Problem-Solving Job Trends in the South East

Problem Solving
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the South East requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 7 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 12 4 4
Rank change year-on-year -8 0 +6
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 1,146 1,287 2,790
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 7.78% 16.82% 17.02%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.70% 18.68% 20.16%
Number of salaries quoted 863 685 1,762
10th Percentile £26,540 £28,100 £25,750
25th Percentile £31,250 £32,500 £32,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £46,000 £50,000 £45,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.00% +11.11% -14.29%
75th Percentile £62,500 £67,500 £62,375
90th Percentile £80,000 £83,750 £72,500
England median annual salary £47,500 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.52% +5.00% -9.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
South East

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 South East.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 10,710 6,891 13,838
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the South East 72.73% 90.05% 84.43%
Number of salaries quoted 6,945 3,406 9,889
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,250 £27,500
25th Percentile £39,000 £37,000 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £54,500 £55,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -0.91% +10.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £70,000 £68,750 £65,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £83,750 £77,500
England median annual salary £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +9.09% -12.00%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the South East

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in the South East

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in the South East

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the South East over the 6 months to 7 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in the South East

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the South East region over the 6 months to 7 May 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
Thames Valley -9 438 £47,500 -9.52% 239
Hampshire -8 248 £40,000 -20.00% 166
Berkshire -3 219 £47,500 -20.83% 114
Surrey -13 183 £40,000 -23.81% 79
Buckinghamshire -12 136 £50,000 -1.90% 72
Kent -13 117 £29,000 -8.66% 70
East Sussex -2 97 £61,500 +43.02% 17
Oxfordshire -2 83 £34,000 -32.00% 56
West Sussex -4 52 £57,500 +23.66% 31
Isle of Wight -9 4 £42,000 -23.64%
Middlesex +1 3 £41,250 -32.65% 14
Sussex -16 1 £30,000 +5.26% 5
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 30 (2.62%) SharePoint
2 29 (2.53%) Microsoft Exchange
3 16 (1.40%) CMS
4 10 (0.87%) IIS
5 7 (0.61%) Confluence
6 5 (0.44%) WordPress
7 4 (0.35%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.26%) Anypoint
8 3 (0.26%) Apache
8 3 (0.26%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.26%) govService
9 2 (0.17%) Gentran
9 2 (0.17%) SAS
10 1 (0.087%) ArcGIS
