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

6 months to
15 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 1,040 1,203 1,860
As % of all permanent jobs in the Midlands 7.84% 21.43% 14.10%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.25% 25.02% 17.78%
Number of salaries quoted 773 686 1,067
10th Percentile £26,250 £25,000 £25,000
25th Percentile £29,750 £29,250 £29,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,000 £41,750 £40,001
Median % change year-on-year +0.60% +4.37% -16.67%
75th Percentile £55,250 £57,500 £57,500
90th Percentile £67,500 £67,500 £70,000
England median annual salary £47,500 £49,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -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 9,245 4,809 10,461
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 69.74% 85.66% 79.28%
Number of salaries quoted 6,553 2,863 7,014
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,750 £26,250
25th Percentile £40,000 £32,500 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £49,000 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% +3.16% -9.52%
75th Percentile £67,250 £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 15 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 15 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 -9 583 £42,500 -5.56% 300
East Midlands -10 453 £35,000 -4.11% 295
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 60 (5.77%) SharePoint
2 40 (3.85%) Microsoft Exchange
3 11 (1.06%) CMS
4 10 (0.96%) IIS
5 5 (0.48%) Skype for Business
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2007
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2010
6 4 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2013
7 3 (0.29%) Confluence
7 3 (0.29%) WordPress
8 1 (0.096%) Apache
8 1 (0.096%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.096%) Appian
8 1 (0.096%) Documentum
8 1 (0.096%) Drupal
8 1 (0.096%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.096%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.096%) SAS
Applications
1 96 (9.23%) Microsoft Office
2 74 (7.12%) Microsoft Excel
3 15 (1.44%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (0.96%) Spreadsheet
5 5 (0.48%) Fusion 360
6 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.19%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.096%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.096%) LaTeX
8 1 (0.096%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.096%) Simulink
8 1 (0.096%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 16 (1.54%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (1.15%) IBM Planning Analytics
3 11 (1.06%) Dynamics CRM
4 9 (0.87%) JDE EnterpriseOne
5 8 (0.77%) SAP Business One
6 5 (0.48%) Magento
6 5 (0.48%) Q-Pulse
6 5 (0.48%) Shopify
7 4 (0.38%) Dynamics AX
7 4 (0.38%) Line 50
7 4 (0.38%) Sage 50
7 4 (0.38%) Sage X3
8 3 (0.29%) iTrent
8 3 (0.29%) SAP CO
8 3 (0.29%) SAP FI
8 3 (0.29%) SAP FI/CO
9 2 (0.19%) Oracle EBS
10 1 (0.096%) Dynamics GP
10 1 (0.096%) NetSuite
10 1 (0.096%) SAP Business ByDesign
Cloud Services
1 227 (21.83%) Microsoft 365
2 182 (17.50%) Azure
3 105 (10.10%) Power Platform
4 80 (7.69%) Entra ID
5 70 (6.73%) AWS
6 36 (3.46%) SaaS
7 22 (2.12%) Dynamics 365
8 19 (1.83%) Serverless
9 18 (1.73%) Power Automate
10 15 (1.44%) Amazon S3
10 15 (1.44%) Microsoft Purview
10 15 (1.44%) PowerApps
11 14 (1.35%) GCP
12 13 (1.25%) AWS Lambda
12 13 (1.25%) Google Workspace
12 13 (1.25%) Microsoft Copilot
12 13 (1.25%) OneDrive
13 10 (0.96%) Azure Data Factory
14 9 (0.87%) Azure DevOps
15 8 (0.77%) Amazon SQS
Communications & Networking
1 63 (6.06%) DNS
1 63 (6.06%) Firewall
2 52 (5.00%) DHCP
3 49 (4.71%) VPN
4 39 (3.75%) TCP/IP
5 32 (3.08%) WAN
6 31 (2.98%) Wireless
