Problem-Solving Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Problem Solving
UK > UK excluding London

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

6 months to
6 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 6 4 3
Rank change year-on-year -2 -1 +5
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 8,048 6,283 7,929
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 9.29% 18.11% 15.29%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.16% 20.76% 19.27%
Number of salaries quoted 5,474 3,491 3,042
10th Percentile £27,000 £25,684 £25,750
25th Percentile £31,250 £29,000 £33,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £43,000 £39,000 £49,000
Median % change year-on-year +10.26% -20.41% +3.10%
75th Percentile £58,750 £55,550 £63,750
90th Percentile £72,500 £68,750 £80,000
UK median annual salary £46,500 £45,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year +3.33% -14.29% -4.55%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

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 UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 61,144 30,266 41,140
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 70.55% 87.22% 79.33%
Number of salaries quoted 42,933 16,073 20,940
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,750 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £32,125 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £47,500 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year +15.79% -9.52% -2.78%
75th Percentile £70,000 £63,750 £67,500
90th Percentile £87,500 £80,000 £81,250
UK median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% -8.33% -

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 6 October 2026.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in the UK excluding London

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 6 October 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
North of England -7 2,035 £45,000 - 1,728
South East -2 1,892 £41,585 +2.68% 1,884
Midlands -6 1,452 £42,500 +11.84% 1,216
North West -2 1,049 £45,000 -9.07% 859
South West -2 979 £45,000 +22.45% 841
East of England -1 819 £42,750 +31.54% 838
West Midlands -6 817 £42,500 - 712
East Midlands -7 633 £42,000 +29.23% 503
Yorkshire -7 611 £42,500 +28.79% 611
North East +6 384 £50,000 +49.25% 273
Scotland +3 327 £37,750 +12.69% 556
Northern Ireland +8 324 £70,000 +17.65% 307
Wales -13 237 £42,500 -11.68% 206
Isle of Man 0 3 £35,000 - 11
Problem-Solving
UK

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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
1 476 (5.91%) SharePoint
2 364 (4.52%) Microsoft Exchange
3 66 (0.82%) Confluence
4 61 (0.76%) CMS
5 56 (0.70%) IIS
6 37 (0.46%) Apache
7 31 (0.39%) Apache Airflow
7 31 (0.39%) WordPress
8 28 (0.35%) Sitecore CMS
9 23 (0.29%) Apache Spark
10 14 (0.17%) Oracle Workflow
11 13 (0.16%) Jupyter
12 12 (0.15%) nginx
13 10 (0.12%) WebSphere
14 9 (0.11%) WebLogic
15 8 (0.099%) SAS
16 7 (0.087%) CICS
16 7 (0.087%) OpenEdge
17 4 (0.050%) Oracle SOA Suite
17 4 (0.050%) Tomcat
Applications
1 601 (7.47%) Microsoft Office
2 543 (6.75%) Microsoft Excel
3 86 (1.07%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 66 (0.82%) Spreadsheet
5 46 (0.57%) AutoCAD
