Problem-Solving Job Trends in the West Midlands

Problem Solving
England > West Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the West Midlands requiring Problem-Solving skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 2 4
Rank change year-on-year -9 +2 +5
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 664 707 951
As % of all permanent jobs in the West Midlands 7.79% 20.48% 14.78%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.26% 24.08% 18.83%
Number of salaries quoted 469 464 432
10th Percentile £28,200 £25,000 £25,500
25th Percentile £33,250 £29,250 £32,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £44,272 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% -6.80% -5.00%
75th Percentile £57,500 £60,688 £59,625
90th Percentile £65,000 £69,625 £73,000
England median annual salary £47,500 £46,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +3.26% -8.00% -9.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
West Midlands

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 West Midlands.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 5,895 2,936 5,050
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the West Midlands 69.12% 85.05% 78.46%
Number of salaries quoted 4,424 1,888 3,088
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,822 £28,119
25th Percentile £40,000 £35,000 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £51,200 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year +7.42% -2.48% -
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £65,603
90th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £80,000
England median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% - -12.00%

Problem-Solving
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

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

Problem-Solving job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

Problem-Solving
Salary Trend in the West Midlands

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Problem-Solving.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Problem-Solving

Problem-Solving
Salary Histogram in the West Midlands

Salary distribution for jobs citing Problem-Solving in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 16 August 2026.

Salary histogram for Problem-Solving in the West Midlands

Problem-Solving
Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Problem-Solving within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 16 August 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
Birmingham -12 238 £52,500 +16.67% 131
Staffordshire -6 87 £47,500 -7.67% 51
Warwickshire -4 76 £35,000 -22.22% 61
Worcestershire -4 62 £37,750 +23.77% 30
Shropshire +7 49 £45,000 +2.86% 38
Coventry -12 35 £42,000 +11.79% 26
Solihull +2 12 £30,500 -44.55% 22
Wolverhampton -7 12 £38,500 +18.46% 12
Walsall +1 8 £37,500 -16.67% 9
Herefordshire -25 8 £40,500 +24.62% 7
Tipton - 8 £33,500 - 5
Halesowen 0 5 £47,500 +46.15%
Dudley - 5 £26,100 - 3
Willenhall -2 4 £37,500 -16.67%
Sutton Coldfield - 4 £42,500 -
Problem-Solving
England

