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 25 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 12 4 8
Rank change year-on-year -8 +4 +5
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 6,423 7,802 12,655
As % of all permanent jobs in England 7.77% 20.38% 14.73%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.52% 21.82% 17.48%
Number of salaries quoted 4,533 4,318 8,452
10th Percentile £27,500 £27,500 £26,110
25th Percentile £31,500 £33,250 £32,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £50,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -5.94% +1.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £69,391 £70,461 £67,563
90th Percentile £87,500 £88,750 £85,000
UK median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £49,000
% change year-on-year -5.00% +2.04% -10.91%

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 61,053 35,757 72,378
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 73.82% 93.39% 84.23%
Number of salaries quoted 40,449 19,146 54,102
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,000 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - +9.09% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £73,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £59,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +1.69% +7.27% -9.84%

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 25 May 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 25 May 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 1,926 £70,000 +7.69% 1,080
North of England -11 1,328 £42,500 -5.56% 667
South East -8 1,151 £46,575 +0.16% 729
Midlands -22 886 £40,000 -11.11% 407
North West -17 681 £45,000 -4.76% 366
South West -8 557 £43,500 +8.75% 284
West Midlands -24 522 £42,500 -11.46% 259
Yorkshire -11 507 £40,500 +8.00% 233
East of England -7 486 £42,175 +4.14% 259
East Midlands -10 360 £35,000 -9.09% 149
North East -17 140 £48,445 +7.65% 79
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
1 329 (5.12%) Microsoft Exchange
2 322 (5.01%) SharePoint
3 71 (1.11%) Confluence
4 63 (0.98%) CMS
5 56 (0.87%) Apache
6 40 (0.62%) Apache Airflow
7 33 (0.51%) Apache Spark
7 33 (0.51%) IIS
8 28 (0.44%) WordPress
9 16 (0.25%) SAS
10 14 (0.22%) Palantir Foundry
11 10 (0.16%) Exchange Server 2013
12 8 (0.12%) Drupal
12 8 (0.12%) Exchange Server 2007
12 8 (0.12%) Exchange Server 2010
12 8 (0.12%) nginx
13 7 (0.11%) OpenEdge
14 5 (0.078%) OpenStack
14 5 (0.078%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 5 (0.078%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 393 (6.12%) Microsoft Office
2 329 (5.12%) Microsoft Excel
3 52 (0.81%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 48 (0.75%) Spreadsheet
5 38 (0.59%) MS Visio
6 27 (0.42%) Microsoft Project
7 15 (0.23%) Chatbot
8 10 (0.16%) Maya
9 9 (0.14%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 9 (0.14%) Adobe Illustrator
9 9 (0.14%) Fusion 360
9 9 (0.14%) SOLIDWORKS
10 8 (0.12%) AutoCAD
11 6 (0.093%) Photoshop
12 5 (0.078%) Simulink
13 4 (0.062%) Trello
14 3 (0.047%) Acrobat
14 3 (0.047%) Autodesk Inventor
15 2 (0.031%) Adobe XD
