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 25 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 3 4
Rank change year-on-year -7 +1 +4
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 1,189 1,188 2,622
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 9.40% 17.53% 17.65%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 12.46% 19.47% 20.71%
Number of salaries quoted 906 665 1,638
10th Percentile £26,500 £28,250 £25,750
25th Percentile £31,281 £35,000 £31,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £50,967 £45,000
Median % change year-on-year -11.71% +13.26% -14.29%
75th Percentile £61,000 £70,000 £62,500
90th Percentile £78,500 £83,750 £72,500
England median annual salary £46,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -16.36% +10.00% -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 9,541 6,102 12,662
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the South East 75.45% 90.04% 85.25%
Number of salaries quoted 6,052 3,239 9,309
10th Percentile £28,500 £30,500 £27,500
25th Percentile £36,250 £41,250 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £65,000 £71,250 £65,000
90th Percentile £82,500 £85,000 £77,750
England median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% +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 25 March 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 25 March 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 -4 442 £45,000 -18.18% 226
Hampshire -1 250 £38,500 -23.00% 132
Berkshire -3 219 £45,000 -30.23% 112
Surrey -10 194 £40,000 -23.81% 76
Buckinghamshire -9 150 £50,000 -13.04% 66
Kent -10 123 £30,000 -11.76% 43
East Sussex 0 91 £80,000 +60.00% 27
Oxfordshire -7 73 £34,000 -20.00% 50
West Sussex -1 58 £57,500 +35.29% 25
Middlesex -6 15 £47,500 -24.00% 10
Isle of Wight +5 12 £43,500 -20.91% 4
Sussex -17 1 £30,000 +5.26% 14
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 41 (3.45%) SharePoint
2 36 (3.03%) Microsoft Exchange
3 17 (1.43%) CMS
3 17 (1.43%) IIS
4 12 (1.01%) WordPress
5 8 (0.67%) Confluence
6 3 (0.25%) Anypoint
6 3 (0.25%) Apache Airflow
6 3 (0.25%) govService
6 3 (0.25%) SAS
7 2 (0.17%) Apache
7 2 (0.17%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.084%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.084%) ArcGIS
8 1 (0.084%) nginx
Applications
1 98 (8.24%) Microsoft Office
2 78 (6.56%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.35%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 11 (0.93%) Photoshop
5 10 (0.84%) Adobe Illustrator
6 8 (0.67%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 8 (0.67%) MS Visio
7 6 (0.50%) Spreadsheet
8 3 (0.25%) Adobe XD
8 3 (0.25%) InDesign
9 2 (0.17%) Adobe After Effects
9 2 (0.17%) Adobe Captivate
9 2 (0.17%) Adobe Premiere
9 2 (0.17%) Elementor
10 1 (0.084%) Acrobat
10 1 (0.084%) AutoCAD
10 1 (0.084%) OrCAD
Business Applications
1 9 (0.76%) SAP CO
2 8 (0.67%) Dynamics CRM
3 7 (0.59%) NetSuite
4 4 (0.34%) Dynamics NAV
4 4 (0.34%) SAP Hybris