Problem-Solving
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 38 (5.72%) SharePoint
2 28 (4.22%) Microsoft Exchange
3 10 (1.51%) IIS
4 5 (0.75%) Skype for Business
5 4 (0.60%) CICS
5 4 (0.60%) Confluence
6 3 (0.45%) Apache Airflow
6 3 (0.45%) WordPress
7 2 (0.30%) Documentum
7 2 (0.30%) Exchange Server 2007
7 2 (0.30%) Exchange Server 2010
7 2 (0.30%) Exchange Server 2013
7 2 (0.30%) SAS
8 1 (0.15%) Apache
8 1 (0.15%) Appian
8 1 (0.15%) CMS
8 1 (0.15%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.15%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 52 (7.83%) Microsoft Office
2 36 (5.42%) Microsoft Excel
3 8 (1.20%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 6 (0.90%) Spreadsheet
5 5 (0.75%) Fusion 360
6 3 (0.45%) Microsoft Project
6 3 (0.45%) Simulink
7 2 (0.30%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.30%) OrCAD
8 1 (0.15%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.15%) LaTeX
8 1 (0.15%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.15%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 11 (1.66%) SAP S/4HANA
2 8 (1.20%) Dynamics CRM
3 5 (0.75%) Magento
3 5 (0.75%) Shopify
4 4 (0.60%) Dynamics AX
4 4 (0.60%) Line 50
4 4 (0.60%) NetSuite
4 4 (0.60%) Sage 50
4 4 (0.60%) Sage X3
4 4 (0.60%) SAP Business One
5 2 (0.30%) JDE EnterpriseOne
5 2 (0.30%) SAP ERP
6 1 (0.15%) Oracle EBS
6 1 (0.15%) SAP CO
6 1 (0.15%) SAP FI
6 1 (0.15%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 132 (19.88%) Azure
2 121 (18.22%) Microsoft 365
3 86 (12.95%) Power Platform
4 53 (7.98%) AWS
5 52 (7.83%) Entra ID
6 43 (6.48%) SaaS
7 22 (3.31%) Dynamics 365
8 17 (2.56%) Azure DevOps
9 16 (2.41%) Power Automate
10 14 (2.11%) PowerApps
11 13 (1.96%) Microsoft Purview
12 11 (1.66%) GitHub
13 10 (1.51%) GCP
13 10 (1.51%) Microsoft Copilot
14 9 (1.36%) GitHub Actions
15 7 (1.05%) PaaS
16 6 (0.90%) Google Workspace
16 6 (0.90%) IaaS
17 4 (0.60%) Amazon Kinesis
17 4 (0.60%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 28 (4.22%) Firewall
2 22 (3.31%) DNS
3 20 (3.01%) VPN
4 18 (2.71%) TCP/IP
4 18 (2.71%) WAN
4 18 (2.71%) Wireless
5 16 (2.41%) Wi-Fi
6 14 (2.11%) DHCP
6 14 (2.11%) LAN
7 12 (1.81%) Network Security
8 10 (1.51%) VLAN
9 8 (1.20%) VoIP
10 5 (0.75%) Cisco IOS
10 5 (0.75%) SD-WAN
10 5 (0.75%) Skype
11 4 (0.60%) Bluetooth
11 4 (0.60%) SSL
12 3 (0.45%) HTTP
12 3 (0.45%) SAN
13 2 (0.30%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 81 (12.20%) Power BI
2 26 (3.92%) SQL Server
3 20 (3.01%) Power Query
4 19 (2.86%) Tableau
5 16 (2.41%) Data Warehouse
6 13 (1.96%) Relational Database
7 12 (1.81%) MySQL
8 11 (1.66%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 9 (1.36%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 8 (1.20%) Data Mining
10 8 (1.20%) Electronic Patient Records
11 6 (0.90%) Amazon Redshift
12 5 (0.75%) Amazon RDS
12 5 (0.75%) Azure SQL Database
12 5 (0.75%) PostgreSQL
12 5 (0.75%) Star Schema
13 4 (0.60%) Data Lake
13 4 (0.60%) Db2
13 4 (0.60%) FileMaker
14 3 (0.45%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 28 (4.22%) Git
2 20 (3.01%) JIRA
3 18 (2.71%) Jenkins
4 6 (0.90%) Maven
5 5 (0.75%) Cucumber
