Problem-Solving Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Problem Solving
England > West Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the West Midlands requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 10 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 3 8
Rank change year-on-year -8 +5 -2
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 412 322 216
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 11.78% 17.76% 11.37%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.83% 20.14% 13.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 267 205 134
10th Percentile £306 £213 £158
25th Percentile £363 £400 £351
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £469 £473
Median % change year-on-year -4.05% -0.74% -10.00%
75th Percentile £528 £538 £575
90th Percentile £648 £636 £646
England median daily rate £500 £490 £500
% change year-on-year +2.04% -2.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 11 5
10th Percentile £12.90 £14.25 -
25th Percentile £13.45 £20.06 £15.13
Median hourly rate £20.50 £33.88 £17.00
Median % change year-on-year -39.49% +99.29% -18.93%
75th Percentile £37.50 £42.01 £18.97
90th Percentile £67.84 £52.50 £20.49
England median hourly rate £19.57 £18.90 £16.23
% change year-on-year +3.57% +16.42% -69.76%

All Process & Methodology Skills
West Midlands

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 West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,978 1,599 1,547
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 85.16% 88.20% 81.42%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,827 1,025 1,008
10th Percentile £313 £250 £255
25th Percentile £413 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £519
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -3.66% +3.80%
75th Percentile £576 £588 £626
90th Percentile £675 £666 £725
England median daily rate £525 £510 £525
% change year-on-year +2.95% -2.87% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 205 103 40
10th Percentile £13.45 £12.62 £14.14
25th Percentile £17.64 £16.07 £15.13
Median hourly rate £29.60 £24.34 £22.05
Median % change year-on-year +21.61% +10.41% -19.84%
75th Percentile £53.75 £35.30 £35.63
90th Percentile £69.14 £50.00 £55.03
England median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +1.18%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

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

Problem-Solving
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 10 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the West Midlands

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

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

Problem-Solving
Hourly Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Problem-Solving in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 10 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Problem-Solving in the West Midlands