10 1 (0.087%) nginx
10 1 (0.087%) OpenEdge
10 1 (0.087%) Tomcat
Applications
1 89 (7.77%) Microsoft Excel
2 76 (6.63%) Microsoft Office
3 11 (0.96%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.79%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.61%) Spreadsheet
6 6 (0.52%) Photoshop
7 5 (0.44%) Adobe Illustrator
8 3 (0.26%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 3 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
9 1 (0.087%) Acrobat
9 1 (0.087%) AutoCAD
Business Applications
1 12 (1.05%) NetSuite
2 10 (0.87%) Dynamics CRM
3 9 (0.79%) SAP CO
4 4 (0.35%) Dynamics NAV
4 4 (0.35%) Magento
5 3 (0.26%) Salesforce CRM
6 2 (0.17%) Dynamics AX
6 2 (0.17%) IBM Planning Analytics
6 2 (0.17%) Infor SunSystems
6 2 (0.17%) Q-Pulse
6 2 (0.17%) Sage 200
7 1 (0.087%) Elite 3E
7 1 (0.087%) HFM
7 1 (0.087%) PeopleSoft HRMS
7 1 (0.087%) Raiser’s Edge
7 1 (0.087%) Sage X3
7 1 (0.087%) SAP GRC
7 1 (0.087%) SAP S/4HANA
7 1 (0.087%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 242 (21.12%) Azure
2 118 (10.30%) Microsoft 365
3 94 (8.20%) AWS
4 87 (7.59%) Power Platform
5 56 (4.89%) SaaS
6 49 (4.28%) Azure DevOps
7 34 (2.97%) GCP
8 30 (2.62%) IaaS
8 30 (2.62%) PaaS
9 27 (2.36%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 20 (1.75%) Dynamics 365
10 20 (1.75%) Entra ID
11 19 (1.66%) Google Workspace
12 18 (1.57%) Mimecast
13 17 (1.48%) Azure Data Factory
13 17 (1.48%) Azure Logic Apps
14 15 (1.31%) Datadog
14 15 (1.31%) OpenShift
15 14 (1.22%) GitHub
16 12 (1.05%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 65 (5.67%) Firewall
2 56 (4.89%) DNS
3 30 (2.62%) DHCP
4 27 (2.36%) TCP/IP
5 24 (2.09%) VPN
6 21 (1.83%) Broadband
7 20 (1.75%) Wireless
8 18 (1.57%) WAN
9 16 (1.40%) LAN
10 13 (1.13%) VoIP
11 11 (0.96%) HTTP
12 9 (0.79%) Intranet
13 8 (0.70%) SAN
14 7 (0.61%) Remote Desktop
15 6 (0.52%) PuTTY
15 6 (0.52%) SSH
15 6 (0.52%) VLAN
15 6 (0.52%) Wi-Fi
16 4 (0.35%) SSL
17 3 (0.26%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 67 (5.85%) Power BI
2 60 (5.24%) SQL Server
3 25 (2.18%) Relational Database
4 24 (2.09%) Data Warehouse
5 18 (1.57%) PostgreSQL
6 17 (1.48%) OLTP
7 14 (1.22%) Power Query
8 13 (1.13%) NoSQL
8 13 (1.13%) Tableau
9 12 (1.05%) MySQL
10 8 (0.70%) Data Lake
11 7 (0.61%) Looker
11 7 (0.61%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 6 (0.52%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 5 (0.44%) Big Data
13 5 (0.44%) Data Mining
13 5 (0.44%) Hadoop
14 4 (0.35%) PowerPivot
15 3 (0.26%) Azure SQL Database
15 3 (0.26%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 51 (4.45%) Git
2 37 (3.23%) JIRA
3 28 (2.44%) GitLab
4 19 (1.66%) Rational DOORS
5 8 (0.70%) Selenium
6 6 (0.52%) Jenkins
7 4 (0.35%) Visual Studio
8 3 (0.26%) Android Studio
8 3 (0.26%) Cypress.io
8 3 (0.26%) Postman
8 3 (0.26%) Robot Framework
9 2 (0.17%) Appium
9 2 (0.17%) JMeter
9 2 (0.17%) LabVIEW
9 2 (0.17%) REST Assured
9 2 (0.17%) Snyk
10 1 (0.087%) Artifactory
10 1 (0.087%) CMake
10 1 (0.087%) JUnit
10 1 (0.087%) Zephyr
General
1 534 (46.60%) Social Skills
2 333 (29.06%) Analytical Skills
3 189 (16.49%) Finance
4 69 (6.02%) Organisational Skills
