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 vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 September 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 3 4 9
Rank change year-on-year +1 +5 -1
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 1,232 1,455 762
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 21.97% 14.45% 13.51%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 25.62% 18.38% 14.35%
Number of salaries quoted 710 547 573
10th Percentile £25,225 £25,750 £26,250
25th Percentile £29,000 £32,250 £33,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £38,000 £45,000 £49,000
Median % change year-on-year -15.56% -8.16% +6.52%
75th Percentile £51,250 £60,000 £63,750
90th Percentile £65,125 £71,250 £71,250
England median annual salary £45,000 £52,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -14.29% -4.55% -

All Process and 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 4,808 7,918 5,310
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 85.73% 78.61% 94.13%
Number of salaries quoted 2,883 4,035 3,831
10th Percentile £27,000 £28,893 £27,500
25th Percentile £32,500 £36,250 £37,954
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £50,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £63,500 £65,000 £66,250
90th Percentile £77,500 £77,500 £78,750
England median annual salary £55,000 £57,500 £62,400
% change year-on-year -4.35% -7.85% +4.00%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the Midlands

Job postings citing Problem-Solving as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the Midlands.

Job vacancy trend for Problem-Solving 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 September 2025.

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 September 2025. 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 +1 652 £44,543 -10.91% 454
East Midlands +2 580 £35,000 -12.50% 344
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the Midlands by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 48 (3.90%) Microsoft Exchange
2 45 (3.65%) SharePoint
3 13 (1.06%) IIS
4 6 (0.49%) CMS
4 6 (0.49%) OpenEdge
5 5 (0.41%) Confluence
6 2 (0.16%) Apache
6 2 (0.16%) HCL Notes
6 2 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
6 2 (0.16%) Skype for Business
7 1 (0.081%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.081%) Apache Solr
7 1 (0.081%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.081%) Appian
7 1 (0.081%) Exchange Server 2010
7 1 (0.081%) Exchange Server 2013
7 1 (0.081%) Headless CMS
7 1 (0.081%) nginx
7 1 (0.081%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.081%) Strapi
Applications
1 98 (7.95%) Microsoft Excel
2 72 (5.84%) Microsoft Office
3 22 (1.79%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
5 2 (0.16%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 2 (0.16%) CATIA
5 2 (0.16%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.16%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.081%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.081%) Revit
6 1 (0.081%) SOLIDWORKS
6 1 (0.081%) Trello
Business Applications
1 29 (2.35%) Dynamics CRM
2 25 (2.03%) NetSuite
3 8 (0.65%) SAP S/4HANA
4 6 (0.49%) Shopify
5 5 (0.41%) Dynamics NAV
5 5 (0.41%) Exchequer
5 5 (0.41%) Infor CloudSuite
5 5 (0.41%) Infor CloudSuite Industrial (formerly SyteLine)
5 5 (0.41%) SAP Business One
5 5 (0.41%) SAP EWM
5 5 (0.41%) SAP FI
5 5 (0.41%) SAP WM
6 4 (0.32%) Magento
7 3 (0.24%) iTrent
7 3 (0.24%) SAP HR
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle Cash Management
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle EBS
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle EBS R12
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
8 2 (0.16%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 174 (14.12%) Azure
2 171 (13.88%) Microsoft 365
3 91 (7.39%) Power Platform
4 42 (3.41%) SaaS
5 41 (3.33%) Entra ID
6 32 (2.60%) Dynamics 365
7 26 (2.11%) AWS
8 25 (2.03%) Cloud Computing
