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 7 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 2 4
Rank change year-on-year -9 +2 +3
Permanent jobs citing Problem-Solving 575 649 1,262
As % of all permanent jobs in the West Midlands 7.27% 20.05% 15.17%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.57% 23.15% 18.85%
Number of salaries quoted 426 428 685
10th Percentile £27,694 £25,000 £25,000
25th Percentile £31,250 £30,688 £29,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £45,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -5.56% +5.88% -15.00%
75th Percentile £57,500 £61,250 £57,500
90th Percentile £64,250 £71,325 £72,500
England median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -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 5,440 2,803 6,695
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the West Midlands 68.77% 86.59% 80.47%
Number of salaries quoted 4,064 1,762 4,540
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,822 £26,750
25th Percentile £40,000 £36,250 £36,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.76% +5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £65,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £78,750
England median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -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 7 July 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 7 July 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 -16 183 £50,149 +4.48% 77
Staffordshire -4 100 £42,500 -17.39% 25
Warwickshire -2 72 £32,500 -29.73% 40
Worcestershire -8 47 £37,500 +22.95% 31
Shropshire -1 34 £50,678 +19.24% 25
Coventry -14 32 £42,000 -20.00% 11
Solihull 0 12 £30,500 -44.55% 3
Herefordshire -19 12 £52,500 -2.33% 6
Wolverhampton -14 11 £38,500 +18.46% 4
Walsall +4 9 £37,500 -14.77% 3
Tipton - 8 £33,500 - 1
Halesowen -3 5 £47,500 +26.67%
Dudley - 5 £26,100 - 3
Willenhall -4 3 £37,500 -16.67% 2
Sutton Coldfield - 3 £42,500 - 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 (8.70%) SharePoint
2 32 (5.57%) Microsoft Exchange
3 8 (1.39%) IIS
4 5 (0.87%) Skype for Business
5 4 (0.70%) Exchange Server 2007
5 4 (0.70%) Exchange Server 2010
5 4 (0.70%) Exchange Server 2013
6 3 (0.52%) WordPress
7 2 (0.35%) Confluence
7 2 (0.35%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.17%) Appian
8 1 (0.17%) Documentum
8 1 (0.17%) SAS
Applications
1 54 (9.39%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (5.22%) Microsoft Excel
3 11 (1.91%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 5 (0.87%) Fusion 360
4 5 (0.87%) Spreadsheet
5 4 (0.70%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.17%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.17%) Simulink
6 1 (0.17%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 9 (1.57%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (1.04%) Dynamics CRM
3 5 (0.87%) Magento
3 5 (0.87%) Shopify
4 4 (0.70%) Line 50
4 4 (0.70%) Sage 50
4 4 (0.70%) Sage X3
5 3 (0.52%) Dynamics AX
5 3 (0.52%) SAP Business ByDesign
6 2 (0.35%) JDE EnterpriseOne
6 2 (0.35%) SAP Business One
7 1 (0.17%) Exchequer
7 1 (0.17%) Oracle EBS
7 1 (0.17%) Raiser’s Edge
Cloud Services
1 122 (21.22%) Microsoft 365
2 112 (19.48%) Azure
3 66 (11.48%) Power Platform
4 59 (10.26%) Entra ID
5 34 (5.91%) AWS
6 31 (5.39%) SaaS
7 14 (2.43%) Dynamics 365
7 14 (2.43%) Microsoft Purview
7 14 (2.43%) Power Automate
7 14 (2.43%) PowerApps
8 10 (1.74%) OneDrive
9 8 (1.39%) Google Workspace
10 6 (1.04%) Azure Data Factory
11 5 (0.87%) GCP
11 5 (0.87%) Microsoft Copilot
11 5 (0.87%) PaaS
12 4 (0.70%) Amazon S3
12 4 (0.70%) IaaS
12 4 (0.70%) Serverless
13 3 (0.52%) Azure Sentinel
Communications & Networking