Problem-Solving
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

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 West Midlands region over the 6 months to 10 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
Shropshire -7 116 £450 -12.62% 42
Warwickshire -1 112 £476 -2.86% 64
Birmingham -14 76 £450 - 168
Coventry -9 34 £363 -14.71% 31
Staffordshire -6 17 £313 -30.56% 51
Solihull -14 15 £493 -17.92% 18
Worcestershire +13 12 £425 +152.98% 24
Herefordshire +2 5 - - 10
Wolverhampton 0 5 £275 +46.67% 20
Dudley - 3 £375 - 11
Wednesbury - 1 - -
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 43 (10.44%) Confluence
2 20 (4.85%) SharePoint
3 16 (3.88%) Oracle Workflow
3 16 (3.88%) SAS
4 9 (2.18%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (1.46%) Oracle Self-Service HR
6 1 (0.24%) Apache
6 1 (0.24%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.24%) Appian
6 1 (0.24%) IIS
6 1 (0.24%) Oracle SOA Suite
6 1 (0.24%) Skype for Business
6 1 (0.24%) WebLogic
Applications
1 27 (6.55%) Microsoft Excel
2 17 (4.13%) Microsoft Office
3 6 (1.46%) Microsoft Project
3 6 (1.46%) Spreadsheet
4 5 (1.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (0.97%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.73%) Navisworks
6 3 (0.73%) Revit
7 2 (0.49%) Adobe XD
7 2 (0.49%) CATIA
7 2 (0.49%) Sketch
8 1 (0.24%) Adobe Captivate
8 1 (0.24%) Adobe Illustrator
8 1 (0.24%) Fusion 360
8 1 (0.24%) Photoshop
8 1 (0.24%) Trello
Business Applications
1 16 (3.88%) SAP S/4HANA
2 11 (2.67%) Dynamics CRM
3 6 (1.46%) Oracle HRMS
4 5 (1.21%) SAP PSCD
5 3 (0.73%) ContrOCC
5 3 (0.73%) Remedy ITSM
5 3 (0.73%) Teamcenter
6 2 (0.49%) NetSuite
6 2 (0.49%) SAP MDG
7 1 (0.24%) Aladdin
7 1 (0.24%) Maximo
7 1 (0.24%) NEC Housing
7 1 (0.24%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.24%) Salesforce CRM
7 1 (0.24%) SAP CX
7 1 (0.24%) SAP GRC
7 1 (0.24%) SAP MM
7 1 (0.24%) SAP QM
7 1 (0.24%) SAP SD
7 1 (0.24%) SAP Travel Management
Cloud Services
1 72 (17.48%) Azure
2 43 (10.44%) Microsoft 365
3 41 (9.95%) AWS
4 38 (9.22%) Power Platform
5 28 (6.80%) Azure DevOps
6 22 (5.34%) Entra ID
7 14 (3.40%) Power Automate
8 13 (3.16%) Dynamics 365
9 12 (2.91%) Serverless
10 11 (2.67%) Azure Data Factory
11 9 (2.18%) Azure Functions
11 9 (2.18%) GitHub
12 8 (1.94%) OneDrive
13 7 (1.70%) Microsoft Purview
13 7 (1.70%) Snowflake
14 6 (1.46%) GCP
15 5 (1.21%) Google Analytics
16 4 (0.97%) SuccessFactors
17 3 (0.73%) Azure Storage
17 3 (0.73%) Figma
Communications & Networking
1 19 (4.61%) DNS
2 17 (4.13%) DHCP
3 14 (3.40%) Firewall
4 13 (3.16%) VPN
5 12 (2.91%) TCP/IP
6 10 (2.43%) LAN
6 10 (2.43%) WAN
7 9 (2.18%) Network Security
8 8 (1.94%) SD-WAN
9 6 (1.46%) Internet
10 4 (0.97%) SSL
10 4 (0.97%) Unified Communications
10 4 (0.97%) VoIP
10 4 (0.97%) Wi-Fi
11 3 (0.73%) Intrusion Detection
11 3 (0.73%) SAN
11 3 (0.73%) VLAN
12 2 (0.49%) Remote Desktop
12 2 (0.49%) Softphone
12 2 (0.49%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (8.50%) Power BI
2 21 (5.10%) Pentaho
2 21 (5.10%) SQL Server
3 20 (4.85%) Data Warehouse
4 19 (4.61%) PostgreSQL
5 16 (3.88%) Relational Database
6 12 (2.91%) Metadata
7 8 (1.94%) Data Lake
7 8 (1.94%) Oracle Reports
8 6 (1.46%) Ingres
8 6 (1.46%) MySQL
8 6 (1.46%) NoSQL
8 6 (1.46%) Oracle Database
9 4 (0.97%) Power Query
9 4 (0.97%) SAP BW
10 3 (0.73%) Amazon RDS
10 3 (0.73%) Big Data
10 3 (0.73%) MongoDB
