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 21 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
21 Apr 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 9 3 11
Rank change year-on-year -6 +8 -2
Contract jobs citing Problem-Solving 347 233 196
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 11.44% 17.13% 10.26%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.72% 19.35% 12.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 243 151 141
10th Percentile £277 £160 £263
25th Percentile £384 £282 £380
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £463 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.70% -7.50% -4.76%
75th Percentile £538 £580 £611
90th Percentile £631 £700 £650
England median daily rate £490 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -2.00% -2.44% -2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 10 4 9
10th Percentile £13.10 £14.52 £14.29
25th Percentile £14.50 £15.64 £15.13
Median hourly rate £19.36 £16.75 £42.00
Median % change year-on-year +15.57% -60.12% +102.85%
75th Percentile £60.25 £28.45 £56.25
90th Percentile £68.80 £47.76 £72.50
England median hourly rate £22.81 £22.14 £17.50
% change year-on-year +3.03% +26.51% -63.84%

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 2,530 1,204 1,603
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 83.42% 88.53% 83.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,658 800 1,064
10th Percentile £305 £200 £275
25th Percentile £402 £392 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.85% - -2.44%
75th Percentile £575 £588 £613
90th Percentile £650 £688 £736
England median daily rate £505 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 99 57 114
10th Percentile £14.00 £12.62 £11.08
25th Percentile £17.09 £14.50 £14.00
Median hourly rate £27.24 £18.00 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +51.33% -20.00% +26.98%
75th Percentile £60.37 £28.18 £41.44
90th Percentile £70.98 £35.90 £58.00
England median hourly rate £41.94 £31.64 £35.00
% change year-on-year +32.55% -9.60% -9.09%

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 21 April 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 21 April 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 21 April 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 -7 100 £460 +1.28% 15
Warwickshire +2 86 £550 -4.35% 55
Birmingham -12 77 £459 -1.29% 79
Coventry -8 28 £313 -20.51% 15
Staffordshire -1 15 £306 +104.17% 39
Worcestershire -11 9 £563 +8.17% 27
Solihull -10 5 £493 - 9
Wolverhampton - 3 £267 - 1
Herefordshire -14 2 - - 5
Brierley Hill - 1 £390 -
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 33 (9.51%) SAS
2 30 (8.65%) Confluence
3 13 (3.75%) WebLogic
4 8 (2.31%) SharePoint
5 7 (2.02%) Oracle Workflow
6 6 (1.73%) Oracle Self-Service HR
7 4 (1.15%) Apache
7 4 (1.15%) JBoss
7 4 (1.15%) Microsoft Exchange
8 2 (0.58%) HCL Notes
8 2 (0.58%) OpenStack
9 1 (0.29%) Appian
9 1 (0.29%) Oracle SOA Suite
9 1 (0.29%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 22 (6.34%) Microsoft Excel
2 21 (6.05%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (2.88%) MS Visio
4 9 (2.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (1.15%) Adobe XD
5 4 (1.15%) Sketch
5 4 (1.15%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.58%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.29%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 1 (0.29%) Fusion 360
7 1 (0.29%) InDesign
7 1 (0.29%) Trello
Business Applications
1 6 (1.73%) Oracle HRMS
2 4 (1.15%) SAP S/4HANA
3 2 (0.58%) Dynamics CRM
3 2 (0.58%) NEC Housing
4 1 (0.29%) Aareon QL
4 1 (0.29%) iTrent
4 1 (0.29%) MIS ActiveH
4 1 (0.29%) OPENHousing
4 1 (0.29%) Orchard Housing
4 1 (0.29%) SAP HR
4 1 (0.29%) SAP PSCD
4 1 (0.29%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 56 (16.14%) Azure
2 48 (13.83%) AWS
3 22 (6.34%) Power Platform
4 20 (5.76%) Microsoft 365
5 17 (4.90%) Entra ID
6 15 (4.32%) GCP
6 15 (4.32%) GitHub
7 9 (2.59%) Azure DevOps
