Problem-Solving Job Trends in the North West

Problem Solving
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 18 7 8
Rank change year-on-year -11 +1 +14
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 716 882 529
As % of all permanent jobs in the North West 12.11% 15.99% 15.04%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 14.14% 18.07% 15.98%
Number of salaries quoted 534 422 361
10th Percentile £27,537 £30,750 £26,000
25th Percentile £32,500 £35,000 £33,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,683 £48,342 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year -1.36% +1.77% -
75th Percentile £53,000 £60,000 £64,750
90th Percentile £64,256 £77,350 £72,500
England median annual salary £45,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -18.18% - -

All Process and Methodology Skills
North West

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 North West.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 5,064 4,882 3,311
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North West 85.66% 88.51% 94.12%
Number of salaries quoted 2,404 2,496 2,511
10th Percentile £27,750 £32,114 £31,250
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £51,750 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.38% -5.91% +0.42%
75th Percentile £65,000 £65,000 £70,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £78,750 £83,750
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 North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Problem-Solving relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the North West

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in the North West

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in the North West

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the North West over the 6 months to 14 December 2025.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in the North West

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the North West region over the 6 months to 14 December 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
Manchester -17 272 £42,750 -14.50% 272
Cheshire -11 154 £53,000 +32.50% 125
Merseyside +2 136 £48,720 +49.91% 72
Lancashire -6 102 £45,497 -13.34% 157
Cumbria +5 50 £45,000 +7.14% 13
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 41 (5.73%) SharePoint
2 21 (2.93%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (0.98%) WordPress
4 5 (0.70%) Confluence
5 4 (0.56%) Camunda
6 2 (0.28%) Apache Solr
6 2 (0.28%) FactoryTalk
6 2 (0.28%) nginx
6 2 (0.28%) WinCC
7 1 (0.14%) Anypoint
7 1 (0.14%) Apache
7 1 (0.14%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.14%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.14%) CMS
Applications
1 45 (6.28%) Microsoft Office
2 41 (5.73%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (0.84%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.42%) Simulink
5 2 (0.28%) AutoCAD
5 2 (0.28%) Revit
5 2 (0.28%) Trello
6 1 (0.14%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.14%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.14%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 8 (1.12%) SAP Business One
2 5 (0.70%) SAP WM
2 5 (0.70%) Unit4 Business World
3 2 (0.28%) NetSuite
3 2 (0.28%) Oracle Assets
3 2 (0.28%) Oracle General Ledger
3 2 (0.28%) Oracle Payables
3 2 (0.28%) Oracle Receivables
3 2 (0.28%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.14%) Dynamics CRM
4 1 (0.14%) Primavera
4 1 (0.14%) Shopify
4 1 (0.14%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 114 (15.92%) Azure
2 80 (11.17%) Microsoft 365
3 74 (10.34%) AWS
4 51 (7.12%) Entra ID
5 44 (6.15%) Power Platform
6 38 (5.31%) GCP
7 31 (4.33%) SaaS
8 14 (1.96%) OneDrive
8 14 (1.96%) Serverless
9 12 (1.68%) Power Automate
10 11 (1.54%) Microsoft Purview
11 8 (1.12%) Microsoft Copilot
12 7 (0.98%) AWS Lambda
