CVs are constantly changing and so should your skills. As you gain more experience, you learn more about yourself or about your professional ability. To make sure that your CV stands out, include keywords that will add some pizzazz and SHOW the value you can bring.
Why are skills important?
Every CV should always have your Profile and Skills at the top of the first page. Why? Well, both work hand-in-hand with one another as you’re emphasising your strengths, competencies and abilities in a short, but concise, section.
The tricky part is to make sure you have a mix of Soft and Hard skills as you also want to bring forward your personality throughout the CV.
What’s the difference?
Hard skills – These are skills that you have gained from continuous learning and professional application in a workplace setting. They tend to be refined the more you put these skills into practice.
Soft skills – These are skills that you either naturally possess i.e. leadership, or have improved without any additional training i.e. communication or relationship building.
What Skills do I include?
This is dependent on the job itself. Ideally, list 9 key skills – 3×3 on the page – that include a mixture of Hard and Soft skills, and require very little editing for different positions. Skills like ‘Interpersonal Relationship Building’, ‘Team Collaboration’, ‘Leadership & Training’ etc., would apply to any position you are going for (provided that you have leadership experience).
There are many, many skills to choose from. Pick out key points from the description then look at your experience. The keywords will then flow.
Need more CV tips? Contact one of our CV Writers today!
- Missed Step 1? Read it here: How to Write a Concise Professional Profile
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