7 9 (2.59%) GitHub Actions
8 7 (2.02%) Datadog
8 7 (2.02%) OpenShift
8 7 (2.02%) Power Automate
9 6 (1.73%) Amazon S3
9 6 (1.73%) Figma
10 5 (1.44%) Azure Data Factory
10 5 (1.44%) PowerApps
10 5 (1.44%) Serverless
11 4 (1.15%) Cloud Computing
11 4 (1.15%) dbt
11 4 (1.15%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 10 (2.88%) DNS
2 8 (2.31%) VPN
3 7 (2.02%) VSAN
4 6 (1.73%) Firewall
5 5 (1.44%) Intrusion Detection
5 5 (1.44%) Network Security
6 4 (1.15%) BIG-IP
6 4 (1.15%) SD-WAN
6 4 (1.15%) TCP/IP
6 4 (1.15%) WAN
7 2 (0.58%) DHCP
7 2 (0.58%) Internet
7 2 (0.58%) LAN
7 2 (0.58%) SMTP
7 2 (0.58%) SSL
7 2 (0.58%) VLAN
7 2 (0.58%) WAAS
8 1 (0.29%) Kerberos
8 1 (0.29%) VoIP
8 1 (0.29%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (7.20%) Pentaho
2 20 (5.76%) Data Warehouse
3 18 (5.19%) Power BI
4 12 (3.46%) PostgreSQL
5 11 (3.17%) MongoDB
5 11 (3.17%) SQL Server
6 8 (2.31%) Elasticsearch
7 6 (1.73%) Metadata
7 6 (1.73%) Oracle Reports
8 5 (1.44%) Relational Database
9 4 (1.15%) Amazon Redshift
9 4 (1.15%) MySQL
9 4 (1.15%) Power Query
9 4 (1.15%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 3 (0.86%) Tableau
10 3 (0.86%) WebFOCUS
11 2 (0.58%) Amazon RDS
11 2 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
11 2 (0.58%) Big Data
11 2 (0.58%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 70 (20.17%) JIRA
2 61 (17.58%) Git
3 40 (11.53%) Jenkins
4 16 (4.61%) Selenium
5 10 (2.88%) JUnit
6 8 (2.31%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 8 (2.31%) GitLab
7 6 (1.73%) Postman
8 5 (1.44%) REST Assured
8 5 (1.44%) Zephyr
9 4 (1.15%) Eclipse
9 4 (1.15%) IntelliJ
10 3 (0.86%) Cucumber
10 3 (0.86%) JMeter
10 3 (0.86%) WebDriver
11 2 (0.58%) Browser DevTools
11 2 (0.58%) CircleCI
12 1 (0.29%) PetaLinux
12 1 (0.29%) Storybook
12 1 (0.29%) Vite
General
1 177 (51.01%) Social Skills
2 132 (38.04%) Analytical Skills
3 41 (11.82%) Finance
4 28 (8.07%) Public Sector
5 17 (4.90%) Organisational Skills
6 12 (3.46%) Influencing Skills
7 9 (2.59%) Banking
7 9 (2.59%) Legal
7 9 (2.59%) Presentation Skills
8 6 (1.73%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 6 (1.73%) Local Government
8 6 (1.73%) Military
9 5 (1.44%) Electronics
10 4 (1.15%) Documentation Skills
11 3 (0.86%) Law
11 3 (0.86%) Retail
11 3 (0.86%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.58%) Advertising
12 2 (0.58%) Manufacturing
12 2 (0.58%) Police
Job Titles
1 63 (18.16%) Analyst
2 33 (9.51%) Developer
3 32 (9.22%) Data Engineer
4 24 (6.92%) Lead
5 19 (5.48%) Business Analyst
6 15 (4.32%) Senior
7 13 (3.75%) Architect
7 13 (3.75%) Consultant
8 11 (3.17%) Administrator
8 11 (3.17%) Delivery Manager
9 10 (2.88%) Infrastructure Analyst
10 9 (2.59%) Business Intelligence Developer
10 9 (2.59%) Data Analyst
10 9 (2.59%) Splunk Engineer
11 8 (2.31%) Project Manager
11 8 (2.31%) Site Engineer
11 8 (2.31%) Site Reliability Engineer
12 7 (2.02%) Network Engineer
12 7 (2.02%) Software Engineer
12 7 (2.02%) Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 19 (5.48%) Spring
2 18 (5.19%) REST
3 11 (3.17%) Spring Boot
4 10 (2.88%) Elastic Stack
4 10 (2.88%) HTML
5 9 (2.59%) HTML5
5 9 (2.59%) RESTful
6 7 (2.02%) AngularJS
6 7 (2.02%) OpenTelemetry
7 6 (1.73%) CSS
7 6 (1.73%) SAML
8 5 (1.44%) CSS3
8 5 (1.44%) J2EE
8 5 (1.44%) Play Framework
8 5 (1.44%) React
8 5 (1.44%) SailPoint
8 5 (1.44%) SOAP
8 5 (1.44%) XML
9 4 (1.15%) EJB
9 4 (1.15%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 15 (4.32%) Cloud Native
1 15 (4.32%) Product Ownership
2 13 (3.75%) Management Information System
2 13 (3.75%) Onboarding
3 11 (3.17%) Operational Technology
3 11 (3.17%) Self-Motivation
4 8 (2.31%) SCADA
5 7 (2.02%) Analytical Mindset
5 7 (2.02%) Data Centre
5 7 (2.02%) Linux Command Line
6 6 (1.73%) Data Structures
6 6 (1.73%) Distributed Systems
6 6 (1.73%) Enterprise Software
6 6 (1.73%) Legacy Systems
7 5 (1.44%) Driving Licence
8 4 (1.15%) CSOC
8 4 (1.15%) Cyber Threat
8 4 (1.15%) Data Protection Act
8 4 (1.15%) Hybrid Cloud