5 3 (0.25%) Magento
5 3 (0.25%) Sage X3
5 3 (0.25%) Salesforce CRM
5 3 (0.25%) SAP S/4HANA
6 2 (0.17%) Dynamics AX
6 2 (0.17%) IBM Planning Analytics
6 2 (0.17%) Q-Pulse
6 2 (0.17%) Sage 200
7 1 (0.084%) Elite 3E
7 1 (0.084%) Infor SunSystems
7 1 (0.084%) PeopleSoft HRMS
7 1 (0.084%) Raiser’s Edge
7 1 (0.084%) SAP GRC
7 1 (0.084%) SAP HR
7 1 (0.084%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 236 (19.85%) Azure
2 147 (12.36%) Microsoft 365
3 87 (7.32%) AWS
4 86 (7.23%) Power Platform
5 66 (5.55%) Azure DevOps
6 61 (5.13%) SaaS
7 37 (3.11%) GCP
8 32 (2.69%) Entra ID
9 29 (2.44%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 26 (2.19%) PaaS
11 25 (2.10%) IaaS
12 20 (1.68%) Mimecast
13 19 (1.60%) Dynamics 365
13 19 (1.60%) Google Workspace
14 18 (1.51%) GitHub
15 17 (1.43%) Azure Logic Apps
16 16 (1.35%) Azure Data Factory
17 15 (1.26%) Figma
18 13 (1.09%) Datadog
18 13 (1.09%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 80 (6.73%) DNS
2 67 (5.63%) Firewall
3 47 (3.95%) DHCP
4 37 (3.11%) TCP/IP
5 35 (2.94%) VPN
6 24 (2.02%) Wireless
7 18 (1.51%) VLAN
8 17 (1.43%) Broadband
9 16 (1.35%) WAN
10 13 (1.09%) LAN
11 11 (0.93%) HTTP
11 11 (0.93%) Intranet
12 10 (0.84%) SAN
12 10 (0.84%) VoIP
13 8 (0.67%) Remote Desktop
14 7 (0.59%) Wi-Fi
15 6 (0.50%) PuTTY
15 6 (0.50%) SSH
16 3 (0.25%) Unified Communications
17 2 (0.17%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 66 (5.55%) Power BI
2 42 (3.53%) SQL Server
3 34 (2.86%) Relational Database
4 24 (2.02%) Data Warehouse
5 18 (1.51%) Power Query
6 15 (1.26%) OLTP
7 14 (1.18%) NoSQL
7 14 (1.18%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 11 (0.93%) Tableau
9 10 (0.84%) MySQL
10 8 (0.67%) Data Lake
10 8 (0.67%) PostgreSQL
10 8 (0.67%) PowerPivot
11 6 (0.50%) Hadoop
12 5 (0.42%) Big Data
12 5 (0.42%) Data Mining
13 4 (0.34%) Azure SQL Database
13 4 (0.34%) Metadata
14 3 (0.25%) Elasticsearch
14 3 (0.25%) SAP Data Services
Development Applications
1 53 (4.46%) Git
2 39 (3.28%) JIRA
3 24 (2.02%) GitLab
3 24 (2.02%) Selenium
4 15 (1.26%) Robot Framework
5 13 (1.09%) Rational DOORS
5 13 (1.09%) Snyk
6 8 (0.67%) Visual Studio
7 7 (0.59%) Jenkins
8 4 (0.34%) Cypress.io
8 4 (0.34%) Postman
9 3 (0.25%) Appium
9 3 (0.25%) REST Assured
9 3 (0.25%) WebDriver
10 2 (0.17%) JMeter
10 2 (0.17%) LabVIEW
10 2 (0.17%) TestRail
11 1 (0.084%) Browser DevTools
11 1 (0.084%) JUnit
11 1 (0.084%) Katalon Studio
General
1 601 (50.55%) Social Skills
2 342 (28.76%) Analytical Skills
3 189 (15.90%) Finance
4 75 (6.31%) Organisational Skills
5 72 (6.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 71 (5.97%) Marketing
6 71 (5.97%) Retail
7 62 (5.21%) Manufacturing
8 50 (4.21%) Telecoms
9 41 (3.45%) Electronics
10 36 (3.03%) Public Sector
11 34 (2.86%) Legal
12 32 (2.69%) Law
13 24 (2.02%) Documentation Skills
14 15 (1.26%) Presentation Skills
15 14 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
16 11 (0.93%) Pharmaceutical
17 10 (0.84%) Banking