1 31 (5.39%) Firewall
2 25 (4.35%) VPN
3 24 (4.17%) WAN
4 23 (4.00%) DNS
5 20 (3.48%) LAN
5 20 (3.48%) Wi-Fi
6 19 (3.30%) DHCP
7 16 (2.78%) Wireless
8 15 (2.61%) TCP/IP
9 12 (2.09%) Network Security
10 10 (1.74%) VLAN
11 9 (1.57%) Internet
12 7 (1.22%) VoIP
13 6 (1.04%) SD-WAN
14 5 (0.87%) Skype
15 4 (0.70%) Bluetooth
15 4 (0.70%) Cisco IOS
16 3 (0.52%) SAN
16 3 (0.52%) SSL
17 2 (0.35%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 63 (10.96%) Power BI
2 21 (3.65%) SQL Server
3 16 (2.78%) Tableau
4 14 (2.43%) Power Query
5 11 (1.91%) MySQL
6 8 (1.39%) Data Warehouse
6 8 (1.39%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 8 (1.39%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 7 (1.22%) Amazon RDS
7 7 (1.22%) Relational Database
7 7 (1.22%) Star Schema
8 6 (1.04%) Data Mining
9 5 (0.87%) Azure SQL Database
10 4 (0.70%) FileMaker
10 4 (0.70%) PostgreSQL
11 3 (0.52%) Amazon Redshift
11 3 (0.52%) GIS
11 3 (0.52%) NoSQL
11 3 (0.52%) SQL Server Analysis Services
12 2 (0.35%) Redis
Development Applications
1 12 (2.09%) Git
2 9 (1.57%) JIRA
3 5 (0.87%) JUnit
4 4 (0.70%) Maven
4 4 (0.70%) Mockito
5 2 (0.35%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 1 (0.17%) Appium
6 1 (0.17%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.17%) Bugzilla
6 1 (0.17%) Carbide.c++
6 1 (0.17%) Cucumber
6 1 (0.17%) Eclipse
6 1 (0.17%) Oracle Forms
6 1 (0.17%) Postman
6 1 (0.17%) SoapUI
6 1 (0.17%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.17%) TestRail
6 1 (0.17%) Visual Studio
6 1 (0.17%) Yeoman
General
1 254 (44.17%) Social Skills
2 151 (26.26%) Analytical Skills
3 91 (15.83%) Finance
4 87 (15.13%) Manufacturing
5 34 (5.91%) Public Sector
6 32 (5.57%) Organisational Skills
7 29 (5.04%) Retail
8 26 (4.52%) Marketing
9 25 (4.35%) Legal
10 18 (3.13%) Law
11 16 (2.78%) Electronics
12 14 (2.43%) Automotive
12 14 (2.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 11 (1.91%) Banking
13 11 (1.91%) Documentation Skills
14 10 (1.74%) Investment Banking
14 10 (1.74%) Telecoms
15 6 (1.04%) Influencing Skills
16 4 (0.70%) Games
16 4 (0.70%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 107 (18.61%) Support Engineer
2 82 (14.26%) Analyst
3 67 (11.65%) IT Support
4 64 (11.13%) Technical Support
5 62 (10.78%) Technical Engineer
5 62 (10.78%) Technical Support Engineer
6 57 (9.91%) Developer
7 53 (9.22%) IT Engineer
8 43 (7.48%) IT Support Engineer
8 43 (7.48%) Senior
9 31 (5.39%) Lead
10 30 (5.22%) IT Manager
10 30 (5.22%) Support Analyst
11 20 (3.48%) Consultant
12 17 (2.96%) 2nd Line Support
13 16 (2.78%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 16 (2.78%) IT Analyst
13 16 (2.78%) Programmer
14 14 (2.43%) 1st Line Support
14 14 (2.43%) Support Technician
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 31 (5.39%) REST
2 21 (3.65%) React
3 18 (3.13%) .NET
4 14 (2.43%) Spring
5 12 (2.09%) AngularJS
6 11 (1.91%) CSS
6 11 (1.91%) HTML
6 11 (1.91%) Spring Boot
7 9 (1.57%) RESTful
8 7 (1.22%) Node.js
9 6 (1.04%) Middleware
10 5 (0.87%) JDBC
10 5 (0.87%) OAuth
10 5 (0.87%) SAP Fiori
10 5 (0.87%) SAPUI5
10 5 (0.87%) SOAP
11 4 (0.70%) .NET Framework
11 4 (0.70%) COM
11 4 (0.70%) DCOM
11 4 (0.70%) LDAP
Miscellaneous
1 47 (8.17%) Driving Licence
2 29 (5.04%) Self-Motivation
3 26 (4.52%) Management Information System
3 26 (4.52%) Onboarding
4 18 (3.13%) Enterprise Software
5 11 (1.91%) Social Media
5 11 (1.91%) Virtual Team
6 10 (1.74%) Legacy Systems
7 9 (1.57%) Analytical Mindset
7 9 (1.57%) Data Structures
7 9 (1.57%) NHS
8 8 (1.39%) Data Centre
8 8 (1.39%) Hybrid Cloud
8 8 (1.39%) IoT
8 8 (1.39%) Security Posture
9 7 (1.22%) AS400
9 7 (1.22%) Cyber Defence
9 7 (1.22%) iSeries
9 7 (1.22%) Mobile App