15 2 (0.031%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 61 (0.95%) Dynamics CRM
1 61 (0.95%) SAP S/4HANA
2 33 (0.51%) NetSuite
3 23 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
4 20 (0.31%) Shopify
5 16 (0.25%) Magento
6 15 (0.23%) Dynamics NAV
7 14 (0.22%) SAP CO
7 14 (0.22%) SAP ERP
8 13 (0.20%) Oracle EBS
9 12 (0.19%) iTrent
10 11 (0.17%) Maximo
11 9 (0.14%) Dynamics AX
11 9 (0.14%) Endur
12 8 (0.12%) Sage 50
12 8 (0.12%) Workday HCM
13 7 (0.11%) Elite 3E
13 7 (0.11%) IBM Planning Analytics
13 7 (0.11%) Q-Pulse
13 7 (0.11%) SAP Business One
Cloud Services
1 1,351 (21.03%) Azure
2 982 (15.29%) Microsoft 365
3 818 (12.74%) AWS
4 479 (7.46%) Power Platform
5 313 (4.87%) SaaS
6 283 (4.41%) GCP
7 265 (4.13%) Entra ID
8 170 (2.65%) Serverless
9 166 (2.58%) Azure DevOps
10 145 (2.26%) GitHub
11 128 (1.99%) Dynamics 365
12 117 (1.82%) Power Automate
13 94 (1.46%) PowerApps
14 91 (1.42%) Amazon S3
15 87 (1.35%) Google Workspace
16 76 (1.18%) PaaS
17 75 (1.17%) GitHub Actions
18 73 (1.14%) AWS Lambda
18 73 (1.14%) IaaS
19 71 (1.11%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 384 (5.98%) Firewall
2 362 (5.64%) DNS
3 295 (4.59%) DHCP
4 251 (3.91%) VPN
5 220 (3.43%) WAN
6 192 (2.99%) Wi-Fi
7 191 (2.97%) LAN
8 183 (2.85%) TCP/IP
9 175 (2.72%) Broadband
10 120 (1.87%) Wireless
11 117 (1.82%) VLAN
12 96 (1.49%) VoIP
13 72 (1.12%) Network Security
14 67 (1.04%) SD-WAN
15 51 (0.79%) SAN
16 42 (0.65%) Internet
17 41 (0.64%) BGP
18 39 (0.61%) OSPF
19 34 (0.53%) HTTP
20 32 (0.50%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 382 (5.95%) Power BI
2 278 (4.33%) SQL Server
3 119 (1.85%) Data Warehouse
4 110 (1.71%) Tableau
5 105 (1.63%) NoSQL
6 93 (1.45%) PostgreSQL
7 83 (1.29%) MySQL
8 75 (1.17%) Relational Database
8 75 (1.17%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 67 (1.04%) Amazon RDS
10 65 (1.01%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 53 (0.83%) Power Query
12 49 (0.76%) Big Data
13 48 (0.75%) MongoDB
14 47 (0.73%) Amazon Redshift
15 44 (0.69%) DynamoDB
16 38 (0.59%) Metadata
17 37 (0.58%) Data Lake
18 35 (0.54%) Azure SQL Database
19 26 (0.40%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 282 (4.39%) Git
2 204 (3.18%) JIRA
3 107 (1.67%) GitLab
3 107 (1.67%) Jenkins
4 30 (0.47%) Selenium
5 28 (0.44%) Rational DOORS
6 22 (0.34%) Maven
7 21 (0.33%) Chocolatey
8 20 (0.31%) Cypress.io
8 20 (0.31%) Visual Studio
9 19 (0.30%) Cucumber
10 17 (0.26%) CircleCI
10 17 (0.26%) SonarQube
11 15 (0.23%) Bitbucket
11 15 (0.23%) Burp Suite
11 15 (0.23%) JUnit
11 15 (0.23%) Metasploit
12 14 (0.22%) TeamCity
13 13 (0.20%) LabVIEW
13 13 (0.20%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 2,935 (45.70%) Social Skills
2 1,876 (29.21%) Analytical Skills
3 1,321 (20.57%) Finance
4 407 (6.34%) Organisational Skills
5 363 (5.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 342 (5.32%) Manufacturing
7 334 (5.20%) Law
8 325 (5.06%) Marketing
9 272 (4.23%) Retail
10 271 (4.22%) Public Sector
11 270 (4.20%) Legal
12 263 (4.09%) Banking
13 157 (2.44%) Telecoms
14 141 (2.20%) Electronics
15 135 (2.10%) Presentation Skills
16 104 (1.62%) Documentation Skills
