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 6 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 26 2 4
Rank change year-on-year -24 +2 +6
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 512 697 1,147
As % of all permanent jobs in the West Midlands 6.10% 21.11% 15.80%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 8.34% 23.68% 19.00%
Number of salaries quoted 385 421 761
10th Percentile £26,100 £26,500 £25,000
25th Percentile £30,250 £35,000 £29,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £49,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -13.27% +15.29% -15.00%
75th Percentile £57,500 £63,750 £58,750
90th Percentile £66,150 £75,000 £71,725
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 6,142 2,943 6,037
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the West Midlands 73.19% 89.15% 83.18%
Number of salaries quoted 3,668 1,682 4,542
10th Percentile £30,000 £29,250 £26,250
25th Percentile £40,000 £38,750 £35,713
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £54,798 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.38% +5.00% -5.88%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £83,750 £80,000 £77,500
England median annual salary £60,000 £60,000 £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 6 May 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 6 May 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 -15 167 £49,500 -10.00% 82
Staffordshire -5 101 £31,500 -37.00% 38
Warwickshire -18 63 £32,500 -7.14% 52
Worcestershire -15 39 £32,500 +6.56% 33
Shropshire -15 29 £50,000 +17.65% 19
Coventry -15 26 £42,500 -26.09% 17
Herefordshire -14 17 £52,500 +4.48% 4
Solihull -5 12 £90,000 +63.64% 10
Walsall +3 8 £40,750 -20.10% 2
Tipton -3 8 £33,500 -
Halesowen -4 6 £47,500 +26.67% 3
Dudley +1 5 £75,000 +114.29% 3
Wolverhampton -30 3 £80,000 +146.15% 3
Kingswinford -6 1 £30,500 -18.67%
Sutton Coldfield -9 1 £28,000 - 2
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 50 (9.77%) SharePoint
2 30 (5.86%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (0.98%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 5 (0.98%) Skype for Business
4 4 (0.78%) Exchange Server 2007
4 4 (0.78%) Exchange Server 2010
4 4 (0.78%) Exchange Server 2013
5 3 (0.59%) WordPress
6 2 (0.39%) Confluence
7 1 (0.20%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.20%) Appian
7 1 (0.20%) SAS
Applications
1 38 (7.42%) Microsoft Office
2 33 (6.45%) Microsoft Excel
3 14 (2.73%) Spreadsheet
4 8 (1.56%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (1.17%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.98%) Fusion 360
7 3 (0.59%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.20%) Abaqus
8 1 (0.20%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.20%) Sketch
8 1 (0.20%) Trello
Business Applications
1 11 (2.15%) Dynamics CRM
2 4 (0.78%) Line 50
2 4 (0.78%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (0.78%) Shopify
3 3 (0.59%) Magento
3 3 (0.59%) SAP Business ByDesign
4 2 (0.39%) NetSuite
4 2 (0.39%) Sage X3
4 2 (0.39%) SAP Business One
4 2 (0.39%) SAP MM
5 1 (0.20%) Dynamics NAV
5 1 (0.20%) Exchequer
5 1 (0.20%) Raiser’s Edge
5 1 (0.20%) Sage 50
Cloud Services
1 116 (22.66%) Microsoft 365
2 108 (21.09%) Azure
3 47 (9.18%) Power Platform
4 43 (8.40%) Entra ID
5 37 (7.23%) AWS
6 23 (4.49%) SaaS
7 13 (2.54%) Power Automate
8 12 (2.34%) PowerApps
9 11 (2.15%) Dynamics 365
9 11 (2.15%) OneDrive
10 9 (1.76%) Google Workspace
11 7 (1.37%) Azure Data Factory
11 7 (1.37%) Azure Sentinel
11 7 (1.37%) Microsoft Copilot
11 7 (1.37%) Serverless
12 6 (1.17%) GCP
13 4 (0.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 4 (0.78%) Amazon S3
13 4 (0.78%) IaaS
