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

6 months to
28 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 17 6 9
Rank change year-on-year -11 +3 +12
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 712 864 545
As % of all permanent jobs in the North West 11.50% 16.54% 13.98%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.83% 18.35% 15.60%
Number of salaries quoted 523 414 364
10th Percentile £26,955 £30,900 £26,000
25th Percentile £31,500 £35,063 £33,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,683 £47,592 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +0.19% +0.19% -5.00%
75th Percentile £53,000 £59,736 £61,764
90th Percentile £64,328 £77,500 £72,500
England median annual salary £45,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -18.18% - -

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 5,150 4,709 3,494
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North West 83.21% 90.16% 89.61%
Number of salaries quoted 2,487 2,346 2,681
10th Percentile £28,000 £32,114 £31,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £41,227
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -5.45% -
75th Percentile £65,000 £66,250 £70,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £82,548
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 28 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 28 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 -17 274 £42,750 -14.50% 574
Merseyside +2 143 £48,720 +49.91% 131
Cheshire -10 143 £53,000 +32.50% 269
Lancashire -7 101 £45,497 -13.34% 180
Cumbria +6 49 £45,000 +9.76% 9
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 43 (6.04%) SharePoint
2 19 (2.67%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (0.98%) WordPress
4 5 (0.70%) Confluence
5 4 (0.56%) Camunda
6 3 (0.42%) Apache Spark
7 2 (0.28%) Apache Solr
7 2 (0.28%) FactoryTalk
7 2 (0.28%) nginx
7 2 (0.28%) WinCC
8 1 (0.14%) Anypoint
8 1 (0.14%) Apache
8 1 (0.14%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.14%) CMS
Applications
1 41 (5.76%) Microsoft Office
2 38 (5.34%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (0.84%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.42%) Simulink
5 2 (0.28%) AutoCAD
5 2 (0.28%) Revit
6 1 (0.14%) Siemens NX
6 1 (0.14%) Trello
Business Applications
1 8 (1.12%) SAP Business One
2 4 (0.56%) 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
3 2 (0.28%) SAP WM
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 (16.01%) Azure
2 77 (10.81%) Microsoft 365
3 70 (9.83%) AWS
4 52 (7.30%) Entra ID
5 46 (6.46%) Power Platform
6 38 (5.34%) GCP
7 33 (4.63%) SaaS
8 15 (2.11%) OneDrive
9 14 (1.97%) Microsoft Purview
10 13 (1.83%) Serverless
11 12 (1.69%) Power Automate
12 10 (1.40%) Azure Monitor
13 8 (1.12%) Microsoft Copilot
13 8 (1.12%) PaaS
14 7 (0.98%) Dynamics 365
14 7 (0.98%) IaaS
15 6 (0.84%) Adobe Analytics
15 6 (0.84%) AWS Lambda
15 6 (0.84%) Figma
15 6 (0.84%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 28 (3.93%) Firewall
2 19 (2.67%) DNS
3 17 (2.39%) DHCP
3 17 (2.39%) VoIP
4 16 (2.25%) Unified Communications
5 14 (1.97%) Telepresence
5 14 (1.97%) WebEx
6 12 (1.69%) TCP/IP
7 11 (1.54%) Wireless
8 10 (1.40%) VPN
9 9 (1.26%) WAN
10 8 (1.12%) VLAN
11 7 (0.98%) Wi-Fi
12 6 (0.84%) Broadband
