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 16 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 12 3 4
Rank change year-on-year -9 +1 +4
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 952 1,126 2,016
As % of all permanent jobs in the Midlands 7.67% 22.41% 14.30%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.04% 25.21% 18.15%
Number of salaries quoted 709 633 1,184
10th Percentile £26,293 £25,267 £25,000
25th Percentile £29,625 £30,000 £28,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,000 £43,000 £40,000
Median % change year-on-year -2.33% +7.50% -15.79%
75th Percentile £56,250 £58,750 £57,500
90th Percentile £65,762 £67,500 £69,700
England median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £49,500
% change year-on-year -5.00% +1.01% -10.00%

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 8,627 4,466 11,106
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Midlands 69.52% 88.89% 78.76%
Number of salaries quoted 6,039 2,541 7,684
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,750 £26,250
25th Percentile £40,000 £32,500 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £51,300 £48,500 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +5.77% +2.11% -9.52%
75th Percentile £67,500 £63,750 £62,500
90th Percentile £82,500 £75,000 £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 16 June 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 16 June 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 -9 542 £42,500 -5.56% 274
East Midlands -10 407 £35,000 -6.67% 203
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 (6.20%) SharePoint
2 43 (4.52%) Microsoft Exchange
3 11 (1.16%) CMS
4 7 (0.74%) IIS
5 5 (0.53%) Oracle SOA Suite
5 5 (0.53%) Skype for Business
6 4 (0.42%) Exchange Server 2007
6 4 (0.42%) Exchange Server 2010
6 4 (0.42%) Exchange Server 2013
7 3 (0.32%) WordPress
8 2 (0.21%) Confluence
9 1 (0.11%) Appian
9 1 (0.11%) Drupal
9 1 (0.11%) SAS
Applications
1 77 (8.09%) Microsoft Office
2 63 (6.62%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (1.26%) Spreadsheet
4 9 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.63%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.53%) Fusion 360
7 4 (0.42%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.11%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.11%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 11 (1.16%) Dynamics CRM
2 10 (1.05%) SAP S/4HANA
3 9 (0.95%) IBM Planning Analytics
4 7 (0.74%) iTrent
4 7 (0.74%) SAP Business One
5 5 (0.53%) Magento
5 5 (0.53%) Q-Pulse
5 5 (0.53%) Shopify
6 4 (0.42%) Line 50
6 4 (0.42%) Sage 50
6 4 (0.42%) Sage X3
7 3 (0.32%) SAP Business ByDesign
8 2 (0.21%) Oracle EBS
9 1 (0.11%) Dynamics AX
9 1 (0.11%) Exchequer
9 1 (0.11%) JDE EnterpriseOne
9 1 (0.11%) NetSuite
9 1 (0.11%) SAP FI
9 1 (0.11%) SAP FI/CO
9 1 (0.11%) SAP WM
Cloud Services
1 203 (21.32%) Microsoft 365
2 174 (18.28%) Azure
3 89 (9.35%) Power Platform
4 82 (8.61%) AWS
5 68 (7.14%) Entra ID
6 29 (3.05%) SaaS
6 29 (3.05%) Serverless
7 24 (2.52%) Amazon S3
8 23 (2.42%) AWS Lambda
9 20 (2.10%) Dynamics 365
10 16 (1.68%) Power Automate
11 14 (1.47%) OneDrive
12 13 (1.37%) Google Workspace
12 13 (1.37%) PowerApps
13 11 (1.16%) GCP
14 10 (1.05%) Microsoft Copilot
15 9 (0.95%) Azure Data Factory
15 9 (0.95%) Azure DevOps
16 8 (0.84%) Amazon Cognito
16 8 (0.84%) Amazon SQS
Communications & Networking
1 54 (5.67%) DNS
1 54 (5.67%) Firewall
2 51 (5.36%) VPN
3 48 (5.04%) DHCP
4 34 (3.57%) WAN
5 31 (3.26%) TCP/IP
6 27 (2.84%) Wireless
7 22 (2.31%) LAN
7 22 (2.31%) VLAN
8 20 (2.10%) Wi-Fi
9 16 (1.68%) SD-WAN
10 15 (1.58%) Internet
11 13 (1.37%) VoIP
12 12 (1.26%) Network Security
13 8 (0.84%) MQTT