5 62 (5.41%) Marketing
6 59 (5.15%) Manufacturing
7 54 (4.71%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 48 (4.19%) Telecoms
9 45 (3.93%) Retail
10 42 (3.66%) Electronics
11 29 (2.53%) Public Sector
12 26 (2.27%) Law
12 26 (2.27%) Legal
13 21 (1.83%) Aerospace
13 21 (1.83%) Documentation Skills
14 15 (1.31%) Presentation Skills
15 14 (1.22%) Pharmaceutical
16 13 (1.13%) Automotive
17 9 (0.79%) Influencing Skills
17 9 (0.79%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 171 (14.92%) Analyst
2 133 (11.61%) Senior
3 132 (11.52%) IT Support
4 122 (10.65%) Support Engineer
5 111 (9.69%) Developer
6 73 (6.37%) Support Analyst
7 65 (5.67%) IT Engineer
8 56 (4.89%) Technical Support
9 49 (4.28%) Systems Engineer
10 46 (4.01%) 2nd Line Support
10 46 (4.01%) IT Support Engineer
10 46 (4.01%) Lead
11 42 (3.66%) Architect
12 41 (3.58%) Technical Engineer
12 41 (3.58%) Technical Support Engineer
13 37 (3.23%) Support Technician
14 36 (3.14%) IT Technician
14 36 (3.14%) Software Engineer
15 33 (2.88%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 32 (2.79%) IT Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 55 (4.80%) .NET
2 50 (4.36%) HTML
3 45 (3.93%) SOAP
4 37 (3.23%) REST
5 31 (2.71%) XML
6 27 (2.36%) CSS
6 27 (2.36%) JSON
7 25 (2.18%) Middleware
8 21 (1.83%) React
9 16 (1.40%) OAuth
10 15 (1.31%) Laravel
10 15 (1.31%) RabbitMQ
11 13 (1.13%) ARM Templates
12 11 (0.96%) CSS3
12 11 (0.96%) HTML5
12 11 (0.96%) RESTful
13 10 (0.87%) jQuery
13 10 (0.87%) Lightning Web Components
13 10 (0.87%) Visualforce
14 9 (0.79%) SAP CO-PA
Miscellaneous
1 71 (6.20%) Onboarding
2 62 (5.41%) Self-Motivation
3 61 (5.32%) Driving Licence
4 43 (3.75%) Management Information System
5 38 (3.32%) Product Ownership
6 31 (2.71%) Distributed Systems
7 30 (2.62%) Cloud Native
8 28 (2.44%) Analytical Mindset
9 19 (1.66%) Low-Code
10 18 (1.57%) Social Media
11 16 (1.40%) Legacy Systems
12 12 (1.05%) Life Science
13 11 (0.96%) Hybrid Cloud
13 11 (0.96%) NHS
13 11 (0.96%) Video Editing
14 10 (0.87%) Algorithms
14 10 (0.87%) Client/Server
14 10 (0.87%) Enterprise Software
14 10 (0.87%) Security Operations Centre
15 9 (0.79%) Cyber Defence
Operating Systems
1 163 (14.22%) Windows
2 92 (8.03%) Linux
3 54 (4.71%) Windows Server
4 20 (1.75%) Mac OS
5 19 (1.66%) Android
6 18 (1.57%) CentOS
7 16 (1.40%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 10 (0.87%) Ubuntu
9 9 (0.79%) VMS
10 7 (0.61%) Windows Server 2012
10 7 (0.61%) Windows Server 2016
10 7 (0.61%) Windows Server 2019
11 6 (0.52%) Apple iOS
12 5 (0.44%) Windows 10
13 3 (0.26%) Debian
13 3 (0.26%) Unix
14 1 (0.087%) Embedded Linux
14 1 (0.087%) FreeBSD
14 1 (0.087%) OpenBSD
14 1 (0.087%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 239 (20.86%) Continuous Improvement
2 197 (17.19%) Customer Service
3 163 (14.22%) Agile
4 136 (11.87%) DevOps
5 128 (11.17%) CI/CD
6 119 (10.38%) Analytics
7 112 (9.77%) Decision-Making
8 106 (9.25%) Computer Science
9 101 (8.81%) Business Intelligence
10 92 (8.03%) Project Management
11 89 (7.77%) Software Engineering
12 85 (7.42%) AI
13 84 (7.33%) CRM
14 79 (6.89%) Data Modelling
15 72 (6.28%) Project Delivery
