Problem-Solving Job Trends in England

Problem Solving
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in England requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 12 4 8
Rank change year-on-year -8 +4 +5
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 6,581 8,000 12,925
As % of all permanent jobs in England 7.90% 20.44% 14.58%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.68% 21.91% 17.47%
Number of salaries quoted 4,659 4,454 8,529
10th Percentile £27,500 £27,375 £26,000
25th Percentile £32,000 £32,750 £32,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £50,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -9.09%
75th Percentile £68,750 £70,000 £67,500
90th Percentile £87,500 £87,500 £85,000
UK median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £48,900
% change year-on-year -5.00% +2.25% -11.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Problem-Solving falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 61,648 36,515 73,982
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 74.00% 93.30% 83.47%
Number of salaries quoted 41,084 19,671 54,793
10th Percentile £30,052 £29,750 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £39,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £58,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +2.56% +6.36% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £78,750 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.69%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in England

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in England over the 6 months to 1 June 2026.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in England

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the England region over the 6 months to 1 June 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
London -5 1,944 £70,000 +7.69% 1,574
North of England -10 1,371 £42,500 -5.24% 726
South East -6 1,189 £45,000 - 802
Midlands -21 918 £40,000 -11.11% 424
North West -16 700 £45,000 -3.74% 401
South West -7 574 £43,500 +8.75% 338
West Midlands -24 534 £42,500 -10.53% 261
Yorkshire -10 517 £40,500 +11.72% 240
East of England -7 501 £44,500 +11.11% 325
East Midlands -10 380 £35,000 -9.09% 164
North East -14 154 £48,222 +7.16% 96
Problem-Solving
UK

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in 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
1 343 (5.21%) Microsoft Exchange
2 342 (5.20%) SharePoint
3 73 (1.11%) Confluence
4 64 (0.97%) CMS
5 54 (0.82%) Apache
6 39 (0.59%) Apache Airflow
7 35 (0.53%) IIS
8 32 (0.49%) Apache Spark
9 26 (0.40%) WordPress
10 17 (0.26%) SAS
11 14 (0.21%) Palantir Foundry
12 10 (0.15%) Exchange Server 2013
13 9 (0.14%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 8 (0.12%) Exchange Server 2007
14 8 (0.12%) Exchange Server 2010
15 7 (0.11%) OpenEdge
16 6 (0.091%) Drupal
16 6 (0.091%) Moodle
16 6 (0.091%) nginx
17 5 (0.076%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 402 (6.11%) Microsoft Office
2 346 (5.26%) Microsoft Excel
3 60 (0.91%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 49 (0.74%) Spreadsheet
5 39 (0.59%) MS Visio
6 28 (0.43%) Microsoft Project
7 16 (0.24%) Chatbot