7 25 (2.40%) VLAN
8 24 (2.31%) LAN
9 22 (2.12%) Wi-Fi
10 15 (1.44%) Network Security
11 12 (1.15%) VoIP
12 11 (1.06%) Internet
13 10 (0.96%) SD-WAN
14 8 (0.77%) MQTT
15 6 (0.58%) Cisco IOS
15 6 (0.58%) SSL
16 5 (0.48%) Remote Desktop
16 5 (0.48%) Skype
17 4 (0.38%) LoRaWAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 96 (9.23%) Power BI
2 42 (4.04%) SQL Server
3 24 (2.31%) Tableau
4 22 (2.12%) Power Query
5 19 (1.83%) MySQL
6 16 (1.54%) Data Warehouse
7 15 (1.44%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 14 (1.35%) Relational Database
9 12 (1.15%) Azure SQL Database
9 12 (1.15%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 8 (0.77%) Amazon Redshift
10 8 (0.77%) DynamoDB
11 7 (0.67%) MongoDB
11 7 (0.67%) Star Schema
12 6 (0.58%) Amazon RDS
12 6 (0.58%) Crystal Reports
12 6 (0.58%) Data Mining
12 6 (0.58%) PostgreSQL
13 5 (0.48%) NoSQL
14 4 (0.38%) SQL Server Analysis Services
Development Applications
1 23 (2.21%) Git
2 14 (1.35%) JIRA
3 5 (0.48%) VersionOne
4 4 (0.38%) Burp Suite
4 4 (0.38%) JUnit
4 4 (0.38%) Metasploit
5 3 (0.29%) Jenkins
5 3 (0.29%) Maven
5 3 (0.29%) Mockito
5 3 (0.29%) Subversion
6 2 (0.19%) Cucumber
6 2 (0.19%) GitLab
6 2 (0.19%) Postman
6 2 (0.19%) SoapUI
6 2 (0.19%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 2 (0.19%) TeamCity
6 2 (0.19%) Visual Studio
7 1 (0.096%) Eclipse
7 1 (0.096%) JMeter
7 1 (0.096%) Oracle Forms
General
1 507 (48.75%) Social Skills
2 309 (29.71%) Analytical Skills
3 174 (16.73%) Finance
4 147 (14.13%) Manufacturing
5 67 (6.44%) Retail
6 66 (6.35%) Organisational Skills
7 47 (4.52%) Marketing
8 45 (4.33%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 37 (3.56%) Legal
10 34 (3.27%) Law
10 34 (3.27%) Public Sector
11 26 (2.50%) Influencing Skills
12 22 (2.12%) Electronics
13 21 (2.02%) Automotive
14 19 (1.83%) Documentation Skills
15 14 (1.35%) Telecoms
16 12 (1.15%) Games
17 11 (1.06%) Banking
18 9 (0.87%) Advertising
18 9 (0.87%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 165 (15.87%) Analyst
2 147 (14.13%) Support Engineer
3 139 (13.37%) IT Support
4 92 (8.85%) Developer
5 90 (8.65%) Senior
6 83 (7.98%) IT Engineer
7 79 (7.60%) Technical Support
8 73 (7.02%) Technical Engineer
9 72 (6.92%) Technical Support Engineer
10 65 (6.25%) Support Technician
11 63 (6.06%) IT Support Engineer
12 54 (5.19%) Lead
13 51 (4.90%) IT Technician
14 44 (4.23%) IT Manager
14 44 (4.23%) IT Support Technician
14 44 (4.23%) Support Analyst
15 38 (3.65%) Consultant
16 37 (3.56%) Data Analyst
17 33 (3.17%) Senior Analyst
18 26 (2.50%) Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (4.04%) REST
2 38 (3.65%) React
3 27 (2.60%) .NET
3 27 (2.60%) Node.js
4 16 (1.54%) CSS
4 16 (1.54%) HTML
4 16 (1.54%) Spring
5 14 (1.35%) SOAP
6 13 (1.25%) Spring Boot
7 12 (1.15%) AngularJS
8 11 (1.06%) RESTful
9 9 (0.87%) Middleware
9 9 (0.87%) SAP Fiori
10 8 (0.77%) JDBC
10 8 (0.77%) OAuth
10 8 (0.77%) SAPUI5
11 7 (0.67%) ASP.NET
12 6 (0.58%) ASP.NET Core
13 5 (0.48%) EDI
13 5 (0.48%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 105 (10.10%) Driving Licence
2 51 (4.90%) Management Information System
3 50 (4.81%) Onboarding
4 44 (4.23%) Self-Motivation
5 22 (2.12%) Enterprise Software
6 18 (1.73%) IoT
7 16 (1.54%) Analytical Mindset
8 13 (1.25%) Social Media
9 12 (1.15%) Greenfield Project
9 12 (1.15%) Legacy Systems
9 12 (1.15%) Security Posture
10 11 (1.06%) Virtual Team
11 10 (0.96%) Data Centre
11 10 (0.96%) NHS
12 9 (0.87%) Data Structures
12 9 (0.87%) Mobile App
12 9 (0.87%) Replication
12 9 (0.87%) SCADA
13 8 (0.77%) Hybrid Cloud
13 8 (0.77%) iSeries
Operating Systems
1 186 (17.88%) Windows
2 66 (6.35%) Windows Server
3 64 (6.15%) Linux
4 48 (4.62%) Windows 10
5 16 (1.54%) Android
6 11 (1.06%) Apple iOS
7 10 (0.96%) Ubuntu