16 70 (6.11%) Cybersecurity
16 70 (6.11%) Mentoring
17 69 (6.02%) Stakeholder Management
18 68 (5.93%) ERP
19 67 (5.85%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 194 (16.93%) Python
2 177 (15.45%) SQL
3 70 (6.11%) JavaScript
4 69 (6.02%) C#
5 68 (5.93%) PowerShell
6 51 (4.45%) Java
7 30 (2.62%) PHP
8 26 (2.27%) Bash
8 26 (2.27%) C++
9 23 (2.01%) C
10 20 (1.75%) PL/SQL
11 19 (1.66%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 15 (1.31%) TypeScript
13 12 (1.05%) Perl
14 11 (0.96%) Bicep
15 10 (0.87%) Apex Code
16 9 (0.79%) Rust
17 7 (0.61%) R
17 7 (0.61%) Scala
18 6 (0.52%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 237 (20.68%) Degree
2 75 (6.54%) Security Cleared
3 52 (4.54%) Computer Science Degree
4 51 (4.45%) DBS Check
5 43 (3.75%) ACCA
5 43 (3.75%) SC Cleared
6 38 (3.32%) CIMA
6 38 (3.32%) Microsoft Certification
7 33 (2.88%) BPSS Clearance
8 26 (2.27%) A+ Certification
9 25 (2.18%) HNC
10 21 (1.83%) Chartered Engineer
11 18 (1.57%) DV Cleared
11 18 (1.57%) Microsoft Certified Professional
12 14 (1.22%) Master's Degree
13 12 (1.05%) PMI Certification
14 10 (0.87%) HND
14 10 (0.87%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
15 9 (0.79%) PMP
16 8 (0.70%) City & Guilds
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 71 (6.20%) QA
2 66 (5.76%) Data Quality
3 44 (3.84%) GDPR
4 33 (2.88%) SLA
5 22 (1.92%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 15 (1.31%) PCI DSS
7 13 (1.13%) Accessibility
8 12 (1.05%) NIST
9 8 (0.70%) SOC 2
10 6 (0.52%) ISO 9001
11 5 (0.44%) Actionable Recommendations
12 4 (0.35%) ISO 26262
12 4 (0.35%) ITGC
13 2 (0.17%) GRC
13 2 (0.17%) IFRS
14 1 (0.087%) Cyber Essentials
14 1 (0.087%) Def Stans
14 1 (0.087%) PMO
System Software
1 100 (8.73%) Active Directory
2 51 (4.45%) Docker
3 33 (2.88%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (2.27%) Hyper-V
5 10 (0.87%) KVM
6 5 (0.44%) Virtual Desktop
6 5 (0.44%) XenApp
7 4 (0.35%) Firmware
7 4 (0.35%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.26%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 3 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.17%) vSphere
10 1 (0.087%) Oracle RAC
10 1 (0.087%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 57 (4.97%) Terraform
2 53 (4.62%) Kubernetes
3 30 (2.62%) Ansible
4 21 (1.83%) Microsoft Intune
5 16 (1.40%) Grafana
6 15 (1.31%) SCCM
7 13 (1.13%) Prometheus
8 9 (0.79%) Nagios
9 7 (0.61%) ZABBIX
10 6 (0.52%) vCenter Server
11 4 (0.35%) Functional Safety
11 4 (0.35%) Puppet
12 3 (0.26%) Graylog
12 3 (0.26%) Nessus
13 2 (0.17%) Docker Swarm
13 2 (0.17%) Podman
14 1 (0.087%) CASB
14 1 (0.087%) Dell DRAC
14 1 (0.087%) Failover Clustering
14 1 (0.087%) Proxmox
Vendors
1 307 (26.79%) Microsoft
2 40 (3.49%) Oracle
3 39 (3.40%) Databricks
4 37 (3.23%) VMware
5 34 (2.97%) Google
6 29 (2.53%) Salesforce
7 26 (2.27%) Veeam
8 24 (2.09%) Adobe
9 23 (2.01%) SAP
10 16 (1.40%) Red Hat
11 14 (1.22%) Splunk
12 13 (1.13%) HubSpot
12 13 (1.13%) Sage
13 12 (1.05%) Dynatrace
13 12 (1.05%) Instagram
14 11 (0.96%) Hootsuite
14 11 (0.96%) ServiceNow
14 11 (0.96%) Wrike
15 10 (0.87%) SolarWinds
16 9 (0.79%) MuleSoft