17 91 (1.42%) Influencing Skills
18 87 (1.35%) Games
19 83 (1.29%) Advertising
20 78 (1.21%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 839 (13.06%) Analyst
2 805 (12.53%) Senior
3 667 (10.38%) IT Support
4 592 (9.22%) Developer
5 570 (8.87%) Support Engineer
6 410 (6.38%) Lead
7 396 (6.17%) IT Engineer
8 310 (4.83%) IT Support Engineer
9 281 (4.37%) Consultant
10 240 (3.74%) Support Analyst
11 231 (3.60%) Architect
11 231 (3.60%) Support Technician
12 215 (3.35%) Software Engineer
13 197 (3.07%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 196 (3.05%) Systems Engineer
15 174 (2.71%) IT Technician
16 172 (2.68%) Technical Support
17 165 (2.57%) Business Analyst
18 163 (2.54%) 2nd Line Support
19 153 (2.38%) Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 253 (3.94%) .NET
2 241 (3.75%) React
3 207 (3.22%) HTML
4 176 (2.74%) CSS
5 161 (2.51%) REST
6 125 (1.95%) Node.js
7 116 (1.81%) RESTful
8 94 (1.46%) SOAP
9 82 (1.28%) Middleware
10 79 (1.23%) Spring
11 77 (1.20%) JSON
12 69 (1.07%) XML
13 63 (0.98%) AngularJS
14 62 (0.97%) Vue
15 61 (0.95%) Kafka
16 60 (0.93%) OAuth
17 55 (0.86%) gRPC
17 55 (0.86%) Spring Boot
18 51 (0.79%) EDI
19 48 (0.75%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 389 (6.06%) Driving Licence
2 370 (5.76%) Onboarding
3 303 (4.72%) Self-Motivation
4 214 (3.33%) Management Information System
5 213 (3.32%) Cloud Native
6 181 (2.82%) Product Ownership
7 162 (2.52%) Data Centre
8 149 (2.32%) Distributed Systems
9 133 (2.07%) Analytical Mindset
10 113 (1.76%) Legacy Systems
11 95 (1.48%) Mobile App
12 90 (1.40%) Social Media
13 89 (1.39%) Enterprise Software
14 81 (1.26%) Data Structures
15 71 (1.11%) Low-Code
16 68 (1.06%) Algorithms
17 66 (1.03%) Virtual Team
18 62 (0.97%) Security Posture
19 60 (0.93%) Video\Live Streaming
20 53 (0.83%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 994 (15.48%) Windows
2 401 (6.24%) Windows Server
3 396 (6.17%) Linux
4 161 (2.51%) Windows 10
5 109 (1.70%) Android
6 101 (1.57%) Windows Server 2016
7 85 (1.32%) Apple iOS
8 80 (1.25%) Mac OS
9 61 (0.95%) Windows Server 2019
10 43 (0.67%) Unix
11 41 (0.64%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 33 (0.51%) CentOS
13 32 (0.50%) Windows Server 2012
14 29 (0.45%) Ubuntu
15 24 (0.37%) VMS
16 16 (0.25%) Windows 7
17 14 (0.22%) Mac OS X
18 10 (0.16%) Debian
19 7 (0.11%) Windows 8
19 7 (0.11%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,212 (18.87%) Continuous Improvement
2 1,025 (15.96%) Agile
3 909 (14.15%) Customer Service
4 706 (10.99%) CI/CD
5 705 (10.98%) AI
6 703 (10.95%) Mentoring
7 669 (10.42%) Decision-Making
8 616 (9.59%) DevOps
9 610 (9.50%) Analytics
10 531 (8.27%) ITIL
11 524 (8.16%) Stakeholder Management
12 518 (8.06%) Software Engineering
13 490 (7.63%) Roadmaps
14 488 (7.60%) Computer Science
15 476 (7.41%) Project Management
16 456 (7.10%) Business Intelligence
17 447 (6.96%) Cybersecurity
18 436 (6.79%) Coaching
19 385 (5.99%) Collaborative Working
20 371 (5.78%) ERP
Programming Languages
1 975 (15.18%) Python
2 893 (13.90%) SQL
3 427 (6.65%) JavaScript
4 330 (5.14%) Java
5 304 (4.73%) C#