8 7 (0.67%) Mac OS
9 6 (0.58%) Debian
9 6 (0.58%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 5 (0.48%) CentOS
10 5 (0.48%) OpenVMS
10 5 (0.48%) Unix
10 5 (0.48%) Windows 7
11 4 (0.38%) FreeRTOS
11 4 (0.38%) VMS
12 3 (0.29%) SUSE
13 1 (0.096%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.096%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 282 (27.12%) Continuous Improvement
2 178 (17.12%) Customer Service
3 144 (13.85%) Decision-Making
4 136 (13.08%) Analytics
5 125 (12.02%) Mentoring
6 124 (11.92%) Collaborative Working
7 123 (11.83%) Agile
8 105 (10.10%) ERP
9 100 (9.62%) Business Intelligence
9 100 (9.62%) ITIL
10 93 (8.94%) Service Delivery
11 92 (8.85%) Cybersecurity
12 82 (7.88%) AI
13 70 (6.73%) Roadmaps
14 63 (6.06%) CRM
15 62 (5.96%) Process Improvement
15 62 (5.96%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 60 (5.77%) Root Cause Analysis
17 57 (5.48%) Data Management
17 57 (5.48%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 175 (16.83%) SQL
2 79 (7.60%) Python
3 43 (4.13%) PowerShell
4 41 (3.94%) Java
5 30 (2.88%) C#
6 28 (2.69%) JavaScript
7 26 (2.50%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 20 (1.92%) Ladder Logic
9 17 (1.63%) TypeScript
10 16 (1.54%) VBA
11 13 (1.25%) PHP
12 12 (1.15%) Bash
13 10 (0.96%) C
13 10 (0.96%) C++
14 8 (0.77%) ABAP
15 7 (0.67%) RPG
15 7 (0.67%) T-SQL
16 6 (0.58%) Go
17 5 (0.48%) Embedded C
17 5 (0.48%) R
Qualifications
1 141 (13.56%) Degree
2 70 (6.73%) Security Cleared
3 55 (5.29%) SC Cleared
4 31 (2.98%) Microsoft Certification
5 27 (2.60%) DBS Check
6 18 (1.73%) CISSP
7 17 (1.63%) Azure Certification
8 15 (1.44%) CompTIA Security+
9 13 (1.25%) Cisco Certification
9 13 (1.25%) Computer Science Degree
10 8 (0.77%) A+ Certification
10 8 (0.77%) BPSS Clearance
11 7 (0.67%) ACCA
11 7 (0.67%) CIMA
11 7 (0.67%) CISA
11 7 (0.67%) PMI Certification
11 7 (0.67%) SSCP
12 6 (0.58%) CCNA
12 6 (0.58%) CCSP
12 6 (0.58%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 49 (4.71%) Data Quality
2 43 (4.13%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 42 (4.04%) Cyber Essentials
4 33 (3.17%) QA
5 30 (2.88%) GDPR
6 26 (2.50%) SLA
7 19 (1.83%) NIST
8 17 (1.63%) Accessibility
8 17 (1.63%) ISO 9001
9 13 (1.25%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 9 (0.87%) ISO 14001
11 7 (0.67%) GRC
11 7 (0.67%) PCI DSS
12 6 (0.58%) Actionable Recommendations
13 5 (0.48%) COSHH
13 5 (0.48%) GMP
14 4 (0.38%) HIPAA
14 4 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 3 (0.29%) California Consumer Privacy Act
15 3 (0.29%) SOC 2
System Software
1 139 (13.37%) Active Directory
2 44 (4.23%) Hyper-V
3 31 (2.98%) VMware Infrastructure
4 19 (1.83%) Docker
5 9 (0.87%) Firmware
6 8 (0.77%) vSphere
7 5 (0.48%) Embedded Firmware
7 5 (0.48%) Virtual Machines
8 4 (0.38%) Virtual Desktop
9 2 (0.19%) Samba
10 1 (0.096%) BitLocker
10 1 (0.096%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 49 (4.71%) Microsoft Intune
2 18 (1.73%) Kubernetes
3 13 (1.25%) Terraform
4 8 (0.77%) Ansible
5 7 (0.67%) Grafana
6 6 (0.58%) 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%) Progress Chef
8 2 (0.19%) Puppet
9 1 (0.096%) BMC PATROL
9 1 (0.096%) Control-M
9 1 (0.096%) FortiGate
9 1 (0.096%) Jamf Pro
9 1 (0.096%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.096%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 303 (29.13%) Microsoft
2 39 (3.75%) SAP
2 39 (3.75%) VMware
3 27 (2.60%) Cisco
4 19 (1.83%) IBM
5 18 (1.73%) Google
6 15 (1.44%) Cognos
6 15 (1.44%) Sage
6 15 (1.44%) ServiceNow
7 14 (1.35%) Workday
8 13 (1.25%) Salesforce
9 12 (1.15%) Dell
10 11 (1.06%) Red Hat
11 10 (0.96%) Oracle
12 9 (0.87%) iManage
12 9 (0.87%) JD Edwards
13 8 (0.77%) HP
13 8 (0.77%) HubSpot
14 7 (0.67%) Apple
14 7 (0.67%) Epicor