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 24 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 2 4
Rank change year-on-year -25 +2 +6
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 536 695 1,116
As % of all permanent jobs in the West Midlands 6.67% 20.78% 15.55%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 9.03% 23.29% 18.68%
Number of salaries quoted 398 422 762
10th Percentile £26,175 £27,750 £25,000
25th Percentile £30,250 £35,313 £29,813
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £50,500 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -15.84% +18.82% -15.00%
75th Percentile £58,563 £63,750 £58,747
90th Percentile £69,125 £76,350 £70,000
England median annual salary £47,500 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.52% +5.00% -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 5,936 2,984 5,974
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the West Midlands 73.86% 89.23% 83.23%
Number of salaries quoted 3,475 1,696 4,530
10th Percentile £30,000 £29,250 £26,250
25th Percentile £40,000 £38,754 £35,700
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £53,300 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -1.50% +6.60% -4.94%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £82,500 £80,000 £77,500
England median annual salary £58,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -3.33% +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 24 April 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 24 April 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 -12 173 £50,000 -9.09% 71
Staffordshire -8 106 £31,500 -37.00% 33
Warwickshire -17 65 £32,500 - 49
Worcestershire -15 43 £37,500 +22.95% 26
Shropshire -15 30 £46,250 +8.82% 18
Coventry -16 26 £52,500 -8.70% 12
Herefordshire -14 21 £52,500 +4.48% 6
Solihull -2 14 £87,500 +59.09% 6
Walsall +3 7 £44,000 -13.73% 3
Tipton -3 7 £33,500 -
Halesowen -4 7 £47,500 - 1
Dudley +2 6 £75,000 +114.29% 4
Wolverhampton -27 3 £80,000 +146.15% 1
Kingswinford -5 2 £45,250 +20.67%
Wednesbury -5 1 £42,500 -5.56%
Sutton Coldfield -6 1 £28,000 - 1
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 48 (8.96%) SharePoint
2 29 (5.41%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (0.93%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 5 (0.93%) Skype for Business
4 4 (0.75%) Exchange Server 2007
4 4 (0.75%) Exchange Server 2010
4 4 (0.75%) Exchange Server 2013
5 3 (0.56%) WordPress
6 2 (0.37%) Confluence
7 1 (0.19%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.19%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.19%) Appian
7 1 (0.19%) SAS
Applications
1 38 (7.09%) Microsoft Excel
2 37 (6.90%) Microsoft Office
3 12 (2.24%) Spreadsheet
4 8 (1.49%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (1.31%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.93%) Fusion 360
7 4 (0.75%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.19%) Abaqus
8 1 (0.19%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.19%) Sketch
8 1 (0.19%) Trello
Business Applications
1 13 (2.43%) Dynamics CRM
2 4 (0.75%) NetSuite
2 4 (0.75%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (0.75%) Shopify
3 3 (0.56%) Line 50
3 3 (0.56%) Magento
3 3 (0.56%) Sage X3
3 3 (0.56%) SAP Business ByDesign
4 2 (0.37%) Dynamics NAV
4 2 (0.37%) SAP Business One
4 2 (0.37%) SAP MM
5 1 (0.19%) Exchequer
5 1 (0.19%) Raiser’s Edge
Cloud Services
1 117 (21.83%) Microsoft 365
2 112 (20.90%) Azure
3 49 (9.14%) Power Platform
4 42 (7.84%) Entra ID
5 35 (6.53%) AWS
6 28 (5.22%) SaaS
7 13 (2.43%) Dynamics 365
8 12 (2.24%) Power Automate
9 11 (2.05%) OneDrive
9 11 (2.05%) PowerApps
10 9 (1.68%) Azure Data Factory
10 9 (1.68%) Google Workspace
11 8 (1.49%) Serverless
12 7 (1.31%) Azure Sentinel
12 7 (1.31%) Microsoft Copilot
