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 1 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 17 4 7
Rank change year-on-year -13 +3 +2
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 914 1,249 779
As % of all permanent jobs in the Midlands 11.71% 18.75% 15.55%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 14.34% 20.89% 17.51%
Number of salaries quoted 706 500 624
10th Percentile £25,875 £28,500 £26,250
25th Percentile £29,000 £35,000 £31,552
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £38,500 £50,000 £48,085
Median % change year-on-year -23.00% +3.98% -3.83%
75th Percentile £53,951 £62,688 £61,063
90th Percentile £68,250 £77,750 £70,000
England median annual salary £45,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -18.18% - -

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 6,374 5,979 4,450
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 81.70% 89.73% 88.80%
Number of salaries quoted 3,514 2,642 3,680
10th Percentile £28,000 £31,250 £26,500
25th Percentile £35,000 £38,750 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £49,489 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -5.73% +5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £65,000 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £76,250
England median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -4.00%

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 1 January 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 1 January 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 -16 541 £42,500 -22.73% 229
East Midlands +1 372 £35,000 -4.11% 156
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 46 (5.03%) SharePoint
2 37 (4.05%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (1.42%) IIS
4 6 (0.66%) Apache
4 6 (0.66%) Confluence
5 5 (0.55%) Oracle SOA Suite
6 2 (0.22%) Exchange Server 2007
6 2 (0.22%) Exchange Server 2010
6 2 (0.22%) Exchange Server 2013
7 1 (0.11%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.11%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.11%) Appian
7 1 (0.11%) HCL Notes
7 1 (0.11%) NServiceBus
7 1 (0.11%) SAS
7 1 (0.11%) WebLogic
Applications
1 91 (9.96%) Microsoft Excel
2 53 (5.80%) Microsoft Office
3 11 (1.20%) Spreadsheet
4 10 (1.09%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 9 (0.98%) AutoCAD
5 9 (0.98%) Microsoft Project
6 8 (0.88%) SOLIDWORKS
7 7 (0.77%) MS Visio
8 4 (0.44%) CATIA
9 3 (0.33%) Trello
10 1 (0.11%) Abaqus
10 1 (0.11%) EPLAN
10 1 (0.11%) Revit
10 1 (0.11%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 42 (4.60%) Dynamics CRM
2 9 (0.98%) NetSuite
3 6 (0.66%) iTrent
4 4 (0.44%) SAP FI
4 4 (0.44%) Shopify
5 3 (0.33%) Dynamics NAV
5 3 (0.33%) SAP Business One
5 3 (0.33%) SAP S/4HANA
6 2 (0.22%) Infor CloudSuite Industrial (formerly SyteLine)
6 2 (0.22%) Oracle Cash Management
6 2 (0.22%) Oracle EBS
6 2 (0.22%) Oracle EBS R12
6 2 (0.22%) Oracle Payables
6 2 (0.22%) SAP ERP
6 2 (0.22%) SAP MM
7 1 (0.11%) Magento
7 1 (0.11%) NEC Housing
7 1 (0.11%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 1 (0.11%) Sage X3
7 1 (0.11%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 192 (21.01%) Azure
2 176 (19.26%) Microsoft 365
3 82 (8.97%) SaaS
4 70 (7.66%) Power Platform
5 67 (7.33%) AWS
6 53 (5.80%) Entra ID
7 31 (3.39%) Dynamics 365
8 16 (1.75%) GCP
9 15 (1.64%) Power Automate
9 15 (1.64%) Serverless
10 13 (1.42%) Azure DevOps
11 11 (1.20%) OneDrive
11 11 (1.20%) PowerApps
12 9 (0.98%) Amazon S3
12 9 (0.98%) GitHub
13 8 (0.88%) Cloud Computing
14 7 (0.77%) AWS Lambda
14 7 (0.77%) OCI
15 6 (0.66%) Azure Sentinel
16 5 (0.55%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 67 (7.33%) DNS
2 63 (6.89%) DHCP
3 44 (4.81%) Remote Desktop
4 40 (4.38%) VPN
5 34 (3.72%) Firewall
6 32 (3.50%) WAN
7 25 (2.74%) LAN
8 19 (2.08%) Internet
9 17 (1.86%) Wi-Fi
