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 20 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 3 6
Rank change year-on-year -7 +3 +6
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 5,052 5,926 8,075
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 10.34% 18.48% 16.03%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 13.50% 20.29% 18.45%
Number of salaries quoted 3,549 2,633 5,600
10th Percentile £26,000 £27,750 £25,750
25th Percentile £29,000 £35,750 £31,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £40,000 £50,000 £45,000
Median % change year-on-year -20.00% +11.11% -10.00%
75th Percentile £57,250 £67,500 £61,250
90th Percentile £71,500 £83,750 £72,500
UK median annual salary £45,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -18.18% +10.00% -13.04%

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 37,412 29,209 43,778
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 76.58% 91.09% 86.89%
Number of salaries quoted 22,115 13,299 33,409
10th Percentile £28,000 £31,250 £27,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £41,250 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -8.33%
75th Percentile £65,000 £70,000 £65,000
90th Percentile £81,250 £83,750 £78,750
UK 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 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 20 February 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 20 February 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 -16 1,363 £42,500 -10.53% 715
South East -3 1,281 £42,500 -19.05% 921
Midlands -15 874 £37,500 -27.63% 478
North West -15 736 £46,000 -8.00% 438
South West -4 588 £40,000 -26.82% 314
West Midlands -20 508 £42,500 -22.73% 301
Yorkshire -6 488 £37,500 -13.79% 205
East of England -5 430 £37,500 -26.42% 323
East Midlands 0 364 £35,000 - 176
Scotland -7 345 £33,500 -33.00% 146
North East -5 139 £45,000 -1.10% 84
Wales -1 118 £42,500 -25.72% 65
Northern Ireland -2 79 £40,500 -32.18% 39
Isle of Man -1 1 £62,500 +150.00% 3
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
1 311 (6.16%) Microsoft Exchange
2 232 (4.59%) SharePoint
3 51 (1.01%) Confluence
4 45 (0.89%) IIS
5 36 (0.71%) CMS
6 25 (0.49%) WordPress
7 23 (0.46%) Apache
8 19 (0.38%) Apache Spark
9 16 (0.32%) Apache Airflow
10 12 (0.24%) Exchange Server 2013
11 10 (0.20%) Exchange Server 2007
11 10 (0.20%) Exchange Server 2010
11 10 (0.20%) nginx
12 7 (0.14%) Drupal
13 6 (0.12%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 4 (0.079%) Moodle
14 4 (0.079%) SAS
14 4 (0.079%) Totara
14 4 (0.079%) WebSphere
14 4 (0.079%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 366 (7.24%) Microsoft Office
2 319 (6.31%) Microsoft Excel
3 63 (1.25%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 28 (0.55%) MS Visio
4 28 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
5 14 (0.28%) AutoCAD
5 14 (0.28%) Microsoft Project
6 12 (0.24%) Photoshop
7 9 (0.18%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 8 (0.16%) Adobe Illustrator
8 8 (0.16%) SOLIDWORKS
9 5 (0.099%) Adobe Premiere
10 4 (0.079%) CATIA
10 4 (0.079%) Fusion 360
10 4 (0.079%) Trello
11 3 (0.059%) Adobe XD