8 9 (0.14%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 9 (0.14%) Adobe Illustrator
8 9 (0.14%) AutoCAD
8 9 (0.14%) SOLIDWORKS
9 8 (0.12%) Fusion 360
10 6 (0.091%) Photoshop
10 6 (0.091%) Trello
11 4 (0.061%) Simulink
12 3 (0.046%) Acrobat
12 3 (0.046%) Autodesk Inventor
12 3 (0.046%) Maya
13 2 (0.030%) Blender
13 2 (0.030%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 63 (0.96%) SAP S/4HANA
2 61 (0.93%) Dynamics CRM
3 34 (0.52%) NetSuite
4 22 (0.33%) Salesforce CRM
5 20 (0.30%) Shopify
6 17 (0.26%) Oracle EBS
7 16 (0.24%) Magento
8 15 (0.23%) Dynamics NAV
9 14 (0.21%) SAP ERP
10 13 (0.20%) SAP CO
11 12 (0.18%) iTrent
12 11 (0.17%) Maximo
13 10 (0.15%) IBM Planning Analytics
14 9 (0.14%) Dynamics AX
14 9 (0.14%) Endur
15 8 (0.12%) Sage 50
16 7 (0.11%) Elite 3E
16 7 (0.11%) Q-Pulse
16 7 (0.11%) SAP Business One
16 7 (0.11%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 1,394 (21.18%) Azure
2 1,024 (15.56%) Microsoft 365
3 835 (12.69%) AWS
4 496 (7.54%) Power Platform
5 324 (4.92%) SaaS
6 284 (4.32%) GCP
7 282 (4.29%) Entra ID
8 173 (2.63%) Serverless
9 172 (2.61%) Azure DevOps
10 143 (2.17%) GitHub
11 130 (1.98%) Dynamics 365
12 117 (1.78%) Power Automate
13 97 (1.47%) PowerApps
14 91 (1.38%) Amazon S3
15 87 (1.32%) Google Workspace
16 78 (1.19%) OneDrive
17 76 (1.15%) PaaS
18 72 (1.09%) IaaS
19 71 (1.08%) AWS Lambda
19 71 (1.08%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 407 (6.18%) Firewall
2 373 (5.67%) DNS
3 312 (4.74%) DHCP
4 256 (3.89%) VPN
5 228 (3.46%) WAN
6 199 (3.02%) Wi-Fi
7 197 (2.99%) LAN
8 193 (2.93%) TCP/IP
9 178 (2.70%) Broadband
10 127 (1.93%) VLAN
11 124 (1.88%) Wireless
12 104 (1.58%) VoIP
13 83 (1.26%) Network Security
14 68 (1.03%) SD-WAN
15 49 (0.74%) SAN
16 44 (0.67%) BGP
17 43 (0.65%) Internet
17 43 (0.65%) OSPF
18 35 (0.53%) HTTP
19 32 (0.49%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 392 (5.96%) Power BI
2 288 (4.38%) SQL Server
3 127 (1.93%) Data Warehouse
4 111 (1.69%) Tableau
5 106 (1.61%) NoSQL
6 96 (1.46%) PostgreSQL
7 85 (1.29%) MySQL
8 80 (1.22%) Amazon RDS
9 79 (1.20%) Relational Database
10 77 (1.17%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 67 (1.02%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 58 (0.88%) Big Data
13 53 (0.81%) Power Query
14 49 (0.74%) MongoDB
15 46 (0.70%) Amazon Redshift
16 41 (0.62%) DynamoDB
17 39 (0.59%) Metadata
18 38 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
18 38 (0.58%) Data Lake
19 27 (0.41%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 283 (4.30%) Git
2 210 (3.19%) JIRA
3 97 (1.47%) GitLab
3 97 (1.47%) Jenkins
4 30 (0.46%) Rational DOORS
5 27 (0.41%) Selenium
6 21 (0.32%) Visual Studio
7 20 (0.30%) Chocolatey
7 20 (0.30%) Maven
8 19 (0.29%) Cypress.io
8 19 (0.29%) JUnit
9 18 (0.27%) Cucumber
10 16 (0.24%) Burp Suite
10 16 (0.24%) Metasploit
11 15 (0.23%) CircleCI
11 15 (0.23%) SonarQube
12 14 (0.21%) Subversion
13 13 (0.20%) LabVIEW
13 13 (0.20%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
13 13 (0.20%) TeamCity
General
1 3,048 (46.32%) Social Skills
2 1,936 (29.42%) Analytical Skills
3 1,341 (20.38%) Finance
4 426 (6.47%) Organisational Skills
5 359 (5.46%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 359 (5.46%) Manufacturing
6 335 (5.09%) Law