13 6 (1.12%) GCP
14 5 (0.93%) Amazon S3
14 5 (0.93%) AWS Lambda
15 4 (0.75%) Amazon EC2
15 4 (0.75%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 28 (5.22%) VPN
2 24 (4.48%) DNS
2 24 (4.48%) Firewall
3 23 (4.29%) WAN
4 21 (3.92%) Internet
4 21 (3.92%) Wi-Fi
5 20 (3.73%) DHCP
6 15 (2.80%) LAN
7 10 (1.87%) SD-WAN
8 9 (1.68%) Network Security
8 9 (1.68%) VLAN
9 8 (1.49%) VoIP
10 6 (1.12%) Wireless
11 5 (0.93%) Skype
12 4 (0.75%) Bluetooth
12 4 (0.75%) Broadband
13 3 (0.56%) TCP/IP
14 2 (0.37%) ADSL
14 2 (0.37%) Ethernet
14 2 (0.37%) VDSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 45 (8.40%) Power BI
2 17 (3.17%) SQL Server
3 11 (2.05%) Power Query
4 9 (1.68%) Tableau
5 8 (1.49%) Oracle Reports
6 7 (1.31%) MySQL
6 7 (1.31%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 7 (1.31%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 6 (1.12%) PostgreSQL
7 6 (1.12%) Star Schema
8 5 (0.93%) NoSQL
9 4 (0.75%) Amazon RDS
9 4 (0.75%) Metadata
9 4 (0.75%) Relational Database
10 3 (0.56%) Data Mining
10 3 (0.56%) Data Warehouse
10 3 (0.56%) FileMaker
10 3 (0.56%) GIS
10 3 (0.56%) Redis
10 3 (0.56%) TimescaleDB
Development Applications
1 18 (3.36%) Git
2 17 (3.17%) JIRA
3 6 (1.12%) JUnit
4 5 (0.93%) GitLab
4 5 (0.93%) Jenkins
4 5 (0.93%) Maven
4 5 (0.93%) Mockito
5 2 (0.37%) Appcelerator Titanium
5 2 (0.37%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 1 (0.19%) Balsamiq
6 1 (0.19%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.19%) Cucumber
6 1 (0.19%) MLflow
6 1 (0.19%) Postman
6 1 (0.19%) Selenium
6 1 (0.19%) SoapUI
6 1 (0.19%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.19%) Visual Studio
6 1 (0.19%) Visual Studio Code
6 1 (0.19%) Yeoman
General
1 238 (44.40%) Social Skills
2 159 (29.66%) Analytical Skills
3 117 (21.83%) Finance
4 65 (12.13%) Manufacturing
5 42 (7.84%) Organisational Skills
6 40 (7.46%) Legal
7 35 (6.53%) Public Sector
8 27 (5.04%) Law
9 25 (4.66%) Retail
10 24 (4.48%) Marketing
11 15 (2.80%) Automotive
11 15 (2.80%) Banking
12 13 (2.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 10 (1.87%) Presentation Skills
14 8 (1.49%) Electronics
14 8 (1.49%) Investment Banking
15 7 (1.31%) Telecoms
16 6 (1.12%) Advertising
17 5 (0.93%) Documentation Skills
18 4 (0.75%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 102 (19.03%) Analyst
2 89 (16.60%) Support Engineer
3 76 (14.18%) IT Support
4 60 (11.19%) IT Engineer
5 49 (9.14%) IT Support Engineer
6 42 (7.84%) Lead
7 40 (7.46%) Senior
8 39 (7.28%) Technical Support
9 37 (6.90%) Support Analyst
9 37 (6.90%) Technical Engineer
9 37 (6.90%) Technical Support Engineer
10 34 (6.34%) Developer
11 22 (4.10%) Architect
12 20 (3.73%) 2nd Line Support
12 20 (3.73%) Business Analyst
13 18 (3.36%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 18 (3.36%) Senior Analyst
14 17 (3.17%) Instructor
15 16 (2.99%) Consultant
16 15 (2.80%) Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (2.80%) REST
2 12 (2.24%) React
3 10 (1.87%) CSS
3 10 (1.87%) HTML
4 9 (1.68%) .NET
5 7 (1.31%) Spring
6 6 (1.12%) AngularJS
6 6 (1.12%) Spring Boot
7 5 (0.93%) Node.js
7 5 (0.93%) RESTful
8 4 (0.75%) .NET Framework
9 3 (0.56%) GraphQL
9 3 (0.56%) Oracle Fusion
9 3 (0.56%) WinForms
10 2 (0.37%) Elastic Stack
10 2 (0.37%) JSON
10 2 (0.37%) Kafka
10 2 (0.37%) Vue
10 2 (0.37%) WPF
11 1 (0.19%) Django
Miscellaneous
1 43 (8.02%) Driving Licence
2 29 (5.41%) Onboarding
3 27 (5.04%) Self-Motivation
4 18 (3.36%) Social Media
5 17 (3.17%) Management Information System
6 15 (2.80%) FMCG
7 11 (2.05%) Analytical Mindset
8 10 (1.87%) Enterprise Software
9 9 (1.68%) Legacy Systems
10 8 (1.49%) Product Ownership
11 7 (1.31%) Cyber Defence
11 7 (1.31%) Data Centre
11 7 (1.31%) Virtual Team
12 6 (1.12%) IoT
13 5 (0.93%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