11 3 (0.059%) Elementor
11 3 (0.059%) InDesign
11 3 (0.059%) Oracle Smart View
11 3 (0.059%) Revit
Business Applications
1 70 (1.39%) SAP S/4HANA
2 45 (0.89%) Dynamics CRM
3 26 (0.51%) NetSuite
4 15 (0.30%) SAP CO
5 13 (0.26%) Oracle Payables
5 13 (0.26%) Sage X3
6 12 (0.24%) Dynamics NAV
7 11 (0.22%) Oracle Assets
7 11 (0.22%) Oracle Receivables
7 11 (0.22%) Shopify
8 10 (0.20%) iTrent
9 8 (0.16%) Oracle General Ledger
9 8 (0.16%) SAP Business One
10 7 (0.14%) Oracle EBS
10 7 (0.14%) Workday HCM
11 6 (0.12%) Markit EDM
11 6 (0.12%) Oracle ERP
11 6 (0.12%) Oracle Financials
11 6 (0.12%) SAP FI
11 6 (0.12%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 1,064 (21.06%) Azure
2 881 (17.44%) Microsoft 365
3 450 (8.91%) AWS
4 325 (6.43%) Power Platform
5 252 (4.99%) SaaS
6 240 (4.75%) Entra ID
7 145 (2.87%) Azure DevOps
8 136 (2.69%) GCP
9 99 (1.96%) GitHub
10 88 (1.74%) Serverless
11 83 (1.64%) Power Automate
12 67 (1.33%) Dynamics 365
13 62 (1.23%) Google Workspace
14 58 (1.15%) Azure Data Factory
15 55 (1.09%) AWS Lambda
16 54 (1.07%) Amazon S3
17 47 (0.93%) Azure Synapse Analytics
17 47 (0.93%) GitHub Actions
17 47 (0.93%) OneDrive
18 46 (0.91%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 399 (7.90%) DNS
2 344 (6.81%) DHCP
3 272 (5.38%) Firewall
4 161 (3.19%) VPN
5 153 (3.03%) TCP/IP
6 152 (3.01%) Wi-Fi
7 143 (2.83%) WAN
8 127 (2.51%) LAN
9 105 (2.08%) Broadband
10 94 (1.86%) VLAN
11 85 (1.68%) VoIP
12 74 (1.46%) Wireless
13 55 (1.09%) Remote Desktop
14 48 (0.95%) Network Security
15 45 (0.89%) Internet
16 39 (0.77%) SD-WAN
17 29 (0.57%) SAN
17 29 (0.57%) Unified Communications
18 24 (0.48%) Wireshark
19 23 (0.46%) Ethernet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 265 (5.25%) Power BI
2 196 (3.88%) SQL Server
3 133 (2.63%) Amazon RDS
4 82 (1.62%) Relational Database
5 78 (1.54%) PostgreSQL
6 68 (1.35%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 67 (1.33%) NoSQL
8 65 (1.29%) Data Warehouse
9 60 (1.19%) MySQL
10 44 (0.87%) Tableau
11 39 (0.77%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 38 (0.75%) Data Lake
13 35 (0.69%) Azure SQL Database
14 34 (0.67%) Amazon Redshift
15 33 (0.65%) Power Query
16 32 (0.63%) DynamoDB
17 31 (0.61%) MongoDB
18 28 (0.55%) Metadata
19 24 (0.48%) Elasticsearch
20 19 (0.38%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 186 (3.68%) Git
2 163 (3.23%) JIRA
3 56 (1.11%) GitLab
4 44 (0.87%) Jenkins
5 31 (0.61%) Selenium
6 16 (0.32%) LabVIEW
6 16 (0.32%) Visual Studio
7 15 (0.30%) Maven
7 15 (0.30%) Robot Framework
8 14 (0.28%) Snyk
9 12 (0.24%) Cucumber
9 12 (0.24%) JUnit
9 12 (0.24%) SonarQube
10 11 (0.22%) Cypress.io
10 11 (0.22%) Rational DOORS
11 10 (0.20%) Bitbucket
11 10 (0.20%) Burp Suite
11 10 (0.20%) Metasploit
12 8 (0.16%) TeamCity
13 7 (0.14%) Mockito
General
1 2,670 (52.85%) Social Skills
2 1,421 (28.13%) Analytical Skills
3 1,024 (20.27%) Finance
4 331 (6.55%) Organisational Skills
5 288 (5.70%) Manufacturing
6 276 (5.46%) Retail
7 231 (4.57%) Marketing
8 216 (4.28%) Public Sector
9 185 (3.66%) Legal
10 168 (3.33%) Law
11 161 (3.19%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 160 (3.17%) Telecoms
