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 26 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 4 7
Rank change year-on-year -3 +3 +4
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 8,327 8,422 10,791
As % of all permanent jobs in England 8.64% 19.25% 14.78%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.76% 21.65% 18.25%
Number of salaries quoted 5,803 4,789 5,362
10th Percentile £27,750 £26,250 £26,750
25th Percentile £33,250 £31,250 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £45,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% -10.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £66,250 £67,500 £70,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £86,250 £85,000
UK median annual salary £47,371 £45,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +5.27% -10.00% -9.09%

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 70,812 38,908 59,129
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 73.46% 88.91% 81.00%
Number of salaries quoted 50,212 22,532 37,613
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,500 £31,250
25th Percentile £42,000 £37,500 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £56,000
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% -1.79% -10.40%
75th Percentile £80,000 £76,250 £75,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £97,500 £95,000
UK median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% - -8.33%

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 26 August 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 26 August 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 -6 2,268 £65,000 - 1,325
North of England -8 1,680 £45,000 +7.14% 702
South East -4 1,592 £42,500 - 700
Midlands -7 1,215 £42,500 +10.39% 596
North West -6 881 £45,000 - 337
South West -4 824 £45,000 +28.57% 547
West Midlands -9 681 £42,500 -2.42% 353
East of England -3 676 £42,500 +21.43% 354
Yorkshire -8 543 £42,500 +21.43% 263
East Midlands -9 532 £41,000 +17.14% 245
North East -6 256 £48,250 +20.63% 118
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
1 470 (5.64%) SharePoint
2 398 (4.78%) Microsoft Exchange
3 102 (1.22%) Confluence
4 57 (0.68%) IIS
5 55 (0.66%) CMS
6 46 (0.55%) Apache
7 37 (0.44%) Apache Airflow
7 37 (0.44%) Apache Spark
8 34 (0.41%) WordPress
9 20 (0.24%) SAS
10 13 (0.16%) Palantir Foundry
11 11 (0.13%) nginx
11 11 (0.13%) WebLogic
11 11 (0.13%) WebSphere
12 9 (0.11%) Jupyter
12 9 (0.11%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 8 (0.096%) Exchange Server 2013
13 8 (0.096%) Tomcat
14 7 (0.084%) OpenEdge
15 5 (0.060%) CICS
Applications
1 535 (6.42%) Microsoft Office
2 475 (5.70%) Microsoft Excel
3 87 (1.04%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 48 (0.58%) Spreadsheet
5 47 (0.56%) MS Visio
6 41 (0.49%) Microsoft Project
7 34 (0.41%) AutoCAD
8 21 (0.25%) Simulink
9 17 (0.20%) Revit
10 15 (0.18%) Chatbot
11 10 (0.12%) SOLIDWORKS
12 8 (0.096%) Adobe Creative Suite
12 8 (0.096%) Trello
13 7 (0.084%) Fusion 360
14 6 (0.072%) Adobe Illustrator
14 6 (0.072%) Autodesk Flame
14 6 (0.072%) Baselight