7 323 (4.91%) Marketing
8 283 (4.30%) Retail
9 275 (4.18%) Legal
10 274 (4.16%) Public Sector
11 262 (3.98%) Banking
12 165 (2.51%) Telecoms
13 143 (2.17%) Electronics
14 138 (2.10%) Presentation Skills
15 106 (1.61%) Documentation Skills
16 105 (1.60%) Influencing Skills
17 86 (1.31%) Advertising
18 85 (1.29%) Aerospace
19 75 (1.14%) Games
Job Titles
1 865 (13.14%) Analyst
2 815 (12.38%) Senior
3 680 (10.33%) IT Support
4 628 (9.54%) Developer
5 584 (8.87%) Support Engineer
6 411 (6.25%) IT Engineer
7 398 (6.05%) Lead
8 322 (4.89%) IT Support Engineer
9 292 (4.44%) Consultant
10 247 (3.75%) Support Analyst
11 243 (3.69%) Support Technician
12 232 (3.53%) Architect
13 223 (3.39%) Software Engineer
14 210 (3.19%) Systems Engineer
15 190 (2.89%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 182 (2.77%) IT Technician
17 176 (2.67%) Technical Support
18 169 (2.57%) Business Analyst
19 162 (2.46%) 2nd Line Support
20 158 (2.40%) Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 266 (4.04%) .NET
2 252 (3.83%) React
3 213 (3.24%) HTML
4 182 (2.77%) CSS
5 172 (2.61%) REST
6 134 (2.04%) Node.js
7 124 (1.88%) RESTful
8 96 (1.46%) SOAP
9 86 (1.31%) Middleware
10 82 (1.25%) JSON
11 79 (1.20%) Spring
12 69 (1.05%) XML
13 68 (1.03%) Vue
14 66 (1.00%) AngularJS
15 64 (0.97%) Kafka
16 61 (0.93%) OAuth
17 56 (0.85%) gRPC
18 54 (0.82%) Web Services
19 52 (0.79%) EDI
19 52 (0.79%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 402 (6.11%) Driving Licence
2 381 (5.79%) Onboarding
3 308 (4.68%) Self-Motivation
4 231 (3.51%) Management Information System
5 215 (3.27%) Cloud Native
6 189 (2.87%) Product Ownership
7 165 (2.51%) Data Centre
8 154 (2.34%) Distributed Systems
9 130 (1.98%) Analytical Mindset
10 127 (1.93%) Legacy Systems
11 98 (1.49%) Mobile App
12 91 (1.38%) Social Media
13 85 (1.29%) Data Structures
14 83 (1.26%) Enterprise Software
15 71 (1.08%) Low-Code
16 69 (1.05%) Algorithms
17 67 (1.02%) Security Posture
18 66 (1.00%) Virtual Team
19 60 (0.91%) Video\Live Streaming
20 56 (0.85%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 1,021 (15.51%) Windows
2 425 (6.46%) Windows Server
3 417 (6.34%) Linux
4 165 (2.51%) Windows 10
5 109 (1.66%) Windows Server 2016
6 108 (1.64%) Android
7 85 (1.29%) Apple iOS
8 81 (1.23%) Mac OS
9 65 (0.99%) Windows Server 2019
10 46 (0.70%) Unix
11 40 (0.61%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 32 (0.49%) CentOS
12 32 (0.49%) Windows Server 2012
13 29 (0.44%) Ubuntu
14 24 (0.36%) VMS
15 16 (0.24%) Windows 7
16 14 (0.21%) Mac OS X
17 10 (0.15%) Debian
18 7 (0.11%) Windows 8
18 7 (0.11%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,260 (19.15%) Continuous Improvement
2 1,047 (15.91%) Agile
3 950 (14.44%) Customer Service
4 733 (11.14%) AI
5 724 (11.00%) Mentoring
6 715 (10.86%) CI/CD
7 695 (10.56%) Decision-Making
8 628 (9.54%) DevOps
9 625 (9.50%) Analytics
10 551 (8.37%) Software Engineering
11 543 (8.25%) ITIL
11 543 (8.25%) Stakeholder Management
12 507 (7.70%) Computer Science
13 503 (7.64%) Roadmaps
14 488 (7.42%) Project Management
15 467 (7.10%) Business Intelligence
16 457 (6.94%) Cybersecurity
17 444 (6.75%) Coaching
18 414 (6.29%) Collaborative Working
19 380 (5.77%) ERP
Programming Languages
