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Identifying transferable skills

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What Even Are Transferable Skills?

Transferable skills are a set of skills and abilities, that you pick up over time, which can be applied across a wide range of different jobs and industries.

These skills can be gained from previous jobs, charity or volunteer work, taking a course, your hobbies, or even at home.

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Examples:

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IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS

leadership

time management

prioritisation

delegation

listening

communication

autonomy

negotiation skills

adaptability

resilience

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Why Do They Matter?

IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS

In a recent survey by The City of London and Nesta 74% of employers prioritised transferable skills as equal to or above technical skills when recruiting new employees.

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The top three transferable skills as rated by employers were:

  • Oral presentation/communication skills
  • Collaboration and teamwork
  • Taking initiative

Q: What is your top priority when hiring someone new?

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Demonstrate Transferable Skills

IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS

REMEMBER: these skills must be demonstrable:

Don’t just say: “Great leadership skills”

Do say: “Excellent leadership skills demonstrated when I successfully managed a small team of individuals on a three day hike for a charity event” AND/OR give a metric eg: “increased the sales by 20% of our retail shop over Christmas.”

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WHERE? In an interview; in your personal statement; in some of your job descriptions (CV, LI); on the job.

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Identify Transferable Skills

JOB EXAMPLES

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  • Stay at home parent
  • Taxi driver
  • Receptionist
  • Academic
  • Civil servant
  • Project Manager
  • Restaurant Manager
  • Writer/Artist
  • Teacher

OR feel free to use your current job as an example

Exercise (10 minutes)

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Brainstorm to list the transferable skills you gain in these jobs.

IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS

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Exercise (10 minutes)

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What Skills are Required To Become a Software Developer?

The following is a real ‘junior software developer’ job description from LinkedIn.

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Map these skills back to the skills you will gain at the end of your CYF course in a demonstrable way.

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IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS

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What Skills are Required To Become a Software Developer exercise continued

JOB DESCRIPTION - JUNIOR SOFTWARE DEVELOPER

Your skills and experience:

  • Demonstrate passion for technology (personal projects, open source involvement)
  • Have excellent interpersonal, oral and written communications skills.
  • Enjoy problem-solving and be logical.
  • Be able to work under pressure in a fast-paced environment.
  • Like working in a team with lots of different people.
  • Be able to take responsibility for a piece of work from start to finish
  • Be good at planning and prioritising workload
  • Articulate and justify conceptual ideas and solutions to clients and internal teams
  • Focus on delivering value to the business with relentless efforts to improve process
  • Fluent in written and verbal English

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IDENTIFYING TRANSFERABLE SKILLS