5 5 (0.75%) JUnit
5 5 (0.75%) Postman
6 4 (0.60%) GitLab
6 4 (0.60%) JMeter
6 4 (0.60%) Selenium
6 4 (0.60%) SoapUI
7 3 (0.45%) Mockito
7 3 (0.45%) Zephyr
8 2 (0.30%) Ant
8 2 (0.30%) Apache Ivy
8 2 (0.30%) Eclipse
8 2 (0.30%) IBM UrbanCode
9 1 (0.15%) Bugzilla
9 1 (0.15%) Oracle Forms
9 1 (0.15%) Visual Studio
General
1 304 (45.78%) Social Skills
2 170 (25.60%) Analytical Skills
3 115 (17.32%) Finance
4 96 (14.46%) Manufacturing
5 48 (7.23%) Public Sector
6 42 (6.33%) Organisational Skills
7 36 (5.42%) Retail
8 27 (4.07%) Marketing
9 26 (3.92%) Legal
10 22 (3.31%) Law
11 19 (2.86%) Electronics
11 19 (2.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 15 (2.26%) Automotive
13 12 (1.81%) Documentation Skills
14 11 (1.66%) Telecoms
15 9 (1.36%) Banking
16 8 (1.20%) Investment Banking
17 7 (1.05%) Fire and Rescue
17 7 (1.05%) Games
17 7 (1.05%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 91 (13.70%) Support Engineer
2 88 (13.25%) Analyst
3 70 (10.54%) Developer
3 70 (10.54%) Technical Support
4 64 (9.64%) Technical Engineer
5 62 (9.34%) Technical Support Engineer
6 56 (8.43%) IT Support
7 50 (7.53%) Senior
8 43 (6.48%) Lead
9 39 (5.87%) Consultant
10 38 (5.72%) IT Manager
11 34 (5.12%) IT Engineer
12 32 (4.82%) Support Analyst
13 27 (4.07%) IT Support Engineer
14 18 (2.71%) 1st Line Support
15 17 (2.56%) Administrator
16 16 (2.41%) Programmer
17 15 (2.26%) Architect
17 15 (2.26%) IT Technician
17 15 (2.26%) Senior Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 38 (5.72%) REST
2 28 (4.22%) .NET
3 26 (3.92%) React
4 24 (3.61%) Spring
5 21 (3.16%) Spring Boot
6 14 (2.11%) RESTful
7 13 (1.96%) AngularJS
7 13 (1.96%) CSS
7 13 (1.96%) HTML
8 12 (1.81%) Playwright
9 9 (1.36%) SOAP
10 8 (1.20%) ISPF
10 8 (1.20%) Node.js
11 7 (1.05%) SAP Fiori
12 6 (0.90%) JDBC
12 6 (0.90%) Middleware
12 6 (0.90%) OAuth
12 6 (0.90%) SAPUI5
13 5 (0.75%) LDAP
13 5 (0.75%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 51 (7.68%) Driving Licence
2 33 (4.97%) Management Information System
3 31 (4.67%) Onboarding
4 29 (4.37%) Self-Motivation
5 26 (3.92%) Enterprise Software
6 19 (2.86%) NHS
7 12 (1.81%) Virtual Team
8 11 (1.66%) Analytical Mindset
8 11 (1.66%) Data Centre
9 10 (1.51%) Cloud Native
9 10 (1.51%) Data Structures
9 10 (1.51%) Legacy Applications
10 9 (1.36%) IoT
10 9 (1.36%) Mobile App
10 9 (1.36%) SystemC
11 8 (1.20%) Data Protection Act
11 8 (1.20%) Mainframe
11 8 (1.20%) Public Cloud
12 7 (1.05%) AS400
12 7 (1.05%) iSeries
Operating Systems
1 105 (15.81%) Windows
2 40 (6.02%) Linux
3 36 (5.42%) Windows Server
4 26 (3.92%) Windows 10
5 13 (1.96%) Android
6 10 (1.51%) Apple iOS
7 9 (1.36%) Unix
8 6 (0.90%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.60%) FreeRTOS
10 3 (0.45%) Windows 7
10 3 (0.45%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.30%) CentOS
11 2 (0.30%) Debian
11 2 (0.30%) Solaris
11 2 (0.30%) Ubuntu
12 1 (0.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 205 (30.87%) Continuous Improvement
2 112 (16.87%) Customer Service
3 104 (15.66%) Agile
4 84 (12.65%) Business Intelligence
4 84 (12.65%) Decision-Making
5 83 (12.50%) Analytics
