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 17 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 3 4
Rank change year-on-year -8 +1 +5
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 1,059 1,217 1,793
As % of all permanent jobs in the Midlands 7.97% 21.57% 13.97%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.42% 25.19% 17.65%
Number of salaries quoted 789 692 1,009
10th Percentile £26,220 £25,252 £25,000
25th Percentile £30,000 £29,250 £29,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,000 £41,500 £42,000
Median % change year-on-year +1.20% -1.19% -11.58%
75th Percentile £55,000 £57,500 £57,500
90th Percentile £67,500 £67,500 £70,000
England median annual salary £47,500 £48,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -2.06% -3.00% -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 9,271 4,831 10,158
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 69.77% 85.64% 79.16%
Number of salaries quoted 6,588 2,875 6,694
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,750 £26,750
25th Percentile £40,000 £32,500 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £49,000 £49,329
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% -0.67% -6.04%
75th Percentile £66,250 £63,750 £62,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £77,500 £75,000
England median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -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 17 July 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 17 July 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 -8 595 £42,500 -5.56% 233
East Midlands -8 460 £35,000 -4.11% 225
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 59 (5.57%) SharePoint
2 39 (3.68%) Microsoft Exchange
3 11 (1.04%) CMS
4 10 (0.94%) IIS
5 5 (0.47%) Skype for Business
6 4 (0.38%) Confluence
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2007
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2010
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2013
7 3 (0.28%) WordPress
8 1 (0.094%) Apache
8 1 (0.094%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.094%) Appian
8 1 (0.094%) Documentum
8 1 (0.094%) Drupal
8 1 (0.094%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.094%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.094%) SAS
Applications
1 98 (9.25%) Microsoft Office
2 79 (7.46%) Microsoft Excel
3 15 (1.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.76%) Spreadsheet
5 5 (0.47%) Fusion 360
6 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.19%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.094%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.094%) LaTeX
8 1 (0.094%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.094%) Simulink
8 1 (0.094%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 17 (1.61%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (1.23%) IBM Planning Analytics
3 11 (1.04%) Dynamics CRM
4 9 (0.85%) JDE EnterpriseOne
4 9 (0.85%) SAP Business One
5 5 (0.47%) Magento
5 5 (0.47%) Q-Pulse
5 5 (0.47%) Shopify
6 4 (0.38%) Dynamics AX
6 4 (0.38%) Line 50
6 4 (0.38%) Sage 50
6 4 (0.38%) Sage X3
7 3 (0.28%) iTrent
7 3 (0.28%) SAP CO
7 3 (0.28%) SAP FI
7 3 (0.28%) SAP FI/CO
8 2 (0.19%) Oracle EBS
9 1 (0.094%) Dynamics GP
9 1 (0.094%) Exchequer
9 1 (0.094%) SAP WM
Cloud Services
1 229 (21.62%) Microsoft 365
2 181 (17.09%) Azure
3 106 (10.01%) Power Platform
4 78 (7.37%) Entra ID
5 71 (6.70%) AWS
6 37 (3.49%) SaaS
7 23 (2.17%) Dynamics 365
8 19 (1.79%) Power Automate
8 19 (1.79%) Serverless
9 16 (1.51%) PowerApps
10 15 (1.42%) Amazon S3
10 15 (1.42%) Microsoft Purview
11 14 (1.32%) GCP
11 14 (1.32%) Google Workspace
12 13 (1.23%) AWS Lambda
12 13 (1.23%) Microsoft Copilot
13 12 (1.13%) OneDrive
14 10 (0.94%) Azure Data Factory
15 9 (0.85%) Azure DevOps
16 8 (0.76%) Amazon Cognito
Communications & Networking