10 12 (1.31%) TCP/IP
10 12 (1.31%) Wireless
11 11 (1.20%) VLAN
11 11 (1.20%) VoIP
12 9 (0.98%) ADSL
12 9 (0.98%) Ethernet
12 9 (0.98%) VDSL
13 7 (0.77%) Broadband
13 7 (0.77%) SD-WAN
14 5 (0.55%) Bluetooth
14 5 (0.55%) PBX
Database & Business Intelligence
1 57 (6.24%) Power BI
2 53 (5.80%) SQL Server
3 18 (1.97%) MySQL
3 18 (1.97%) Relational Database
4 15 (1.64%) GIS
4 15 (1.64%) PostgreSQL
5 14 (1.53%) Oracle Reports
6 12 (1.31%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 10 (1.09%) Tableau
8 7 (0.77%) Metadata
8 7 (0.77%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 6 (0.66%) Azure SQL Database
9 6 (0.66%) Crystal Reports
10 5 (0.55%) Amazon RDS
10 5 (0.55%) Amazon Redshift
10 5 (0.55%) BusinessObjects
10 5 (0.55%) Data Lake
11 4 (0.44%) Data Mining
12 3 (0.33%) Data Warehouse
12 3 (0.33%) Oracle BI Publisher
Development Applications
1 30 (3.28%) JIRA
2 22 (2.41%) Git
3 8 (0.88%) GitLab
4 7 (0.77%) JUnit
4 7 (0.77%) Subversion
5 6 (0.66%) Burp Suite
5 6 (0.66%) Jenkins
5 6 (0.66%) Metasploit
6 5 (0.55%) Mockito
7 4 (0.44%) Maven
7 4 (0.44%) Selenium
8 3 (0.33%) Appcelerator Titanium
8 3 (0.33%) Cucumber
9 2 (0.22%) Vagrant
9 2 (0.22%) Visual Studio Code
10 1 (0.11%) Babel
10 1 (0.11%) Rational DOORS
10 1 (0.11%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.11%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
10 1 (0.11%) webpack
General
1 475 (51.97%) Social Skills
2 277 (30.31%) Analytical Skills
3 215 (23.52%) Finance
4 148 (16.19%) Retail
5 80 (8.75%) Manufacturing
6 49 (5.36%) Law
7 45 (4.92%) Organisational Skills
8 44 (4.81%) Marketing
9 40 (4.38%) Legal
10 36 (3.94%) Public Sector
11 28 (3.06%) Digital Health
12 26 (2.84%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 24 (2.63%) Electronics
14 19 (2.08%) Documentation Skills
14 19 (2.08%) Telecoms
15 15 (1.64%) Presentation Skills
16 14 (1.53%) Fire and Rescue
17 13 (1.42%) Banking
18 12 (1.31%) Aerospace
18 12 (1.31%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 159 (17.40%) Support Engineer
2 152 (16.63%) IT Support
3 136 (14.88%) Analyst
4 87 (9.52%) IT Engineer
5 79 (8.64%) Technical Support
6 76 (8.32%) 2nd Line Support
7 75 (8.21%) Developer
7 75 (8.21%) IT Support Engineer
7 75 (8.21%) Support Analyst
8 71 (7.77%) Lead
9 68 (7.44%) Technical Engineer
10 65 (7.11%) Technical Support Engineer
11 64 (7.00%) Senior
12 45 (4.92%) Support Technician
13 39 (4.27%) Applications Support
14 35 (3.83%) Architect
15 31 (3.39%) 1st/2nd Line Support
15 31 (3.39%) Administrator
16 28 (3.06%) 1st Line Support
17 26 (2.84%) 2nd Line Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 35 (3.83%) .NET
2 32 (3.50%) React
3 28 (3.06%) REST
4 26 (2.84%) HTML
5 24 (2.63%) CSS
6 17 (1.86%) AngularJS
7 16 (1.75%) JSON
8 15 (1.64%) Node.js
9 11 (1.20%) Razor View Engine
10 10 (1.09%) EDI
11 8 (0.88%) Middleware
11 8 (0.88%) Oracle Fusion
11 8 (0.88%) RESTful
12 7 (0.77%) Vue
13 6 (0.66%) LAMP
13 6 (0.66%) Laravel
13 6 (0.66%) Spring
14 5 (0.55%) Web Services
15 4 (0.44%) ASP.NET
15 4 (0.44%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 114 (12.47%) Onboarding
2 109 (11.93%) Driving Licence
3 57 (6.24%) FMCG
4 47 (5.14%) Self-Motivation
5 41 (4.49%) Analytical Mindset
5 41 (4.49%) Management Information System
6 17 (1.86%) SCADA
7 15 (1.64%) Legacy Systems
8 13 (1.42%) Operational Technology
8 13 (1.42%) Product Ownership
8 13 (1.42%) Security Posture
9 12 (1.31%) e-Learning
10 10 (1.09%) Embedded Systems
10 10 (1.09%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 10 (1.09%) Social Media
11 9 (0.98%) Enterprise Software
12 8 (0.88%) Data Centre
12 8 (0.88%) Data Structures
12 8 (0.88%) IoT
12 8 (0.88%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 161 (17.61%) Windows
2 58 (6.35%) Windows Server
3 41 (4.49%) Linux
4 33 (3.61%) Windows 10
5 11 (1.20%) Apple iOS