10 3 (0.73%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 3 (0.73%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 60 (14.56%) JIRA
2 28 (6.80%) Git
3 23 (5.58%) Jenkins
4 17 (4.13%) Selenium
5 15 (3.64%) Postman
6 13 (3.16%) Maven
7 12 (2.91%) JUnit
8 11 (2.67%) SonarQube
9 10 (2.43%) Cypress.io
9 10 (2.43%) GitLab
9 10 (2.43%) Mockito
10 9 (2.18%) WebDriver
11 6 (1.46%) Cucumber
12 5 (1.21%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 5 (1.21%) Zephyr
13 4 (0.97%) Bitbucket
13 4 (0.97%) REST Assured
14 3 (0.73%) Browser DevTools
14 3 (0.73%) Protractor
14 3 (0.73%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 226 (54.85%) Social Skills
2 170 (41.26%) Analytical Skills
3 75 (18.20%) Public Sector
4 65 (15.78%) Finance
5 22 (5.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 22 (5.34%) Manufacturing
6 21 (5.10%) Organisational Skills
7 18 (4.37%) Local Government
8 14 (3.40%) Influencing Skills
8 14 (3.40%) Legal
9 10 (2.43%) Automotive
9 10 (2.43%) Presentation Skills
10 8 (1.94%) Banking
10 8 (1.94%) Marketing
10 8 (1.94%) Retail
11 7 (1.70%) Billing
12 6 (1.46%) Documentation Skills
13 5 (1.21%) Electronics
13 5 (1.21%) Telecoms
14 2 (0.49%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 66 (16.02%) Analyst
2 44 (10.68%) Lead
2 44 (10.68%) Senior
3 36 (8.74%) Developer
4 33 (8.01%) Data Engineer
5 26 (6.31%) Consultant
6 23 (5.58%) Architect
7 20 (4.85%) Administrator
8 19 (4.61%) SAP Consultant
9 18 (4.37%) Business Analyst
10 16 (3.88%) Test Analyst
11 13 (3.16%) Data Analyst
11 13 (3.16%) Support Engineer
12 12 (2.91%) Java Developer
13 11 (2.67%) Delivery Manager
13 11 (2.67%) Technical Engineer
14 10 (2.43%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 10 (2.43%) Senior Developer
15 8 (1.94%) Network Engineer
15 8 (1.94%) Technical Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 32 (7.77%) REST
2 26 (6.31%) SOAP
3 14 (3.40%) AngularJS
3 14 (3.40%) RESTful
3 14 (3.40%) Spring
3 14 (3.40%) Spring Boot
3 14 (3.40%) Web Services
4 12 (2.91%) Spring Cloud
4 12 (2.91%) Terraform
5 11 (2.67%) Hibernate
5 11 (2.67%) JPA
6 10 (2.43%) ActiveMQ
6 10 (2.43%) Oracle Fusion
7 9 (2.18%) Gherkin
8 7 (1.70%) Middleware
8 7 (1.70%) Play Framework
9 6 (1.46%) XML
10 5 (1.21%) JDBC
10 5 (1.21%) SAP Fiori
10 5 (1.21%) SAP PI
Miscellaneous
1 27 (6.55%) Cloud Native
1 27 (6.55%) Self-Motivation
2 23 (5.58%) Management Information System
3 18 (4.37%) Enterprise Software
4 16 (3.88%) Product Ownership
5 11 (2.67%) Legacy Systems
5 11 (2.67%) Onboarding
6 9 (2.18%) Analytical Mindset
6 9 (2.18%) Data Centre
6 9 (2.18%) Virtual Team
7 7 (1.70%) Operational Technology
8 6 (1.46%) Autonomous Agent
8 6 (1.46%) Cyber Threat
8 6 (1.46%) Data Protection Act
8 6 (1.46%) SCADA
9 5 (1.21%) Hybrid Cloud
9 5 (1.21%) Life Science
10 4 (0.97%) iPhone
10 4 (0.97%) Mobile App
10 4 (0.97%) Renewable Energy
Operating Systems
1 47 (11.41%) Windows
2 14 (3.40%) Windows Server
3 13 (3.16%) Windows 10
4 12 (2.91%) Linux
4 12 (2.91%) Mac OS
5 11 (2.67%) Unix
6 3 (0.73%) Apple iOS
7 2 (0.49%) CentOS
7 2 (0.49%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.49%) Ubuntu
8 1 (0.24%) Embedded Linux
8 1 (0.24%) HPUX
8 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2003
8 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 142 (34.47%) Agile
2 127 (30.83%) Continuous Improvement
3 83 (20.15%) Stakeholder Management
4 70 (16.99%) CI/CD
5 68 (16.50%) DevOps
6 62 (15.05%) Test Automation