6 288 (4.48%) PowerShell
7 190 (2.96%) TypeScript
8 159 (2.48%) Bash
9 124 (1.93%) C++
10 86 (1.34%) PHP
11 85 (1.32%) Go
12 65 (1.01%) Scala
13 57 (0.89%) C
13 57 (0.89%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 44 (0.69%) T-SQL
15 41 (0.64%) PL/SQL
15 41 (0.64%) R
15 41 (0.64%) Rust
16 35 (0.54%) Apex Code
16 35 (0.54%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 1,127 (17.55%) Degree
2 475 (7.40%) Security Cleared
3 313 (4.87%) SC Cleared
4 252 (3.92%) Computer Science Degree
5 217 (3.38%) DBS Check
6 185 (2.88%) Microsoft Certification
7 114 (1.77%) Master's Degree
8 112 (1.74%) DV Cleared
9 110 (1.71%) CISSP
10 105 (1.63%) Cisco Certification
11 84 (1.31%) A+ Certification
11 84 (1.31%) PMI Certification
12 82 (1.28%) BPSS Clearance
13 81 (1.26%) Azure Certification
14 70 (1.09%) PMP
15 67 (1.04%) ACCA
16 65 (1.01%) CCNA
17 62 (0.97%) CIMA
18 56 (0.87%) Network+ Certification
19 52 (0.81%) HNC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 328 (5.11%) QA
2 294 (4.58%) Data Quality
3 259 (4.03%) GDPR
4 193 (3.00%) SLA
5 149 (2.32%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 147 (2.29%) Cyber Essentials
7 137 (2.13%) NIST
8 135 (2.10%) Accessibility
9 111 (1.73%) PCI DSS
10 44 (0.69%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 35 (0.54%) ISO 9001
12 32 (0.50%) PMO
13 31 (0.48%) SOC 2
14 28 (0.44%) GRC
15 24 (0.37%) COBIT
16 21 (0.33%) Actionable Recommendations
17 14 (0.22%) GMP
18 12 (0.19%) IFRS
18 12 (0.19%) TickIT
19 11 (0.17%) PERC
System Software
1 664 (10.34%) Active Directory
2 285 (4.44%) Docker
3 187 (2.91%) Hyper-V
4 185 (2.88%) VMware Infrastructure
5 43 (0.67%) Virtual Desktop
6 42 (0.65%) Terminal Server
7 36 (0.56%) Firmware
8 23 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
9 20 (0.31%) vSphere
10 15 (0.23%) KVM
11 13 (0.20%) VMware ESXi
12 10 (0.16%) IAG
13 7 (0.11%) VMware Workstation
13 7 (0.11%) XenApp
14 4 (0.062%) Embedded Firmware
14 4 (0.062%) Slurm Workload Manager
14 4 (0.062%) VMware NSX
15 3 (0.047%) Microsoft Virtual Server
15 3 (0.047%) Terminal Services
15 3 (0.047%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 297 (4.62%) Terraform
2 239 (3.72%) Microsoft Intune
3 237 (3.69%) Kubernetes
4 147 (2.29%) Ansible
5 91 (1.42%) Grafana
6 82 (1.28%) SCCM
7 56 (0.87%) Prometheus
8 37 (0.58%) Nagios
9 31 (0.48%) Single Sign-On
10 22 (0.34%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 18 (0.28%) Kibana
12 14 (0.22%) Autotask
13 13 (0.20%) Puppet
14 12 (0.19%) Argo
14 12 (0.19%) Jamf Pro
14 12 (0.19%) vCenter Server
15 11 (0.17%) Nessus
16 10 (0.16%) Docker Swarm
16 10 (0.16%) WSUS
16 10 (0.16%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 1,674 (26.06%) Microsoft
2 267 (4.16%) VMware
3 187 (2.91%) Oracle
4 169 (2.63%) Google
5 155 (2.41%) SAP
6 148 (2.30%) Cisco
7 136 (2.12%) Salesforce
8 131 (2.04%) ServiceNow
9 111 (1.73%) SolarWinds
10 107 (1.67%) Databricks
11 100 (1.56%) Veeam
12 91 (1.42%) Splunk
13 79 (1.23%) Apple
14 70 (1.09%) Adobe
15 60 (0.93%) Dell
16 54 (0.84%) Red Hat
17 51 (0.79%) Dynatrace
18 50 (0.78%) Meraki
19 45 (0.70%) Fortinet
19 45 (0.70%) Typelevel