Problem-Solving Job Trends in the Midlands

Problem Solving
England > Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the Midlands requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 19 4 5
Rank change year-on-year -15 +1 +3
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 868 1,163 1,300
As % of all permanent jobs in the Midlands 9.76% 19.64% 15.51%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 12.38% 21.33% 18.06%
Number of salaries quoted 686 472 1,021
10th Percentile £26,000 £27,750 £25,000
25th Percentile £28,500 £36,250 £29,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £37,500 £52,443 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -28.49% +23.40% -15.00%
75th Percentile £53,951 £63,750 £58,750
90th Percentile £67,500 £83,750 £68,750
England median annual salary £45,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -18.18% +10.00% -9.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
Midlands

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 the Midlands.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 7,010 5,452 7,198
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 78.79% 92.08% 85.88%
Number of salaries quoted 3,946 2,434 5,841
10th Percentile £28,000 £31,250 £26,250
25th Percentile £35,000 £39,000 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £49,532
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.99% -5.65%
75th Percentile £65,000 £66,863 £62,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £75,000
England median annual salary £55,000 £62,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -12.00% +13.64% -12.00%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the Midlands

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the Midlands

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in the Midlands

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Midlands citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Midlands citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in the Midlands

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the Midlands over the 6 months to 18 February 2026.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in the Midlands