14 5 (0.53%) Skype
15 4 (0.42%) Bluetooth
15 4 (0.42%) LoRaWAN
16 3 (0.32%) Remote Desktop
16 3 (0.32%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 80 (8.40%) Power BI
2 33 (3.47%) SQL Server
3 20 (2.10%) Tableau
4 19 (2.00%) Power Query
5 17 (1.79%) MySQL
6 14 (1.47%) Amazon Redshift
7 13 (1.37%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 11 (1.16%) Relational Database
9 9 (0.95%) Data Warehouse
10 8 (0.84%) Azure SQL Database
10 8 (0.84%) DynamoDB
11 7 (0.74%) Star Schema
12 6 (0.63%) MongoDB
12 6 (0.63%) SQL Server Reporting Services
13 5 (0.53%) Amazon RDS
13 5 (0.53%) NoSQL
13 5 (0.53%) Oracle Reports
14 4 (0.42%) Data Mining
14 4 (0.42%) FileMaker
14 4 (0.42%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 19 (2.00%) Git
2 13 (1.37%) JIRA
3 8 (0.84%) JUnit
4 7 (0.74%) Burp Suite
4 7 (0.74%) Maven
4 7 (0.74%) Metasploit
4 7 (0.74%) Mockito
5 5 (0.53%) VersionOne
6 4 (0.42%) Subversion
7 3 (0.32%) Jenkins
8 2 (0.21%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
8 2 (0.21%) TeamCity
8 2 (0.21%) Visual Studio
8 2 (0.21%) XCUITest
9 1 (0.11%) Appium
9 1 (0.11%) Bugzilla
9 1 (0.11%) Carbide.c++
9 1 (0.11%) Oracle Forms
9 1 (0.11%) Postman
9 1 (0.11%) TestRail
General
1 434 (45.59%) Social Skills
2 296 (31.09%) Analytical Skills
3 165 (17.33%) Finance
4 114 (11.97%) Manufacturing
5 61 (6.41%) Organisational Skills
6 57 (5.99%) Retail
7 48 (5.04%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 40 (4.20%) Marketing
9 37 (3.89%) Legal
10 33 (3.47%) Law
11 31 (3.26%) Public Sector
12 27 (2.84%) Influencing Skills
13 23 (2.42%) Electronics
14 18 (1.89%) Documentation Skills
15 17 (1.79%) Automotive
16 13 (1.37%) Banking
17 11 (1.16%) Investment Banking
17 11 (1.16%) Telecoms
18 9 (0.95%) Advertising
18 9 (0.95%) Games
Job Titles
1 153 (16.07%) Analyst
2 141 (14.81%) Support Engineer
3 115 (12.08%) IT Support
4 91 (9.56%) Senior
5 85 (8.93%) Developer
6 83 (8.72%) IT Engineer
7 70 (7.35%) Technical Support
8 66 (6.93%) IT Support Engineer
9 64 (6.72%) Technical Engineer
9 64 (6.72%) Technical Support Engineer
10 54 (5.67%) Support Technician
11 50 (5.25%) Lead
12 37 (3.89%) Data Analyst
13 36 (3.78%) IT Technician
14 35 (3.68%) Support Analyst
15 33 (3.47%) IT Manager
15 33 (3.47%) IT Support Technician
16 32 (3.36%) Consultant
16 32 (3.36%) Senior Analyst
17 26 (2.73%) Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (4.62%) React
2 30 (3.15%) Node.js
2 30 (3.15%) REST
3 23 (2.42%) CSS
3 23 (2.42%) HTML
4 19 (2.00%) .NET
5 13 (1.37%) Spring
6 11 (1.16%) AngularJS
7 10 (1.05%) RESTful
7 10 (1.05%) Spring Boot
8 7 (0.74%) Middleware
9 5 (0.53%) ASP.NET
9 5 (0.53%) ASP.NET Core
9 5 (0.53%) EDI
9 5 (0.53%) SOAP
10 4 (0.42%) .NET Framework
10 4 (0.42%) JDBC
10 4 (0.42%) OAuth
10 4 (0.42%) SAP Fiori
10 4 (0.42%) SAPUI5
Miscellaneous
1 90 (9.45%) Driving Licence
2 50 (5.25%) Onboarding
3 49 (5.15%) Management Information System
4 42 (4.41%) Self-Motivation
5 15 (1.58%) Analytical Mindset
6 13 (1.37%) Enterprise Software
6 13 (1.37%) Security Posture
6 13 (1.37%) Social Media
7 12 (1.26%) IoT
8 11 (1.16%) Greenfield Project
8 11 (1.16%) Legacy Systems
9 10 (1.05%) Virtual Team
10 9 (0.95%) Data Centre
10 9 (0.95%) FMCG
10 9 (0.95%) Mobile App
10 9 (0.95%) Replication
11 8 (0.84%) Data Structures
11 8 (0.84%) iSeries
11 8 (0.84%) SCADA
12 7 (0.74%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 155 (16.28%) Windows
2 59 (6.20%) Windows Server
3 55 (5.78%) Linux
4 49 (5.15%) Windows 10
5 12 (1.26%) Apple iOS
6 11 (1.16%) Android
7 10 (1.05%) Ubuntu
8 7 (0.74%) Debian
9 5 (0.53%) CentOS
9 5 (0.53%) Mac OS
9 5 (0.53%) Windows 7
10 4 (0.42%) FreeRTOS
10 4 (0.42%) Unix
10 4 (0.42%) VMS
11 3 (0.32%) SUSE
12 2 (0.21%) OpenVMS
