) Support Analyst
14 17 (2.31%) Data Engineer
15 16 (2.18%) DevOps Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 47 (6.39%) Terraform
2 44 (5.99%) REST
3 29 (3.95%) Spring
4 26 (3.54%) Kafka
5 25 (3.40%) Spring Boot
6 21 (2.86%) HTML
7 20 (2.72%) React
8 19 (2.59%) Node.js
9 18 (2.45%) CSS
10 14 (1.90%) Playwright
11 11 (1.50%) .NET
11 11 (1.50%) OAuth
11 11 (1.50%) RESTful
12 10 (1.36%) FastAPI
13 9 (1.22%) OpenTelemetry
13 9 (1.22%) SOAP
13 9 (1.22%) Web Services
14 8 (1.09%) AngularJS
14 8 (1.09%) XML
15 7 (0.95%) OpenID
Miscellaneous
1 51 (6.94%) Product Ownership
2 50 (6.80%) Cloud Native
3 38 (5.17%) Onboarding
4 34 (4.63%) Data Protection Act
5 31 (4.22%) Data Centre
5 31 (4.22%) Self-Motivation
6 30 (4.08%) Enterprise Software
7 26 (3.54%) Driving Licence
8 21 (2.86%) Analytical Mindset
9 20 (2.72%) Distributed Systems
10 19 (2.59%) Data Structures
10 19 (2.59%) PKI
11 17 (2.31%) Management Information System
12 15 (2.04%) Mainframe
13 13 (1.77%) AI Agents
13 13 (1.77%) Legacy Systems
14 12 (1.63%) NHS
15 10 (1.36%) Virtual Team
16 9 (1.22%) Mobile App
16 9 (1.22%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 125 (17.01%) Windows
2 35 (4.76%) Linux
3 31 (4.22%) Windows 10
4 25 (3.40%) Windows Server
5 23 (3.13%) Apple iOS
6 20 (2.72%) Android
7 16 (2.18%) Unix
8 13 (1.77%) Mac OS
9 5 (0.68%) Solaris
10 4 (0.54%) zOS
11 3 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 2 (0.27%) AIX
12 2 (0.27%) Data ONTAP
12 2 (0.27%) HPUX
12 2 (0.27%) Mac OS X
12 2 (0.27%) Oracle Linux
12 2 (0.27%) SUSE
12 2 (0.27%) VMS
13 1 (0.14%) Ubuntu
13 1 (0.14%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 183 (24.90%) Continuous Improvement
2 171 (23.27%) Agile
3 146 (19.86%) CI/CD
4 136 (18.50%) Stakeholder Management
5 109 (14.83%) DevOps
6 90 (12.24%) AI
7 84 (11.43%) Customer Service
8 79 (10.75%) ITIL
9 71 (9.66%) Migration
10 68 (9.25%) Test Automation
11 64 (8.71%) Analytics
11 64 (8.71%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 63 (8.57%) Data Protection
13 59 (8.03%) Decision-Making
14 58 (7.89%) Validation
15 57 (7.76%) Microservices
16 56 (7.62%) Change Management
17 55 (7.48%) Software Engineering
18 53 (7.21%) Infrastructure as Code
19 52 (7.07%) Observability
Programming Languages
1 110 (14.97%) Python
2 105 (14.29%) SQL
3 62 (8.44%) Java
4 51 (6.94%) PowerShell
5 26 (3.54%) JavaScript
6 15 (2.04%) Bash
7 11 (1.50%) PL/SQL
8 10 (1.36%) Shell Script
9 9 (1.22%) C#
9 9 (1.22%) TypeScript
10 8 (1.09%) R
11 6 (0.82%) Apex Code
11 6 (0.82%) COBOL
12 5 (0.68%) ABAP
12 5 (0.68%) ActionScript
12 5 (0.68%) Kotlin
12 5 (0.68%) T-SQL