8 4 (1.15%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 31 (8.93%) Linux
2 27 (7.78%) Windows
3 14 (4.03%) Unix
4 8 (2.31%) Windows 10
5 7 (2.02%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 5 (1.44%) Mac OS
6 5 (1.44%) Windows Server
7 2 (0.58%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.29%) CentOS
8 1 (0.29%) Embedded Linux
8 1 (0.29%) Ubuntu
8 1 (0.29%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 130 (37.46%) Agile
2 108 (31.12%) Continuous Improvement
3 83 (23.92%) CI/CD
4 69 (19.88%) DevOps
5 60 (17.29%) Scrum
6 58 (16.71%) Analytics
7 57 (16.43%) Data Modelling
8 52 (14.99%) Business Intelligence
8 52 (14.99%) Migration
9 51 (14.70%) ETL
9 51 (14.70%) Stakeholder Management
10 49 (14.12%) Test Automation
11 48 (13.83%) AI
12 44 (12.68%) Decision-Making
13 40 (11.53%) Generative AI
14 38 (10.95%) Change Management
14 38 (10.95%) Data Pipeline
15 36 (10.37%) Validation
16 34 (9.80%) Data Integration
17 32 (9.22%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 85 (24.50%) SQL
2 48 (13.83%) Python
3 32 (9.22%) Java
4 17 (4.90%) Bash
5 15 (4.32%) PL/SQL
6 12 (3.46%) PowerShell
7 11 (3.17%) JavaScript
8 7 (2.02%) Shell Script
9 6 (1.73%) Perl
10 5 (1.44%) Scala
10 5 (1.44%) TypeScript
11 4 (1.15%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 4 (1.15%) Kusto Query Language
12 3 (0.86%) C
12 3 (0.86%) C++
12 3 (0.86%) Go
12 3 (0.86%) MATLAB
13 2 (0.58%) Bicep
13 2 (0.58%) C#
14 1 (0.29%) SystemVerilog
Qualifications
1 110 (31.70%) Security Cleared
2 90 (25.94%) SC Cleared
3 50 (14.41%) Degree
4 13 (3.75%) BPSS Clearance
4 13 (3.75%) Computer Science Degree
5 10 (2.88%) Microsoft Certification
6 9 (2.59%) DV Cleared
7 7 (2.02%) Azure Certification
8 6 (1.73%) Cisco Certification
9 4 (1.15%) CCNP
9 4 (1.15%) Master's Degree
9 4 (1.15%) OCP
9 4 (1.15%) Oracle Certification
9 4 (1.15%) PMI Certification
9 4 (1.15%) PMP
10 3 (0.86%) MCSE
11 2 (0.58%) CCNA
11 2 (0.58%) ITIL Certification
11 2 (0.58%) PRINCE2 Certification
11 2 (0.58%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 45 (12.97%) Data Quality
2 20 (5.76%) QA
3 9 (2.59%) PMO
4 8 (2.31%) Accessibility
5 6 (1.73%) GDPR
6 5 (1.44%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 4 (1.15%) ISO 19650
7 4 (1.15%) SLA
7 4 (1.15%) WCAG
8 3 (0.86%) ISO 9001
8 3 (0.86%) ISO/IEC 12207
8 3 (0.86%) ISO/IEC 15288
9 2 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials
9 2 (0.58%) GRC
9 2 (0.58%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 2 (0.58%) NIST
10 1 (0.29%) Actionable Recommendations
10 1 (0.29%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.29%) NCSC
10 1 (0.29%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 67 (19.31%) Docker
2 19 (5.48%) Active Directory
3 18 (5.19%) VMware Infrastructure
4 11 (3.17%) vSphere
5 4 (1.15%) Snort
6 3 (0.86%) Hyper-V
6 3 (0.86%) VMware NSX
7 2 (0.58%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.29%) Microsoft App-V
8 1 (0.29%) Oracle RAC
8 1 (0.29%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 67 (19.31%) Kubernetes
2 15 (4.32%) Ansible
2 15 (4.32%) Terraform
3 14 (4.03%) Grafana
4 12 (3.46%) Puppet
5 9 (2.59%) Prometheus
6 8 (2.31%) Kibana
6 8 (2.31%) vRealize
6 8 (2.31%) VxRail
7 6 (1.73%) Argo
7 6 (1.73%) SCCM
8 4 (1.15%) CSIRT
8 4 (1.15%) Microsoft Intune
9 3 (0.86%) Control-M
9 3 (0.86%) IBM Guardium
9 3 (0.86%) Nessus
9 3 (0.86%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.58%) Jamf Pro
10 2 (0.58%) Podman
10 2 (0.58%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 65 (18.73%) Microsoft
2 44 (12.68%) Oracle
3 36 (10.37%) ServiceNow
4 25 (7.20%) Talend
5 24 (6.92%) Denodo
6 19 (5.48%) VMware
7 18 (5.19%) Cisco
8 17 (4.90%) Splunk
9 15 (4.32%) SAP
10 9 (2.59%) Red Hat
10 9 (2.59%) SolarWinds
11 8 (2.31%) AppDynamics
11 8 (2.31%) Atlassian
11 8 (2.31%) Dell
11 8 (2.31%) HP
12 7 (2.02%) Adobe
12 7 (2.02%) Commvault
12 7 (2.02%) IBM
13 5 (1.44%) Okta
14 4 (1.15%) Zscaler
271 Problem-Solving jobs in the West Midlands