14 6 (0.072%) EPLAN
14 6 (0.072%) Navisworks
15 5 (0.060%) Lightworks
Business Applications
1 87 (1.04%) Dynamics CRM
2 84 (1.01%) SAP S/4HANA
3 66 (0.79%) NetSuite
4 31 (0.37%) Shopify
5 21 (0.25%) Oracle EBS
6 17 (0.20%) Magento
7 15 (0.18%) IBM Planning Analytics
7 15 (0.18%) SAP Business One
8 14 (0.17%) Elite 3E
8 14 (0.17%) SAP ERP
9 13 (0.16%) Salesforce CRM
10 12 (0.14%) Dynamics AX
11 11 (0.13%) Oracle ERP
12 10 (0.12%) JDE EnterpriseOne
12 10 (0.12%) Oracle Applications
12 10 (0.12%) Sage X3
13 9 (0.11%) iTrent
13 9 (0.11%) Primavera
13 9 (0.11%) Sage 50
13 9 (0.11%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 1,711 (20.55%) Azure
2 1,301 (15.62%) Microsoft 365
3 1,009 (12.12%) AWS
4 698 (8.38%) Power Platform
5 404 (4.85%) Entra ID
6 367 (4.41%) SaaS
7 347 (4.17%) GCP
8 208 (2.50%) Azure DevOps
9 206 (2.47%) GitHub
10 186 (2.23%) Serverless
11 181 (2.17%) Dynamics 365
12 177 (2.13%) Power Automate
13 152 (1.83%) PowerApps
14 118 (1.42%) Microsoft Copilot
15 115 (1.38%) OneDrive
16 98 (1.18%) Amazon S3
17 93 (1.12%) GitHub Actions
18 85 (1.02%) AWS Lambda
19 81 (0.97%) AWS CloudFormation
20 79 (0.95%) Google Workspace
Communications & Networking
1 503 (6.04%) Firewall
2 469 (5.63%) DNS
3 397 (4.77%) DHCP
4 318 (3.82%) VPN
5 289 (3.47%) TCP/IP
6 206 (2.47%) Wi-Fi
7 201 (2.41%) WAN
8 198 (2.38%) LAN
9 176 (2.11%) Wireless
10 166 (1.99%) VLAN
11 149 (1.79%) Network Security
12 110 (1.32%) Broadband
13 108 (1.30%) VoIP
14 49 (0.59%) Internet
15 42 (0.50%) HTTP
16 41 (0.49%) SAN
17 36 (0.43%) OSPF
17 36 (0.43%) SD-WAN
18 35 (0.42%) BGP
19 33 (0.40%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 544 (6.53%) Power BI
2 416 (5.00%) SQL Server
3 143 (1.72%) MySQL
4 141 (1.69%) Data Warehouse
5 136 (1.63%) Amazon RDS
6 134 (1.61%) Relational Database
7 122 (1.47%) Tableau
8 116 (1.39%) PostgreSQL
9 106 (1.27%) NoSQL
10 95 (1.14%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 84 (1.01%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 63 (0.76%) Big Data
12 63 (0.76%) MongoDB
13 58 (0.70%) Azure SQL Database
14 57 (0.68%) Data Lake
15 51 (0.61%) Power Query
16 49 (0.59%) Metadata
17 42 (0.50%) DynamoDB
18 41 (0.49%) Electronic Patient Records
19 36 (0.43%) Looker
Development Applications
1 373 (4.48%) Git
2 294 (3.53%) JIRA
3 131 (1.57%) Jenkins
4 105 (1.26%) GitLab
5 40 (0.48%) Selenium
6 37 (0.44%) Eclipse
7 35 (0.42%) Claude Code
8 33 (0.40%) JUnit
8 33 (0.40%) Subversion
9 28 (0.34%) Cucumber
10 26 (0.31%) Postman
11 24 (0.29%) Rational DOORS
12 23 (0.28%) Cypress.io
13 21 (0.25%) Bitbucket
14 20 (0.24%) Oracle Forms
15 18 (0.22%) SonarQube
16 17 (0.20%) Visual Studio
17 16 (0.19%) Chocolatey
18 15 (0.18%) MLflow
19 14 (0.17%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 4,080 (49.00%) Social Skills
2 2,531 (30.40%) Analytical Skills
3 1,666 (20.01%) Finance
4 646 (7.76%) Manufacturing
5 533 (6.40%) Organisational Skills
6 500 (6.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 491 (5.90%) Law
8 421 (5.06%) Retail
9 363 (4.36%) Marketing
10 323 (3.88%) Public Sector
11 320 (3.84%) Legal
12 304 (3.65%) Banking
