Problem-Solving Contract Job Trends in the North West

Problem Solving
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 9 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 13 2 9
Rank change year-on-year -11 +7 +9
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 367 398 327
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 10.04% 18.62% 11.85%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.98% 21.10% 13.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 206 226 189
10th Percentile £286 £230 £300
25th Percentile £367 £386 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £449 £485 £493
Median % change year-on-year -7.43% -1.72% +2.49%
75th Percentile £538 £575 £550
90th Percentile £626 £701 £638
England median daily rate £495 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.00% - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 45 42 47
10th Percentile £15.17 £12.27 -
25th Percentile £17.35 £17.44 £10.95
Median hourly rate £37.50 £28.75 £11.20
Median % change year-on-year +30.43% +156.81% -59.29%
75th Percentile £75.00 £56.26 £36.25
90th Percentile £178.75 £70.00 £56.67
England median hourly rate £21.49 £21.25 £16.23
% change year-on-year +1.13% +30.93% -68.79%

All Process & Methodology Skills
North West

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 West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 3,063 1,886 2,337
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 83.76% 88.21% 84.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,811 1,240 1,426
10th Percentile £298 £280 £300
25th Percentile £400 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £477 £450 £493
Median % change year-on-year +6.00% -8.72% -1.40%
75th Percentile £588 £570 £585
90th Percentile £675 £669 £675
England median daily rate £525 £515 £525
% change year-on-year +1.94% -1.90% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 281 118 265
10th Percentile £17.25 £13.30 £11.00
25th Percentile £25.38 £19.02 £15.50
Median hourly rate £50.00 £29.90 £28.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.22% +6.79% -6.67%
75th Percentile £76.00 £60.00 £46.18
90th Percentile £85.00 £81.00 £67.14
England median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +86.88% -34.02% -6.07%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the North West

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the North West over the 6 months to 9 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the North West

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Problem-Solving in the North West over the 6 months to 9 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the North West