13 131 (2.59%) Electronics
14 120 (2.38%) Banking
15 110 (2.18%) Presentation Skills
16 83 (1.64%) Automotive
16 83 (1.64%) Games
17 82 (1.62%) Documentation Skills
18 55 (1.09%) Aerospace
19 49 (0.97%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 819 (16.21%) Analyst
2 725 (14.35%) IT Support
3 595 (11.78%) Support Engineer
4 564 (11.16%) Senior
5 374 (7.40%) Developer
6 327 (6.47%) IT Engineer
7 286 (5.66%) IT Support Engineer
8 283 (5.60%) Support Analyst
9 271 (5.36%) Lead
10 232 (4.59%) Technical Support
11 205 (4.06%) Business Analyst
12 180 (3.56%) 2nd Line Support
13 177 (3.50%) Support Technician
14 170 (3.37%) Systems Engineer
15 160 (3.17%) Technical Engineer
16 152 (3.01%) Technical Support Engineer
17 144 (2.85%) Consultant
18 143 (2.83%) Architect
19 141 (2.79%) IT Analyst
20 128 (2.53%) Trainee
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 186 (3.68%) .NET
2 161 (3.19%) React
3 158 (3.13%) HTML
4 120 (2.38%) CSS
5 85 (1.68%) REST
6 74 (1.46%) Node.js
7 57 (1.13%) RESTful
8 51 (1.01%) AngularJS
9 48 (0.95%) Vue
10 47 (0.93%) SOAP
11 43 (0.85%) JSON
12 37 (0.73%) Spring
13 36 (0.71%) XML
14 35 (0.69%) ASP.NET
15 34 (0.67%) Django
16 33 (0.65%) .NET Framework
17 31 (0.61%) Laravel
17 31 (0.61%) Spring Boot
18 27 (0.53%) EDI
18 27 (0.53%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 518 (10.25%) Driving Licence
2 376 (7.44%) Onboarding
3 312 (6.18%) Self-Motivation
4 169 (3.35%) Legacy Systems
5 166 (3.29%) Management Information System
6 148 (2.93%) Analytical Mindset
7 109 (2.16%) Data Centre
8 102 (2.02%) Product Ownership
9 87 (1.72%) Cloud Native
10 65 (1.29%) Enterprise Software
11 62 (1.23%) Social Media
12 50 (0.99%) Mobile App
13 47 (0.93%) EPoS
13 47 (0.93%) Low-Code
14 43 (0.85%) Distributed Systems
14 43 (0.85%) FMCG
15 39 (0.77%) Virtual Team
16 38 (0.75%) Data Structures
17 37 (0.73%) IoT
18 36 (0.71%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 974 (19.28%) Windows
2 436 (8.63%) Windows Server
3 348 (6.89%) Linux
4 146 (2.89%) Windows Server 2016
5 122 (2.41%) Windows 10
6 89 (1.76%) Android
7 66 (1.31%) Mac OS
8 57 (1.13%) Apple iOS
9 37 (0.73%) Unix
10 36 (0.71%) Windows Server 2019
11 25 (0.49%) Windows Server 2012
12 19 (0.38%) Windows 7
13 18 (0.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
14 12 (0.24%) CentOS
15 9 (0.18%) Windows 8
15 9 (0.18%) Windows Server 2008
16 8 (0.16%) VMS
17 6 (0.12%) Ubuntu
18 5 (0.099%) Debian
19 2 (0.040%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 949 (18.78%) Customer Service
2 940 (18.61%) Continuous Improvement
3 648 (12.83%) Agile
4 478 (9.46%) Project Management
5 466 (9.22%) Mentoring
6 449 (8.89%) Decision-Making
7 394 (7.80%) Analytics
8 392 (7.76%) ITIL
9 382 (7.56%) Business Intelligence
10 381 (7.54%) DevOps
11 340 (6.73%) CI/CD
12 338 (6.69%) ERP
13 335 (6.63%) Change Management
14 317 (6.27%) AI
15 308 (6.10%) Computer Science
15 308 (6.10%) Cybersecurity
16 305 (6.04%) CRM
17 299 (5.92%) Stakeholder Management
18 298 (5.90%) Process Improvement
19 297 (5.88%) Customer Experience
Programming Languages
1 684 (13.54%) SQL
2 506 (10.02%) Python
3 285 (5.64%) JavaScript
