No matter your past experiences, you have been developing transferable skills -- whether
you realized it or not.
Transferable skills are the skills you can "transfer" or take with you from one experience
What are transferable skills
to another.
Transferable skills are usually skills in areas like organization, communication, teamwork,
and problem solving.
These skills are useful in many different work environments.
But how do you know what transferable skills you have?
Let's go over three steps to identify and articulate your transferable skills:
Step 1: Describe your proudest accomplishments from your past experiences
Step 1 Describe your proudest accomplishments
Step 2: Identify transferable skills that you used
Step 3: Articulate those transferable skills to a potential employer
Here's how!
Step 1: Start by writing down the accomplishments
you are most proud of.
These can be from any experience in any area of your life, such as a part-time job, a class
project, or a club activity.
For example, "I taught kids how to swim at summer camp" or "I created a mobile application
with a team at a hackathon."
Step 2 Identify transferable skills
Step 2: Next, write down all the skills involved in
this accomplishment.
It might help to start with a list of skills, which you can find by visiting icc.ucdavis.edu,
then searching "transferable skills."
For example, if you taught kids to swim, you might be able to "anticipate people's needs
and reactions" or "assess learning styles and respond accordingly."
Or, if you created a mobile application with a team, your transferable skills might include
being able to "develop a plan and set objectives," or "facilitate conflict management."
Step 3: Finally, read through the whole list of transferable
Step 3 articulate transferable skills
skills and check off the ones you have.
Only check off skills you can perform with little or no supervision, as these will make
the strongest examples when speaking to employers.
By learning to generalize your skills into language that can be applied to many different
job tasks, you can start to articulate your skills in terms that a prospective employer
will find valuable.
Also note that, if you see a transferable skill you want to have but don't yet, make
a note of it.
Look for future opportunities to develop that skill!
Once you have begun to take inventory of your transferable skills using these three steps,
you'll have a new way to demonstrate your value to a potential employer, even if your
experience seems unrelated!
In fact, even describing your transferable skills IS a skill!
And it's one that will help you be better prepared, whether you are having a networking
conversation, writing a resume, or preparing for an interview.