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 17 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 12 7 5
Rank change year-on-year -5 -2 +7
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 981 997 1,067
As % of all permanent jobs in the North West 7.71% 19.39% 13.81%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.60% 21.72% 17.72%
Number of salaries quoted 718 488 411
10th Percentile £26,561 £26,250 £26,750
25th Percentile £31,657 £32,500 £31,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £48,202 £45,000
Median % change year-on-year -6.64% +7.11% -5.26%
75th Percentile £60,000 £57,500 £60,000
90th Percentile £75,000 £67,500 £78,500
England median annual salary £47,000 £45,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year +4.44% -14.29% -4.55%

All Process & 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 9,253 4,591 6,020
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North West 72.74% 89.30% 77.91%
Number of salaries quoted 6,948 2,186 3,447
10th Percentile £30,000 £27,750 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £35,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £50,000 £50,055
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% -0.11% -8.99%
75th Percentile £75,000 £65,000 £65,000
90th Percentile £90,000 £80,000 £78,750
England median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £57,500
% change year-on-year +9.09% -4.35% -7.26%

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 17 September 2026.

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 17 September 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
Manchester -7 548 £47,750 +7.30% 707
Merseyside -4 156 £42,500 -19.81% 92
Cheshire -10 151 £42,500 -19.81% 140
Lancashire +4 83 £42,500 -10.53% 119
Cumbria -5 33 £32,500 -9.35% 15
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 81 (8.26%) SharePoint
2 53 (5.40%) Microsoft Exchange
3 12 (1.22%) IIS
4 5 (0.51%) Apache Spark
5 3 (0.31%) Apache Airflow
5 3 (0.31%) Oracle Workflow
6 2 (0.20%) Apache
6 2 (0.20%) CMS
6 2 (0.20%) Exchange Server 2013
6 2 (0.20%) nginx
7 1 (0.10%) ArcGIS
7 1 (0.10%) Confluence
7 1 (0.10%) Jupyter
7 1 (0.10%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.10%) SharePoint Server
7 1 (0.10%) Sitecore CMS
7 1 (0.10%) Umbraco
7 1 (0.10%) WebLogic
7 1 (0.10%) WebSphere
7 1 (0.10%) WordPress
Applications
1 55 (5.61%) Microsoft Office
2 53 (5.40%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.63%) MS Visio
4 6 (0.61%) Spreadsheet
5 5 (0.51%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.51%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.20%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.20%) Windchill
7 1 (0.10%) Acrobat
7 1 (0.10%) Revit
7 1 (0.10%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 17 (1.73%) SAP S/4HANA
2 10 (1.02%) Dynamics CRM
3 7 (0.71%) SAP ERP
4 4 (0.41%) Magento
4 4 (0.41%) NEC Housing
4 4 (0.41%) NetSuite
4 4 (0.41%) Oracle EBS
4 4 (0.41%) SAP PP
5 3 (0.31%) Dynamics AX
5 3 (0.31%) Oracle Cash Management
5 3 (0.31%) Oracle Payables
5 3 (0.31%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
5 3 (0.31%) Payment Gateway
5 3 (0.31%) Salesforce CRM
6 2 (0.20%) Oracle ERP
6 2 (0.20%) Remedy ITSM
7 1 (0.10%) Dynamics NAV
7 1 (0.10%) Odoo
7 1 (0.10%) Oracle Applications
7 1 (0.10%) SAP ECC
Cloud Services
1 194 (19.78%) Azure
2 160 (16.31%) Microsoft 365
3 112 (11.42%) AWS
4 110 (11.21%) Power Platform
5 49 (4.99%) PowerApps
6 40 (4.08%) SaaS
7 39 (3.98%) Entra ID
8 38 (3.87%) GCP
9 35 (3.57%) GitHub
9 35 (3.57%) Power Automate
10 32 (3.26%) Microsoft Copilot
11 31 (3.16%) Azure DevOps
11 31 (3.16%) OneDrive
12 27 (2.75%) Dynamics 365
13 20 (2.04%) Serverless
14 19 (1.94%) Microsoft Purview
15 12 (1.22%) Boomi
15 12 (1.22%) Copilot Studio
15 12 (1.22%) GitHub Actions
15 12 (1.22%) Google Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 64 (6.52%) DNS