6 43 (0.53%) MS Visio
7 40 (0.50%) Microsoft Project
8 37 (0.46%) Simulink
9 27 (0.34%) Revit
10 20 (0.25%) EPLAN
11 16 (0.20%) SOLIDWORKS
12 11 (0.14%) Navisworks
13 10 (0.12%) Adobe Creative Suite
13 10 (0.12%) OrCAD
14 8 (0.099%) Chatbot
15 7 (0.087%) Siemens NX
16 6 (0.075%) Adobe Illustrator
16 6 (0.075%) Lightworks
17 5 (0.062%) Adobe XD
17 5 (0.062%) Fusion 360
Business Applications
1 76 (0.94%) Dynamics CRM
2 64 (0.80%) NetSuite
3 51 (0.63%) SAP S/4HANA
4 33 (0.41%) Shopify
5 22 (0.27%) Oracle EBS
6 21 (0.26%) Workday HCM
7 19 (0.24%) Dynamics NAV
8 15 (0.19%) Oracle Payables
8 15 (0.19%) SAP Business One
9 14 (0.17%) Salesforce CRM
10 13 (0.16%) SAP ERP
11 12 (0.15%) IBM Planning Analytics
11 12 (0.15%) Magento
11 12 (0.15%) Oracle Cash Management
11 12 (0.15%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
12 11 (0.14%) Dynamics AX
12 11 (0.14%) Payment Gateway
13 10 (0.12%) JDE EnterpriseOne
13 10 (0.12%) Sage X3
14 9 (0.11%) Primavera
Cloud Services
1 1,405 (17.46%) Azure
2 1,290 (16.03%) Microsoft 365
3 698 (8.67%) AWS
4 618 (7.68%) Power Platform
5 450 (5.59%) Entra ID
6 294 (3.65%) SaaS
7 235 (2.92%) GCP
8 174 (2.16%) Azure DevOps
9 158 (1.96%) PowerApps
10 153 (1.90%) GitHub
11 148 (1.84%) Dynamics 365
12 146 (1.81%) Power Automate
13 126 (1.57%) OneDrive
14 114 (1.42%) Serverless
15 97 (1.21%) Microsoft Copilot
16 80 (0.99%) Google Workspace
17 71 (0.88%) Amazon S3
18 70 (0.87%) AWS CloudFormation
19 67 (0.83%) GitHub Actions
20 57 (0.71%) AWS Lambda
Communications & Networking
1 455 (5.65%) DNS
2 454 (5.64%) Firewall
3 375 (4.66%) DHCP
4 297 (3.69%) VPN
5 238 (2.96%) TCP/IP
6 218 (2.71%) Wi-Fi
7 201 (2.50%) WAN
8 196 (2.44%) LAN
9 180 (2.24%) Wireless
10 152 (1.89%) VLAN
11 129 (1.60%) Network Security
12 115 (1.43%) VoIP
13 64 (0.80%) Broadband
14 60 (0.75%) Internet
15 31 (0.39%) SSL
16 30 (0.37%) Remote Desktop
17 29 (0.36%) SAN
18 27 (0.34%) SD-WAN
19 26 (0.32%) Ethernet
19 26 (0.32%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 488 (6.06%) Power BI
2 337 (4.19%) SQL Server
3 137 (1.70%) MySQL
4 122 (1.52%) Relational Database
5 121 (1.50%) Amazon RDS
6 105 (1.30%) Data Warehouse
7 100 (1.24%) PostgreSQL
8 86 (1.07%) NoSQL
9 70 (0.87%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 67 (0.83%) Tableau
11 57 (0.71%) MongoDB
12 51 (0.63%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 50 (0.62%) Big Data
13 50 (0.62%) Data Lake
14 49 (0.61%) Power Query
15 47 (0.58%) Electronic Patient Records
16 46 (0.57%) Azure SQL Database
17 34 (0.42%) Metadata
17 34 (0.42%) Oracle Reports
18 27 (0.34%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 315 (3.91%) Git
2 247 (3.07%) JIRA
3 101 (1.25%) GitLab
4 91 (1.13%) Jenkins
5 40 (0.50%) Eclipse
6 35 (0.43%) Selenium
7 34 (0.42%) Subversion
8 32 (0.40%) Cucumber
9 30 (0.37%) Claude Code
10 26 (0.32%) JUnit
11 25 (0.31%) Oracle Forms
12 23 (0.29%) Bitbucket
12 23 (0.29%) Postman
13 22 (0.27%) Cypress.io
14 20 (0.25%) LabVIEW
15 19 (0.24%) Rational DOORS
16 15 (0.19%) Burp Suite
17 14 (0.17%) Team Foundation Server
18 13 (0.16%) Visual Studio
19 12 (0.15%) Metasploit
General
1 3,962 (49.23%) Social Skills
2 2,206 (27.41%) Analytical Skills
3 1,290 (16.03%) Finance
4 969 (12.04%) Manufacturing
5 657 (8.16%) Organisational Skills
