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 4 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 7 5 8
Rank change year-on-year -2 +3 +14
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 721 983 549
As % of all permanent jobs in the North West 14.56% 15.74% 15.21%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 17.27% 18.39% 16.13%
Number of salaries quoted 537 411 385
10th Percentile £27,300 £30,750 £26,000
25th Percentile £32,500 £35,000 £32,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £48,000 £47,683 £48,000
Median % change year-on-year +0.66% -0.66% +1.05%
75th Percentile £53,000 £59,471 £65,000
90th Percentile £65,000 £77,500 £73,750
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 4,176 5,345 3,404
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North West 84.35% 85.60% 94.32%
Number of salaries quoted 2,405 2,716 2,581
10th Percentile £27,750 £32,114 £31,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £41,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £51,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% -6.36% +3.54%
75th Percentile £65,000 £65,000 £70,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £78,750 £84,000
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 4 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 4 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 -6 275 £45,000 -10.00% 237
Cheshire -11 155 £53,000 +32.50% 107
Merseyside +2 135 £48,720 +49.91% 76
Lancashire -9 104 £46,499 -9.31% 229
Cumbria +6 50 £45,000 +8.43% 22
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 37 (5.13%) SharePoint
2 21 (2.91%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (0.97%) WordPress
4 4 (0.55%) Camunda
4 4 (0.55%) Confluence
5 2 (0.28%) Apache Solr
5 2 (0.28%) FactoryTalk
5 2 (0.28%) nginx
5 2 (0.28%) WinCC
6 1 (0.14%) Anypoint
6 1 (0.14%) Apache
6 1 (0.14%) Apache Airflow
6 1 (0.14%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.14%) IIS
Applications
1 45 (6.24%) Microsoft Office
2 43 (5.96%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (0.83%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.28%) AutoCAD
4 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Project
4 2 (0.28%) MS Visio
4 2 (0.28%) Revit
4 2 (0.28%) Simulink
4 2 (0.28%) Trello
5 1 (0.14%) CANalyzer
5 1 (0.14%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 8 (1.11%) SAP Business One
2 7 (0.97%) SAP WM
3 6 (0.83%) Unit4 Business World
4 2 (0.28%) NetSuite
4 2 (0.28%) Oracle Assets
4 2 (0.28%) Oracle General Ledger
4 2 (0.28%) Oracle Payables
4 2 (0.28%) Oracle Receivables
5 1 (0.14%) Dynamics CRM
5 1 (0.14%) Primavera
5 1 (0.14%) SAP S/4HANA
5 1 (0.14%) Shopify
5 1 (0.14%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 114 (15.81%) Azure
2 82 (11.37%) AWS
3 72 (9.99%) Microsoft 365
4 47 (6.52%) Entra ID
5 43 (5.96%) Power Platform
6 42 (5.83%) GCP
7 29 (4.02%) SaaS
8 16 (2.22%) Serverless
9 13 (1.80%) OneDrive
10 11 (1.53%) Power Automate
11 10 (1.39%) Microsoft Purview
12 9 (1.25%) AWS Lambda
13 8 (1.11%) Microsoft Copilot
14 7 (0.97%) Cloud Computing
14 7 (0.97%) Dynamics 365
15 6 (0.83%) Adobe Analytics
15 6 (0.83%) Azure Monitor
15 6 (0.83%) Figma
15 6 (0.83%) Snowflake
16 5 (0.69%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 30 (4.16%) Firewall
2 15 (2.08%) DNS
3 14 (1.94%) DHCP
4 13 (1.80%) VoIP
5 11 (1.53%) TCP/IP
6 10 (1.39%) WAN