9 18 (1.46%) Power Automate
10 17 (1.38%) Azure Data Factory
10 17 (1.38%) OneDrive
11 16 (1.30%) PowerApps
12 13 (1.06%) Azure DevOps
12 13 (1.06%) GCP
12 13 (1.06%) IaaS
12 13 (1.06%) PaaS
13 8 (0.65%) GitHub
14 7 (0.57%) Google Workspace
15 6 (0.49%) Snowflake
16 5 (0.41%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 69 (5.60%) Firewall
2 59 (4.79%) VPN
3 54 (4.38%) DNS
4 51 (4.14%) DHCP
5 47 (3.81%) WAN
6 46 (3.73%) LAN
7 37 (3.00%) TCP/IP
8 27 (2.19%) Remote Desktop
9 21 (1.70%) Wi-Fi
10 16 (1.30%) Network Security
11 11 (0.89%) VoIP
12 10 (0.81%) Broadband
13 8 (0.65%) Cisco IOS
13 8 (0.65%) Wireless
14 5 (0.41%) Ethernet
14 5 (0.41%) Internet
14 5 (0.41%) SAN
15 4 (0.32%) ADSL
15 4 (0.32%) Bluetooth
15 4 (0.32%) PBX
Database & Business Intelligence
1 84 (6.82%) Power BI
2 65 (5.28%) SQL Server
3 23 (1.87%) SQL Server Reporting Services
4 20 (1.62%) GIS
5 17 (1.38%) MySQL
5 17 (1.38%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 14 (1.14%) Data Warehouse
7 13 (1.06%) Relational Database
8 12 (0.97%) Tableau
9 10 (0.81%) BusinessObjects
9 10 (0.81%) Crystal Reports
10 8 (0.65%) Star Schema
11 6 (0.49%) Metadata
11 6 (0.49%) MS Access
12 5 (0.41%) EDRMS
12 5 (0.41%) Geospatial Data
12 5 (0.41%) PostgreSQL
13 4 (0.32%) Data Lake
13 4 (0.32%) FileMaker
13 4 (0.32%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 21 (1.70%) JIRA
2 16 (1.30%) Cucumber
3 15 (1.22%) Robot Framework
4 11 (0.89%) Git
5 9 (0.73%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 7 (0.57%) Visual Studio
7 4 (0.32%) Selenium
8 3 (0.24%) Jenkins
9 2 (0.16%) ERwin
9 2 (0.16%) GitLab
9 2 (0.16%) Oracle Forms
9 2 (0.16%) Subversion
9 2 (0.16%) Vagrant
10 1 (0.081%) Maven
10 1 (0.081%) Mockito
10 1 (0.081%) PowerDesigner
10 1 (0.081%) Rational DOORS
10 1 (0.081%) SoapUI
10 1 (0.081%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.081%) TestComplete
General
1 524 (42.53%) Social Skills
2 414 (33.60%) Retail
3 336 (27.27%) Manufacturing
4 267 (21.67%) Analytical Skills
5 233 (18.91%) Finance
6 76 (6.17%) Dutch Language
6 76 (6.17%) Finnish Language
6 76 (6.17%) Norwegian Language
7 67 (5.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 45 (3.65%) Organisational Skills
9 43 (3.49%) Law
10 36 (2.92%) Marketing
11 33 (2.68%) Digital Health
11 33 (2.68%) Legal
12 29 (2.35%) Telecoms
13 27 (2.19%) Public Sector
14 22 (1.79%) Banking
14 22 (1.79%) Games
15 19 (1.54%) Catalan Language
16 15 (1.22%) Electronics
Job Titles
1 286 (23.21%) Trainer
2 172 (13.96%) IT Support
3 142 (11.53%) Analyst
4 126 (10.23%) Support Engineer
5 98 (7.95%) Developer
6 91 (7.39%) 2nd Line Support
7 82 (6.66%) Technical Support
8 73 (5.93%) Technical Engineer
9 71 (5.76%) Support Analyst
9 71 (5.76%) Technical Support Engineer
10 47 (3.81%) Senior
11 40 (3.25%) Lead
12 38 (3.08%) 1st Line Support
12 38 (3.08%) Consultant
12 38 (3.08%) IT Engineer
13 35 (2.84%) Applications Support
14 33 (2.68%) Support Technician
15 30 (2.44%) IT Support Engineer
16 27 (2.19%) Infrastructure Engineer
17 23 (1.87%) 2nd Line Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 38 (3.08%) .NET
2 24 (1.95%) CSS
2 24 (1.95%) REST
3 23 (1.87%) HTML
4 22 (1.79%) React
5 16 (1.30%) EDI
6 12 (0.97%) AngularJS
6 12 (0.97%) Elastic Stack
6 12 (0.97%) Web Services
7 10 (0.81%) JSON
7 10 (0.81%) Razor View Engine
8 9 (0.73%) .NET Framework
8 9 (0.73%) Middleware
8 9 (0.73%) SOAP
9 8 (0.65%) ASP.NET
10 7 (0.57%) jQuery
10 7 (0.57%) RESTful
10 7 (0.57%) Spring
11 6 (0.49%) Entity Framework
11 6 (0.49%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 286 (23.21%) Robotics
2 86 (6.98%) Onboarding
3 81 (6.57%) Driving Licence
4 53 (4.30%) FMCG
5 40 (3.25%) Self-Motivation
6 36 (2.92%) Analytical Mindset
6 36 (2.92%) Management Information System
7 20 (1.62%) EPoS
7 20 (1.62%) SCADA
8 18 (1.46%) Linux Command Line
9 14 (1.14%) Data Centre
10 13 (1.06%) Legacy Systems
10 13 (1.06%) Operational Technology
10 13 (1.06%) Product Ownership
11 12 (0.97%) e-Learning