6 430 (5.34%) Retail
7 427 (5.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 386 (4.80%) Public Sector
9 357 (4.44%) Electronics
10 332 (4.13%) Law
11 331 (4.11%) Legal
12 326 (4.05%) Aerospace
13 295 (3.67%) Marketing
14 206 (2.56%) Telecoms
15 156 (1.94%) Influencing Skills
16 150 (1.86%) Automotive
17 139 (1.73%) Documentation Skills
18 119 (1.48%) Presentation Skills
19 115 (1.43%) Banking
20 110 (1.37%) Military
Job Titles
1 1,071 (13.31%) Analyst
2 838 (10.41%) Senior
3 771 (9.58%) IT Support
4 720 (8.95%) Developer
5 605 (7.52%) Support Engineer
6 417 (5.18%) Lead
7 409 (5.08%) Support Analyst
8 396 (4.92%) IT Engineer
9 362 (4.50%) Consultant
10 305 (3.79%) IT Support Engineer
11 293 (3.64%) Technical Support
12 276 (3.43%) Support Technician
13 249 (3.09%) Technical Engineer
14 243 (3.02%) IT Technician
15 228 (2.83%) Architect
16 226 (2.81%) Technical Support Engineer
17 222 (2.76%) Systems Engineer
18 221 (2.75%) Software Engineer
19 211 (2.62%) Senior Developer
20 195 (2.42%) IT Support Technician
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 375 (4.66%) .NET
2 286 (3.55%) Terraform
3 221 (2.75%) React
4 198 (2.46%) REST
5 189 (2.35%) HTML
6 139 (1.73%) CSS
7 137 (1.70%) RESTful
8 98 (1.22%) Node.js
9 94 (1.17%) Web Services
10 93 (1.16%) SOAP
11 87 (1.08%) ASP.NET
12 80 (0.99%) Spring
13 77 (0.96%) Vue
13 77 (0.96%) XML
14 73 (0.91%) Middleware
14 73 (0.91%) Spring Boot
15 72 (0.89%) AngularJS
16 69 (0.86%) JSON
17 68 (0.84%) Kafka
18 52 (0.65%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 736 (9.15%) Driving Licence
2 568 (7.06%) Onboarding
3 424 (5.27%) Self-Motivation
4 370 (4.60%) Management Information System
5 213 (2.65%) Cloud Native
6 178 (2.21%) Product Ownership
7 169 (2.10%) Enterprise Software
8 151 (1.88%) Legacy Systems
9 143 (1.78%) Robotics
10 133 (1.65%) Data Centre
11 95 (1.18%) NHS
12 94 (1.17%) Analytical Mindset
13 88 (1.09%) Distributed Systems
14 84 (1.04%) Cyber Threat
14 84 (1.04%) Security Posture
15 83 (1.03%) IoT
16 79 (0.98%) CCTV
17 74 (0.92%) Social Media
17 74 (0.92%) Virtual Team
18 72 (0.89%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 1,232 (15.31%) Windows
2 539 (6.70%) Windows Server
3 448 (5.57%) Linux
4 128 (1.59%) Windows 10
5 102 (1.27%) Windows Server 2016
6 89 (1.11%) Apple iOS
7 87 (1.08%) Android
8 86 (1.07%) Mac OS
9 41 (0.51%) Unix
10 40 (0.50%) Windows Server 2019
11 24 (0.30%) Ubuntu
12 15 (0.19%) Embedded Linux
12 15 (0.19%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 15 (0.19%) VMS
13 13 (0.16%) Debian
14 9 (0.11%) FreeRTOS
15 7 (0.087%) Rocky
15 7 (0.087%) Windows Server 2012
16 6 (0.075%) CentOS
17 5 (0.062%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 2,203 (27.37%) Continuous Improvement
2 1,512 (18.79%) Customer Service
3 1,117 (13.88%) Agile
4 852 (10.59%) Decision-Making
5 844 (10.49%) Stakeholder Management
6 801 (9.95%) Mentoring
7 796 (9.89%) AI
8 748 (9.29%) CI/CD
9 692 (8.60%) Project Delivery
10 653 (8.11%) Collaborative Working
11 614 (7.63%) Cybersecurity
12 612 (7.60%) Analytics
13 604 (7.50%) DevOps
14 597 (7.42%) ERP
15 596 (7.41%) Software Engineering
16 572 (7.11%) ITIL
17 556 (6.91%) Project Management
18 533 (6.62%) Business Intelligence
19 505 (6.27%) CRM