7 9 (1.25%) Unified Communications
7 9 (1.25%) Wireless
8 8 (1.11%) LAN
8 8 (1.11%) Telepresence
8 8 (1.11%) WebEx
9 7 (0.97%) Broadband
9 7 (0.97%) VPN
9 7 (0.97%) Wi-Fi
10 4 (0.55%) Ethernet
10 4 (0.55%) Internet
10 4 (0.55%) Structured Cabling
11 3 (0.42%) ATM
11 3 (0.42%) SD-WAN
11 3 (0.42%) SSH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 37 (5.13%) Power BI
2 24 (3.33%) SQL Server
3 14 (1.94%) Tableau
4 13 (1.80%) NoSQL
5 10 (1.39%) MongoDB
6 9 (1.25%) MySQL
6 9 (1.25%) PostgreSQL
7 8 (1.11%) Crystal Reports
8 7 (0.97%) Data Warehouse
8 7 (0.97%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 6 (0.83%) Amazon Redshift
9 6 (0.83%) DynamoDB
9 6 (0.83%) Oracle Reports
10 4 (0.55%) Azure SQL Database
10 4 (0.55%) Big Data
10 4 (0.55%) BigQuery
10 4 (0.55%) Elasticsearch
10 4 (0.55%) Looker
10 4 (0.55%) Relational Database
11 2 (0.28%) Data Mart
Development Applications
1 20 (2.77%) Git
2 10 (1.39%) GitLab
3 7 (0.97%) Jenkins
3 7 (0.97%) JIRA
4 6 (0.83%) Bitbucket
5 5 (0.69%) SonarQube
5 5 (0.69%) Sonatype Nexus
6 4 (0.55%) LabVIEW
7 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.14%) CANoe
7 1 (0.14%) TeamCity
General
1 321 (44.52%) Social Skills
2 178 (24.69%) Analytical Skills
3 147 (20.39%) Finance
4 50 (6.93%) Automotive
5 41 (5.69%) Legal
6 32 (4.44%) Organisational Skills
7 26 (3.61%) Manufacturing
8 25 (3.47%) Public Sector
9 24 (3.33%) Retail
10 20 (2.77%) Electronics
11 19 (2.64%) Law
11 19 (2.64%) Presentation Skills
12 17 (2.36%) Banking
12 17 (2.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 17 (2.36%) Telecoms
13 15 (2.08%) Marketing
13 15 (2.08%) Pharmaceutical
14 13 (1.80%) Advertising
14 13 (1.80%) Games
14 13 (1.80%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 90 (12.48%) Analyst
2 70 (9.71%) Senior
3 63 (8.74%) IT Support
4 52 (7.21%) Support Engineer
5 51 (7.07%) Lead
6 47 (6.52%) Developer
7 28 (3.88%) Business Analyst
8 26 (3.61%) Architect
9 25 (3.47%) Team Leader
9 25 (3.47%) Trainee
10 24 (3.33%) Support Analyst
10 24 (3.33%) Systems Engineer
11 22 (3.05%) Solutions Architect
12 20 (2.77%) Technical Engineer
12 20 (2.77%) Technical Support
12 20 (2.77%) Technical Support Engineer
12 20 (2.77%) Trainee Analyst
12 20 (2.77%) Trainee Business Analyst
13 19 (2.64%) Support Team Leader
13 19 (2.64%) Systems Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.61%) React
2 17 (2.36%) HTML
3 12 (1.66%) .NET
3 12 (1.66%) CSS
3 12 (1.66%) RESTful
4 10 (1.39%) Node.js
4 10 (1.39%) Spring
5 9 (1.25%) Hibernate
5 9 (1.25%) REST
5 9 (1.25%) Spring Boot
6 8 (1.11%) Oracle Fusion
7 7 (0.97%) Vue
8 6 (0.83%) AngularJS
8 6 (0.83%) Laravel
9 5 (0.69%) .NET Core
9 5 (0.69%) Django
9 5 (0.69%) JSON
9 5 (0.69%) RabbitMQ
9 5 (0.69%) Software Packaging
9 5 (0.69%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 180 (24.97%) Driving Licence
2 52 (7.21%) Onboarding
3 33 (4.58%) Self-Motivation
4 21 (2.91%) EPoS
5 19 (2.64%) Analytical Mindset
6 17 (2.36%) Management Information System
7 16 (2.22%) Cloud Native
7 16 (2.22%) Enterprise Software
8 14 (1.94%) Distributed Systems
9 10 (1.39%) CCTV
9 10 (1.39%) Video Conferencing
10 9 (1.25%) IoT
10 9 (1.25%) Product Ownership
11 8 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
11 8 (1.11%) Virtual Team
12 7 (0.97%) e-Learning
12 7 (0.97%) NHS
12 7 (0.97%) SCADA
13 6 (0.83%) Home Automation