6 6 (0.66%) Mac OS
7 5 (0.55%) Mac OS X
7 5 (0.55%) Windows Server 2019
8 4 (0.44%) Unix
9 3 (0.33%) Android
10 2 (0.22%) VMS
10 2 (0.22%) Windows 7
10 2 (0.22%) Windows Server 2012
11 1 (0.11%) Oracle Linux
11 1 (0.11%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.11%) Windows Mobile
11 1 (0.11%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 216 (23.63%) Continuous Improvement
2 193 (21.12%) Customer Service
3 128 (14.00%) CRM
4 122 (13.35%) ERP
5 101 (11.05%) Project Management
6 99 (10.83%) Agile
7 97 (10.61%) Logistics
7 97 (10.61%) Mentoring
8 92 (10.07%) ITIL
9 87 (9.52%) Decision-Making
10 84 (9.19%) Business Intelligence
11 72 (7.88%) Analytics
12 70 (7.66%) Incident Management
13 64 (7.00%) Root Cause Analysis
14 60 (6.56%) Process Improvement
15 59 (6.46%) Analytical Thinking
15 59 (6.46%) E-Commerce
16 53 (5.80%) Computer Science
17 50 (5.47%) Change Management
17 50 (5.47%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 189 (20.68%) SQL
2 85 (9.30%) C#
3 63 (6.89%) Python
4 49 (5.36%) JavaScript
5 34 (3.72%) Java
6 30 (3.28%) PowerShell
7 23 (2.52%) PHP
8 16 (1.75%) T-SQL
9 10 (1.09%) C
9 10 (1.09%) TypeScript
10 8 (0.88%) Bash
11 7 (0.77%) C++
11 7 (0.77%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 5 (0.55%) Ladder Logic
12 5 (0.55%) PL/SQL
12 5 (0.55%) R
13 4 (0.44%) Delphi
13 4 (0.44%) Perl
14 3 (0.33%) Groovy
14 3 (0.33%) VB.NET
Qualifications
1 182 (19.91%) Degree
2 81 (8.86%) Security Cleared
3 55 (6.02%) SC Cleared
4 36 (3.94%) Microsoft Certification
5 34 (3.72%) Computer Science Degree
6 24 (2.63%) DBS Check
7 19 (2.08%) Master's Degree
8 18 (1.97%) ACCA
8 18 (1.97%) CIMA
8 18 (1.97%) Cisco Certification
9 17 (1.86%) BPSS Clearance
9 17 (1.86%) CISSP
10 16 (1.75%) MCP
11 11 (1.20%) MCSE
12 10 (1.09%) AWS Certification
12 10 (1.09%) CCNA
12 10 (1.09%) CISM
13 9 (0.98%) CompTIA Security+
13 9 (0.98%) DV Cleared
13 9 (0.98%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 52 (5.69%) QA
2 27 (2.95%) Data Quality
3 26 (2.84%) GDPR
4 22 (2.41%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 12 (1.31%) SLA
6 11 (1.20%) Cyber Essentials
7 10 (1.09%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 9 (0.98%) Actionable Recommendations
8 9 (0.98%) NIST
9 4 (0.44%) Accessibility
10 3 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 20000
10 3 (0.33%) PMO
11 2 (0.22%) COBIT
11 2 (0.22%) Government Security Classifications
11 2 (0.22%) HIPAA
11 2 (0.22%) ISO 20022
11 2 (0.22%) ISO 9001
11 2 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 19770
11 2 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
11 2 (0.22%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 120 (13.13%) Active Directory
2 19 (2.08%) Docker
3 18 (1.97%) VMware Infrastructure
4 8 (0.88%) vSphere
5 7 (0.77%) Firmware
5 7 (0.77%) Hyper-V
6 3 (0.33%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
7 2 (0.22%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 38 (4.16%) Microsoft Intune
2 19 (2.08%) Kubernetes
3 14 (1.53%) Terraform
4 6 (0.66%) Nmap
5 5 (0.55%) Ansible
5 5 (0.55%) SCCM
6 3 (0.33%) Grafana
6 3 (0.33%) Nagios
7 2 (0.22%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.11%) Argo
8 1 (0.11%) Autotask
8 1 (0.11%) AWS Copilot
8 1 (0.11%) CA Service Virtualization
8 1 (0.11%) HP Quality Center
8 1 (0.11%) Prometheus
8 1 (0.11%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.11%) Symantec Endpoint Protection
Vendors
1 271 (29.65%) Microsoft
2 72 (7.88%) SAP
3 57 (6.24%) Oracle
4 38 (4.16%) Salesforce
5 34 (3.72%) Cisco
6 18 (1.97%) VMware
7 15 (1.64%) ServiceNow
8 12 (1.31%) Databricks
8 12 (1.31%) Zoho
9 10 (1.09%) Google
9 10 (1.09%) HubSpot
10 9 (0.98%) Meraki
10 9 (0.98%) Sage
11 7 (0.77%) Infor
11 7 (0.77%) QAD
12 6 (0.66%) Freshdesk
13 5 (0.55%) Apple
13 5 (0.55%) Epicor
13 5 (0.55%) HP
13 5 (0.55%) Juniper