13 4 (0.54%) Bicep
13 4 (0.54%) Go
13 4 (0.54%) Scala
Qualifications
1 106 (14.42%) Security Cleared
2 80 (10.88%) SC Cleared
3 63 (8.57%) Degree
4 28 (3.81%) BPSS Clearance
4 28 (3.81%) Computer Science Degree
5 22 (2.99%) Microsoft Certification
6 20 (2.72%) Cisco Certification
7 19 (2.59%) CISSP
8 13 (1.77%) CCNP
9 11 (1.50%) A+ Certification
9 11 (1.50%) AWS Certification
9 11 (1.50%) PMP
10 10 (1.36%) HNC
10 10 (1.36%) Network+ Certification
10 10 (1.36%) PMI Certification
11 8 (1.09%) Azure Certification
11 8 (1.09%) CompTIA Security+
12 7 (0.95%) CEH
13 6 (0.82%) CISM
13 6 (0.82%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 54 (7.35%) Data Quality
2 30 (4.08%) QA
3 27 (3.67%) Accessibility
4 22 (2.99%) SLA
5 13 (1.77%) GRC
5 13 (1.77%) NIST
6 12 (1.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 11 (1.50%) GDPR
8 7 (0.95%) PMO
9 6 (0.82%) WCAG
10 5 (0.68%) PCI DSS
11 2 (0.27%) COSHH
11 2 (0.27%) HIPAA
11 2 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 2 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 2 (0.27%) MiFID
11 2 (0.27%) NCSC
11 2 (0.27%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 1 (0.14%) ISO 8583
12 1 (0.14%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 76 (10.34%) Active Directory
2 51 (6.94%) Docker
3 27 (3.67%) VMware Infrastructure
4 12 (1.63%) Hyper-V
5 8 (1.09%) Virtual Desktop
6 7 (0.95%) Virtual Machines
7 6 (0.82%) Firmware
7 6 (0.82%) VMware ESXi
7 6 (0.82%) vSphere
8 4 (0.54%) Citrix Hypervisor
8 4 (0.54%) Oracle RAC
8 4 (0.54%) Virtual Servers
8 4 (0.54%) VMware NSX
8 4 (0.54%) XenApp
8 4 (0.54%) XenDesktop
9 2 (0.27%) EMC RecoverPoint
9 2 (0.27%) KVM
9 2 (0.27%) NFS
9 2 (0.27%) SRDF
10 1 (0.14%) ACF2
Systems Management
1 55 (7.48%) Kubernetes
2 26 (3.54%) Microsoft Intune
3 24 (3.27%) Grafana
4 23 (3.13%) Prometheus
4 23 (3.13%) SCCM
5 21 (2.86%) Ansible
6 10 (1.36%) Nessus
7 9 (1.22%) Control-M
8 7 (0.95%) IBM Guardium
9 6 (0.82%) McAfee ePO
10 4 (0.54%) Data Guard
10 4 (0.54%) Kustomize
10 4 (0.54%) Single Sign-On
10 4 (0.54%) vCenter Server
11 3 (0.41%) Argo
11 3 (0.41%) CA Endevor
11 3 (0.41%) FortiGate
11 3 (0.41%) Istio
11 3 (0.41%) VxRail
11 3 (0.41%) WMI
Vendors
1 180 (24.49%) Microsoft
2 67 (9.12%) ServiceNow
3 51 (6.94%) SAP
4 39 (5.31%) Oracle
5 30 (4.08%) Cisco
6 28 (3.81%) VMware
7 21 (2.86%) Google
8 20 (2.72%) Splunk
9 15 (2.04%) F5
10 13 (1.77%) IBM
10 13 (1.77%) Salesforce
10 13 (1.77%) Workday
11 12 (1.63%) Palo Alto
12 11 (1.50%) Concur
12 11 (1.50%) Remedy
13 10 (1.36%) Dell
13 10 (1.36%) Fortinet
13 10 (1.36%) Tenable
14 8 (1.09%) CheckPoint
14 8 (1.09%) CrowdStrike