12 6 (0.84%) Ethernet
12 6 (0.84%) LAN
13 5 (0.70%) Structured Cabling
14 4 (0.56%) SD-WAN
15 3 (0.42%) ATM
15 3 (0.42%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 36 (5.06%) Power BI
2 23 (3.23%) SQL Server
3 13 (1.83%) NoSQL
3 13 (1.83%) 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%) Big Data
10 5 (0.70%) Data Warehouse
10 5 (0.70%) Elasticsearch
10 5 (0.70%) Relational Database
11 4 (0.56%) BigQuery
11 4 (0.56%) DynamoDB
11 4 (0.56%) Looker
12 3 (0.42%) Hadoop
Development Applications
1 20 (2.81%) Git
2 12 (1.69%) GitLab
3 7 (0.98%) Bitbucket
3 7 (0.98%) Jenkins
3 7 (0.98%) JIRA
4 5 (0.70%) SonarQube
4 5 (0.70%) Sonatype Nexus
5 4 (0.56%) LabVIEW
6 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 1 (0.14%) TeamCity
General
1 310 (43.54%) Social Skills
2 171 (24.02%) Analytical Skills
3 150 (21.07%) Finance
4 49 (6.88%) Automotive
5 44 (6.18%) Legal
6 31 (4.35%) Organisational Skills
7 26 (3.65%) Public Sector
8 24 (3.37%) Retail
9 23 (3.23%) Telecoms
10 20 (2.81%) Manufacturing
11 19 (2.67%) Electronics
11 19 (2.67%) Law
11 19 (2.67%) Presentation Skills
12 17 (2.39%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 16 (2.25%) Banking
14 15 (2.11%) Marketing
15 14 (1.97%) Advertising
16 13 (1.83%) Pharmaceutical
17 11 (1.54%) French Language
17 11 (1.54%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 88 (12.36%) Analyst
2 67 (9.41%) IT Support
3 63 (8.85%) Senior
4 59 (8.29%) Support Engineer
5 49 (6.88%) Lead
6 44 (6.18%) Developer
7 31 (4.35%) Business Analyst
8 29 (4.07%) Trainee
9 26 (3.65%) Systems Engineer
10 25 (3.51%) Architect
10 25 (3.51%) Trainee Analyst
10 25 (3.51%) Trainee Business Analyst
11 23 (3.23%) Team Leader
12 21 (2.95%) IT Engineer
12 21 (2.95%) IT Support Engineer
12 21 (2.95%) Solutions Architect
13 20 (2.81%) Consultant
13 20 (2.81%) HR Advisor
13 20 (2.81%) Support Technician
14 18 (2.53%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (2.95%) React
2 16 (2.25%) HTML
3 12 (1.69%) RESTful
4 11 (1.54%) .NET
4 11 (1.54%) CSS
5 10 (1.40%) Spring
6 9 (1.26%) Node.js
6 9 (1.26%) REST
6 9 (1.26%) Spring Boot
7 8 (1.12%) Hibernate
7 8 (1.12%) Oracle Fusion
8 7 (0.98%) Laravel
8 7 (0.98%) Vue
9 6 (0.84%) AngularJS
10 5 (0.70%) Django
10 5 (0.70%) JSON
10 5 (0.70%) XML
11 4 (0.56%) ASP.NET
11 4 (0.56%) RabbitMQ
11 4 (0.56%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 181 (25.42%) Driving Licence
2 58 (8.15%) Onboarding
3 30 (4.21%) Self-Motivation
4 21 (2.95%) Analytical Mindset
5 20 (2.81%) Enterprise Software
5 20 (2.81%) EPoS
6 14 (1.97%) Management Information System
7 13 (1.83%) Cloud Native
7 13 (1.83%) Distributed Systems
8 12 (1.69%) CCTV
9 11 (1.54%) Video Conferencing
10 10 (1.40%) IoT
11 7 (0.98%) Legacy Systems
11 7 (0.98%) SCADA
11 7 (0.98%) Virtual Team
12 6 (0.84%) Data Protection Act
12 6 (0.84%) Home Automation
12 6 (0.84%) Life Science
12 6 (0.84%) NHS
12 6 (0.84%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 81 (11.38%) Windows
2 29 (4.07%) Windows Server
3 19 (2.67%) 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%) Unix
9 1 (0.14%) CentOS
9 1 (0.14%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.14%) Solaris
9 1 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 111 (15.59%) Continuous Improvement