1 1,007 (15.30%) Python
2 959 (14.57%) SQL
3 452 (6.87%) JavaScript
4 334 (5.08%) Java
5 327 (4.97%) C#
6 295 (4.48%) PowerShell
7 197 (2.99%) TypeScript
8 155 (2.36%) Bash
9 131 (1.99%) C++
10 92 (1.40%) PHP
11 86 (1.31%) Go
12 63 (0.96%) Scala
13 58 (0.88%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 57 (0.87%) C
15 49 (0.74%) T-SQL
16 45 (0.68%) PL/SQL
16 45 (0.68%) R
17 41 (0.62%) Rust
18 37 (0.56%) Apex Code
19 35 (0.53%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 1,124 (17.08%) Degree
2 501 (7.61%) Security Cleared
3 338 (5.14%) SC Cleared
4 256 (3.89%) Computer Science Degree
5 226 (3.43%) DBS Check
6 188 (2.86%) Microsoft Certification
7 116 (1.76%) DV Cleared
8 113 (1.72%) Master's Degree
9 111 (1.69%) Cisco Certification
9 111 (1.69%) CISSP
10 85 (1.29%) Azure Certification
11 83 (1.26%) BPSS Clearance
11 83 (1.26%) PMI Certification
12 82 (1.25%) A+ Certification
13 70 (1.06%) CCNA
13 70 (1.06%) PMP
14 65 (0.99%) ACCA
15 60 (0.91%) CIMA
16 58 (0.88%) Network+ Certification
17 54 (0.82%) HNC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 347 (5.27%) QA
2 314 (4.77%) Data Quality
3 262 (3.98%) GDPR
4 195 (2.96%) SLA
5 163 (2.48%) Cyber Essentials
6 153 (2.32%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 142 (2.16%) Accessibility
8 138 (2.10%) NIST
9 115 (1.75%) PCI DSS
10 46 (0.70%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 37 (0.56%) PMO
12 34 (0.52%) ISO 9001
13 29 (0.44%) SOC 2
14 28 (0.43%) GRC
15 23 (0.35%) COBIT
16 22 (0.33%) Actionable Recommendations
17 16 (0.24%) GMP
18 13 (0.20%) IFRS
19 12 (0.18%) TickIT
20 11 (0.17%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 689 (10.47%) Active Directory
2 285 (4.33%) Docker
3 212 (3.22%) Hyper-V
4 201 (3.05%) VMware Infrastructure
5 49 (0.74%) Terminal Server
6 44 (0.67%) Virtual Desktop
7 38 (0.58%) Firmware
8 25 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
9 21 (0.32%) vSphere
10 15 (0.23%) KVM
11 14 (0.21%) VMware ESXi
12 10 (0.15%) IAG
13 7 (0.11%) VMware Workstation
13 7 (0.11%) XenApp
14 5 (0.076%) Embedded Firmware
14 5 (0.076%) VMware NSX
15 4 (0.061%) Microsoft Virtual Server
15 4 (0.061%) Slurm Workload Manager
15 4 (0.061%) Virtual Servers
16 3 (0.046%) ClearTrust
Systems Management
1 293 (4.45%) Terraform
2 248 (3.77%) Microsoft Intune
3 239 (3.63%) Kubernetes
4 143 (2.17%) Ansible
5 89 (1.35%) Grafana
6 81 (1.23%) SCCM
7 54 (0.82%) Prometheus
8 36 (0.55%) Nagios
9 32 (0.49%) Single Sign-On
10 21 (0.32%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 18 (0.27%) Kibana
12 14 (0.21%) Autotask
12 14 (0.21%) vCenter Server
13 13 (0.20%) FortiGate
13 13 (0.20%) Jamf Pro
14 12 (0.18%) Puppet
15 11 (0.17%) Argo
15 11 (0.17%) Nessus
16 10 (0.15%) Kubeflow
16 10 (0.15%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 1,744 (26.50%) Microsoft
2 290 (4.41%) VMware
3 187 (2.84%) Oracle
4 172 (2.61%) Google
5 159 (2.42%) SAP
6 155 (2.36%) Cisco
7 138 (2.10%) Salesforce
8 128 (1.94%) ServiceNow
9 118 (1.79%) SolarWinds
10 111 (1.69%) Veeam
11 108 (1.64%) Databricks
12 99 (1.50%) Splunk
13 79 (1.20%) Apple
14 66 (1.00%) Adobe
15 58 (0.88%) Dell
16 54 (0.82%) Meraki
17 51 (0.77%) Red Hat
18 50 (0.76%) Nimble Storage
19 49 (0.74%) Dynatrace
19 49 (0.74%) Tanium