10 5 (0.87%) FMCG
Operating Systems
1 99 (17.22%) Windows
2 31 (5.39%) Windows 10
3 30 (5.22%) Windows Server
4 29 (5.04%) Linux
5 14 (2.43%) Android
6 10 (1.74%) Apple iOS
7 5 (0.87%) Unix
7 5 (0.87%) Windows 7
8 4 (0.70%) FreeRTOS
8 4 (0.70%) Mac OS
9 2 (0.35%) CentOS
9 2 (0.35%) Debian
9 2 (0.35%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 152 (26.43%) Continuous Improvement
2 92 (16.00%) Customer Service
3 68 (11.83%) Agile
3 68 (11.83%) Analytics
4 67 (11.65%) ITIL
5 66 (11.48%) Collaborative Working
5 66 (11.48%) Mentoring
6 65 (11.30%) Decision-Making
7 64 (11.13%) Business Intelligence
8 59 (10.26%) ERP
9 54 (9.39%) AI
10 53 (9.22%) Cybersecurity
11 47 (8.17%) Customer Experience
12 46 (8.00%) Service Delivery
13 43 (7.48%) Root Cause Analysis
14 40 (6.96%) CRM
15 32 (5.57%) Collaborative Culture
16 31 (5.39%) Computer Science
16 31 (5.39%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 30 (5.22%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 88 (15.30%) SQL
2 35 (6.09%) Java
3 31 (5.39%) Python
4 22 (3.83%) PowerShell
5 19 (3.30%) C#
6 18 (3.13%) Ladder Logic
7 14 (2.43%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 12 (2.09%) JavaScript
9 11 (1.91%) PHP
10 9 (1.57%) C
10 9 (1.57%) TypeScript
11 8 (1.39%) Bash
12 7 (1.22%) RPG
13 5 (0.87%) ABAP
13 5 (0.87%) C++
13 5 (0.87%) Embedded C
13 5 (0.87%) PL/SQL
14 4 (0.70%) RPG IV
14 4 (0.70%) RPG/400
15 3 (0.52%) RPG III
Qualifications
1 75 (13.04%) Degree
2 59 (10.26%) Security Cleared
3 46 (8.00%) SC Cleared
4 20 (3.48%) Microsoft Certification
5 17 (2.96%) Azure Certification
5 17 (2.96%) DBS Check
6 11 (1.91%) CISSP
7 10 (1.74%) A+ Certification
7 10 (1.74%) CompTIA Security+
8 8 (1.39%) BPSS Clearance
9 7 (1.22%) CISA
9 7 (1.22%) Cisco Certification
9 7 (1.22%) Computer Science Degree
9 7 (1.22%) SSCP
10 6 (1.04%) ACCA
10 6 (1.04%) CIMA
11 5 (0.87%) HND
11 5 (0.87%) MCITP
12 4 (0.70%) PMI Certification
12 4 (0.70%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (5.57%) Data Quality
1 32 (5.57%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 28 (4.87%) Cyber Essentials
3 26 (4.52%) GDPR
4 24 (4.17%) QA
5 18 (3.13%) NIST
6 16 (2.78%) ISO 9001
7 14 (2.43%) Accessibility
8 13 (2.26%) SLA
9 9 (1.57%) ISO 14001
10 7 (1.22%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 4 (0.70%) HIPAA
11 4 (0.70%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 3 (0.52%) Actionable Recommendations
12 3 (0.52%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 3 (0.52%) ISO/IEC 20000
12 3 (0.52%) SOC 2
13 2 (0.35%) GRC
13 2 (0.35%) PCI DSS
13 2 (0.35%) PMO
System Software
1 86 (14.96%) Active Directory
2 26 (4.52%) Hyper-V
3 21 (3.65%) VMware Infrastructure
4 12 (2.09%) Docker
5 8 (1.39%) Firmware
6 5 (0.87%) Embedded Firmware
7 4 (0.70%) Virtual Machines
8 3 (0.52%) Virtual Desktop
9 2 (0.35%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 39 (6.78%) Microsoft Intune
2 12 (2.09%) Kubernetes
3 9 (1.57%) Terraform
4 6 (1.04%) Ansible
5 4 (0.70%) Functional Safety
6 3 (0.52%) Nagios
6 3 (0.52%) Prometheus
6 3 (0.52%) SCCM
7 2 (0.35%) Grafana
7 2 (0.35%) Progress Chef
7 2 (0.35%) Puppet
7 2 (0.35%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.17%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.17%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 165 (28.70%) Microsoft
2 26 (4.52%) VMware
3 25 (4.35%) SAP
4 21 (3.65%) Cisco
5 15 (2.61%) Sage
6 12 (2.09%) Dell
7 11 (1.91%) Salesforce
8 10 (1.74%) Oracle
9 9 (1.57%) Google
10 7 (1.22%) HP
10 7 (1.22%) IBM
11 6 (1.04%) Apple
11 6 (1.04%) McAfee
11 6 (1.04%) Meraki
11 6 (1.04%) SolarWinds
11 6 (1.04%) Sophos
12 5 (0.87%) HubSpot
12 5 (0.87%) iManage
13 4 (0.70%) Veeam
13 4 (0.70%) Xero