14 4 (0.75%) Data Structures
14 4 (0.75%) Hybrid Cloud
14 4 (0.75%) Reference Data
14 4 (0.75%) Web Conferencing
15 3 (0.56%) Team-Oriented Environment
Operating Systems
1 87 (16.23%) Windows
2 26 (4.85%) Windows 10
3 18 (3.36%) Linux
4 15 (2.80%) Windows Server
5 13 (2.43%) Apple iOS
6 5 (0.93%) Android
6 5 (0.93%) Windows 7
7 3 (0.56%) FreeRTOS
7 3 (0.56%) Mac OS
7 3 (0.56%) Unix
8 2 (0.37%) CentOS
8 2 (0.37%) Debian
8 2 (0.37%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 107 (19.96%) Continuous Improvement
2 68 (12.69%) Agile
3 66 (12.31%) ITIL
4 64 (11.94%) Customer Service
5 58 (10.82%) Decision-Making
6 51 (9.51%) Analytics
7 50 (9.33%) Project Management
8 48 (8.96%) Business Intelligence
9 46 (8.58%) ERP
10 44 (8.21%) Mentoring
11 42 (7.84%) CRM
12 38 (7.09%) Collaborative Working
13 37 (6.90%) Cybersecurity
13 37 (6.90%) Roadmaps
14 34 (6.34%) AI
14 34 (6.34%) Coaching
14 34 (6.34%) Migration
15 31 (5.78%) Process Improvement
15 31 (5.78%) Project Delivery
16 30 (5.60%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 69 (12.87%) SQL
2 34 (6.34%) Python
3 21 (3.92%) Java
4 19 (3.54%) PowerShell
5 14 (2.61%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 13 (2.43%) Ladder Logic
7 12 (2.24%) C
8 10 (1.87%) PHP
9 9 (1.68%) Bash
9 9 (1.68%) JavaScript
10 7 (1.31%) T-SQL
11 6 (1.12%) C#
11 6 (1.12%) TypeScript
12 5 (0.93%) C++
12 5 (0.93%) PL/SQL
12 5 (0.93%) R
13 3 (0.56%) Embedded C
13 3 (0.56%) Rust
14 2 (0.37%) Shell Script
14 2 (0.37%) VB
Qualifications
1 72 (13.43%) Degree
2 45 (8.40%) Security Cleared
3 38 (7.09%) SC Cleared
4 19 (3.54%) Microsoft Certification
5 18 (3.36%) DBS Check
6 11 (2.05%) A+ Certification
7 10 (1.87%) CISSP
8 8 (1.49%) BPSS Clearance
8 8 (1.49%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (1.49%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 7 (1.31%) ACCA
9 7 (1.31%) CIMA
9 7 (1.31%) CISA
9 7 (1.31%) CompTIA Security+
9 7 (1.31%) SSCP
10 6 (1.12%) MCITP
11 5 (0.93%) PMI Certification
12 4 (0.75%) AWS Certification
12 4 (0.75%) Oracle Certification
12 4 (0.75%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (5.97%) Data Quality
2 26 (4.85%) QA
3 22 (4.10%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 18 (3.36%) NIST
5 17 (3.17%) GDPR
6 14 (2.61%) Cyber Essentials
7 13 (2.43%) SLA
8 10 (1.87%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 7 (1.31%) ISO/IEC 20000
10 6 (1.12%) HIPAA
11 5 (0.93%) Accessibility
12 4 (0.75%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 4 (0.75%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 4 (0.75%) SOC 2
13 3 (0.56%) Actionable Recommendations
13 3 (0.56%) ISO 14001
13 3 (0.56%) ISO 9001
14 2 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 19770
14 2 (0.37%) PMO
15 1 (0.19%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 63 (11.75%) Active Directory
2 17 (3.17%) Docker
3 13 (2.43%) VMware Infrastructure
4 8 (1.49%) Hyper-V
5 5 (0.93%) Firmware
6 3 (0.56%) Embedded Firmware
7 2 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 28 (5.22%) Microsoft Intune
2 17 (3.17%) Kubernetes
3 13 (2.43%) Terraform
4 6 (1.12%) Ansible
5 3 (0.56%) Nagios
5 3 (0.56%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.37%) Grafana
6 2 (0.37%) Progress Chef
6 2 (0.37%) Puppet
6 2 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.19%) SCCM
7 1 (0.19%) Symantec Endpoint Protection
Vendors
1 143 (26.68%) Microsoft
2 20 (3.73%) Cisco
2 20 (3.73%) Oracle
3 18 (3.36%) SAP
3 18 (3.36%) VMware
4 12 (2.24%) Sage
5 10 (1.87%) Dell
6 9 (1.68%) Google
7 8 (1.49%) Salesforce
7 8 (1.49%) SolarWinds
8 7 (1.31%) HP
8 7 (1.31%) Meraki
8 7 (1.31%) Zscaler
9 6 (1.12%) Avaya
9 6 (1.12%) McAfee
9 6 (1.12%) ServiceNow
9 6 (1.12%) Sophos
10 4 (0.75%) Databricks
11 3 (0.56%) Adobe
11 3 (0.56%) Apple