2 56 (5.71%) DHCP
3 55 (5.61%) Firewall
4 42 (4.28%) VPN
5 39 (3.98%) TCP/IP
6 31 (3.16%) Wireless
7 26 (2.65%) VLAN
8 23 (2.34%) VoIP
9 22 (2.24%) Wi-Fi
10 21 (2.14%) Network Security
11 17 (1.73%) LAN
12 14 (1.43%) WAN
13 12 (1.22%) Broadband
14 11 (1.12%) Unified Communications
15 9 (0.92%) SD-WAN
16 8 (0.82%) BGP
17 7 (0.71%) OSPF
17 7 (0.71%) SNMP
18 6 (0.61%) SAN
18 6 (0.61%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 69 (7.03%) Power BI
2 53 (5.40%) SQL Server
3 26 (2.65%) SQL Server Reporting Services
4 25 (2.55%) MySQL
5 21 (2.14%) Data Warehouse
6 12 (1.22%) BigQuery
7 11 (1.12%) NoSQL
8 10 (1.02%) Big Data
8 10 (1.02%) Looker
9 9 (0.92%) Power Query
10 8 (0.82%) Amazon Redshift
10 8 (0.82%) MongoDB
10 8 (0.82%) PostgreSQL
10 8 (0.82%) Redis
10 8 (0.82%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 7 (0.71%) Electronic Patient Records
12 6 (0.61%) MariaDB
12 6 (0.61%) Relational Database
13 5 (0.51%) Oracle BI Publisher
13 5 (0.51%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 39 (3.98%) Git
2 34 (3.47%) JIRA
3 13 (1.33%) Jenkins
4 8 (0.82%) GitLab
5 7 (0.71%) Bitbucket
6 6 (0.61%) Cypress.io
7 5 (0.51%) Cucumber
8 4 (0.41%) Claude Code
8 4 (0.41%) Robot Framework
9 3 (0.31%) Visual Studio Code
10 2 (0.20%) Selenium
10 2 (0.20%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 1 (0.10%) Artifactory
11 1 (0.10%) gulp
11 1 (0.10%) Maven
11 1 (0.10%) Oracle Forms
11 1 (0.10%) Rational DOORS
11 1 (0.10%) Rational Rhapsody
11 1 (0.10%) Vagrant
11 1 (0.10%) webpack
General
1 419 (42.71%) Social Skills
2 302 (30.78%) Analytical Skills
3 160 (16.31%) Finance
4 91 (9.28%) Law
5 73 (7.44%) Manufacturing
5 73 (7.44%) Organisational Skills
6 68 (6.93%) Legal
7 51 (5.20%) Telecoms
8 50 (5.10%) Retail
9 38 (3.87%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 38 (3.87%) Marketing
10 26 (2.65%) Military
10 26 (2.65%) Public Sector
11 18 (1.83%) Banking
12 17 (1.73%) Aerospace
13 13 (1.33%) Billing
14 12 (1.22%) Documentation Skills
14 12 (1.22%) Electronics
15 10 (1.02%) Automotive
15 10 (1.02%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 136 (13.86%) Analyst
2 135 (13.76%) Senior
3 122 (12.44%) Developer
4 64 (6.52%) IT Support
5 54 (5.50%) Support Engineer
6 48 (4.89%) Lead
7 46 (4.69%) Senior Developer
8 45 (4.59%) Support Analyst
9 44 (4.49%) Consultant
10 43 (4.38%) Software Engineer
11 34 (3.47%) Administrator
11 34 (3.47%) Support Technician
12 28 (2.85%) IT Engineer
13 27 (2.75%) Junior
14 26 (2.65%) Applications Support
14 26 (2.65%) IT Technician
15 24 (2.45%) IT Support Engineer
16 22 (2.24%) Architect
16 22 (2.24%) Data Engineer
16 22 (2.24%) IT Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 53 (5.40%) .NET
2 47 (4.79%) React
3 46 (4.69%) HTML
4 42 (4.28%) REST
5 27 (2.75%) Terraform
6 24 (2.45%) Middleware
7 23 (2.34%) AngularJS
7 23 (2.34%) CSS
8 21 (2.14%) Spring
8 21 (2.14%) Vue
9 20 (2.04%) XML
10 19 (1.94%) Spring Boot
11 17 (1.73%) SOAP
12 16 (1.63%) EDI
13 15 (1.53%) JSON
14 13 (1.33%) Node.js
15 12 (1.22%) Web Services
16 11 (1.12%) Next.js
17 10 (1.02%) Laravel
17 10 (1.02%) Microsoft Graph
Miscellaneous
1 66 (6.73%) Driving Licence
2 62 (6.32%) Onboarding
3 41 (4.18%) Self-Motivation
4 37 (3.77%) Cloud Native
5 36 (3.67%) Product Ownership
6 33 (3.36%) Management Information System
7 21 (2.14%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
8 20 (2.04%) Distributed Systems
9 16 (1.63%) IoT
9 16 (1.63%) NHS
9 16 (1.63%) Security Posture
10 15 (1.53%) Enterprise Software
11 14 (1.43%) Replication
12 12 (1.22%) Mobile App
13 11 (1.12%) FMCG
13 11 (1.12%) Low-Code
14 10 (1.02%) Data Centre
15 9 (0.92%) AI Agents
15 9 (0.92%) Enterprise Cloud
16 8 (0.82%) Fibre Optics
Operating Systems
1 135 (13.76%) Windows
2 61 (6.22%) Windows Server
3 40 (4.08%) Linux
4 22 (2.24%) Windows 10
5 19 (1.94%) Apple iOS
6 9 (0.92%) Android
6 9 (0.92%) Mac OS
7 7 (0.71%) Windows Server 2016