1 64 (6.04%) Firewall
2 62 (5.85%) DNS
3 51 (4.82%) DHCP
4 49 (4.63%) VPN
5 39 (3.68%) TCP/IP
6 33 (3.12%) WAN
7 32 (3.02%) Wireless
8 26 (2.46%) VLAN
9 25 (2.36%) LAN
10 23 (2.17%) Wi-Fi
11 16 (1.51%) Network Security
12 11 (1.04%) VoIP
13 10 (0.94%) SD-WAN
14 9 (0.85%) Internet
15 8 (0.76%) MQTT
16 6 (0.57%) Cisco IOS
16 6 (0.57%) SSL
17 5 (0.47%) Remote Desktop
17 5 (0.47%) Skype
18 4 (0.38%) Bluetooth
Database & Business Intelligence
1 97 (9.16%) Power BI
2 43 (4.06%) SQL Server
3 24 (2.27%) Tableau
4 22 (2.08%) Power Query
5 19 (1.79%) MySQL
6 17 (1.61%) Data Warehouse
7 15 (1.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 14 (1.32%) Relational Database
9 12 (1.13%) Azure SQL Database
9 12 (1.13%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 8 (0.76%) Amazon Redshift
10 8 (0.76%) DynamoDB
11 7 (0.66%) Crystal Reports
11 7 (0.66%) MongoDB
11 7 (0.66%) Star Schema
12 6 (0.57%) Amazon RDS
12 6 (0.57%) Data Mining
12 6 (0.57%) PostgreSQL
13 5 (0.47%) NoSQL
14 4 (0.38%) Neo4j
Development Applications
1 24 (2.27%) Git
2 17 (1.61%) JIRA
3 5 (0.47%) VersionOne
4 4 (0.38%) Burp Suite
4 4 (0.38%) Jenkins
4 4 (0.38%) JUnit
4 4 (0.38%) Metasploit
5 3 (0.28%) Cucumber
5 3 (0.28%) GitLab
5 3 (0.28%) Maven
5 3 (0.28%) Mockito
5 3 (0.28%) Postman
5 3 (0.28%) SoapUI
5 3 (0.28%) Subversion
6 2 (0.19%) JMeter
6 2 (0.19%) Selenium
6 2 (0.19%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 2 (0.19%) TeamCity
6 2 (0.19%) Visual Studio
6 2 (0.19%) Zephyr
General
1 522 (49.29%) Social Skills
2 315 (29.75%) Analytical Skills
3 179 (16.90%) Finance
4 151 (14.26%) Manufacturing
5 70 (6.61%) Organisational Skills
6 69 (6.52%) Retail
7 47 (4.44%) Marketing
8 45 (4.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 39 (3.68%) Legal
10 36 (3.40%) Law
11 34 (3.21%) Public Sector
12 26 (2.46%) Influencing Skills
13 23 (2.17%) Electronics
14 21 (1.98%) Automotive
15 19 (1.79%) Documentation Skills
16 15 (1.42%) Telecoms
17 13 (1.23%) Games
18 11 (1.04%) Banking
19 9 (0.85%) Advertising
19 9 (0.85%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 174 (16.43%) Analyst
2 146 (13.79%) Support Engineer
3 143 (13.50%) IT Support
4 95 (8.97%) Developer
5 92 (8.69%) Senior
6 83 (7.84%) IT Engineer
7 78 (7.37%) Technical Support
8 73 (6.89%) Technical Engineer
9 72 (6.80%) Technical Support Engineer
10 65 (6.14%) Support Technician
11 63 (5.95%) IT Support Engineer
12 54 (5.10%) Lead
13 51 (4.82%) IT Technician
14 47 (4.44%) Support Analyst
15 45 (4.25%) IT Manager
16 44 (4.15%) IT Support Technician
17 39 (3.68%) Consultant
18 38 (3.59%) Data Analyst
19 35 (3.31%) Senior Analyst
20 27 (2.55%) 2nd Line Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (4.15%) REST
2 38 (3.59%) React
3 28 (2.64%) Node.js
4 27 (2.55%) .NET
5 17 (1.61%) SOAP
6 16 (1.51%) CSS
6 16 (1.51%) HTML
6 16 (1.51%) Spring
7 13 (1.23%) Spring Boot
8 12 (1.13%) AngularJS
9 11 (1.04%) RESTful
10 10 (0.94%) SAP Fiori
11 9 (0.85%) JDBC
11 9 (0.85%) Middleware
11 9 (0.85%) OAuth
11 9 (0.85%) SAPUI5
12 7 (0.66%) ASP.NET
13 6 (0.57%) ASP.NET Core
13 6 (0.57%) JSON
14 5 (0.47%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 107 (10.10%) Driving Licence
2 55 (5.19%) Management Information System
3 50 (4.72%) Onboarding
4 44 (4.15%) Self-Motivation
5 22 (2.08%) Enterprise Software
6 18 (1.70%) IoT
7 16 (1.51%) Analytical Mindset
8 13 (1.23%) Greenfield Project
8 13 (1.23%) Social Media
9 12 (1.13%) Legacy Systems
9 12 (1.13%) Security Posture
10 11 (1.04%) Data Centre
10 11 (1.04%) NHS
10 11 (1.04%) Virtual Team
11 9 (0.85%) Data Structures
11 9 (0.85%) Mobile App
11 9 (0.85%) Replication
11 9 (0.85%) SCADA
12 8 (0.76%) Hybrid Cloud
12 8 (0.76%) iSeries
Operating Systems
1 189 (17.85%) Windows
2 66 (6.23%) Windows Server
3 65 (6.14%) Linux
4 47 (4.44%) Windows 10
5 16 (1.51%) Android
6 11 (1.04%) Apple iOS