18 9 (0.76%) Aerospace
19 8 (0.67%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 179 (15.05%) IT Support
2 172 (14.47%) Support Engineer
3 170 (14.30%) Analyst
4 128 (10.77%) Senior
5 109 (9.17%) Developer
6 86 (7.23%) Support Analyst
7 82 (6.90%) IT Engineer
8 67 (5.63%) IT Support Engineer
8 67 (5.63%) Technical Support
9 56 (4.71%) 2nd Line Support
10 50 (4.21%) Lead
11 48 (4.04%) Technical Engineer
11 48 (4.04%) Technical Support Engineer
12 44 (3.70%) IT Analyst
13 43 (3.62%) IT Support Analyst
14 39 (3.28%) Architect
15 38 (3.20%) Software Engineer
16 34 (2.86%) IT Technician
17 33 (2.78%) Support Technician
18 32 (2.69%) Project Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 57 (4.79%) .NET
2 49 (4.12%) HTML
3 32 (2.69%) SOAP
4 27 (2.27%) REST
5 26 (2.19%) React
6 25 (2.10%) CSS
7 22 (1.85%) XML
8 17 (1.43%) .NET Framework
8 17 (1.43%) JSON
9 16 (1.35%) ASP.NET
10 15 (1.26%) Middleware
11 14 (1.18%) Laravel
12 13 (1.09%) Lightning Web Components
13 12 (1.01%) ARM Templates
13 12 (1.01%) Visualforce
14 11 (0.93%) Entity Framework
14 11 (0.93%) OLE
15 10 (0.84%) OAuth
15 10 (0.84%) WinForms
16 9 (0.76%) SAP CO-PA
Miscellaneous
1 88 (7.40%) Onboarding
2 82 (6.90%) Driving Licence
3 65 (5.47%) Self-Motivation
4 38 (3.20%) Management Information System
5 34 (2.86%) Product Ownership
6 23 (1.93%) Distributed Systems
7 22 (1.85%) Analytical Mindset
7 22 (1.85%) Cloud Native
7 22 (1.85%) Social Media
8 20 (1.68%) Low-Code
9 13 (1.09%) Enterprise Software
9 13 (1.09%) Legacy Systems
10 11 (0.93%) Video Editing
11 10 (0.84%) Client/Server
11 10 (0.84%) Life Science
11 10 (0.84%) Security Operations Centre
11 10 (0.84%) Video Conferencing
12 9 (0.76%) IoT
12 9 (0.76%) NHS
13 7 (0.59%) Algorithms
Operating Systems
1 219 (18.42%) Windows
2 89 (7.49%) Linux
3 66 (5.55%) Windows Server
4 25 (2.10%) Mac OS
5 21 (1.77%) Windows 10
6 17 (1.43%) Android
7 14 (1.18%) CentOS
7 14 (1.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 10 (0.84%) Windows Server 2012
9 7 (0.59%) Apple iOS
9 7 (0.59%) VMS
9 7 (0.59%) Windows Server 2019
10 6 (0.50%) Ubuntu
11 5 (0.42%) Windows Server 2016
12 4 (0.34%) Unix
13 1 (0.084%) Debian
13 1 (0.084%) FreeBSD
13 1 (0.084%) OpenBSD
13 1 (0.084%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 243 (20.44%) Continuous Improvement
2 203 (17.07%) Customer Service
3 166 (13.96%) Agile
4 138 (11.61%) DevOps
5 115 (9.67%) Analytics
6 112 (9.42%) CI/CD
7 101 (8.49%) Decision-Making
8 100 (8.41%) Business Intelligence
9 94 (7.91%) Project Management
10 91 (7.65%) Computer Science
11 86 (7.23%) Mentoring
12 79 (6.64%) AI
13 74 (6.22%) Stakeholder Management
14 73 (6.14%) Cybersecurity
15 71 (5.97%) Software Engineering
16 69 (5.80%) Collaborative Culture
17 68 (5.72%) ITIL
18 67 (5.63%) CRM
19 65 (5.47%) Process Improvement
20 64 (5.38%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 188 (15.81%) Python
1 188 (15.81%) SQL
2 75 (6.31%) PowerShell
3 73 (6.14%) C#
4 71 (5.97%) JavaScript
5 45 (3.78%) Java