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in the Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the Midlands region over the 6 months to 18 February 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
West Midlands -19 504 £42,500 -22.73% 279
East Midlands 0 362 £35,000 - 171
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the 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 55 (6.34%) SharePoint
2 31 (3.57%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (1.50%) IIS
4 6 (0.69%) Apache
4 6 (0.69%) Oracle SOA Suite
5 5 (0.58%) CMS
5 5 (0.58%) Confluence
5 5 (0.58%) Exchange Server 2007
5 5 (0.58%) Exchange Server 2010
5 5 (0.58%) Exchange Server 2013
6 1 (0.12%) Apache Airflow
6 1 (0.12%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.12%) Drupal
6 1 (0.12%) NServiceBus
6 1 (0.12%) SAS
6 1 (0.12%) WebLogic
Applications
1 64 (7.37%) Microsoft Excel
2 50 (5.76%) Microsoft Office
3 15 (1.73%) Spreadsheet
4 10 (1.15%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (1.15%) Microsoft Project
5 9 (1.04%) AutoCAD
6 8 (0.92%) SOLIDWORKS
7 7 (0.81%) MS Visio
8 4 (0.46%) CATIA
9 2 (0.23%) Trello
10 1 (0.12%) Abaqus
10 1 (0.12%) EPLAN
10 1 (0.12%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 28 (3.23%) Dynamics CRM
2 11 (1.27%) iTrent
3 9 (1.04%) NetSuite
4 5 (0.58%) SAP S/4HANA
5 4 (0.46%) Q-Pulse
6 3 (0.35%) Dynamics NAV
6 3 (0.35%) SAP Business ByDesign
7 2 (0.23%) Infor CloudSuite Industrial (formerly SyteLine)
7 2 (0.23%) Oracle Cash Management
7 2 (0.23%) Oracle EBS
7 2 (0.23%) Oracle EBS R12
7 2 (0.23%) Oracle Payables
7 2 (0.23%) SAP ERP
7 2 (0.23%) SAP MM
8 1 (0.12%) NEC Housing
8 1 (0.12%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 1 (0.12%) Raiser’s Edge
8 1 (0.12%) Sage X3
8 1 (0.12%) SAP EWM
8 1 (0.12%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 181 (20.85%) Azure
2 176 (20.28%) Microsoft 365
3 76 (8.76%) SaaS
4 73 (8.41%) AWS
5 64 (7.37%) Power Platform
6 52 (5.99%) Entra ID
7 28 (3.23%) Dynamics 365
8 26 (3.00%) Serverless
9 18 (2.07%) Power Automate
10 16 (1.84%) Amazon S3
10 16 (1.84%) AWS Lambda
11 15 (1.73%) GCP
11 15 (1.73%) PowerApps
12 13 (1.50%) Google Workspace
13 12 (1.38%) Azure DevOps
13 12 (1.38%) OneDrive
14 9 (1.04%) Azure Data Factory
15 7 (0.81%) Azure Sentinel
15 7 (0.81%) OCI
16 5 (0.58%) Amazon CloudWatch
Communications & Networking
1 67 (7.72%) DNS
2 65 (7.49%) DHCP
3 45 (5.18%) VPN
4 36 (4.15%) Remote Desktop
4 36 (4.15%) WAN
5 30 (3.46%) Firewall
6 28 (3.23%) Internet
7 24 (2.76%) LAN
8 21 (2.42%) Wi-Fi
9 18 (2.07%) TCP/IP
10 16 (1.84%) Wireless
11 14 (1.61%) SD-WAN
12 13 (1.50%) VoIP
13 12 (1.38%) VLAN
14 9 (1.04%) ADSL
14 9 (1.04%) Ethernet
14 9 (1.04%) VDSL
15 6 (0.69%) Broadband
16 5 (0.58%) Network Security
16 5 (0.58%) PBX
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (5.88%) Power BI
2 48 (5.53%) SQL Server
3 16 (1.84%) MySQL
4 15 (1.73%) Oracle Reports
5 14 (1.61%) Relational Database
5 14 (1.61%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 13 (1.50%) PostgreSQL
7 12 (1.38%) Amazon Redshift
7 12 (1.38%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 12 (1.38%) Tableau
8 6 (0.69%) Crystal Reports
8 6 (0.69%) Data Warehouse
8 6 (0.69%) GIS
8 6 (0.69%) Metadata
9 5 (0.58%) Amazon RDS
9 5 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
9 5 (0.58%) Power Query
10 4 (0.46%) Data Lake
11 3 (0.35%) NoSQL
11 3 (0.35%) Redis
Development Applications
1 27 (3.11%) JIRA
2 22 (2.53%) Git
3 9 (1.04%) JUnit
4 7 (0.81%) Burp Suite
4 7 (0.81%) Metasploit
4 7 (0.81%) Mockito
5 6 (0.69%) GitLab
5 6 (0.69%) Jenkins
5 6 (0.69%) Maven
6 5 (0.58%) Subversion
7 3 (0.35%) Appcelerator Titanium
7 3 (0.35%) Cucumber
7 3 (0.35%) Selenium
7 3 (0.35%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
8 2 (0.23%) Visual Studio Code
9 1 (0.12%) Babel
9 1 (0.12%) Balsamiq
9 1 (0.12%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.12%) Sonatype Nexus
9 1 (0.12%) webpack
General
1 421 (48.50%) Social Skills
2 284 (32.72%) Analytical Skills
3 170 (19.59%) Finance
4 105 (12.10%) Retail
5 82 (9.45%) Manufacturing
6 57 (6.57%) Organisational Skills
7 48 (5.53%) Law
8 39 (4.49%) Legal
9 38 (4.38%) Public Sector
10 37 (4.26%) Marketing
11 26 (3.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 23 (2.65%) Electronics
13 19 (2.19%) Telecoms
14 18 (2.07%) Documentation Skills
15 14 (1.61%) Automotive
15 14 (1.61%) Banking
16 13 (1.50%) Presentation Skills
17 12 (1.38%) Aerospace
18 8 (0.92%) Advertising
18 8 (0.92%) Games
Job Titles
1 158 (18.20%) Support Engineer
2 157 (18.09%) IT Support
3 126 (14.52%) Analyst
4 104 (11.98%) IT Engineer
5 92 (10.60%) IT Support Engineer
6 80 (9.22%) Lead
7 75 (8.64%) Developer
8 72 (8.29%) Technical Support
9 62 (7.14%) Senior
10 59 (6.80%) Technical Engineer
11 58 (6.68%) Support Analyst
12 57 (6.57%) Technical Support Engineer
13 53 (6.11%) 2nd Line Support
14 47 (5.41%) Support Technician
15 36 (4.15%) Administrator
16 34 (3.92%) Applications Support
17 33 (3.80%) Architect
18 32 (3.69%) 1st/2nd Line Support
19 28 (3.23%) Full-Stack Developer