20 502 (6.24%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 1,102 (13.69%) SQL
2 778 (9.67%) Python
3 452 (5.62%) C#
4 437 (5.43%) JavaScript
5 319 (3.96%) Java
6 302 (3.75%) PowerShell
7 207 (2.57%) C++
8 201 (2.50%) TypeScript
9 123 (1.53%) Bash
10 84 (1.04%) C
11 63 (0.78%) PHP
12 62 (0.77%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 58 (0.72%) T-SQL
14 54 (0.67%) Ruby
15 51 (0.63%) MATLAB
16 46 (0.57%) Shell Script
17 45 (0.56%) PL/SQL
18 41 (0.51%) Rust
19 40 (0.50%) Perl
20 34 (0.42%) Go
Qualifications
1 1,312 (16.30%) Degree
2 753 (9.36%) Security Cleared
3 527 (6.55%) SC Cleared
4 272 (3.38%) HNC
5 233 (2.90%) DBS Check
6 227 (2.82%) HND
7 213 (2.65%) Computer Science Degree
8 193 (2.40%) Microsoft Certification
9 185 (2.30%) DV Cleared
10 168 (2.09%) BPSS Clearance
11 139 (1.73%) Azure Certification
12 104 (1.29%) Chartered Engineer
13 91 (1.13%) Cisco Certification
14 85 (1.06%) NVQ Level 3
15 79 (0.98%) Master's Degree
16 74 (0.92%) A+ Certification
17 72 (0.89%) PMI Certification
18 61 (0.76%) City & Guilds
19 60 (0.75%) CISSP
20 57 (0.71%) ACCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 495 (6.15%) QA
2 302 (3.75%) Data Quality
3 235 (2.92%) GDPR
4 208 (2.58%) Accessibility
5 185 (2.30%) SLA
6 171 (2.12%) Cyber Essentials
7 137 (1.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 105 (1.30%) PCI DSS
9 74 (0.92%) NIST
10 51 (0.63%) ISO 9001
11 42 (0.52%) PMO
12 35 (0.43%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 23 (0.29%) DO-254
14 20 (0.25%) GMP
14 20 (0.25%) Good Clinical Practice
15 19 (0.24%) NCSC
16 16 (0.20%) Actionable Recommendations
16 16 (0.20%) GRC
17 13 (0.16%) GxP
17 13 (0.16%) WCAG
System Software
1 884 (10.98%) Active Directory
2 296 (3.68%) Hyper-V
3 271 (3.37%) Docker
4 213 (2.65%) VMware Infrastructure
5 86 (1.07%) Firmware
6 72 (0.89%) Terminal Server
7 45 (0.56%) Virtual Desktop
8 37 (0.46%) Virtual Machines
9 31 (0.39%) Embedded Firmware
10 25 (0.31%) vSphere
11 14 (0.17%) VMware ESXi
12 12 (0.15%) Virtual Servers
13 5 (0.062%) ClearTrust
13 5 (0.062%) Microsoft Virtual Server
13 5 (0.062%) Squid
14 4 (0.050%) KVM
15 3 (0.037%) Terminal Services
15 3 (0.037%) VMware Server
16 2 (0.025%) Samba
16 2 (0.025%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 278 (3.45%) Microsoft Intune
2 232 (2.88%) Kubernetes
3 107 (1.33%) Ansible
4 66 (0.82%) Grafana
5 51 (0.63%) SCCM
6 50 (0.62%) BMC PATROL
6 50 (0.62%) Prometheus
7 46 (0.57%) Single Sign-On
8 24 (0.30%) Jamf Pro
9 21 (0.26%) FortiGate
10 19 (0.24%) Functional Safety
11 15 (0.19%) Puppet
11 15 (0.19%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
12 12 (0.15%) Kibana
12 12 (0.15%) Nagios
12 12 (0.15%) Nmap
13 10 (0.12%) Failover Clustering
13 10 (0.12%) logstash
13 10 (0.12%) Proxmox
14 9 (0.11%) QRadar
Vendors
1 2,457 (30.53%) Microsoft
2 343 (4.26%) VMware
3 231 (2.87%) Google
3 231 (2.87%) SAP
4 210 (2.61%) Workday
5 179 (2.22%) Oracle
6 146 (1.81%) Veeam
7 143 (1.78%) Cisco
8 128 (1.59%) ServiceNow
9 123 (1.53%) Splunk
10 111 (1.38%) Salesforce
11 102 (1.27%) Sage
12 92 (1.14%) SolarWinds
13 80 (0.99%) Fortinet
13 80 (0.99%) Tanium
14 73 (0.91%) Brocade
14 73 (0.91%) Databricks
14 73 (0.91%) Nimble Storage
15 69 (0.86%) Siemens
16 66 (0.82%) Apple