13 6 (0.83%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 81 (11.23%) Windows
2 29 (4.02%) Windows Server
3 21 (2.91%) Linux
4 10 (1.39%) Windows 10
5 5 (0.69%) Android
6 4 (0.55%) Windows 7
6 4 (0.55%) Windows 8
7 3 (0.42%) Mac OS
7 3 (0.42%) Unix
8 2 (0.28%) CentOS
9 1 (0.14%) Apple iOS
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
1 125 (17.34%) Continuous Improvement
2 103 (14.29%) Agile
3 98 (13.59%) Decision-Making
4 82 (11.37%) Customer Service
5 72 (9.99%) Project Management
6 69 (9.57%) Mentoring
7 54 (7.49%) DevOps
8 50 (6.93%) ITIL
8 50 (6.93%) Stakeholder Management
9 49 (6.80%) CRM
9 49 (6.80%) Cybersecurity
10 47 (6.52%) Analytics
11 45 (6.24%) AI
12 43 (5.96%) Business Strategy
13 42 (5.83%) Business Intelligence
13 42 (5.83%) Change Management
14 41 (5.69%) CI/CD
14 41 (5.69%) Service Delivery
15 39 (5.41%) Coaching
16 38 (5.27%) Process Improvement
Programming Languages
1 80 (11.10%) SQL
2 39 (5.41%) Python
3 25 (3.47%) Java
4 22 (3.05%) JavaScript
5 14 (1.94%) TypeScript
6 13 (1.80%) PowerShell
7 12 (1.66%) C#
8 10 (1.39%) PHP
9 9 (1.25%) MATLAB
10 6 (0.83%) Bash
10 6 (0.83%) Go
11 5 (0.69%) Elixir
11 5 (0.69%) Ruby
12 4 (0.55%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 3 (0.42%) C
13 3 (0.42%) Kotlin
13 3 (0.42%) Ladder Logic
14 2 (0.28%) Bicep
14 2 (0.28%) C++
14 2 (0.28%) R
Qualifications
1 152 (21.08%) Degree
2 32 (4.44%) BPSS Clearance
3 27 (3.74%) DBS Check
3 27 (3.74%) Master's Degree
4 19 (2.64%) Security Cleared
5 15 (2.08%) SC Cleared
6 13 (1.80%) Computer Science Degree
7 11 (1.53%) Azure Certification
8 10 (1.39%) PMI Certification
9 9 (1.25%) PMP
10 8 (1.11%) A+ Certification
10 8 (1.11%) HNC
11 7 (0.97%) ACCA
11 7 (0.97%) CIMA
11 7 (0.97%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 7 (0.97%) Microsoft Certification
11 7 (0.97%) NVQ Level 4
12 6 (0.83%) TOGAF Certification
13 5 (0.69%) CIPD
14 4 (0.55%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 28 (3.88%) QA
2 26 (3.61%) GDPR
3 20 (2.77%) Data Quality
4 12 (1.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 9 (1.25%) SLA
6 8 (1.11%) Accessibility
7 6 (0.83%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (0.83%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 5 (0.69%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 5 (0.69%) GLBA
8 5 (0.69%) 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 63 (8.74%) Active Directory
2 36 (4.99%) Docker
3 24 (3.33%) Hyper-V
4 7 (0.97%) VMware Infrastructure
5 3 (0.42%) VMware Workstation
6 2 (0.28%) Firmware
6 2 (0.28%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.28%) Virtual Machines
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 (5.83%) BMC PATROL
2 30 (4.16%) Kubernetes
3 28 (3.88%) Microsoft Intune
4 22 (3.05%) Terraform
5 8 (1.11%) Cisco CUCM
6 7 (0.97%) Ansible
7 6 (0.83%) SCCM
7 6 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (0.69%) Grafana
8 5 (0.69%) Prometheus
9 4 (0.55%) 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
1 133 (18.45%) Microsoft
2 24 (3.33%) SAP
2 24 (3.33%) ServiceNow
2 24 (3.33%) Workday
3 21 (2.91%) Oracle
4 19 (2.64%) Cisco
5 17 (2.36%) Google
6 13 (1.80%) VMware
7 10 (1.39%) Siemens
8 8 (1.11%) ESET
9 7 (0.97%) HubSpot
10 6 (0.83%) Adobe
10 6 (0.83%) iManage
10 6 (0.83%) Qualtrics
11 5 (0.69%) Facebook
11 5 (0.69%) SnapLogic
12 4 (0.55%) EXASOL
12 4 (0.55%) New Relic
12 4 (0.55%) Splunk
12 4 (0.55%) Ubiquiti