Problem-Solving
Contract Job Locations in the North West

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 West region over the 6 months to 9 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
Manchester -13 184 £446 -2.72% 208
Cheshire -5 106 £446 -9.30% 72
Lancashire -7 34 £500 +11.11% 69
Cumbria -5 24 £488 +143.75% 11
Merseyside -26 10 £250 -48.72% 31
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 24 (6.54%) Confluence
2 7 (1.91%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.36%) Microsoft Exchange
4 3 (0.82%) Apache Spark
5 2 (0.54%) Camunda
5 2 (0.54%) CMS
6 1 (0.27%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 1 (0.27%) JBoss
6 1 (0.27%) Mule
6 1 (0.27%) Mule ESB
6 1 (0.27%) NetWeaver
6 1 (0.27%) nginx
6 1 (0.27%) WebLogic
Applications
1 18 (4.90%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (3.27%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (1.63%) MS Visio
4 4 (1.09%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.82%) CATIA
5 3 (0.82%) Chatbot
5 3 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 1 (0.27%) Acrobat
6 1 (0.27%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 26 (7.08%) SAP S/4HANA
2 8 (2.18%) Remedy ITSM
3 3 (0.82%) Dynamics CRM
3 3 (0.82%) Payment Gateway
4 2 (0.54%) SAP ERP
4 2 (0.54%) SAP HCM
4 2 (0.54%) SAP Payroll
5 1 (0.27%) Elite 3E
5 1 (0.27%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.27%) ResourceLink
Cloud Services
1 76 (20.71%) Azure
2 53 (14.44%) AWS
3 35 (9.54%) Microsoft 365
4 29 (7.90%) Power Platform
5 18 (4.90%) GCP
6 16 (4.36%) Entra ID
7 12 (3.27%) GitHub
8 8 (2.18%) Azure DevOps
8 8 (2.18%) Power Automate
9 6 (1.63%) OpenShift
10 5 (1.36%) Azure Monitor
10 5 (1.36%) GitHub Actions
11 4 (1.09%) Azure AKS
11 4 (1.09%) dbt
11 4 (1.09%) Google Sheets
11 4 (1.09%) Google Workspace
11 4 (1.09%) SaaS
12 3 (0.82%) Azure Data Factory
12 3 (0.82%) Azure Synapse Analytics
12 3 (0.82%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 18 (4.90%) Firewall
2 17 (4.63%) VPN
3 16 (4.36%) DNS
4 9 (2.45%) WAN
5 8 (2.18%) TCP/IP
5 8 (2.18%) Wireless
6 7 (1.91%) DHCP
6 7 (1.91%) Kerberos
6 7 (1.91%) Wi-Fi
7 6 (1.63%) LAN
7 6 (1.63%) Network Security
7 6 (1.63%) VLAN
8 4 (1.09%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 4 (1.09%) SAN
8 4 (1.09%) SSL
9 3 (0.82%) BGP
9 3 (0.82%) DMZ
9 3 (0.82%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
9 3 (0.82%) SD-WAN
9 3 (0.82%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (6.81%) Power BI
2 20 (5.45%) SQL Server
3 14 (3.81%) MongoDB
4 12 (3.27%) Data Warehouse
5 11 (3.00%) Relational Database
6 7 (1.91%) MySQL
7 6 (1.63%) NoSQL
7 6 (1.63%) PostgreSQL
8 5 (1.36%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 4 (1.09%) Big Data
9 4 (1.09%) DataStage
9 4 (1.09%) Snowflake Schema
10 3 (0.82%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
10 3 (0.82%) Data Vault
10 3 (0.82%) Db2
10 3 (0.82%) Hadoop
10 3 (0.82%) Metadata
10 3 (0.82%) Power Query
10 3 (0.82%) Tableau
11 2 (0.54%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 49 (13.35%) JIRA
2 21 (5.72%) Git
3 13 (3.54%) GitLab
4 11 (3.00%) Mockito
5 8 (2.18%) Jenkins
5 8 (2.18%) Postman
6 6 (1.63%) JUnit
6 6 (1.63%) Selenium
7 5 (1.36%) Cucumber
8 4 (1.09%) Gatling
8 4 (1.09%) REST Assured
9 3 (0.82%) MSI
9 3 (0.82%) Sonatype Nexus
10 2 (0.54%) Burp Suite
10 2 (0.54%) Claude Code
10 2 (0.54%) Gradle
10 2 (0.54%) JMeter
10 2 (0.54%) LoadRunner
10 2 (0.54%) Serenity BDD
10 2 (0.54%) SoapUI
General
1 173 (47.14%) Social Skills
2 160 (43.60%) Analytical Skills
3 104 (28.34%) Finance
4 39 (10.63%) Banking
5 25 (6.81%) Public Sector
6 19 (5.18%) Manufacturing
7 15 (4.09%) Legal
7 15 (4.09%) Organisational Skills
8 11 (3.00%) Influencing Skills
9 10 (2.72%) Documentation Skills
9 10 (2.72%) Law
10 8 (2.18%) Telecoms
11 7 (1.91%) Aerospace
11 7 (1.91%) Automotive
12 6 (1.63%) Retail
13 3 (0.82%) Investment Banking
13 3 (0.82%) Presentation Skills
13 3 (0.82%) Retail Banking
14 2 (0.54%) French Language
14 2 (0.54%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 68 (18.53%) Analyst
2 41 (11.17%) Developer
3 26 (7.08%) Lead
4 25 (6.81%) Architect
4 25 (6.81%) Senior
5 24 (6.54%) Administrator
6 21 (5.72%) Business Analyst
6 21 (5.72%) IT Support
6 21 (5.72%) Java Developer
7 20 (5.45%) Consultant
8 17 (4.63%) Project Manager
9 16 (4.36%) IT Analyst
10 15 (4.09%) Support Analyst
11 14 (3.81%) Data Engineer
12 13 (3.54%) IT Support Analyst
13 12 (3.27%) SAP Consultant
14 11 (3.00%) IT Engineer
15 10 (2.72%) Finance Manager
15 10 (2.72%) Support Engineer
15 10 (2.72%) Transformation Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (5.45%) REST
1 20 (5.45%) Spring
2 19 (5.18%) Kafka
3 18 (4.90%) Spring Boot
4 15 (4.09%) React
5 14 (3.81%) RESTful
6 10 (2.72%) HTML
6 10 (2.72%) JSON