13 4 (0.78%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 27 (5.27%) VPN
2 25 (4.88%) WAN
3 24 (4.69%) Firewall
4 22 (4.30%) DNS
5 21 (4.10%) Wi-Fi
6 20 (3.91%) Internet
7 18 (3.52%) DHCP
8 16 (3.13%) LAN
9 11 (2.15%) SD-WAN
10 10 (1.95%) Network Security
10 10 (1.95%) VLAN
10 10 (1.95%) Wireless
11 8 (1.56%) VoIP
12 5 (0.98%) Bluetooth
12 5 (0.98%) Skype
13 4 (0.78%) TCP/IP
14 3 (0.59%) Broadband
14 3 (0.59%) SAN
15 2 (0.39%) NAS
16 1 (0.20%) 4G
Database & Business Intelligence
1 43 (8.40%) Power BI
2 15 (2.93%) SQL Server
3 11 (2.15%) Power Query
4 10 (1.95%) Tableau
5 7 (1.37%) Oracle Reports
5 7 (1.37%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 7 (1.37%) Star Schema
6 5 (0.98%) MySQL
6 5 (0.98%) PostgreSQL
7 4 (0.78%) Data Mining
7 4 (0.78%) Data Warehouse
7 4 (0.78%) FileMaker
7 4 (0.78%) NoSQL
7 4 (0.78%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 3 (0.59%) Amazon RDS
8 3 (0.59%) GIS
8 3 (0.59%) Metadata
8 3 (0.59%) Redis
8 3 (0.59%) TimescaleDB
9 2 (0.39%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 17 (3.32%) Git
1 17 (3.32%) JIRA
2 6 (1.17%) JUnit
3 5 (0.98%) Jenkins
3 5 (0.98%) Maven
3 5 (0.98%) Mockito
4 4 (0.78%) GitLab
5 2 (0.39%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 1 (0.20%) Appcelerator Titanium
6 1 (0.20%) Balsamiq
6 1 (0.20%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.20%) Bugzilla
6 1 (0.20%) Cucumber
6 1 (0.20%) MLflow
6 1 (0.20%) Postman
6 1 (0.20%) Selenium
6 1 (0.20%) SoapUI
6 1 (0.20%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.20%) Visual Studio
6 1 (0.20%) Yeoman
General
1 219 (42.77%) Social Skills
2 151 (29.49%) Analytical Skills
3 100 (19.53%) Finance
4 59 (11.52%) Manufacturing
5 38 (7.42%) Organisational Skills
6 31 (6.05%) Legal
6 31 (6.05%) Public Sector
7 24 (4.69%) Law
8 22 (4.30%) Marketing
9 19 (3.71%) Retail
10 15 (2.93%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 14 (2.73%) Automotive
12 10 (1.95%) Banking
12 10 (1.95%) Electronics
13 9 (1.76%) Investment Banking
13 9 (1.76%) Telecoms
14 8 (1.56%) Presentation Skills
15 6 (1.17%) Documentation Skills
16 5 (0.98%) Advertising
16 5 (0.98%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 91 (17.77%) Analyst
2 88 (17.19%) Support Engineer
3 75 (14.65%) IT Support
4 63 (12.30%) IT Engineer
5 50 (9.77%) IT Support Engineer
6 38 (7.42%) Lead
7 37 (7.23%) Technical Support
8 36 (7.03%) Senior
8 36 (7.03%) Technical Engineer
8 36 (7.03%) Technical Support Engineer
9 33 (6.45%) Developer
10 31 (6.05%) Support Analyst
11 21 (4.10%) 2nd Line Support
12 18 (3.52%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 17 (3.32%) Architect
13 17 (3.32%) Business Analyst
13 17 (3.32%) Instructor
14 16 (3.13%) Consultant
15 15 (2.93%) Programmer
16 14 (2.73%) Senior Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (3.13%) REST
2 12 (2.34%) React
3 10 (1.95%) CSS
3 10 (1.95%) HTML
4 8 (1.56%) .NET
4 8 (1.56%) Spring
5 7 (1.37%) Spring Boot
6 6 (1.17%) AngularJS
7 4 (0.78%) .NET Framework
7 4 (0.78%) Node.js
7 4 (0.78%) RESTful
8 3 (0.59%) GraphQL
8 3 (0.59%) WinForms
9 2 (0.39%) Elastic Stack
9 2 (0.39%) JSON
9 2 (0.39%) Oracle Fusion
9 2 (0.39%) WPF
10 1 (0.20%) Django
10 1 (0.20%) Kafka
10 1 (0.20%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 45 (8.79%) Driving Licence
2 28 (5.47%) Self-Motivation
3 26 (5.08%) Onboarding
4 18 (3.52%) Social Media
5 16 (3.13%) Management Information System
6 15 (2.93%) FMCG
7 10 (1.95%) Enterprise Software
8 9 (1.76%) Data Centre
8 9 (1.76%) Virtual Team
9 8 (1.56%) Analytical Mindset
9 8 (1.56%) Product Ownership
10 7 (1.37%) Cyber Defence
10 7 (1.37%) Legacy Systems
11 5 (0.98%) Hybrid Cloud
12 4 (0.78%) CAN bus