7 55 (13.35%) Migration
7 55 (13.35%) Scrum
8 53 (12.86%) AI
9 50 (12.14%) Business Intelligence
9 50 (12.14%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 49 (11.89%) Data Modelling
11 48 (11.65%) Analytics
12 47 (11.41%) Decision-Making
13 46 (11.17%) ETL
14 41 (9.95%) Generative AI
15 39 (9.47%) User Acceptance Testing
16 37 (8.98%) Technical Leadership
16 37 (8.98%) Validation
17 35 (8.50%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 68 (16.50%) SQL
2 33 (8.01%) Java
3 32 (7.77%) Python
4 18 (4.37%) JavaScript
5 15 (3.64%) PowerShell
6 13 (3.16%) TypeScript
7 11 (2.67%) C
7 11 (2.67%) C#
8 10 (2.43%) Bash
9 9 (2.18%) PL/SQL
10 8 (1.94%) ProC
11 7 (1.70%) ABAP
11 7 (1.70%) Scala
12 5 (1.21%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 4 (0.97%) Bicep
13 4 (0.97%) C++
14 3 (0.73%) MATLAB
15 2 (0.49%) VB
15 2 (0.49%) VB6
15 2 (0.49%) VBA
Qualifications
1 120 (29.13%) Security Cleared
2 101 (24.51%) SC Cleared
3 44 (10.68%) Degree
4 27 (6.55%) BPSS Clearance
5 21 (5.10%) Microsoft Certification
6 11 (2.67%) Azure Certification
7 10 (2.43%) Cisco Certification
8 9 (2.18%) ISTQB
9 8 (1.94%) Computer Science Degree
9 8 (1.94%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 7 (1.70%) CCNA
11 6 (1.46%) CISSP
11 6 (1.46%) DV Cleared
11 6 (1.46%) OCP
11 6 (1.46%) Oracle Certification
12 5 (1.21%) A+ Certification
12 5 (1.21%) AWS Certification
12 5 (1.21%) MCSE
12 5 (1.21%) Network+ Certification
13 4 (0.97%) RHCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 48 (11.65%) Data Quality
2 41 (9.95%) QA
3 18 (4.37%) Accessibility
4 16 (3.88%) GDPR
5 13 (3.16%) SLA
6 10 (2.43%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 10 (2.43%) WCAG
7 4 (0.97%) Cyber Essentials
7 4 (0.97%) NIST
7 4 (0.97%) PMO
8 3 (0.73%) GRC
8 3 (0.73%) HIPAA
9 2 (0.49%) ISO 19650
9 2 (0.49%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.24%) HL7
10 1 (0.24%) ISO 14001
10 1 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 12207
10 1 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 15288
10 1 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 17025
10 1 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 20000
System Software
1 30 (7.28%) Docker
2 23 (5.58%) Active Directory
3 13 (3.16%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (2.43%) vSphere
5 9 (2.18%) VMware ESXi
6 8 (1.94%) Hyper-V
7 2 (0.49%) FreeRADIUS
7 2 (0.49%) Virtual Desktop
8 1 (0.24%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
8 1 (0.24%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 19 (4.61%) Kubernetes
2 18 (4.37%) SCCM
3 16 (3.88%) Grafana
4 14 (3.40%) Microsoft Intune
4 14 (3.40%) Prometheus
5 10 (2.43%) Ansible
6 5 (1.21%) Jamf Pro
6 5 (1.21%) Single Sign-On
7 4 (0.97%) Podman
7 4 (0.97%) PowerCLI
7 4 (0.97%) vMotion
8 2 (0.49%) Argo
8 2 (0.49%) FortiGate
9 1 (0.24%) AirWatch
9 1 (0.24%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.24%) QRadar
9 1 (0.24%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 93 (22.57%) Microsoft
2 51 (12.38%) Oracle
3 35 (8.50%) SAP
4 21 (5.10%) ServiceNow
5 20 (4.85%) VMware
6 16 (3.88%) Cisco
6 16 (3.88%) Denodo
6 16 (3.88%) Talend
7 11 (2.67%) Atlassian
8 9 (2.18%) Google
8 9 (2.18%) Splunk
9 8 (1.94%) Databricks
10 7 (1.70%) Qualys
11 6 (1.46%) Apple
12 5 (1.21%) Informatica
12 5 (1.21%) webMethods
13 4 (0.97%) Adobe
13 4 (0.97%) Fortinet
13 4 (0.97%) Red Hat
13 4 (0.97%) Siemens