12 7 (0.98%) Azure Monitor
12 7 (0.98%) Cloud Computing
12 7 (0.98%) Dynamics 365
12 7 (0.98%) PaaS
13 6 (0.84%) Adobe Analytics
13 6 (0.84%) Figma
13 6 (0.84%) IaaS
Communications & Networking
1 31 (4.33%) Firewall
2 18 (2.51%) DNS
3 16 (2.23%) DHCP
4 14 (1.96%) VoIP
5 12 (1.68%) TCP/IP
5 12 (1.68%) Unified Communications
6 11 (1.54%) WAN
6 11 (1.54%) Wireless
7 10 (1.40%) Telepresence
7 10 (1.40%) WebEx
8 9 (1.26%) VPN
9 8 (1.12%) LAN
10 7 (0.98%) Wi-Fi
11 6 (0.84%) Broadband
11 6 (0.84%) VLAN
12 5 (0.70%) Ethernet
12 5 (0.70%) Structured Cabling
13 4 (0.56%) Internet
13 4 (0.56%) SD-WAN
14 3 (0.42%) ATM
Database & Business Intelligence
1 37 (5.17%) Power BI
2 24 (3.35%) SQL Server
3 13 (1.82%) NoSQL
3 13 (1.82%) Tableau
4 11 (1.54%) MySQL
5 10 (1.40%) MongoDB
6 9 (1.26%) PostgreSQL
7 8 (1.12%) Crystal Reports
8 7 (0.98%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 6 (0.84%) Amazon Redshift
9 6 (0.84%) Oracle Reports
10 5 (0.70%) Azure SQL Database
10 5 (0.70%) Data Warehouse
10 5 (0.70%) DynamoDB
10 5 (0.70%) Elasticsearch
11 4 (0.56%) BigQuery
11 4 (0.56%) Looker
11 4 (0.56%) Relational Database
12 3 (0.42%) Big Data
13 2 (0.28%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 20 (2.79%) Git
2 12 (1.68%) GitLab
3 8 (1.12%) JIRA
4 7 (0.98%) Bitbucket
4 7 (0.98%) Jenkins
5 5 (0.70%) SonarQube
5 5 (0.70%) Sonatype Nexus
6 4 (0.56%) LabVIEW
7 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.14%) TeamCity
General
1 317 (44.27%) Social Skills
2 173 (24.16%) Analytical Skills
3 142 (19.83%) Finance
4 49 (6.84%) Automotive
5 42 (5.87%) Legal
6 34 (4.75%) Organisational Skills
7 27 (3.77%) Public Sector
8 25 (3.49%) Retail
9 22 (3.07%) Manufacturing
10 19 (2.65%) Electronics
10 19 (2.65%) Law
10 19 (2.65%) Presentation Skills
10 19 (2.65%) Telecoms
11 16 (2.23%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 15 (2.09%) Banking
12 15 (2.09%) Marketing
13 14 (1.96%) Advertising
14 13 (1.82%) Pharmaceutical
15 11 (1.54%) Influencing Skills
15 11 (1.54%) Police
Job Titles
1 87 (12.15%) Analyst
2 69 (9.64%) IT Support
3 68 (9.50%) Senior
4 58 (8.10%) Support Engineer
5 51 (7.12%) Lead
6 45 (6.28%) Developer
7 27 (3.77%) Business Analyst
7 27 (3.77%) Systems Engineer
8 25 (3.49%) Team Leader
9 24 (3.35%) Architect
9 24 (3.35%) Trainee
10 22 (3.07%) IT Engineer
10 22 (3.07%) IT Support Engineer
11 21 (2.93%) Solutions Architect
11 21 (2.93%) Support Analyst
12 20 (2.79%) Trainee Analyst
12 20 (2.79%) Trainee Business Analyst
13 19 (2.65%) Support Team Leader
13 19 (2.65%) Technical Engineer
13 19 (2.65%) Technical Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (3.21%) React
2 16 (2.23%) HTML
3 12 (1.68%) RESTful
4 11 (1.54%) .NET
4 11 (1.54%) CSS
5 9 (1.26%) Node.js
5 9 (1.26%) REST
5 9 (1.26%) Spring
6 8 (1.12%) Hibernate
6 8 (1.12%) Oracle Fusion
6 8 (1.12%) Spring Boot
7 7 (0.98%) Laravel
7 7 (0.98%) Vue
8 6 (0.84%) AngularJS
9 5 (0.70%) Django
9 5 (0.70%) JSON
9 5 (0.70%) Software Packaging
9 5 (0.70%) XML
10 4 (0.56%) ASP.NET
10 4 (0.56%) RabbitMQ
Miscellaneous
1 183 (25.56%) Driving Licence
2 55 (7.68%) Onboarding
3 32 (4.47%) Self-Motivation
4 21 (2.93%) Analytical Mindset
5 20 (2.79%) EPoS
6 17 (2.37%) Enterprise Software
7 15 (2.09%) Cloud Native
7 15 (2.09%) Management Information System
8 13 (1.82%) Distributed Systems
9 12 (1.68%) CCTV
10 11 (1.54%) Video Conferencing
11 10 (1.40%) IoT
12 8 (1.12%) Product Ownership
12 8 (1.12%) Virtual Team
13 7 (0.98%) Data Protection Act
13 7 (0.98%) NHS
13 7 (0.98%) SCADA
14 6 (0.84%) Legacy Systems
14 6 (0.84%) Life Science
14 6 (0.84%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 85 (11.87%) Windows
2 30 (4.19%) Windows Server
3 21 (2.93%) Linux
4 10 (1.40%) Windows 10
5 5 (0.70%) Android
6 4 (0.56%) Mac OS
6 4 (0.56%) Windows 7
6 4 (0.56%) Windows 8
7 3 (0.42%) Apple iOS
8 2 (0.28%) CentOS