6 10 (2.72%) XML
7 9 (2.45%) OAuth
8 8 (2.18%) ActiveMQ
8 8 (2.18%) CSS
8 8 (2.18%) JAX-RS
8 8 (2.18%) SOAP
9 7 (1.91%) LDAP
10 6 (1.63%) AngularJS
10 6 (1.63%) Playwright
10 6 (1.63%) Swagger
11 5 (1.36%) ARM Templates
11 5 (1.36%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 25 (6.81%) Onboarding
2 24 (6.54%) Product Ownership
3 14 (3.81%) Cloud Native
4 13 (3.54%) Analytical Mindset
4 13 (3.54%) Data Protection Act
4 13 (3.54%) Management Information System
5 11 (3.00%) Data Centre
5 11 (3.00%) Driving Licence
6 8 (2.18%) Legacy Systems
7 7 (1.91%) Data Structures
8 6 (1.63%) AI Agents
8 6 (1.63%) Distributed Systems
8 6 (1.63%) Enterprise Software
8 6 (1.63%) PKI
8 6 (1.63%) Security Posture
9 5 (1.36%) Private Cloud
9 5 (1.36%) Public Cloud
9 5 (1.36%) Replication
9 5 (1.36%) Self-Motivation
10 4 (1.09%) SWIFT Messaging Network
Operating Systems
1 51 (13.90%) Windows
2 24 (6.54%) Linux
3 18 (4.90%) Windows 10
4 15 (4.09%) Unix
5 9 (2.45%) Mac OS
6 7 (1.91%) Apple iOS
6 7 (1.91%) Windows Server
7 6 (1.63%) Mac OS X
8 4 (1.09%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (0.82%) Solaris
9 3 (0.82%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.54%) AIX
10 2 (0.54%) Android
10 2 (0.54%) HPUX
10 2 (0.54%) Oracle Linux
10 2 (0.54%) SUSE
10 2 (0.54%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 79 (21.53%) Agile
2 72 (19.62%) Continuous Improvement
3 67 (18.26%) Stakeholder Management
4 55 (14.99%) Change Management
4 55 (14.99%) Migration
5 51 (13.90%) CI/CD
6 48 (13.08%) ITIL
7 45 (12.26%) Project Management
8 43 (11.72%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 38 (10.35%) Validation
10 37 (10.08%) DevOps
10 37 (10.08%) ERP
10 37 (10.08%) Workshop Facilitation
11 35 (9.54%) Test Automation
12 32 (8.72%) Data Migration
12 32 (8.72%) Decision-Making
13 31 (8.45%) Customer Service
14 30 (8.17%) Microservices
15 29 (7.90%) Analytics
15 29 (7.90%) Root Cause Analysis
Programming Languages
1 47 (12.81%) SQL
2 42 (11.44%) Java
3 38 (10.35%) Python
4 37 (10.08%) PowerShell
5 16 (4.36%) JavaScript
6 10 (2.72%) TypeScript
7 9 (2.45%) Bash
8 6 (1.63%) Shell Script
9 4 (1.09%) Go
9 4 (1.09%) PL/SQL
9 4 (1.09%) T-SQL
10 3 (0.82%) Apex Code
10 3 (0.82%) C#
10 3 (0.82%) CLIST
10 3 (0.82%) COBOL
10 3 (0.82%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 3 (0.82%) JCL
10 3 (0.82%) Kotlin
10 3 (0.82%) REXX
10 3 (0.82%) VBA
Qualifications
1 55 (14.99%) Security Cleared
2 47 (12.81%) Degree
3 39 (10.63%) SC Cleared
4 31 (8.45%) BPSS Clearance
5 22 (5.99%) Computer Science Degree
6 16 (4.36%) Microsoft Certification
7 15 (4.09%) CISSP
8 13 (3.54%) A+ Certification
8 13 (3.54%) Cisco Certification
9 12 (3.27%) Network+ Certification
10 9 (2.45%) CCNA
11 7 (1.91%) AWS Certification
11 7 (1.91%) CompTIA Security+
12 6 (1.63%) CISM
12 6 (1.63%) HNC
13 5 (1.36%) Azure Certification
13 5 (1.36%) CCNP
13 5 (1.36%) CEH
13 5 (1.36%) PMI Certification
13 5 (1.36%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 28 (7.63%) Data Quality
2 12 (3.27%) QA
3 10 (2.72%) NIST
4 9 (2.45%) GRC
5 8 (2.18%) SLA
6 7 (1.91%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 7 (1.91%) PSD2
7 6 (1.63%) PMO
8 4 (1.09%) Accessibility
8 4 (1.09%) GDPR
8 4 (1.09%) ISO 20022
8 4 (1.09%) PCI DSS
8 4 (1.09%) SEPA
9 2 (0.54%) ISO 8583
9 2 (0.54%) ISO/IEC 27005
10 1 (0.27%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 43 (11.72%) Active Directory
2 23 (6.27%) Docker
3 7 (1.91%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (1.36%) Firmware
5 4 (1.09%) Virtual Desktop
5 4 (1.09%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (1.09%) VMware NSX
6 3 (0.82%) ACF2
6 3 (0.82%) RACF
6 3 (0.82%) Time Sharing Option
6 3 (0.82%) vSphere
7 1 (0.27%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.27%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 26 (7.08%) Kubernetes
2 17 (4.63%) Terraform
3 11 (3.00%) Grafana
3 11 (3.00%) SCCM
4 8 (2.18%) Ansible
5 7 (1.91%) Microsoft Intune
5 7 (1.91%) Prometheus
6 4 (1.09%) Single Sign-On
7 3 (0.82%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 3 (0.82%) CA Endevor
7 3 (0.82%) FortiGate
7 3 (0.82%) McAfee ePO
7 3 (0.82%) Tivoli
7 3 (0.82%) Tivoli Storage Manager
8 2 (0.54%) Argo
8 2 (0.54%) HP ALM
8 2 (0.54%) Istio
8 2 (0.54%) WMI
9 1 (0.27%) Functional Safety
9 1 (0.27%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 69 (18.80%) Microsoft
2 44 (11.99%) SAP
3 37 (10.08%) ServiceNow
4 19 (5.18%) Oracle
5 14 (3.81%) Splunk
6 12 (3.27%) Sage
7 11 (3.00%) Cisco
8 9 (2.45%) Google
8 9 (2.45%) VMware
8 9 (2.45%) Workday
9 8 (2.18%) F5
9 8 (2.18%) Remedy
10 6 (1.63%) BeyondTrust
10 6 (1.63%) CrowdStrike
10 6 (1.63%) HP
10 6 (1.63%) Palo Alto
11 5 (1.36%) Bomgar
11 5 (1.36%) Dell
11 5 (1.36%) DocuSign
11 5 (1.36%) Salesforce