20 23 (2.65%) Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (4.49%) React
2 31 (3.57%) .NET
3 28 (3.23%) CSS
4 27 (3.11%) HTML
4 27 (3.11%) REST
5 24 (2.76%) Node.js
6 14 (1.61%) AngularJS
6 14 (1.61%) JSON
7 10 (1.15%) Razor View Engine
8 7 (0.81%) Oracle Fusion
8 7 (0.81%) Vue
9 6 (0.69%) LAMP
9 6 (0.69%) Laravel
9 6 (0.69%) Middleware
9 6 (0.69%) RESTful
10 5 (0.58%) Spring
10 5 (0.58%) Web Services
11 4 (0.46%) Next.js
11 4 (0.46%) WPF
12 3 (0.35%) Tailwind CSS
Miscellaneous
1 108 (12.44%) Driving Licence
2 101 (11.64%) Onboarding
3 48 (5.53%) Management Information System
4 45 (5.18%) Self-Motivation
5 34 (3.92%) Analytical Mindset
6 30 (3.46%) FMCG
7 18 (2.07%) Social Media
8 14 (1.61%) Enterprise Software
8 14 (1.61%) Legacy Systems
8 14 (1.61%) Product Ownership
9 12 (1.38%) Operational Technology
10 11 (1.27%) Security Posture
11 10 (1.15%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
12 9 (1.04%) Data Structures
12 9 (1.04%) EPoS
12 9 (1.04%) IoT
13 7 (0.81%) Data Centre
13 7 (0.81%) Embedded Systems
13 7 (0.81%) Linux Command Line
13 7 (0.81%) Web Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 158 (18.20%) Windows
2 56 (6.45%) Windows Server
3 38 (4.38%) Linux
4 24 (2.76%) Windows 10
5 12 (1.38%) Apple iOS
6 5 (0.58%) Windows 7
6 5 (0.58%) Windows Server 2019
7 4 (0.46%) Android
7 4 (0.46%) Debian
7 4 (0.46%) Unix
8 2 (0.23%) Windows Server 2012
9 1 (0.12%) CentOS
9 1 (0.12%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.12%) Oracle Linux
9 1 (0.12%) SUSE
9 1 (0.12%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.12%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 190 (21.89%) Continuous Improvement
2 182 (20.97%) Customer Service
3 115 (13.25%) CRM
4 111 (12.79%) ERP
5 95 (10.94%) Agile
6 94 (10.83%) Project Management
7 92 (10.60%) Decision-Making
7 92 (10.60%) Mentoring
8 83 (9.56%) ITIL
9 79 (9.10%) Business Intelligence
10 72 (8.29%) Analytics
11 56 (6.45%) Root Cause Analysis
12 55 (6.34%) Computer Science
13 54 (6.22%) Analytical Thinking
13 54 (6.22%) Process Improvement
14 53 (6.11%) Migration
15 52 (5.99%) Time Management
16 50 (5.76%) Change Management
16 50 (5.76%) Logistics
16 50 (5.76%) Service Delivery
Programming Languages
1 175 (20.16%) SQL
2 72 (8.29%) C#
3 60 (6.91%) Python
4 54 (6.22%) JavaScript
5 32 (3.69%) Java
6 30 (3.46%) PowerShell
7 21 (2.42%) PHP
8 16 (1.84%) T-SQL
9 13 (1.50%) C
10 11 (1.27%) Bash
11 9 (1.04%) TypeScript
12 8 (0.92%) Ladder Logic
13 7 (0.81%) PL/SQL
13 7 (0.81%) R
14 6 (0.69%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 4 (0.46%) Delphi
16 3 (0.35%) C++
16 3 (0.35%) VB.NET
16 3 (0.35%) VBA
17 2 (0.23%) Perl
Qualifications
1 167 (19.24%) Degree
2 75 (8.64%) Security Cleared
3 55 (6.34%) SC Cleared
4 32 (3.69%) Computer Science Degree
4 32 (3.69%) Microsoft Certification
5 26 (3.00%) DBS Check
6 19 (2.19%) Master's Degree
7 16 (1.84%) BPSS Clearance
7 16 (1.84%) Cisco Certification
8 14 (1.61%) CISSP
9 11 (1.27%) A+ Certification
9 11 (1.27%) CompTIA Security+
10 10 (1.15%) CCNA
10 10 (1.15%) PMI Certification
11 9 (1.04%) ACCA
11 9 (1.04%) AWS Certification
11 9 (1.04%) CIMA
11 9 (1.04%) CISMP
11 9 (1.04%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 9 (1.04%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 60 (6.91%) QA
2 37 (4.26%) Data Quality
3 30 (3.46%) GDPR
4 26 (3.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 12 (1.38%) Actionable Recommendations
6 10 (1.15%) NIST
7 9 (1.04%) SLA
8 8 (0.92%) Cyber Essentials
9 7 (0.81%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 5 (0.58%) Accessibility
10 5 (0.58%) ISO/IEC 20000
11 4 (0.46%) COSHH
11 4 (0.46%) GMP
12 3 (0.35%) HIPAA
13 2 (0.23%) Government Security Classifications
13 2 (0.23%) ISO 20022
13 2 (0.23%) ISO 9001
13 2 (0.23%) ISO/IEC 19770
13 2 (0.23%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
13 2 (0.23%) PMO
System Software
1 103 (11.87%) Active Directory
2 23 (2.65%) Docker
3 14 (1.61%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (1.04%) Hyper-V
5 8 (0.92%) vSphere
6 5 (0.58%) Firmware
7 2 (0.23%) Virtual Desktop
7 2 (0.23%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.23%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 40 (4.61%) Microsoft Intune
2 24 (2.76%) Kubernetes
3 14 (1.61%) Terraform
4 7 (0.81%) Ansible
4 7 (0.81%) Nmap
5 5 (0.58%) Grafana
5 5 (0.58%) SCCM
6 4 (0.46%) Nagios
7 2 (0.23%) FortiGate
7 2 (0.23%) Prometheus
7 2 (0.23%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.12%) Argo
8 1 (0.12%) Autotask
8 1 (0.12%) AWS Copilot
8 1 (0.12%) CA Service Virtualization
8 1 (0.12%) Symantec Endpoint Protection
Vendors
1 242 (27.88%) Microsoft
2 64 (7.37%) SAP
3 54 (6.22%) Oracle
4 35 (4.03%) Cisco
5 32 (3.69%) Salesforce
6 16 (1.84%) Google
7 15 (1.73%) ServiceNow
7 15 (1.73%) VMware
8 10 (1.15%) HP
8 10 (1.15%) Meraki
9 9 (1.04%) Databricks
9 9 (1.04%) Sage
10 7 (0.81%) Epicor
10 7 (0.81%) Infor
11 6 (0.69%) Freshdesk
11 6 (0.69%) SolarWinds
12 5 (0.58%) Dell
12 5 (0.58%) Panasonic
12 5 (0.58%) Samsung
12 5 (0.58%) Zscaler