6 78 (11.75%) Mentoring
7 76 (11.45%) AI
8 71 (10.69%) ERP
9 70 (10.54%) Collaborative Working
10 62 (9.34%) ITIL
11 56 (8.43%) Cybersecurity
12 55 (8.28%) Collaborative Culture
13 53 (7.98%) CI/CD
14 50 (7.53%) Stakeholder Management
15 48 (7.23%) Customer Experience
16 47 (7.08%) CRM
17 46 (6.93%) Root Cause Analysis
17 46 (6.93%) Service Delivery
18 44 (6.63%) Workflow
Programming Languages
1 103 (15.51%) SQL
2 53 (7.98%) Java
3 43 (6.48%) Python
4 22 (3.31%) C#
4 22 (3.31%) JavaScript
5 21 (3.16%) PowerShell
6 20 (3.01%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 18 (2.71%) Ladder Logic
8 15 (2.26%) TypeScript
9 11 (1.66%) C
9 11 (1.66%) PHP
10 9 (1.36%) Embedded C
11 8 (1.20%) COBOL
11 8 (1.20%) JCL
12 7 (1.05%) RPG
13 6 (0.90%) ABAP
13 6 (0.90%) Bash
14 5 (0.75%) C++
15 4 (0.60%) PL/SQL
15 4 (0.60%) RPG/400
Qualifications
1 96 (14.46%) Degree
2 70 (10.54%) Security Cleared
3 57 (8.58%) SC Cleared
4 20 (3.01%) Azure Certification
5 14 (2.11%) Microsoft Certification
6 13 (1.96%) DBS Check
7 11 (1.66%) CISSP
7 11 (1.66%) PMI Certification
8 10 (1.51%) CompTIA Security+
9 9 (1.36%) Cisco Certification
10 7 (1.05%) ACCA
10 7 (1.05%) BPSS Clearance
10 7 (1.05%) CIMA
10 7 (1.05%) CISA
10 7 (1.05%) SSCP
11 6 (0.90%) CCNA
11 6 (0.90%) Computer Science Degree
12 5 (0.75%) HND
12 5 (0.75%) PMP
13 4 (0.60%) CCNP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 39 (5.87%) Data Quality
2 32 (4.82%) GDPR
3 29 (4.37%) QA
4 26 (3.92%) Cyber Essentials
5 24 (3.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 22 (3.31%) SLA
7 19 (2.86%) Accessibility
8 17 (2.56%) ISO 9001
9 15 (2.26%) NIST
10 9 (1.36%) ISO 14001
11 4 (0.60%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 4 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 3 (0.45%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 3 (0.45%) HIPAA
12 3 (0.45%) SOC 2
13 2 (0.30%) GMP
13 2 (0.30%) GRC
13 2 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 2 (0.30%) PCI DSS
13 2 (0.30%) PMO
System Software
1 79 (11.90%) Active Directory
2 24 (3.61%) Hyper-V
3 17 (2.56%) Docker
4 16 (2.41%) VMware Infrastructure
5 8 (1.20%) Firmware
6 6 (0.90%) Embedded Firmware
7 4 (0.60%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (0.60%) vSphere
8 3 (0.45%) Virtual Desktop
9 2 (0.30%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 30 (4.52%) Microsoft Intune
2 15 (2.26%) Kubernetes
3 13 (1.96%) Terraform
4 6 (0.90%) Ansible
5 5 (0.75%) Functional Safety
5 5 (0.75%) SCCM
6 4 (0.60%) Progress Chef
6 4 (0.60%) Puppet
7 3 (0.45%) Prometheus
8 2 (0.30%) Grafana
8 2 (0.30%) Nagios
8 2 (0.30%) Single Sign-On
8 2 (0.30%) WSUS
9 1 (0.15%) FortiGate
9 1 (0.15%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 181 (27.26%) Microsoft
2 33 (4.97%) SAP
3 23 (3.46%) VMware
4 21 (3.16%) Cisco
5 14 (2.11%) Sage
6 12 (1.81%) Dell
6 12 (1.81%) Salesforce
7 11 (1.66%) ServiceNow
8 10 (1.51%) HubSpot
8 10 (1.51%) Oracle
9 9 (1.36%) Workday
10 8 (1.20%) Apple
10 8 (1.20%) Google
10 8 (1.20%) Sophos
11 7 (1.05%) IBM
12 6 (0.90%) iManage
12 6 (0.90%) McAfee
13 5 (0.75%) Databricks
13 5 (0.75%) SolarWinds
14 4 (0.60%) Xero