6 28 (2.35%) PHP
7 26 (2.19%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 22 (1.85%) Bash
8 22 (1.85%) C++
9 21 (1.77%) C
10 18 (1.51%) PL/SQL
11 17 (1.43%) TypeScript
12 13 (1.09%) Apex Code
13 12 (1.01%) Bicep
14 11 (0.93%) Perl
15 10 (0.84%) T-SQL
16 9 (0.76%) Kusto Query Language
16 9 (0.76%) Rust
17 8 (0.67%) R
Qualifications
1 248 (20.86%) Degree
2 79 (6.64%) Security Cleared
3 50 (4.21%) Computer Science Degree
4 48 (4.04%) ACCA
5 39 (3.28%) CIMA
5 39 (3.28%) SC Cleared
6 34 (2.86%) DBS Check
7 31 (2.61%) BPSS Clearance
8 30 (2.52%) Microsoft Certification
9 23 (1.93%) DV Cleared
10 21 (1.77%) HNC
10 21 (1.77%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 17 (1.43%) A+ Certification
12 15 (1.26%) Chartered Engineer
13 11 (0.93%) Master's Degree
14 9 (0.76%) HND
14 9 (0.76%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
15 8 (0.67%) City & Guilds
15 8 (0.67%) PMI Certification
16 7 (0.59%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 70 (5.89%) QA
2 56 (4.71%) Data Quality
3 49 (4.12%) GDPR
4 24 (2.02%) SLA
5 23 (1.93%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 18 (1.51%) Accessibility
7 12 (1.01%) PCI DSS
8 11 (0.93%) NIST
9 5 (0.42%) Actionable Recommendations
9 5 (0.42%) Cyber Essentials
9 5 (0.42%) SOC 2
10 4 (0.34%) ISO 9001
10 4 (0.34%) ITGC
11 2 (0.17%) GRC
12 1 (0.084%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 1 (0.084%) GAAP
12 1 (0.084%) IFRS
12 1 (0.084%) ISO 26262
12 1 (0.084%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 1 (0.084%) PMO
System Software
1 148 (12.45%) Active Directory
2 40 (3.36%) Docker
3 37 (3.11%) Hyper-V
4 36 (3.03%) VMware Infrastructure
5 10 (0.84%) KVM
6 6 (0.50%) VMware ESXi
7 5 (0.42%) Firmware
7 5 (0.42%) XenApp
8 3 (0.25%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.17%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.084%) Oracle RAC
10 1 (0.084%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.084%) Virtual Servers
10 1 (0.084%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 57 (4.79%) Terraform
2 39 (3.28%) Kubernetes
3 35 (2.94%) Microsoft Intune
4 33 (2.78%) Ansible
5 17 (1.43%) SCCM
6 15 (1.26%) Grafana
6 15 (1.26%) Prometheus
7 10 (0.84%) Nagios
7 10 (0.84%) vCenter Server
7 10 (0.84%) ZABBIX
8 2 (0.17%) Nessus
8 2 (0.17%) Netcool
8 2 (0.17%) Netcool/OMNIbus
8 2 (0.17%) Puppet
9 1 (0.084%) Control-M
9 1 (0.084%) Docker Swarm
9 1 (0.084%) FortiGate
9 1 (0.084%) Kibana
9 1 (0.084%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 1 (0.084%) Oracle RMAN
Vendors
1 321 (27.00%) Microsoft
2 46 (3.87%) VMware
3 42 (3.53%) Databricks
4 38 (3.20%) Google
5 36 (3.03%) Veeam
6 34 (2.86%) Adobe
6 34 (2.86%) SAP
7 31 (2.61%) Salesforce
8 30 (2.52%) Sage
9 29 (2.44%) Oracle
10 23 (1.93%) HubSpot
11 20 (1.68%) NEC
12 17 (1.43%) ServiceNow
13 14 (1.18%) Red Hat
14 13 (1.09%) Black Duck
14 13 (1.09%) Coverity
14 13 (1.09%) Dynatrace
15 12 (1.01%) SolarWinds
15 12 (1.01%) Xamarin
16 11 (0.93%) Splunk