12 10 (0.81%) Cyberattack
13 9 (0.73%) Data Structures
13 9 (0.73%) Embedded Systems
14 8 (0.65%) Cyber Threat
14 8 (0.65%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 215 (17.45%) Windows
2 54 (4.38%) Windows Server
3 49 (3.98%) Windows 10
4 45 (3.65%) Linux
5 23 (1.87%) Mac OS
6 15 (1.22%) Android
7 7 (0.57%) Apple iOS
7 7 (0.57%) Windows Server 2016
8 6 (0.49%) Mac OS X
8 6 (0.49%) Windows 7
9 5 (0.41%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 2 (0.16%) Unix
10 2 (0.16%) VMS
10 2 (0.16%) Windows Server 2003
11 1 (0.081%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.081%) Windows Mobile
Processes & Methodologies
1 315 (25.57%) Artificial Intelligence
2 295 (23.94%) Machine Learning
3 285 (23.13%) Generative AI
3 285 (23.13%) LLM
3 285 (23.13%) Red Team
4 242 (19.64%) Data Privacy
5 229 (18.59%) Customer Service
6 186 (15.10%) Continuous Improvement
7 117 (9.50%) ERP
8 110 (8.93%) Logistics
9 109 (8.85%) CRM
10 96 (7.79%) Business Intelligence
11 94 (7.63%) Project Management
12 92 (7.47%) Mentoring
13 89 (7.22%) Agile
13 89 (7.22%) Cybersecurity
14 84 (6.82%) Decision-Making
15 77 (6.25%) ITIL
16 66 (5.36%) Analytics
17 56 (4.55%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 162 (13.15%) SQL
2 69 (5.60%) Python
3 67 (5.44%) C#
4 53 (4.30%) JavaScript
4 53 (4.30%) PowerShell
5 34 (2.76%) Java
6 27 (2.19%) Bash
7 18 (1.46%) T-SQL
8 16 (1.30%) PHP
9 8 (0.65%) C++
10 6 (0.49%) Perl
10 6 (0.49%) R
10 6 (0.49%) TypeScript
11 5 (0.41%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 3 (0.24%) C
12 3 (0.24%) Groovy
13 2 (0.16%) Delphi
13 2 (0.16%) Go
13 2 (0.16%) Ruby
13 2 (0.16%) XAML
Qualifications
1 433 (35.15%) Degree
2 56 (4.55%) Security Cleared
3 36 (2.92%) Computer Science Degree
4 29 (2.35%) Microsoft Certification
5 27 (2.19%) SC Cleared
6 22 (1.79%) DBS Check
7 17 (1.38%) Master's Degree
8 14 (1.14%) BPSS Clearance
8 14 (1.14%) DV Cleared
8 14 (1.14%) MCP
9 13 (1.06%) A+ Certification
9 13 (1.06%) ACCA
9 13 (1.06%) CIMA
10 12 (0.97%) Azure Certification
11 10 (0.81%) CISSP
11 10 (0.81%) MCSA
12 9 (0.73%) HNC
13 8 (0.65%) Cisco Certification
13 8 (0.65%) HND
14 7 (0.57%) AAT
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 39 (3.17%) QA
2 30 (2.44%) GDPR
3 23 (1.87%) SLA
4 22 (1.79%) Data Quality
5 20 (1.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 10 (0.81%) Cyber Essentials
7 7 (0.57%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 6 (0.49%) Actionable Recommendations
8 6 (0.49%) PMO
9 5 (0.41%) NIST
10 4 (0.32%) ISO 9001
11 3 (0.24%) COBIT
11 3 (0.24%) PCI DSS
12 2 (0.16%) Accessibility
12 2 (0.16%) ISO 20022
12 2 (0.16%) PMBOK
13 1 (0.081%) Government Security Classifications
13 1 (0.081%) ISO 14001
13 1 (0.081%) ISO 9000
13 1 (0.081%) NEBOSH
System Software
1 141 (11.44%) Active Directory
2 26 (2.11%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (1.46%) Hyper-V
4 13 (1.06%) Docker
5 11 (0.89%) Firmware
5 11 (0.89%) vSphere
6 8 (0.65%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.32%) Embedded Firmware
8 1 (0.081%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 28 (2.27%) Microsoft Intune
2 18 (1.46%) Terraform
3 12 (0.97%) Ansible
4 6 (0.49%) Kubernetes
5 4 (0.32%) SCOM
6 3 (0.24%) Nagios
6 3 (0.24%) SCCM
7 2 (0.16%) FortiGate
7 2 (0.16%) Progress Chef
7 2 (0.16%) Puppet
7 2 (0.16%) SCOrch
7 2 (0.16%) SCSM
8 1 (0.081%) AirWatch
8 1 (0.081%) CA Service Virtualization
8 1 (0.081%) EMC NetWorker
8 1 (0.081%) HP Quality Center
8 1 (0.081%) Norton AntiVirus
8 1 (0.081%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 302 (24.51%) Google
2 301 (24.43%) Databricks
3 296 (24.03%) Microsoft
4 290 (23.54%) Adobe
5 69 (5.60%) SAP
6 52 (4.22%) Cisco
7 51 (4.14%) Salesforce
8 27 (2.19%) VMware
9 24 (1.95%) Oracle
10 22 (1.79%) Juniper
11 14 (1.14%) Dell
12 13 (1.06%) Apple
13 12 (0.97%) Splunk
14 11 (0.89%) McAfee
14 11 (0.89%) Progress
15 10 (0.81%) HubSpot
16 9 (0.73%) BT
16 9 (0.73%) ServiceNow
16 9 (0.73%) Zoho
17 8 (0.65%) 3PAR