4 256 (5.07%) PowerShell
5 223 (4.41%) C#
6 167 (3.31%) Java
7 79 (1.56%) TypeScript
8 75 (1.48%) PHP
9 68 (1.35%) Bash
10 59 (1.17%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 56 (1.11%) C++
12 46 (0.91%) C
13 42 (0.83%) T-SQL
14 25 (0.49%) PL/SQL
14 25 (0.49%) R
15 20 (0.40%) MATLAB
16 19 (0.38%) Go
17 18 (0.36%) Bicep
17 18 (0.36%) Perl
18 16 (0.32%) VBA
Qualifications
1 1,041 (20.61%) Degree
2 427 (8.45%) Security Cleared
3 295 (5.84%) SC Cleared
4 155 (3.07%) DBS Check
5 145 (2.87%) Microsoft Certification
6 123 (2.43%) Computer Science Degree
7 102 (2.02%) BPSS Clearance
8 73 (1.44%) Master's Degree
9 67 (1.33%) A+ Certification
10 66 (1.31%) ACCA
11 65 (1.29%) DV Cleared
12 62 (1.23%) Cisco Certification
13 58 (1.15%) CIMA
14 56 (1.11%) HND
15 50 (0.99%) HNC
16 49 (0.97%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
17 45 (0.89%) CCNA
18 44 (0.87%) Network+ Certification
19 41 (0.81%) AWS Certification
20 35 (0.69%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 263 (5.21%) QA
2 180 (3.56%) Cyber Essentials
3 175 (3.46%) Data Quality
4 145 (2.87%) GDPR
5 140 (2.77%) PCI DSS
6 115 (2.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 77 (1.52%) Accessibility
8 70 (1.39%) SLA
9 45 (0.89%) NIST
10 37 (0.73%) ISO 9001
11 29 (0.57%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 28 (0.55%) Actionable Recommendations
13 11 (0.22%) PMO
14 9 (0.18%) ISO 13485
14 9 (0.18%) SOC 2
15 7 (0.14%) ISO/IEC 20000
16 6 (0.12%) WCAG
17 5 (0.099%) California Consumer Privacy Act
18 4 (0.079%) GMP
18 4 (0.079%) GRC
System Software
1 677 (13.40%) Active Directory
2 251 (4.97%) Hyper-V
3 176 (3.48%) Docker
4 121 (2.40%) VMware Infrastructure
5 112 (2.22%) Terminal Server
6 28 (0.55%) Firmware
7 23 (0.46%) Virtual Desktop
8 16 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
8 16 (0.32%) vSphere
9 15 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
10 9 (0.18%) KVM
11 8 (0.16%) Virtual Servers
11 8 (0.16%) VMware Workstation
12 5 (0.099%) Embedded Firmware
13 4 (0.079%) Microsoft Virtual Server
14 2 (0.040%) RHEV
14 2 (0.040%) VMware NSX
14 2 (0.040%) Xen
14 2 (0.040%) XenApp
15 1 (0.020%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 202 (4.00%) Terraform
2 199 (3.94%) Microsoft Intune
3 127 (2.51%) Kubernetes
4 79 (1.56%) Ansible
5 54 (1.07%) SCCM
6 49 (0.97%) Grafana
7 42 (0.83%) BMC PATROL
8 31 (0.61%) Prometheus
9 18 (0.36%) Single Sign-On
10 17 (0.34%) Nagios
11 14 (0.28%) Cisco CUCM
12 13 (0.26%) vCenter Server
13 12 (0.24%) Jamf Pro
14 10 (0.20%) Autotask
14 10 (0.20%) AWS Copilot
14 10 (0.20%) Nmap
15 9 (0.18%) ZABBIX
16 8 (0.16%) Active Directory Federation Services
16 8 (0.16%) Control-M
17 6 (0.12%) HP Fortify
Vendors
1 1,387 (27.45%) Microsoft
2 269 (5.32%) VMware
3 227 (4.49%) SAP
4 176 (3.48%) Veeam
5 173 (3.42%) Oracle
6 140 (2.77%) SolarWinds
7 139 (2.75%) Splunk
8 132 (2.61%) Cisco
9 117 (2.32%) Google
10 113 (2.24%) Tanium
11 112 (2.22%) Brocade
11 112 (2.22%) Nimble Storage
12 79 (1.56%) Salesforce
13 71 (1.41%) ServiceNow
14 66 (1.31%) Adobe
15 61 (1.21%) Databricks
16 60 (1.19%) Sage
17 59 (1.17%) Apple
18 58 (1.15%) BT
19 48 (0.95%) HubSpot