Three Transferable Skills You Never Knew You Had

Transferable skills are the route into a new career or industry. By highlighting skills that you have gained in previous work experience, recruiters can link them with skills required to perform in a different role. These are then used to demonstrate how you would fit into the job description and why you should be chosen.

In simple terms, transferable skills are evidence that you can do a certain role without having done that role before. This also applies to moving industry.

Generic transferable skills include; communication, punctuality and team work. These are common and ones that are included on nearly everyone’s CVs. However, there are a few skills that do not spring to mind, but can be found in most people’s history:

Decision making

The decision making skill can make or break a great leader. From the President of the United States deciding how to react to a nuclear attack, through to what type of post it note the office manager should purchase, having this skill can determine our success.

Over analysis and under thinking are polar opposites in the decision making ability. The strength of being able to make a choice based on the facts in front of you, appears daily in all of our lives. Which car to purchase? What to have for dinner tonight? Without making decisions, our lives, jobs and progress would come to a standstill.

In the office environment, this is also true. Sales people are entrusted to make a decision on whether or not to negotiate a price. Customer Service Executives are tasked with handing the ‘refund or not to refund’ decision. Credit Controllers have to make the choice to chase a debt, or write it off.

Think back in your career and ask yourself ‘have I been empowered to make a decision and did I make that decision in a swift manner after reviewing the full facts?’. If yes, include this in your CV.

Problem Solving

Are you somebody that likes to get involved, solve a problem and watch the outcome? Then you’re a problem solver. Problems come up everywhere; personal relationships, work, self-development etc. We can either step up, solve them and move on or hide and hope they go away. Those that solve them, tend to progress further in the relevant area.

Whether you are solving problems for clients, finding new ways to improve processes or simply resolving missing orders for customers, we tend to see this skill as invaluable in any role. For example; Customer Service executives resolve order errors, P.R. professionals solve negative publicity issues and data administrators solve missing data.

Time Management

Applicable to feature on a lot of CVs, being able to manage your time is a fundamental part of a lot of roles. Mainly those that are self-managing, for example; marketing, sales and project management. Roles that are process based like call centre agents do not have to manage their time. This is down to each call being finished and swiftly moving on to the next.

As you progress up the ladder and become responsible for a team, this skill become even more apparent. You’ll have to manage not only your own, but those in your team’s time and workload also.

If you are applying for a skills-based, not process-driven role, then including time management as a skill on your CV is beneficial.

By including these in your CV, under the time period they were used, you’ll stand a better chance at securing a role in a different industry or a higher level.