2 98 (13.76%) Agile
2 98 (13.76%) Decision-Making
3 74 (10.39%) Customer Service
4 73 (10.25%) Project Management
5 70 (9.83%) Mentoring
6 55 (7.72%) AI
6 55 (7.72%) Stakeholder Management
7 54 (7.58%) DevOps
8 49 (6.88%) CRM
8 49 (6.88%) Cybersecurity
9 46 (6.46%) ITIL
10 45 (6.32%) Analytics
11 43 (6.04%) Change Management
12 41 (5.76%) Coaching
13 40 (5.62%) Business Intelligence
13 40 (5.62%) CI/CD
14 39 (5.48%) Collaborative Culture
15 38 (5.34%) Service Delivery
16 36 (5.06%) Process Improvement
Programming Languages
1 76 (10.67%) SQL
2 38 (5.34%) Python
3 25 (3.51%) Java
4 20 (2.81%) JavaScript
5 14 (1.97%) PowerShell
6 11 (1.54%) PHP
7 10 (1.40%) C#
7 10 (1.40%) MATLAB
7 10 (1.40%) TypeScript
8 7 (0.98%) Go
9 5 (0.70%) Elixir
9 5 (0.70%) Ruby
10 4 (0.56%) Bash
10 4 (0.56%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 4 (0.56%) Kotlin
10 4 (0.56%) Scala
11 3 (0.42%) Ladder Logic
12 2 (0.28%) Bicep
12 2 (0.28%) R
12 2 (0.28%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 148 (20.79%) Degree
2 32 (4.49%) BPSS Clearance
3 22 (3.09%) DBS Check
4 20 (2.81%) Master's Degree
5 17 (2.39%) Security Cleared
6 13 (1.83%) SC Cleared
7 10 (1.40%) Azure Certification
7 10 (1.40%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (1.12%) A+ Certification
8 8 (1.12%) HNC
8 8 (1.12%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 7 (0.98%) ACCA
9 7 (0.98%) CIMA
9 7 (0.98%) Microsoft Certification
9 7 (0.98%) NVQ Level 4
10 5 (0.70%) CIPD
11 4 (0.56%) HND
11 4 (0.56%) ITIL Certification
12 3 (0.42%) CCNA
12 3 (0.42%) Cisco Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 26 (3.65%) GDPR
1 26 (3.65%) QA
2 21 (2.95%) Data Quality
3 9 (1.26%) Cyber Essentials
3 9 (1.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 8 (1.12%) Accessibility
4 8 (1.12%) SLA
5 6 (0.84%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 5 (0.70%) California Consumer Privacy Act
6 5 (0.70%) GLBA
6 5 (0.70%) PMO
7 2 (0.28%) Actionable Recommendations
7 2 (0.28%) COBIT
7 2 (0.28%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.28%) ITGC
7 2 (0.28%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.14%) ISO 14001
8 1 (0.14%) ISO 9001
8 1 (0.14%) NIST
System Software
1 66 (9.27%) Active Directory
2 30 (4.21%) Docker
3 18 (2.53%) Hyper-V
4 5 (0.70%) 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%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 42 (5.90%) BMC PATROL
2 32 (4.49%) Microsoft Intune
3 25 (3.51%) Kubernetes
4 24 (3.37%) Terraform
5 14 (1.97%) Cisco CUCM
6 10 (1.40%) Single Sign-On
7 7 (0.98%) Ansible
7 7 (0.98%) SCCM
8 4 (0.56%) Autotask
8 4 (0.56%) Grafana
8 4 (0.56%) Prometheus
9 3 (0.42%) cPanel
9 3 (0.42%) Plesk
10 2 (0.28%) AssetCenter
10 2 (0.28%) Jamf Pro
10 2 (0.28%) Rancher
11 1 (0.14%) Argo
11 1 (0.14%) AWS Copilot
11 1 (0.14%) FortiGate
11 1 (0.14%) Podman
Vendors
1 129 (18.12%) Microsoft
2 29 (4.07%) ServiceNow
3 28 (3.93%) Oracle
3 28 (3.93%) Workday
4 20 (2.81%) Cisco
5 18 (2.53%) SAP
6 12 (1.69%) Google
7 11 (1.54%) VMware
8 10 (1.40%) Siemens
9 8 (1.12%) New Relic
9 8 (1.12%) Splunk
10 7 (0.98%) HubSpot
11 6 (0.84%) Adobe
11 6 (0.84%) BiZZdesign
11 6 (0.84%) iManage
11 6 (0.84%) Qualtrics
12 5 (0.70%) ESET
12 5 (0.70%) Facebook
12 5 (0.70%) SnapLogic
13 4 (0.56%) EXASOL