8 2 (0.28%) Unix
9 1 (0.14%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.14%) Solaris
9 1 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.14%) Windows Server 2008
9 1 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 116 (16.20%) Continuous Improvement
2 99 (13.83%) Agile
3 97 (13.55%) Decision-Making
4 79 (11.03%) Customer Service
5 70 (9.78%) Mentoring
6 69 (9.64%) Project Management
7 53 (7.40%) DevOps
8 52 (7.26%) Stakeholder Management
9 51 (7.12%) ITIL
10 50 (6.98%) Cybersecurity
11 47 (6.56%) CRM
12 46 (6.42%) AI
12 46 (6.42%) Analytics
13 42 (5.87%) Coaching
13 42 (5.87%) Service Delivery
14 41 (5.73%) Business Intelligence
15 40 (5.59%) Business Strategy
15 40 (5.59%) CI/CD
16 39 (5.45%) Change Management
16 39 (5.45%) Collaborative Culture
Programming Languages
1 79 (11.03%) SQL
2 37 (5.17%) Python
3 22 (3.07%) Java
4 21 (2.93%) JavaScript
5 15 (2.09%) PowerShell
6 12 (1.68%) TypeScript
7 11 (1.54%) PHP
8 10 (1.40%) C#
8 10 (1.40%) MATLAB
9 7 (0.98%) Go
10 6 (0.84%) Bash
11 5 (0.70%) Elixir
11 5 (0.70%) Ruby
12 4 (0.56%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 3 (0.42%) Kotlin
13 3 (0.42%) Ladder Logic
14 2 (0.28%) Bicep
14 2 (0.28%) R
14 2 (0.28%) Scala
14 2 (0.28%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 148 (20.67%) Degree
2 33 (4.61%) BPSS Clearance
3 25 (3.49%) DBS Check
4 23 (3.21%) Master's Degree
5 17 (2.37%) Security Cleared
6 13 (1.82%) SC Cleared
7 11 (1.54%) Azure Certification
8 9 (1.26%) Computer Science Degree
9 8 (1.12%) A+ Certification
9 8 (1.12%) HNC
9 8 (1.12%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 7 (0.98%) ACCA
10 7 (0.98%) CIMA
10 7 (0.98%) Microsoft Certification
10 7 (0.98%) NVQ Level 4
10 7 (0.98%) PMI Certification
11 6 (0.84%) PMP
12 5 (0.70%) CIPD
13 4 (0.56%) HND
13 4 (0.56%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 27 (3.77%) QA
2 24 (3.35%) GDPR
3 20 (2.79%) Data Quality
4 11 (1.54%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 9 (1.26%) SLA
6 8 (1.12%) Accessibility
6 8 (1.12%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (0.84%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 5 (0.70%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 5 (0.70%) GLBA
8 5 (0.70%) PMO
9 2 (0.28%) Actionable Recommendations
9 2 (0.28%) COBIT
9 2 (0.28%) Disclosure Scotland
9 2 (0.28%) ITGC
10 1 (0.14%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.14%) ISO 14001
10 1 (0.14%) ISO 9001
10 1 (0.14%) NIST
10 1 (0.14%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 69 (9.64%) Active Directory
2 33 (4.61%) Docker
3 23 (3.21%) Hyper-V
4 6 (0.84%) VMware Infrastructure
5 3 (0.42%) Firmware
5 3 (0.42%) Virtual Desktop
5 3 (0.42%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (0.42%) VMware Workstation
6 2 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.14%) Dovecot
7 1 (0.14%) HDFS
7 1 (0.14%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 42 (5.87%) BMC PATROL
2 31 (4.33%) Microsoft Intune
3 27 (3.77%) Kubernetes
4 22 (3.07%) Terraform
5 10 (1.40%) Cisco CUCM
6 8 (1.12%) Ansible
7 7 (0.98%) SCCM
7 7 (0.98%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (0.70%) Grafana
8 5 (0.70%) Prometheus
9 4 (0.56%) Autotask
10 3 (0.42%) cPanel
10 3 (0.42%) Plesk
11 2 (0.28%) AssetCenter
11 2 (0.28%) Jamf Pro
11 2 (0.28%) Rancher
12 1 (0.14%) Argo
12 1 (0.14%) FortiGate
12 1 (0.14%) Podman
12 1 (0.14%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 137 (19.13%) Microsoft
2 26 (3.63%) ServiceNow
3 25 (3.49%) Workday
4 23 (3.21%) Oracle
5 21 (2.93%) SAP
6 18 (2.51%) Cisco
7 13 (1.82%) Google
8 12 (1.68%) VMware
9 10 (1.40%) Siemens
10 7 (0.98%) ESET
10 7 (0.98%) HubSpot
11 6 (0.84%) Adobe
11 6 (0.84%) iManage
11 6 (0.84%) Qualtrics
12 5 (0.70%) BiZZdesign
12 5 (0.70%) Facebook
12 5 (0.70%) New Relic
12 5 (0.70%) SnapLogic
12 5 (0.70%) Splunk
13 4 (0.56%) EXASOL