8 6 (0.61%) Unix
8 6 (0.61%) Windows Server 2019
9 3 (0.31%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 2 (0.20%) Solaris
10 2 (0.20%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.10%) Embedded Linux
11 1 (0.10%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 273 (27.83%) Continuous Improvement
2 200 (20.39%) Customer Service
3 141 (14.37%) Mentoring
4 140 (14.27%) AI
5 134 (13.66%) Agile
6 128 (13.05%) Stakeholder Management
7 113 (11.52%) Decision-Making
8 105 (10.70%) CI/CD
9 97 (9.89%) CRM
10 93 (9.48%) Software Engineering
11 92 (9.38%) ERP
12 90 (9.17%) DevOps
13 87 (8.87%) Analytics
14 86 (8.77%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 85 (8.66%) Collaborative Working
16 83 (8.46%) Roadmaps
17 82 (8.36%) Project Delivery
18 65 (6.63%) User Acceptance Testing
19 63 (6.42%) User Experience
20 62 (6.32%) Business Intelligence
Programming Languages
1 180 (18.35%) SQL
2 124 (12.64%) Python
3 72 (7.34%) JavaScript
4 67 (6.83%) C#
5 52 (5.30%) Java
6 45 (4.59%) PowerShell
7 27 (2.75%) TypeScript
8 22 (2.24%) Bash
9 20 (2.04%) PHP
10 17 (1.73%) C++
11 13 (1.33%) Shell Script
12 11 (1.12%) T-SQL
13 9 (0.92%) C
14 8 (0.82%) Ruby
15 7 (0.71%) Go
16 6 (0.61%) Bicep
16 6 (0.61%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 6 (0.61%) R
17 5 (0.51%) Apex Code
17 5 (0.51%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 131 (13.35%) Degree
2 58 (5.91%) Security Cleared
3 35 (3.57%) SC Cleared
4 29 (2.96%) HNC
5 27 (2.75%) DBS Check
6 23 (2.34%) DV Cleared
7 22 (2.24%) Microsoft Certification
8 18 (1.83%) Computer Science Degree
9 14 (1.43%) BPSS Clearance
9 14 (1.43%) CCNP
9 14 (1.43%) Cisco Certification
10 13 (1.33%) Azure Certification
11 11 (1.12%) HND
12 9 (0.92%) Master's Degree
13 8 (0.82%) ACCA
13 8 (0.82%) ITIL Certification
13 8 (0.82%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
14 7 (0.71%) CIMA
14 7 (0.71%) Postgraduate
15 6 (0.61%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 53 (5.40%) Data Quality
2 43 (4.38%) Accessibility
3 40 (4.08%) QA
4 35 (3.57%) GDPR
5 14 (1.43%) SLA
6 13 (1.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 12 (1.22%) TickIT
8 9 (0.92%) NIST
9 4 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 14443
9 4 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 7816
10 3 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials
10 3 (0.31%) NEBOSH
10 3 (0.31%) PMO
11 2 (0.20%) Actionable Recommendations
11 2 (0.20%) WCAG
12 1 (0.10%) DICOM
12 1 (0.10%) GMP
12 1 (0.10%) Good Clinical Practice
12 1 (0.10%) GxP
12 1 (0.10%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 102 (10.40%) Active Directory
2 49 (4.99%) Docker
3 31 (3.16%) VMware Infrastructure
4 19 (1.94%) Hyper-V
5 8 (0.82%) Virtual Machines
6 4 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
6 4 (0.41%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (0.31%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 38 (3.87%) Kubernetes
2 30 (3.06%) Microsoft Intune
3 14 (1.43%) Grafana
4 11 (1.12%) FortiGate
4 11 (1.12%) Prometheus
4 11 (1.12%) Single Sign-On
5 10 (1.02%) Ansible
6 5 (0.51%) Argo
7 4 (0.41%) Microsoft Clustering
8 2 (0.20%) Nagios
8 2 (0.20%) Nessus
8 2 (0.20%) Podman
9 1 (0.10%) Istio
9 1 (0.10%) linkerd
9 1 (0.10%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 1 (0.10%) Packer
9 1 (0.10%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.10%) SCCM
9 1 (0.10%) vCenter Server
9 1 (0.10%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 324 (33.03%) Microsoft
2 43 (4.38%) VMware
3 36 (3.67%) SAP
4 30 (3.06%) Google
5 23 (2.34%) Sage
6 19 (1.94%) Cisco
7 18 (1.83%) YouTube
8 17 (1.73%) ServiceNow
9 16 (1.63%) Salesforce
10 15 (1.53%) Civica
11 14 (1.43%) iManage
11 14 (1.43%) Oracle
12 13 (1.33%) Aruba
13 9 (0.92%) Adobe
13 9 (0.92%) HubSpot
13 9 (0.92%) Juniper
13 9 (0.92%) OpenAI
14 8 (0.82%) Aderant
14 8 (0.82%) Tanium
15 6 (0.61%) Sophos