13 230 (2.76%) Electronics
14 215 (2.58%) Aerospace
15 190 (2.28%) Telecoms
16 178 (2.14%) Influencing Skills
17 155 (1.86%) Presentation Skills
18 109 (1.31%) Documentation Skills
19 90 (1.08%) Advertising
20 88 (1.06%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 1,085 (13.03%) Analyst
2 918 (11.02%) Senior
3 807 (9.69%) Developer
4 706 (8.48%) IT Support
5 576 (6.92%) Support Engineer
6 510 (6.12%) Lead
7 420 (5.04%) Consultant
8 391 (4.70%) IT Engineer
9 346 (4.16%) Support Analyst
10 307 (3.69%) Software Engineer
11 301 (3.61%) IT Support Engineer
12 278 (3.34%) Architect
13 261 (3.13%) Technical Support
14 254 (3.05%) Systems Engineer
15 250 (3.00%) Support Technician
16 222 (2.67%) IT Technician
17 213 (2.56%) Technical Engineer
18 191 (2.29%) Data Engineer
19 189 (2.27%) Technical Support Engineer
20 177 (2.13%) Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 377 (4.53%) .NET
2 367 (4.41%) Terraform
3 305 (3.66%) React
4 266 (3.19%) REST
5 260 (3.12%) HTML
6 201 (2.41%) CSS
7 178 (2.14%) RESTful
8 146 (1.75%) Node.js
9 116 (1.39%) SOAP
10 112 (1.35%) Spring
11 102 (1.22%) AngularJS
11 102 (1.22%) JSON
12 94 (1.13%) ASP.NET
13 93 (1.12%) Vue
14 91 (1.09%) Kafka
14 91 (1.09%) Web Services
15 89 (1.07%) Middleware
16 79 (0.95%) XML
17 73 (0.88%) OAuth
18 72 (0.86%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 549 (6.59%) Onboarding
2 537 (6.45%) Driving Licence
3 425 (5.10%) Self-Motivation
4 345 (4.14%) Management Information System
5 307 (3.69%) Cloud Native
6 244 (2.93%) Product Ownership
7 179 (2.15%) Data Centre
8 175 (2.10%) Legacy Systems
9 152 (1.83%) Distributed Systems
10 149 (1.79%) Enterprise Software
11 117 (1.41%) Data Structures
12 113 (1.36%) Analytical Mindset
13 110 (1.32%) Security Posture
14 102 (1.22%) NHS
15 101 (1.21%) AI Agents
16 98 (1.18%) Algorithms
17 96 (1.15%) Cyber Threat
18 90 (1.08%) Robotics
19 84 (1.01%) IoT
19 84 (1.01%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 1,271 (15.26%) Windows
2 558 (6.70%) Linux
3 549 (6.59%) Windows Server
4 160 (1.92%) Windows 10
5 115 (1.38%) Windows Server 2016
6 105 (1.26%) Mac OS
7 96 (1.15%) Android
8 94 (1.13%) Apple iOS
9 55 (0.66%) Unix
10 46 (0.55%) Windows Server 2019
11 32 (0.38%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 32 (0.38%) Ubuntu
12 30 (0.36%) VMS
13 18 (0.22%) CentOS
14 15 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
15 11 (0.13%) Debian
16 9 (0.11%) Embedded Linux
16 9 (0.11%) FreeRTOS
16 9 (0.11%) Mac OS X
17 8 (0.096%) Rocky
Processes & Methodologies
1 2,051 (24.63%) Continuous Improvement
2 1,365 (16.39%) Agile
3 1,268 (15.23%) Customer Service
4 1,070 (12.85%) AI
5 1,005 (12.07%) Decision-Making
6 922 (11.07%) Stakeholder Management
7 898 (10.78%) CI/CD
8 895 (10.75%) Mentoring
9 784 (9.42%) Analytics
10 769 (9.24%) Software Engineering
11 758 (9.10%) DevOps
12 689 (8.27%) Cybersecurity
13 665 (7.99%) ITIL
13 665 (7.99%) Roadmaps
14 629 (7.55%) Project Delivery
15 616 (7.40%) Business Intelligence
16 605 (7.27%) Project Management
17 600 (7.21%) Computer Science
18 557 (6.69%) Stakeholder Engagement