7 10 (0.94%) Ubuntu
8 7 (0.66%) Mac OS
9 6 (0.57%) Debian
9 6 (0.57%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 5 (0.47%) CentOS
10 5 (0.47%) OpenVMS
10 5 (0.47%) Unix
10 5 (0.47%) Windows 7
11 4 (0.38%) FreeRTOS
11 4 (0.38%) VMS
12 3 (0.28%) SUSE
13 1 (0.094%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.094%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 288 (27.20%) Continuous Improvement
2 182 (17.19%) Customer Service
3 146 (13.79%) Decision-Making
4 139 (13.13%) Analytics
5 127 (11.99%) Collaborative Working
6 126 (11.90%) Agile
6 126 (11.90%) Mentoring
7 108 (10.20%) ERP
8 102 (9.63%) ITIL
9 101 (9.54%) Business Intelligence
10 95 (8.97%) Service Delivery
11 92 (8.69%) Cybersecurity
12 82 (7.74%) AI
13 70 (6.61%) Roadmaps
14 65 (6.14%) Process Improvement
15 64 (6.04%) CRM
15 64 (6.04%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 62 (5.85%) Stakeholder Management
17 61 (5.76%) Root Cause Analysis
18 58 (5.48%) Data Management
Programming Languages
1 179 (16.90%) SQL
2 79 (7.46%) Python
3 43 (4.06%) Java
3 43 (4.06%) PowerShell
4 30 (2.83%) C#
5 29 (2.74%) JavaScript
6 26 (2.46%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 20 (1.89%) Ladder Logic
8 17 (1.61%) TypeScript
9 16 (1.51%) VBA
10 13 (1.23%) PHP
11 12 (1.13%) Bash
12 11 (1.04%) C
12 11 (1.04%) C++
13 9 (0.85%) ABAP
14 7 (0.66%) RPG
14 7 (0.66%) T-SQL
15 6 (0.57%) Go
16 5 (0.47%) Embedded C
16 5 (0.47%) R
Qualifications
1 143 (13.50%) Degree
2 69 (6.52%) Security Cleared
3 55 (5.19%) SC Cleared
4 31 (2.93%) Microsoft Certification
5 27 (2.55%) DBS Check
6 18 (1.70%) CISSP
7 17 (1.61%) Azure Certification
8 15 (1.42%) CompTIA Security+
9 14 (1.32%) Cisco Certification
10 13 (1.23%) Computer Science Degree
11 8 (0.76%) A+ Certification
11 8 (0.76%) BPSS Clearance
12 7 (0.66%) ACCA
12 7 (0.66%) CCNA
12 7 (0.66%) CIMA
12 7 (0.66%) CISA
12 7 (0.66%) PMI Certification
12 7 (0.66%) SSCP
13 6 (0.57%) CCSP
13 6 (0.57%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 50 (4.72%) Data Quality
2 43 (4.06%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 42 (3.97%) Cyber Essentials
4 33 (3.12%) QA
5 30 (2.83%) GDPR
6 28 (2.64%) SLA
7 19 (1.79%) NIST
8 17 (1.61%) Accessibility
8 17 (1.61%) ISO 9001
9 13 (1.23%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 9 (0.85%) ISO 14001
11 7 (0.66%) GRC
11 7 (0.66%) PCI DSS
12 6 (0.57%) Actionable Recommendations
13 5 (0.47%) COSHH
13 5 (0.47%) GMP
14 4 (0.38%) HIPAA
14 4 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 3 (0.28%) California Consumer Privacy Act
15 3 (0.28%) SOC 2
System Software
1 139 (13.13%) Active Directory
2 44 (4.15%) Hyper-V
3 31 (2.93%) VMware Infrastructure
4 19 (1.79%) Docker
5 9 (0.85%) Firmware
6 8 (0.76%) vSphere
7 5 (0.47%) Embedded Firmware
7 5 (0.47%) Virtual Machines
8 4 (0.38%) Virtual Desktop
9 2 (0.19%) Samba
10 1 (0.094%) BitLocker
10 1 (0.094%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 47 (4.44%) Microsoft Intune
2 18 (1.70%) Kubernetes
3 13 (1.23%) Terraform
4 8 (0.76%) Ansible
5 7 (0.66%) Grafana
6 6 (0.57%) Prometheus
7 4 (0.38%) Functional Safety
7 4 (0.38%) Galera Cluster
7 4 (0.38%) Nagios
7 4 (0.38%) Nmap
7 4 (0.38%) SCCM
7 4 (0.38%) vCenter Server
8 2 (0.19%) BMC PATROL
8 2 (0.19%) Control-M
8 2 (0.19%) Progress Chef
8 2 (0.19%) Puppet
8 2 (0.19%) WhatsUp Gold
9 1 (0.094%) FortiGate
9 1 (0.094%) Jamf Pro
9 1 (0.094%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 309 (29.18%) Microsoft
2 44 (4.15%) SAP
3 39 (3.68%) VMware
4 28 (2.64%) Cisco
5 20 (1.89%) IBM
6 19 (1.79%) Google
7 18 (1.70%) ServiceNow
8 16 (1.51%) Cognos
9 15 (1.42%) Sage
9 15 (1.42%) Workday
10 14 (1.32%) Salesforce
11 12 (1.13%) Dell
12 11 (1.04%) Red Hat
13 10 (0.94%) iManage
13 10 (0.94%) Oracle
14 9 (0.85%) JD Edwards
15 8 (0.76%) Epicor
15 8 (0.76%) HP
15 8 (0.76%) HubSpot
15 8 (0.76%) SolarWinds