12 4 (0.78%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
12 4 (0.78%) IoT
13 3 (0.59%) CCTV
13 3 (0.59%) EPoS
13 3 (0.59%) iSeries
Operating Systems
1 85 (16.60%) Windows
2 24 (4.69%) Windows 10
3 20 (3.91%) Linux
4 16 (3.13%) Windows Server
5 10 (1.95%) Apple iOS
6 5 (0.98%) Android
6 5 (0.98%) Windows 7
7 4 (0.78%) FreeRTOS
7 4 (0.78%) Mac OS
7 4 (0.78%) Unix
8 2 (0.39%) CentOS
8 2 (0.39%) Debian
8 2 (0.39%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 102 (19.92%) Continuous Improvement
2 67 (13.09%) Agile
3 62 (12.11%) Customer Service
4 57 (11.13%) ITIL
5 55 (10.74%) Decision-Making
6 50 (9.77%) Analytics
7 46 (8.98%) Project Management
8 43 (8.40%) Business Intelligence
9 41 (8.01%) ERP
10 40 (7.81%) Collaborative Working
10 40 (7.81%) CRM
10 40 (7.81%) Mentoring
11 39 (7.62%) AI
12 34 (6.64%) Cybersecurity
13 33 (6.45%) Coaching
13 33 (6.45%) Service Delivery
14 32 (6.25%) Roadmaps
15 29 (5.66%) Customer Experience
15 29 (5.66%) Migration
16 28 (5.47%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 58 (11.33%) SQL
2 34 (6.64%) Python
3 21 (4.10%) Java
4 20 (3.91%) PowerShell
5 12 (2.34%) C
5 12 (2.34%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 10 (1.95%) Ladder Logic
6 10 (1.95%) PHP
7 9 (1.76%) Bash
8 8 (1.56%) JavaScript
9 7 (1.37%) TypeScript
10 6 (1.17%) C#
11 5 (0.98%) C++
11 5 (0.98%) PL/SQL
11 5 (0.98%) R
12 4 (0.78%) Embedded C
13 3 (0.59%) Rust
13 3 (0.59%) T-SQL
14 2 (0.39%) Go
14 2 (0.39%) Google Apps Script
Qualifications
1 64 (12.50%) Degree
2 42 (8.20%) Security Cleared
3 36 (7.03%) SC Cleared
4 20 (3.91%) DBS Check
4 20 (3.91%) Microsoft Certification
5 11 (2.15%) A+ Certification
6 10 (1.95%) CISSP
7 9 (1.76%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (1.56%) BPSS Clearance
8 8 (1.56%) CompTIA Security+
9 7 (1.37%) ACCA
9 7 (1.37%) CIMA
9 7 (1.37%) CISA
9 7 (1.37%) SSCP
10 6 (1.17%) MCITP
11 5 (0.98%) Cisco Certification
11 5 (0.98%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 5 (0.98%) PMI Certification
12 4 (0.78%) AWS Certification
12 4 (0.78%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 30 (5.86%) Data Quality
2 29 (5.66%) QA
3 23 (4.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 18 (3.52%) NIST
5 17 (3.32%) GDPR
6 16 (3.13%) Cyber Essentials
7 12 (2.34%) SLA
8 10 (1.95%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 8 (1.56%) Accessibility
10 6 (1.17%) HIPAA
10 6 (1.17%) ISO/IEC 20000
11 5 (0.98%) ISO 14001
11 5 (0.98%) ISO 9001
12 4 (0.78%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 4 (0.78%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 4 (0.78%) SOC 2
13 2 (0.39%) Actionable Recommendations
13 2 (0.39%) PMO
14 1 (0.20%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 63 (12.30%) Active Directory
2 17 (3.32%) Docker
3 14 (2.73%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (1.76%) Hyper-V
5 7 (1.37%) Firmware
6 4 (0.78%) Embedded Firmware
7 1 (0.20%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 28 (5.47%) Microsoft Intune
2 17 (3.32%) Kubernetes
3 13 (2.54%) Terraform
4 6 (1.17%) Ansible
5 3 (0.59%) Nagios
5 3 (0.59%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.39%) Grafana
6 2 (0.39%) Progress Chef
6 2 (0.39%) Puppet
6 2 (0.39%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.20%) Functional Safety
7 1 (0.20%) SCCM
Vendors
1 138 (26.95%) Microsoft
2 21 (4.10%) Cisco
3 19 (3.71%) Oracle
3 19 (3.71%) VMware
4 17 (3.32%) SAP
5 11 (2.15%) Dell
5 11 (2.15%) Sage
6 9 (1.76%) Google
6 9 (1.76%) SolarWinds
7 8 (1.56%) Meraki
7 8 (1.56%) Salesforce
8 7 (1.37%) HP
8 7 (1.37%) Zscaler
9 6 (1.17%) Avaya
9 6 (1.17%) McAfee
9 6 (1.17%) Sophos
10 4 (0.78%) Adobe
10 4 (0.78%) Apple
11 3 (0.59%) HubSpot
11 3 (0.59%) ServiceNow