19 544 (6.53%) Collaborative Working
Programming Languages
1 1,298 (15.59%) SQL
2 1,183 (14.21%) Python
3 573 (6.88%) JavaScript
4 484 (5.81%) C#
5 424 (5.09%) Java
6 369 (4.43%) PowerShell
7 253 (3.04%) TypeScript
8 226 (2.71%) C++
9 173 (2.08%) Bash
10 93 (1.12%) C
11 90 (1.08%) PHP
12 74 (0.89%) Go
13 71 (0.85%) T-SQL
14 68 (0.82%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 49 (0.59%) Perl
15 49 (0.59%) Shell Script
16 45 (0.54%) Rust
17 43 (0.52%) R
18 39 (0.47%) Ruby
18 39 (0.47%) VBA
Qualifications
1 1,457 (17.50%) Degree
2 778 (9.34%) Security Cleared
3 521 (6.26%) SC Cleared
4 321 (3.85%) Computer Science Degree
5 237 (2.85%) DBS Check
6 206 (2.47%) Microsoft Certification
7 189 (2.27%) DV Cleared
8 168 (2.02%) Azure Certification
9 148 (1.78%) Cisco Certification
10 147 (1.77%) CISSP
11 143 (1.72%) BPSS Clearance
12 133 (1.60%) Master's Degree
13 119 (1.43%) HNC
14 106 (1.27%) PMI Certification
15 103 (1.24%) HND
16 83 (1.00%) CISM
16 83 (1.00%) PMP
17 82 (0.98%) CCNA
18 76 (0.91%) CCNP
19 71 (0.85%) AWS Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 491 (5.90%) QA
2 412 (4.95%) Data Quality
3 347 (4.17%) GDPR
4 231 (2.77%) Accessibility
5 230 (2.76%) SLA
6 200 (2.40%) Cyber Essentials
7 194 (2.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 161 (1.93%) NIST
9 142 (1.71%) PCI DSS
10 63 (0.76%) PMO
11 54 (0.65%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 41 (0.49%) GRC
13 34 (0.41%) ISO 9001
14 25 (0.30%) SOC 2
15 24 (0.29%) NCSC
16 23 (0.28%) Sarbanes-Oxley
17 22 (0.26%) Actionable Recommendations
18 21 (0.25%) COBIT
18 21 (0.25%) GMP
19 19 (0.23%) WCAG
System Software
1 851 (10.22%) Active Directory
2 361 (4.34%) Docker
3 279 (3.35%) Hyper-V
4 252 (3.03%) VMware Infrastructure
5 70 (0.84%) Terminal Server
6 57 (0.68%) Firmware
7 50 (0.60%) Virtual Desktop
8 43 (0.52%) Virtual Machines
9 35 (0.42%) vSphere
10 19 (0.23%) Embedded Firmware
11 18 (0.22%) VMware ESXi
12 13 (0.16%) KVM
13 6 (0.072%) XenApp
14 5 (0.060%) ClearTrust
14 5 (0.060%) GPFS
14 5 (0.060%) IAG
14 5 (0.060%) Squid
14 5 (0.060%) StorNext
14 5 (0.060%) Virtual Servers
14 5 (0.060%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 330 (3.96%) Kubernetes
2 283 (3.40%) Microsoft Intune
3 154 (1.85%) Ansible
4 94 (1.13%) Grafana
5 78 (0.94%) SCCM
6 60 (0.72%) Single Sign-On
7 51 (0.61%) Prometheus
8 28 (0.34%) Jamf Pro
9 26 (0.31%) FortiGate
10 23 (0.28%) Nagios
11 20 (0.24%) Puppet
12 15 (0.18%) Argo
13 13 (0.16%) Functional Safety
13 13 (0.16%) Kibana
14 12 (0.14%) Proxmox
15 11 (0.13%) Autotask
15 11 (0.13%) BMC PATROL
15 11 (0.13%) logstash
15 11 (0.13%) Nmap
16 10 (0.12%) Podman
Vendors
1 2,412 (28.97%) Microsoft
2 369 (4.43%) VMware
3 255 (3.06%) SAP
4 245 (2.94%) Google
5 240 (2.88%) Oracle
6 170 (2.04%) ServiceNow
7 169 (2.03%) Cisco
8 161 (1.93%) Salesforce
9 134 (1.61%) Veeam
10 131 (1.57%) Databricks
11 123 (1.48%) Splunk
12 112 (1.35%) SolarWinds
13 80 (0.96%) Sage
14 78 (0.94%) Tanium
15 75 (0.90%) Apple
16 71 (0.85%) Nimble Storage
17 70 (0.84%) Brocade
18 64 (0.77%) Fortinet
19 58 (0.70%) HubSpot
20 57 (0.68%) Palo Alto