12 2 (0.21%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 2 (0.21%) Windows Server 2012
13 1 (0.11%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.11%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 232 (24.37%) Continuous Improvement
2 160 (16.81%) Customer Service
3 133 (13.97%) Decision-Making
4 122 (12.82%) Agile
5 111 (11.66%) Analytics
6 103 (10.82%) Collaborative Working
6 103 (10.82%) Mentoring
7 91 (9.56%) ITIL
8 82 (8.61%) Business Intelligence
8 82 (8.61%) Service Delivery
9 81 (8.51%) ERP
10 78 (8.19%) Cybersecurity
11 71 (7.46%) Roadmaps
12 70 (7.35%) AI
13 67 (7.04%) Process Improvement
14 60 (6.30%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 58 (6.09%) Computer Science
16 55 (5.78%) CRM
17 54 (5.67%) Coaching
18 50 (5.25%) Root Cause Analysis
Programming Languages
1 157 (16.49%) SQL
2 83 (8.72%) Python
3 42 (4.41%) PowerShell
4 33 (3.47%) Java
5 30 (3.15%) JavaScript
6 23 (2.42%) C#
7 22 (2.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 17 (1.79%) TypeScript
9 16 (1.68%) Ladder Logic
10 15 (1.58%) Bash
11 13 (1.37%) PHP
12 12 (1.26%) VBA
13 11 (1.16%) C
14 8 (0.84%) C++
14 8 (0.84%) PL/SQL
14 8 (0.84%) R
15 7 (0.74%) RPG
15 7 (0.74%) T-SQL
16 6 (0.63%) Go
17 4 (0.42%) RPG/400
Qualifications
1 136 (14.29%) Degree
2 73 (7.67%) Security Cleared
3 56 (5.88%) SC Cleared
4 34 (3.57%) Microsoft Certification
5 27 (2.84%) DBS Check
6 21 (2.21%) Computer Science Degree
7 19 (2.00%) CISSP
8 16 (1.68%) CompTIA Security+
9 14 (1.47%) Cisco Certification
10 11 (1.16%) A+ Certification
11 10 (1.05%) ACCA
11 10 (1.05%) Azure Certification
11 10 (1.05%) CIMA
11 10 (1.05%) PMI Certification
12 9 (0.95%) BPSS Clearance
12 9 (0.95%) CCNA
13 8 (0.84%) PMP
14 7 (0.74%) CISA
14 7 (0.74%) MCSE
14 7 (0.74%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 43 (4.52%) Data Quality
2 38 (3.99%) QA
3 36 (3.78%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 31 (3.26%) Cyber Essentials
5 29 (3.05%) GDPR
6 22 (2.31%) SLA
7 21 (2.21%) NIST
8 14 (1.47%) Accessibility
9 13 (1.37%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 11 (1.16%) ISO 9001
11 10 (1.05%) Actionable Recommendations
12 9 (0.95%) ISO 14001
13 7 (0.74%) PCI DSS
14 6 (0.63%) GRC
14 6 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 20000
15 5 (0.53%) COSHH
15 5 (0.53%) GMP
16 4 (0.42%) HIPAA
16 4 (0.42%) Sarbanes-Oxley
17 3 (0.32%) SOC 2
System Software
1 119 (12.50%) Active Directory
2 29 (3.05%) VMware Infrastructure
3 28 (2.94%) Hyper-V
4 23 (2.42%) Docker
5 10 (1.05%) vSphere
6 8 (0.84%) Firmware
7 5 (0.53%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.42%) Embedded Firmware
8 4 (0.42%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.21%) VMware ESXi
10 1 (0.11%) BitLocker
10 1 (0.11%) Samba
10 1 (0.11%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 42 (4.41%) Microsoft Intune
2 22 (2.31%) Kubernetes
3 14 (1.47%) Terraform
4 9 (0.95%) Ansible
5 7 (0.74%) Nmap
6 5 (0.53%) Grafana
6 5 (0.53%) Nagios
7 4 (0.42%) Functional Safety
7 4 (0.42%) Galera Cluster
7 4 (0.42%) Prometheus
7 4 (0.42%) vCenter Server
8 3 (0.32%) SCCM
8 3 (0.32%) Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.21%) Progress Chef
9 2 (0.21%) Puppet
10 1 (0.11%) FortiGate
10 1 (0.11%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 257 (27.00%) Microsoft
2 37 (3.89%) VMware
3 33 (3.47%) SAP
4 30 (3.15%) Cisco
5 22 (2.31%) Oracle
6 17 (1.79%) Sage
7 16 (1.68%) Google
7 16 (1.68%) IBM
8 15 (1.58%) Salesforce
9 12 (1.26%) Cognos
9 12 (1.26%) Dell
9 12 (1.26%) Workday
10 11 (1.16%) ServiceNow
10 11 (1.16%) SolarWinds
11 9 (0.95%) Databricks
12 8 (0.84%) Apple
12 8 (0.84%) HP
13 7 (0.74%) Red Hat
14 6 (0.63%) Avaya
14 6 (0.63%) McAfee